Legal Question in Disability Law in Georgia
''Powder''
My son lost his job today. He worked for Express Oil Change and from the first day he started there, both employees and management have referred to him as ''Powder'' because of his pale skin and very blonde hair. My son has been ridiculed all his life, often called ''albino'' and ''mighty whitey'' among other things. When a fellow employee demaded my son do both their jobs while he watched, my son refused. This resulted in a verbal confrontation in which both store managers joined in and again referred to him as ''Powder''. My son has always been shy and soft spoken but exploded with the name calling. He was fired and told to leave. He cannot afford an attorney and feels that he should have some legal stance against an employer not only condoning but participating in such ridicule. What can he do??
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: ''Powder''
The elements of a hostile work environment claim are: A plaintiff may establish a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C.S. � 2000e et seq., by proving that the sex discrimination created a hostile or abusive work environment without having to prove a tangible employment action. In order to establish a hostile work environment claim, an employee must show the following: (1) the employee is a member of a protected class, (2) the employee was subject to unwelcomed sexual harassment, (3) the harassment was based on the employee's sex, (4) the harassment created a hostile work environment, and (5) the employer failed to take reasonable, care to prevent and correct any sexually harassing behavior. The fifth prong is related to an affirmative defense--namely that in a harassment case an employer may avoid liability by showing that the employer had taken reasonable care to prevent and correct harassment and that the plaintiff failed to avail himself or herself of the employer's mechanisms for redressing harassment. To be actionable, harassment must be severe or pervasive, creating an objectively hostile work environment, thus altering the conditions of employment.
Unfortunately, be ridiculed based on a pale complection is not covered as a violation of Title VII of the U.S. Civil Rights Act. To violate Title VII requires a pattern of racial or sexual discrimination. Having an obnoxious boss is insufficient to create a civil rights claim.
Georgia law may create a state penalty for this kind of harassment, but I am not licensed in Georgia and cannot give advice on state law remedies.
As hard as it may be for you to take, the best recourse here is for your son to find an even better job somewhere else and then have the satisfaction knowing that you did not have to put up with abuse on his old job.
Employers are required to have a formal grievance procedure. If he is prepared to leave his job anyway, then he should file a grievance and see if the employing company acts on the grievance. If you publicized these facts in your local newspaper in a letter to the editor, then intelligent people would no longer go to that Express Oil Change, and you might drive them out of business until management changed there.
How old is your son? Maybe he could work in a white collar job as a paralegal and not be subjected to the same kind of teasing.
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