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Jay W Pennell writes and Harcoreracefans.com reports that NASCAR has settled a $225 million lawsuit with a former technical inspector.

Avoiding a potentially long and drawn-out public trial, NASCAR has settled a $225 million lawsuit with former Nationwide Series official Mauricia Grant. The former technical inspector filed suit against NASCAR in June of 2008, alleging she was subjected to racial discrimination and sexual harassment while serving as an official.

Settled in mediation in New York on December 3, terms of the settlement remain confidential.

“We’re glad to have the case settled on mutually acceptable terms,” NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Poston explained in a statement. “NASCAR remains dedicated to maintaining a professional work environment for all employees at all times, and we wish Ms. Grant well in her future endeavors.”

The African-American woman filed suit in June of this year alleging 23 specific accounts of sexual harrassment and 34 incidents of racial and gender discrimination. Claiming she was called ?Nappy Headed Mo? and ?Queen Sheba? by her fellow officials, Grant believed she was threatened by an official who specifically made references to the Ku Klux Klan.

Grant also claimed in the suit she was the victim of sexual advances by some officials. Taking those advances even further, Grant described that two of her fellow officials went as far as exposing themselves to her.

NASCAR took action after the complaint was filed, conducting twenty-seven interviews in Kentucky in June. Out of those twenty-seven testimonies, two officials ? Tom Knox and Bud Moore ? were ultimatly fired for the incident.

Throughout this entire ordeal, NASCAR has fought to maintain its integrity, claiming every employee has the opportunity to file a complaint about any form of discrimination or harassment. Grant claims she attempted to file a complaint, but when Nationwide Series director Joe Balash failed to listen to her complaints.

The former official claims two weeks after bringing the issue up with Balash, she was reprimanded for her actions by NASCAR?s human resources director and that she was fired not long after.

With the annoucnement of the resolution, both parties are now able to pick up their pieces and move on.

Posted on December 22nd, 2008 by Saswat Pattanayak
Filed under: All Posts, Gender Discrimination, Media, News, Race Discrimination, Sexual Harassment | No Comments »

Labor attorneys advise firms on defensible downsizing. Avoid the appearance of bias by category, one says.

By Carol J. Williams for LA Times

Lured away from her job in Houston to take an executive position at Dell Inc., Jan Chapman persuaded her husband to quit his job, move with her to Austin, Texas, and buy a house at the height of the real estate bubble.

Seven months later, the computer maker laid off Chapman, whose 25-year career in human resources had been filled with flattering performance evaluations.

Chapman, 59, and three other top female managers have filed a class-action lawsuit against Dell, alleging age and sex discrimination in the company’s termination of 8,000 employees over the last year.

The suit, filed in federal court in San Francisco, is one of only a few so far emanating from the mass layoffs sweeping the country.

But labor and employment lawyers warn that a tidal wave of wrongful-termination suits is expected in the coming months as the jobless burn through their savings, run up debt and find few work prospects in the worst economic downturn in decades.

Attorneys specializing in labor law say they haven’t been this busy since the late 1980s, as strapped corporate clients seek their counsel on how to reduce staff without inviting litigation.

“Unfortunately, we’re doing a lot of that lately. Nobody is immune,” said Jay P. Krupin, who leads the labor and employment practice at Epstein Becker Green’s Washington office.

Krupin walks clients through a checklist of laws and company policies that need to be considered in identifying positions to be eliminated, including notification requirements, severance pay provisions and a “disparate impact analysis” to guard against terminating those in a protected class who might have grounds to sue. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits employers from discriminating on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin.

The 20-year-old Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, called the WARN Act, requires employers to give at least 60 days’ notice of plant closings that eliminate 50 or more jobs, and before mass layoffs affecting 500 employees or more than a third of the workforce. Lawyers and staff members at two San Francisco law firms that have dissolved in recent weeks, Thelen and Heller Ehrman, have sued their former employers, alleging violations of WARN Act terms.

“If you got rid of a number of employees and they all happened to be over 40, they would have a cause of action” for age discrimination, Krupin said. The same could apply to disproportionate dismissal of minorities or women, he said, even if there wasn’t deliberate intent to target those workers.

Companies that regularly evaluate employees and identify underperformers are best positioned to defend their decisions to lay off the laggards. Conversely, employers that haven’t documented poor performance — or have given glowing reports or pay raises to workers they want to lay off — are likely to have a hard time defending those dismissals.

“You better have an explanation for why you promoted me two weeks ago, said I had a rosy future and then today you come in and say, ‘Here’s your final paycheck,’ ” said Robert F. Millman, founder of the Los Angeles office of employment law firm Littler Mendelson.

That said, such bungled downsizing does occur, especially amid rapid economic setbacks like those now afflicting financial institutions, real estate companies, retailers and the hospitality industry, Millman said. He described the current environment as “the worst economic contraction I have ever experienced in 34 years as a labor and employment lawyer.”

Rick Brandt, president of consulting services for TalentQuest, an Atlanta-based consulting firm, said employers must take care to make clear, fair and informed choices about which employees to let go and which to keep.

“You need to be transparent about how you made the decisions you made. People tend to undercommunicate in these situations,” he said.

One indicator of the heightened concern about litigation has been the rise in policies that employers have taken out for employment practices liability insurance, said Jenny Jones, president of the independent Los Angeles insurance brokerage Elkins Jones. Her agency has seen a 32% increase in policies to cover defense costs in the event of wrongful-termination lawsuits.

As part of the liability coverage, her agency makes employment lawyers available to counsel a company’s managers on how to construct a defensible downsizing plan, she said.

“We have only seen the tip of the iceberg here,” Jones said of the expected lawsuits.

Law firms, especially those with large real estate and mergers and acquisitions practices — areas hit especially hard by the recession — are among the businesses struggling to downsize without spurring litigation.

Chapman and the other Dell employees who sued the computer maker took action a month ago, saying they waited so their lawyers could develop evidence to show a pattern of discrimination.

Analysis of the 8,000 employees Dell laid off over the last year will show that women and people over 40 were disproportionately affected, said Steve Wittels, a founding partner of the Sanford Wittels & Heisler law firm, which filed the class-action suit seeking $500 million in damages.

“What occurred at Dell was that women and older workers who had good ratings and favorable performance reviews in prior years suddenly found their reviews were being manipulated — readjusted and used as a basis for wrongfully firing them,” Wittels said.

Dell executives deny the lawsuit’s allegations.

“We take any claims against our recognized efforts to embrace diversity and equal opportunity seriously,” said spokesman Jess Blackburn. “We believe the claims in the suit are without merit.”

Chapman, who has yet to find new work seven months after her termination, said she remained bewildered about why the company wooed her only to let her go when there was a need for human resources expertise.

“I never expected to be on this side of a case. Never. I have no idea why I was selected for this dubious honor. It certainly wasn’t related to my performance,” Chapman said. “But I feel very strongly that we will prevail. What occurred to us is illegal.”

Posted on December 22nd, 2008 by Saswat Pattanayak
Filed under: All Posts, Media, News, Politics | No Comments »

Article from: Agence France-Presse

POPE Benedict XVI has denounced gender theory, warning that it blurs the distinction between male and female and could thus lead to the “self-destruction” of the human race.

When the Roman Catholic Church defends God’s Creation, “it does not only defend the earth, water and the air … but (it) also protects man from his own destruction”, the Pope said in his end-of-year speech to the Vatican hierarchy today.

Gender theory, which originated in the United States, explores sexual orientation, the roles assigned by society to individuals according to their gender and how people perceive their biological identity.

The Catholic Church has repeatedly spoken out against gender theory, which gay and transgender advocacy groups promote as a key to understanding and tolerance.

“If tropical forests deserve our protection, humankind … deserves it no less,” the 81-year-old pontiff said, calling for “an ecology of the human being”.

It is not “outmoded metaphysics” to urge respect for the “nature of the human being as man and woman”, he told scores of prelates gathered in the Vatican’s sumptuous Clementine Hall.

Posted on December 21st, 2008 by Saswat Pattanayak
Filed under: All Posts, Gender Discrimination, LGBT, Media, News, Politics | No Comments »

By Michelle Kornblit

In light of the shocking revelations of the unethical, and illegal employment practices at the Agriprocessor Kosher slaughterhouse in Postville Iowa, there has been a demand in the Orthodox Jewish community to insist that kosher food production must be about more than the dietary laws; kosher food must reflect Jewish ethical values through a greater accountability on the part of the kosher industry to ensure legal and ethical employment conditions. After the news broke out about the Agriprocessors plant in mid-May, consumers of kosher products have been appalled conditions that have led to the almost $10 million in fines for 96,436 illegal payroll deductions and the 9,311 criminal misdemeanor charges the owners of Agriprocessors face for employing at least 32 underage workers.

A groundbreaking campaign to address this issue in the kosher food industry has been launched by Uri L’Tzedek, an Orthodox social justice organization guided by Torah values and dedicated to empowering the Jewish community to work towards a more just world. Uri L’Tzedek has created the “Tav HaYosher,” an ethical seal for kosher restaurants in America who are committed to a just workplace. Volunteers will award this free seal to restaurants based on their dedication to three basic standards derived from federal, state, and local employment laws; the right to fair pay, the right to fair time, and the right to a safe working environment.

According to New York State law, all non-tipped employees must be paid at least minimum wage of $7.15 an hour. All tipped employees must receive their legal minimum wage of $4.60 an hour. These minimum wage laws apply to both documented and undocumented workers. A 2006 survey conducted by Restaurant Opportunities Center of New York (ROC-NY), while not a random sample survey, indicated that 13% of workers earned less than the minimum wage and 59% percent experienced overtime violations.

By law, wage workers must be paid time and a half for any hours over 40 they work a week and restaurant workers cannot legally work seven days a week. Restaurant workers must be provided with one day off a week and breaks of 20, 30 or 45 minutes according to the number of hours of which they worked. According the NYU Brennan Center for Justice, a lack of or irregular employee breaks are very common in New York City restaurants with a single meal break for a 12-hour work shift being very common.

It is illegal for an employer to subject an employee to harassment or discrimination based on their protected status, which includes race, color, religion, sex, age, national origin, pregnancy, disability and/or perceived disability, and sexual orientation. Employees have a right to organize to protect their rights an interests and it is illegal for an employer to retaliate against them through threatening employees with termination of employment and benefits or calling federal immigration authorities to conduct an immigration raid. According to OSHA regulations governing restaurant safety, employees have the right to a safe, clean, and sanitary working environment.

It is Uri L’Tzedek’s goal to get New York City’s kosher restaurants and the kosher Jewish community, to get involved in ensuring employees are given the wages they are legally entitled to, given breaks and compensation for overtime, and work in an environment that treats them with respect. In an industry with widespread abuse and labor violations, Uri L’Tzedek wants make sure exploitation does not take place in kosher restaurants. One of the leading rabbis of Jewish Orthodoxy in the 20th Century, Rabbi Dr. Yosef Breuer, emphasized the importance of the connection between the kosher dietary laws and social justice, “ God’s Torah not only demands the observance of Kashrut [kosher diet laws] and the sanctification of our physical enjoyment; it also insists on the sanctification of our social relationships. This requires the strict application of the tenets of justice and righteousness which avoid even the slightest trace of dishonesty in our business dealings and personal life.” The Tav HaYosher will stress the importance of bringing employees, restaurant owners, and Jewish communities together in a commitment to the kosher dietary laws and justice.

Posted on December 16th, 2008 by Michelle Kornblit
Filed under: All Posts, Commentary, Labor, Media, News, Opinion | No Comments »

By Saswat Pattanayak

Texas is the state with highest percentage of people not covered by health insurance in the US. It is noteworthy only because it is where the President Bush and his family plan to move back to in January. Because as such, the rest of the country is not so much better off either.

The recent reports on the health of the United States are startling. The country with highest level of capitalism in the world has equally shocking lack of concern for its citizens. Is it merely coincidental or consequential?

I am selectively quoting from reports as compiled by Rankings compiled from a study by United Health Foundation, American Public Health Association and Partnership for Prevention. Data for the study were provided by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics, Census Bureau, Bureau of Economic Analysis, National Center for Education Statistics, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Environmental Protection Agency, American Medical Association, Dartmouth Atlas Project and Trust for America’s Health.

Lack of Health Insurance (percent without health insurance):
Texas- 50%
Florida- 48%
Louisiana- 47%
Mississippi- 46%
Nevada- 43%
Oklahoma- 42%
Georgia - 41%
Arkansas- 40%

Prevalence of Obesity (percent of population):
Mississippi- 50%
Louisiana - 47%
Tennessee - 47%
Arkansas- 45%
South Carolina - 44%
Oklahoma - 43%
Georgia - 40%
Texas - 39%

Immunization Coverage (percent of children ages 19 to 35 months):
Florida- 10%
South Carolina- 17%
Georgia- 19%
Tennessee- 22%
Oklahoma- 25%

Primary Care Physicians (number per 100,000 population):
Tennessee- 17
Louisiana- 20
Florida- 33
South Carolina- 34
Georgia- 38

Posted on November 23rd, 2008 by Saswat Pattanayak
Filed under: All Posts, Commentary, Labor, Media, News, Opinion, Politics | No Comments »

Planning your maternity leave? Here are 10 ways to protect your rights at work, before and after your baby’s birth.

FAMILY PHYSICIAN Nicolle Overstreet, D.O., was fired on Oct. 10, 2007, nine days after she told the owner of the medical practice that she was pregnant. “I was stunned,” says Overstreet. She knew her boss’s claim that he could no longer afford her didn’t add up, so she filed a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), where pregnancy discrimination cases have reached a record high.

While Overstreet’s scenario may seem unthinkable, “what employers will do when they anticipate a hit to the bottom line is incredible,” says New York women’s rights attorney Jack Tuckner. To maximize your legal rights, follow these 10 pieces of advice.

1. Know the federal laws: As part of the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1975, pregnancy-or- childbirth- related leave must be covered by short-term disability insurance if your company has such a plan. Women generally receive partial pay; how long they receive it depends on the state and insurance policy.

The federal Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) guarantees employees of companies with 50 or more workers upto 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for a newborn. However, you must have been employed at the company during the previous 12 months and worked at least 1,250hours during that time. You also must give your employer written notice at least 30 days before your leave. You may use any accrued vacation time, sick days and/or disability insurance available to fund part of your leave.

2. Research state policies: Depending on where you live, you may be legally entitled to longer unpaid leave and/or paid lave. However, “don’t depend on your employer’s human resources departjent to be up-to-date,” says Tuckner. Your state’s department of labor is a better source. For a general overview, visit nationalpartnership.org and click on “Our Work,” then on “Family and Medical Leave.”

3. Tell your boss first: Your cubicle-mate may be your best friend, but don’t tell her you’re pregnant until you’ve alerted the higher-ups. “it’s a sign of respect,” Tucker says. “plus it protects you in case your boss hears through the grapevine and states to discriminate against you before you think he even knows.”

4. Don’t apologize: Don’t let your employer rib you of the joy of being pregnant, advises Ellen Bravo, former director of 9to5, National Association of Working Women and author of Taking on the Big Boys or why feminism Is Good for families, Business and the Nation (Feminist Press). “Be happy and prepared,” she says. “Discuss arrangements to help cover your workload while you’re gone, and let your boss know when you intent to return.”

5. Confirm in writing: After you tell your boss the good news, follow up the same day with an email or memo outlining what you discussed and any next steps. Be sure to “cc” your human resources contact and inquire about paperwork you’d like to get rolling. A paper trail is crucial in case you need to file pregnancy-discrimination complaint later on.

6. Voice your concerns: If you notice you’re being treated differently now that you’re pregnant, speak up. “People often let things go because they’re afraid to make trouble,” Bravo says. “You don’t always win if you stad up for yourself, but you never win if you don’t.”

Unlike Overstreet, most workers who file discrimination complaints aren’t fired. Rather, they’re taken off assignments, excluded from meetings and given the cold shoulder- all illegal. “if you’re on your way up and that momentum is halted once you reveal you’re pregnant, your rights are being violated,” Bravo says. Share your frustration with your boss, your boss’s boss and human resources.

7. Call for help: Not sure what paperwork you need to fill out or whether your company is acting appropriately? For free advice, call 9to5’s Job Survival Hotline at 800-522-0925 or email a trained staffer at hotline@9to5.org. You can also contact the EEOC at 800-669-4000, or visit the agency online at eeoc.gov.

8. Ask dad to take time off: New dads are also protected under the FMLA, although fewer fathers than mothers take advantage of it. “The practice will become mre culturally acceptable only if more men request parental leave,” Bravo says.

9. Leave contact info: Make sure you’re reachable in case you’re urgently needed. “It’s not a great idea to say , ‘Don’t call me, ever!’” Tuckner says, “But companies also need to act reasonably, and its not reasonable to be dealing with work issues every day while you’re on leave.”

10. Ease back in: “You’re not weal if you need to come back and work 10 to 4 for a few months,” says Bravo. Or perhaps you’d like to return to a four-day workweek or a job-sharing situation. “Knowing your value, and work with your manager to find solution that fits both your needs,” she says. For more information on flexible work arrangements, visit workoptions.com

Posted on September 1st, 2008 by Saswat Pattanayak
Filed under: All Posts, Commentary, Family Responsibilities Discrimination, Gender Discrimination, Media, News, Opinion, Pregnancy Discrimination | No Comments »

By Samantha McLane

In these times of scientific and technological progression, international commerce, globalization, internet communication, multiculturalism, and other important achievements that have provided us with “better living conditions”, health services seem to be heading to medieval times when I read the kind of news which follows.

In its battle to leave the country with a conservative impression, the Bush administration has been working towards making women’s lives more difficult, specifically; limiting our own control on our bodies and violating our reproductive rights. If you ever thought you haven’t practiced an abortion, well read this:

The government has drafted a new set of health regulations that would define abortion as “any of the various procedures — including the prescription and administration of any drug or the performance of any procedure or any other action — that results in the termination of the life of a human being in utero between conception and natural birth, whether before or after implantation.”

The regulation also would allow any employee of a healthcare provider to refuse to treat any individual receiving any services that would violate the employee’s moral beliefs.
Could it be worse?

As the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health informs, low-income latinas will be deeply affected because many of the clinics that they frequent often receive federal funding and may be compromised under these new definitions.

Latina’s reproductive rights are already at stake, especially for low-income latinas who are alienated at the time of receiving health services. Thus they are denied a basic human right; the access to health.

In an effort to not discriminate against religious and moral beliefs on abortion issues, these regulations at the same time discriminate against a disadvantaged group: women, moreover low-income women. It has taken just a couple of decades to turn aside the efforts of women and concerned society. When the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) was created, it recommended to States Parties in its 12th article to provide appropriate reproductive health services for women.

The National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health invites us to take action on the matter by contacting The Department of Health and Human Services. Just take a couple of minutes visiting this link and follow the easy instructions: And if we still don’t get enough of obscurantism in the beginning of the 21st century, where nations claim to promote modern social approaches to human interaction, where racism and sexism are at last vanishing, what do we think about hospitals denying access to illegal immigrants and community health services denying translation services?

As mentioned before, low-income latinas frequent more often community health services where they can receive several necessary services. The National Association of Community Health Centers released a report on June 16th concerning the lack of reimbursement for language services provided at community health centers (CHCs). This report states that the reimbursement for translation services is optional and currently only 12 states and DC have decided to do it. So we have thirty-eight states that do not care about giving a human service to non-english-speakers, without recognizing diversity, and furthermore violating human rights.

I believe this is proof of the theory of ascending and descending cycles in historical achievements concerning human and civil rights. In the 14th century, Venetian women who believed they were already empowered by gaining access to public spaces, control of businesses and access to education never imagined that the generations of women in the following centuries were going to suffer and get degraded again. Now feminists of the 60’s can’t imagine that we have to fight back again.

Posted on August 21st, 2008 by Samantha Mc Lane
Filed under: All Posts, Commentary, Gender Discrimination, Politics, Pregnancy Discrimination | No Comments »

The night my church opened its 10-bed homeless shelter for 18-to-24-year-olds, I volunteered to supervise them. A novice to any kind of shelter experience, I was nervous as I dragged my red cart with pillow and blanket to the church, and grateful that Mina, an elegant, 70-something social worker, also would be there.

Six young people arrived in a clump at 10 p.m., clutching pillows and belongings and, in one case, a teddy bear. They came from Sylvia’s Place, an overcrowded downtown shelter. One woman, wearing a do-rag under a baseball cap, surprised me with a quick hug. In the coming months, she would outline the danger she felt in our relatively safe-seeming Manhattan neighborhood, how every time she walked outside she’d hear some comment, how she was hit in the face just waiting for the bus.

But that night we didn’t talk much. I fussed around, putting out food and setting up beds. After midnight, when everyone else was asleep, Mina wrapped herself in a blanket and propped herself on a chair against the wall. I stayed awake in the kitchen, by the light, reading. The next morning we woke everyone at 8 and ushered them out, still groggy, into the icy February air. I walked home past restaurants that looked newly exclusive and out of reach. Overwhelmed by the luxury of it all, I crawled under my thick yellow duvet and slept.

That was more than two years ago. During a recent weekend work retreat, my teaching colleagues and I were drinking cappuccino when I mentioned our shelter is for LGBT young adults.

Lydie Raschka for The Washington Post

“LGB — what?” asked Pat, an elementary school teacher.

LGBT — lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender — has been in use only since the 1990s, and even those familiar with the abbreviation may have little understanding of what the last term means. My colleagues asked me to define it.

Let me try: Trans means “across, beyond or through,” as in translate, or transfer. Gender, like genre, means “kind or sort.” A transgender person moves across gender. The term is applied to those whose gender identity does not match the gender they were assigned at birth. They may or may not have been surgically or hormonally treated, or want to be. They may simply feel they are male rather than female, or vice versa, and so dress and act accordingly.

I — straight and white — still have a long way to go toward understanding what it means, inside and out, to be transgender. “Are you okay hugging me even though I’m black?” one of the shelter’s guests asked me, registering a minute hesitation on my part. “You don’t know the half of it,” I thought wryly. But as I got to know her and the other shelter residents, my unease dissipated.

This tall, African American transgender woman speaks with a slight Texas drawl and favors tan slacks. She is brilliant — the kind of person who learned to speak French watching “Sex and the City” on DVD by changing the language function. Last summer she won a full scholarship to a New England college, where she is pursuing a degree in international business. But when she came “home” to her cot in our church basement on break, she told me the students at her college don’t really talk to her: “Their eyes kind of glaze over, you know?”

Another transgender woman shared her autobiography with me, a two-page testament on college-ruled paper, in which she described being raped at age 12 and beatings by her foster father. “You are so nice,” she once told me, tapping me playfully on the shoulder, “and I ought to know.”

One day she arrived at the shelter in terrible shape. She had been followed and attacked, unprovoked, near Times Square in the middle of the day. Our pastor arranged for her to stay inside that day, and after the reconstructive facial surgery that followed.

An analysis of available research done by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force suggests that between 20 and 40 percent of all homeless youth identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. These young people clearly experience homelessness at a disproportionate rate, given that only between 3 and 5 percent of the total U.S. population identify as LGBT.

Thousands of them make their way to New York City looking for a safe haven after coming out to unhappy receptions at home. There are only about 100 beds in the city designated specifically for this population, who often experience abuse in other shelters, such as one resident who said he was urinated on. Mainstream churches are beginning to open their doors, including the year-round transitional shelter at my church, Trinity Lutheran, on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

The 55 youths who have stayed there for varying lengths of time have come from all over the world: Amsterdam, Nevada, Alaska, England and the Bronx. We have heard some of their stories: the teenager who took to the streets at age 13 after he was stabbed with a fork by his mother when he told her he was gay; the girl who was raped by her father’s friend to “straighten her out” after she confessed to liking girls.

I coordinate the volunteers who relieve our shelter monitor on his night off. These days I do my occasional overnight alone. The young people who come to our shelter are screened and referred from other shelters in the city. Residents are required to be working, actively seeking employment, or in school. Living in a church basement is no one’s idea of an end goal, yet sometimes it is enough to help a marginalized young person grow into the “independent, positive and productive adult” envisioned in our mission statement.

One henna-haired woman changed my view of our church basement as a dead end. This young woman passes out leaflets for a Rite Aid in Queens. She calls me “Miss” and enthusiastically identifies herself as bisexual. “It’s so great, Miss, ’cause I have boyfriends and girlfriends! I love everybody!” She loves everybody to a fault, buying clothes and phone cards for her friends. We give her a weekly fare card so she can get to and from work, but saving her own money has been a challenge. As we made apple pie together one night, I commented on her apple-slicing technique. She confided that she learned to peel and slice apples during two years in prison. For her, our shelter was definitely a step up.

Often, however, living there is not enough to repair deep wounds: A sensitive 21-year-old man from the Bronx who was studying for his GED disappeared. A delicate Latino woman from Arizona, who plays the piano beautifully, was arrested by an undercover cop for selling drugs and entered an endless string of court dates that felt like a vortex from which she would never emerge.

I no longer juxtapose my life against theirs, as I did on that first night, but try to see them more on their own terms. More often than not they are philosophical, cleareyed and remarkably resilient in the face of the most intense rejection imaginable. Acronyms and labels are dissolving as individual faces become distinct.

At dinner with my colleagues, I tried to articulate how these young people affect me when I arrive for an overnight: They have no family support and no permanent place to stay, I tell the other teachers, and yet they ask me how I am.

It’s hard to explain — just as the spectrum of gender is hard to explain. Parents’ and society’s rejection of children who don’t fit the norm is hard to explain, too. But most confounding of all is the forbearance these young people have in the face of intolerance and cruelty. They go — like the definition of trans– “across, beyond and through” preconceptions. They are unlike anyone I have encountered before.

Posted on July 28th, 2008 by Saswat Pattanayak
Filed under: All Posts, LGBT, Labor, Media, News, Politics | No Comments »

The macho man image is dying in the workplace.

Tresa Baldas writes in The National Law Journal

Employment and family law attorneys say a growing number of men are filing a wide variety of workplace lawsuits, suing over everything from more leave time to care for their children to sexual harassment.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission notes that in 2007 it saw a record number of sexual harassment complaints filed by men. Men accounted for a record 16 percent of all sexual harassment complaints, nearly double the 9 percent figure in the early 1990s.

On the parental leave front, lawyers note, a growing number of men are filing Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) claims, many of them single dads with more responsibilities at home. Others are simply asserting their desires to spend more time with their children.

FATHERS’ RIGHTS

Lawyers are calling this a byproduct of the father’s rights movement.

“Without question, it’s the next step. It’s an expansion of fathers in the court system seeking their parental rights. Now they’re asserting their rights with respect to the labor laws,” said family law attorney and longtime father’s rights advocate Sari Friedman of Garden City, N.Y.

Employee rights attorney Charles Siedlecki of Chicago’s Charles Siedlecki & Associates is currently representing several men pursing FMLA claims, some claiming they were retaliated against for taking time off to care for their children, others for aging parents, and some for themselves.

“I think it’s just a societal thing. There are so many more single dads out there than there used to be who have custody … and of course everybody has aging parents,” said Siedlecki, who has seen men being retaliated against for taking FMLA leave. “If there’s any opportunity for advancement, those people aren’t going to be at the top of the list only because they used their federally guaranteed right.”

Siedlecki secured the largest jury verdict ever — $11.65 million — in a caregiver bias suit on behalf of a man who charged that he was retaliated against for taking time off under the FMLA to care for his aging parents. Schultz v. Advocate Health, No. 01C-0702 (N.D. Ill. June 5, 2002). The case settled for an undisclosed amount in 2003.

Loring N. Spolter, a solo employment law attorney in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., who represents both employees and employers, said he too has noticed a rise in FMLA claims filed by men. The suits are being filed by older men who need time off to care for their own health needs, their wives’ health needs or their aging parents. “And younger males are more likely to take time off than their older counterparts for things that their counterparts may have been reluctant to take time off for, like taking care of a second child,” Spolter said.

Meanwhile, EEOC attorney Elizabeth Grossman, who works in the New York office, said stereotypes against men continue to exist in the workplace, although many employers are getting better at establishing gender-neutral leave policies.

“I expect that the number of men coming forward to claim caregiver discrimination will increase,” Grossman said. “Men are deciding to fight the stereotypes. Men are deciding they want to have a work/family balance.”

And employers are listening and responding, said several management-side attorneys, who said Corporate America is acting responsibly in assuring men and women equal rights.

“The recognition that paternity leave is equally important to men as for women, and of value to the family unit overall, is receiving increasing recognition in the U.S. workplace,” said Diana Scott, co-chairwoman of Greenberg Traurig’s labor and employment practice out of the firm’s Los Angeles office.

She noted that unlike the goals of the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, or state pregnancy disability acts, paternity leave does not focus on the physically debilitating effects of pregnancy. “Rather, it deals with nongender-specific issues such as baby bonding and family-unit care, which are relevant to both parents,” she said.

Tarun Mehta, a management-side lawyer in the San Francisco office of Bryan Cave, said he encourages employers to establish a nonhostile work environment so that no one — including men — is scared to take time off.

“There is still a hesitation on the part of a lot of males in the blue- and white-collar fields to take the leave for fear of how it will look,” Mehta said. “It’s important for those of us who do employment work to make sure that they know, that all levels of employers know, that it’s not OK to make jokes or derogatory comments like, ‘Oh, John took this time off.’ “

Posted on July 28th, 2008 by Saswat Pattanayak
Filed under: All Posts, Gender Discrimination, Labor, Media, News, Sexual Harassment | No Comments »

An embarrassing question from a boy in a locker room inspired Karen Deamons to fight the city: Why was there a woman in the men’s room?

Deamons decided last month she would no longer abide by Cleveland’s requirement that she change in the men’s locker room at the indoor pool at the city-run Cudell Recreation Center. A transgender who identifies as a woman _ but has not had sex-change surgery _ Deamons wants to be able to put on her bathing suit in the women’s locker room.

Deamons, 53, said she filed a complaint June 2 with the Ohio Civil Rights Commission. She’s also asking the Ohio Legislature to pass a bill that would prohibit cities from discriminating because of sexual orientation or gender identity.

“I can’t do it anymore, Deamons said. “Every time I go through there, it’s tearing my insides out.”

The city’s stance toward Deamons is not discriminatory, Cleveland Law Director Robert Triozzi said.

“We are being as accommodating as we possibly can, given the request that’s been made, given her own personal situation, given where she’s at in life,” Triozzi said. “We’re trying to be sensitive.”

A telephone message The Associated Press left for Civil Rights Commission executive director G. Michael Payton on Sunday afternoon was not immediately returned.

Several women interviewed recently at the recreation center said they would feel uncomfortable having a transgender woman openly changing clothes in the women’s locker room.

“I just don’t want them seeing, you know,” said Holly Workman, who brought six children to the Cudell center earlier this month.

A letter that Deamons carries with her from endocrinologist Thomas Murphy said Deamons possesses the mind, personality and behavioral characteristics of the female gender. Transgender men and women should go about their lives as the gender they identify with, Murphy said.

“It’s just kind of the common sense approach,” said Kristina Wertz, legal director for the California-based Transgender Law Center. “Someone should use the restroom that corresponds with their identity and their appearance.”

Deamons lived for years as a man, marrying twice and having three children. She began hormone treatment in 2000 to become a woman.

Deamons suffered three strokes in 2003 and 2004, and doctors have prescribed water exercises to keep mobility in her left arm and leg. Deamons uses a wheelchair and relies on public transportation, and Cudell’s pool is the most convenient from her Cleveland home.

She changed in the private toilet stalls of the women’s locker room for about five months in 2006 with no problem, she said. Several women from the pool lodged complaints against her later that year, and city officials responded by asking Deamons whether she had had sex reassignment surgery. Since she hadn’t, Deamons agreed to use the men’s locker room, which has doorless bathroom stalls.

Last month, the young boy asked his question, and Deamons decided she’d had enough.

“I don’t want to keep confusing these kids,” she said. “This just can’t happen anymore. There are kids running in and out, and it’s so embarrassing.”

Posted on July 27th, 2008 by Saswat Pattanayak
Filed under: All Posts, LGBT, Media, News, Politics | No Comments »