Thursday, October 19, 2017

“Jim Crow” Conditions Alleged at Tesla Plant

Reuters Legal reports that “Tesla Inc. was hit with a racial discrimination lawsuit in California state court accusing the electric car manufacturer of running a workplace so hostile to black workers that it was reminiscent of the ‘Jim Crow era.’”
In a lawsuit filed on Monday, three former workers claimed that coworkers and supervisors at Tesla's factory in Fremont, California freely used racial epithets and drew racist cartoons. They also alleged that they were punished for complaining about the racially hostile work environment.
The workers also sued three staffing firms that lease employees to Tesla.
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In my ongoing research on racial slurs and disparagement of minority workers—including unequal or made-up discipline against these workers— I am documenting a sharp upsurge, starting in the mid-1990s and accelerating in the past ten years.

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