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Tesla Is a 'Hotbed For Racist Behavior,' Worker Claims In Lawsuit (bloomberg.com)
An African-American employee has filed a lawsuit against Tesla, claiming their production floor is a "hotbed for racist behavior" and that black workers at the electric carmaker suffer severe and pervasive harassment. "The employee says he's one of more than 100 African-American Tesla workers affected and is seeking permission from a judge to sue on behalf of the group," reports Bloomberg. "He's seeking unspecified general and punitive monetary damages as well as an order for Tesla to implement policies to prevent and correct harassment." From the report: "Although Tesla stands out as a groundbreaking company at the forefront of the electric car revolution, its standard operating procedure at the Tesla factory is pre-Civil Rights era race discrimination," the employee said in the complaint, filed Monday in California's Alameda County Superior Court. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Marcus Vaughn, who worked in the Fremont factory from April 23 to Oct. 31. Vaughn alleged that employees and supervisors regularly used the "N word" around him and other black colleagues. Vaughn said he complained in writing to human resources and Musk and was terminated in late October for "not having a positive attitude."
I'm glad to live in a country where a guy like this can sue the Tesla. Hopefully, he had the presence of mind to record them or get some hard evidence. EEOC complaints can be an effective avenue, so can a discrimination lawsuit. The only way to stop this kind of behavior is to bow-up and fight back.
So was an Air Force Academy recently until it was found out that the very same person who was pitching a fit about " racism " was also the same person who wrote the slur on the wall to begin with.
Don't like it.......don't work there! In other words.......
I am sick and tired of all these drama queens making up stories about how they are "offended" all the time. We have an Internet and sensationalist media which WILL bring a corporation to its knees if there is any REAL amount of racism going on there.
If the allegations are true they would be simple to confirm, since the plaintiff claims to have contacted HR and Musk. My experience with HR groups is they don't sit on such complaints as they would have in the past. So I am doubting this story - time will tell.
But anyway - what I want to know is if this individual was involved in trying to unionize the workforce. Unions are notorious for these kinds of lawsuits when they don't get their way. You don't play ball, they withhold support for projects and file lawsuits. The lawsuit itself is nonsense but tactical in trying to force an owner to their knees to service the unions.
Society itself is a "hotbed for racist behavior".
It sucks that so many people can't see past the superfluous differences of what country a person happens to be from or what color their skin happens to be, and treat every single person with no less respect than what anyone would desire to be treated themselves, but going after a company like Telsa for this is not going accomplish a darn thing other than at most, cost Tesla some money that won't have the slightest impact on society at large beyond possibly making their cars even more expensive.
Hell, even the laws of thermodynamics suggest not only that life's not fair, but that you also can't get even either.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Tossing off any racial epithet around here in the silicon valley is likely to make half of the people within earshot fall down in a swoon, and the other half going apeshit over it on twitter within milliseconds. The odds of this allegation turning out to be utter bullshit is approaching unity.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
I, for one would not mind if anybody called me "Whitey" or "Whiter" or whatever expression related to the colour of my skin.
Once again I have to wonder why anyine imagines Silicon Valley corporate culture is magically any different from any other corporate culture. There are just as many unethical crooks and slimeballs as there are in any other humongous company.
With the massive lay-offs at Tesla recently I have to wonder, was this man simply layed off because of poor performance and trying to get money some other way now?
I'm not saying Tesla isn't racist, I have no clue what goes on in the company but it seems that he's been happy to work at the "racist" company until he got fired.
I find it rather odd that he and his lawyers are trying to sue on behalf of a group of more then 100 people when he is the only one to have come forward with allegations
This one I gotta go with pics or ... ?
Are there multiple witnesses? Does he evidence?
[ Of course I didn't actually read the article and only skimmed the summary you newb! ]
I'm as far left whatever the hell that means on social issues as one can get without being a campus thought policer but I'm wait and see here.
As a human being, I hang my head in shame for the fact that, in the 21st century, we still have to deal with racism. I just wish we could all grow up and behave like the advanced species we claim to be.
One aspect of this story particularly interests me - and it might be a subtle, legal point - which is: what is/are the responsibilities of "Tesla the Company", with respect to tackling and preventing racism in the workplace?
I am not for one moment suggesting that the claims of this plaintiff are anything less than genuine. What interests me is: as an employer, where do Tesla's responsibilities stop? Do they have to have anti-racism training for their staff? Do they have to have a grievance procedure? Do they have to have an anonymous whistleblowing program? Are there other things that an employer needs to demonstrate in order to avoid accusations of institutional racism?
The reason I ask the original question is that it seems to me that we need to understand the difference between "Tesla the Company" and "Tesla's Other Employees". I would be willing to accept the words of the complaint that suggest that some employees at Tesla are out-and-out racists. I would hope that Tesla are doing all they can to identify and expel such people. But does the presence of one or more racist employees at any company mean that the company itself is racist?
If not, how do we make the differentiation? Is it when 10% of employees are racist? 20%? Is it if the company fails to handle accusations of racism appropriately - and, if so, what does "appropriate handling" need to include?
This is a sensitive, emotive and hugely important topic for us as a society: it is, perhaps, one of the defining aspects of human history over the last few hundred years, so I think that our response to this - as individuals, employers, colleagues and friends - is hugely important.
But much as I'm concerned by these claims and would want to see some solid evidence of a reasonable response to them, I'm struggling to make the leap from "a number of employees at Company X demonstrated racist behaviour" as being equal to "Company X is racist".
Is this reasonable skepticism, or is this splitting hairs that an unethical company would hide behind? Is it fair to make the distinction? What would be the indicators you would look for, in a case like this, before you would conclude that a company was racist?
Did you copy/paste this from HuffPost? Vox, maybe? Actually, now that I think about, I feel like I heard this on American Horror Story.
This is coming from the unions who want into the plant. Notice how they are checking every box with race, gender, sexuality? Tesla said no so now the unions file frivolous lawsuits.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Are you talking about the guy who made the allegations or those against who he sued? 'cause I really can't tell.
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
=Automatic racism lawsuit.
FFS. Get a life. Not everything bad in the country is because of Trump.
I'm no Trump fan, but just give it up already. The general public is sick and tired of you pleebes blaming Trump for everything. It's gotten old.
Racists exists regardless of who is in the White House.
Maybe you should check what "civilized decency" means. How rude!
...terminated in late October for "not having a positive attitude."
I love the bullshit reasons they come up with when they lay you off. I was was overworked at Hard Rock Cafe as a dish washer on minimum wage for one summer years ago when I was still a student. The washing machine broke down regularly meaning I had to hand wash everything during the lunch and evening rushes and I was doing a two man job even when the damn machine worked and cleaning out all the crusty kitchen pots as well. Needless to say I was none too happy about that and made this known. Eventually they solved the problem, not by fixing the machine and hiring a second worker (which there was supposed to be), but by laying me off and hiring somebody who was easier to bully. When the manager came to axe me just before closing time one night he actually told me I was being laid off for, and I quote: 'not getting into the Hard Rock spirit'. I laughed so hard I coughed. Then I thanked him for an excellent joke and handed him the apron fast enough that it did not occur to him to refuse to accept the slimy food particle encrusted thing and left. I didn't hand him the dirty rag with any ill intent mind you but he ended up holding it and was none to happy about it since he was a rather bacteria-phobic neat freak. For a while afterwards I regretted not telling him to shove it up his ass but then I decided that there was no reason to be rude and leaving him there with smelly 8 hour old slimy food particles all over his well groomed yuppie hands was probably way better.
Hey, beats working.
They aren't White. Save it for the next Anglo that passes by.
When you don't make your extortion payments to Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
I want to sue The Rockettes and The Knicks, neither one would look at my resume.
Talk about ageist and sexist, those two are bonkers.
>> Vaughn alleged that employees and supervisors regularly used the "N word" around him and other black colleagues.
I wonder what ratio of the employees and supervisors using the N word were also black?
Elon was born in Africa, now he's American. Wouldn't that make him an African-American as well?
but if I was going to file a discrimination suit I'd try to keep it out of the feds. We had 8 years of right wing presidents (debatable 16 since Clinton was pretty right wing) followed by 8 years of blocked judicial appointments. I'm not so sure you're going to get anywhere with a federal suit. The courts are pretty well stacked in the other camp. People forget just how much power a president with a compliant congress has over our legal system...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
......ring a bell?
If it was "pre Civil rights era treatment" they wouldn't have had a job in the first place. Thier lawyer is suffering a rhetoric deficiency.
Which so often resembles a Breitbart comment section.
We recently laid off an Indian employee because there wasn't enough IT work to justify his big salary. He filed a union complaint charging racial and religious discrimination. There was no discrimination at all and he presented zero evidence of it, so that was quickly squashed. The employee had a son that also worked there and he quit months before that. He also complained of racial and religious discrimination in an email to the higher ups among other things. I'm not sure why because he sucked at his job and then quit on his own. The lawyers lol'ed at his complaint because his boss was also Indian, as were a few of his co-workers. They all said he sucked at his job. Stupid people will claim all kinds of things. If there is real evidence, then it will come out. I've never seen brazen racism at any place I've worked so I have to be skeptical about claims like the ones at Tesla. If those are true, then all people involved need to be fired.
What the fuck are you on about?
This story has literally nothing to do with the Orange Combover. Especially since the allegations haven't been proven in any way, shape, substance, or form. It's literally one guy and his lawyer saying "uh-huh!" after the company said "nuh-uhh!"
It's amazing how some people will do some extreme contortions to relate literally anything to the Dorito-tinted-Commander-in-Chief; it's probably the same people that did the piss and moan about the exact same thing when other people were doing amazing contortions to non-ironically proclaim "Thanks, Obama!"
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Wah wah wah.
People at Tesla thought they had it pretty good.
That they could continue doing the shit job they were doing and it'd never end.
Like Tesla was a Detroit dinosaur, mired in union bullshit.
BZZT!
So, now that this shitheels has been kicked to the curb, he's gonna pull the race card.
Because, let's face it, who in this country HASN'T pulled the race cade lately?
Well...except for white heterosexual males...y'know, the "root of all evil".
My housekeeper's husband works as a welder at the Tesla plant. I might see him later this week so I'm going to ask him what he thinks about this. (He's Hispanic and a pretty good guy.) Unfortunately the way that Slashdot works this thread will be pretty much dead and buried by the time I learn anything worth contributing. But if the question comes up again I'll post it.
As far as other Tesla people I run into at the various lunch establishments in the neighborhood -- they are all preoccupied with getting Series 3 production up to speed. They don't seem to have much else to talk about.
Stay away from the Musk household this November.
Saying that the production floor was a "hotbed for racist behavior" is an extraordinary claim imo. I find it a lot easier believe that a few workers were subject to racism that flew under the radar of Tesla supervisors than I do that the production floor at Tesla was a "hotbed for racist behavior". But that claim does make Tesla more desirous for this matter to get settled than a lesser charge would. Racism exists in the world, and so does the desire to profit off of claiming it. Both things could be true here. The complainant may well have received treatment that deserves a lawsuit, and he may also be bullshitting about the production floor being a "hotbed for racist behavior". If the complaint is based on fact then Tesla deserves a shakeup. If the complaint is a gross exaggeration then there should be repercussions to that. It's too serious a crime to claim it's having happened as a ploy. Well, hopefully truth will out.
It's not that Dolt45 did anything to cause this situation, just that he changed the culture to enable it.
Prior to Drumpf announcing his candidacy, racism was something one did not verbally express in polite society, much the way one might not curse in front of ladies a century ago. After he announced his candidacy by essentially declaring Mexicans as rapists and murderers, the culture changed such that racists felt that it was OK to verbally express racism, much like it is now acceptable to curse in front of a lady.
Now, the Command-Turd-in-Chief did nothing to make those people racists or cause them to make the defendant feel harrassed, but he did make it so they thought it was more acceptable than before. You can see this also in the FBI's reported uptick in hate crimes since the election and in the "Unite the Right" rallies.
dom
Isn't this getting a bit old and lame? All we hear about Tesla here on /. is how they are keeping the unions out and how the are a hive of horrors for workers.
Can we stop with the propaganda and get back to the techie stuff that keeps us reading here.
Only hire white males and you will not have these problems.
Well, I understand that right-wing white supremacist KKK nazi trash would be terrified by the idea that they would be forced to live in a world where they would have to show respect to their black neighbor, or their homosexual coworker, or their female boss, or where they would no longer be allowed to bully and exploit the less fortunate, control and abuse their wives or rape their daughters.
But you'll excuse me for not giving a flying fuck about their anxieties.
What's the matter, little conservative snowflake ? Triggered by the fact that freedom of speech applies to everyone and not just to right-wing white supremacists when they want to spew their racist KKK nazi filth ?
So calling out the scum of the earth for what they are is considered rude now ?
Sorry folks, he got out again. We got him back into the straitjacket and he won't be bothering anyone anymore now. Please resume your discussion.
Wow, it took longer than usual for the Trumpist filth to mod me down. As if suppressing my right to free speech (something that they continually blame the left for, prooving that they are hypocritical scum) would somehow make the truth of their digusting nature less true.
Why don't you vote for Harvey Weinstein for president next, scumbags ?
This is irrelevant and masturbation.