What creates a racially hostile work environment for South Carolina employees? While many working environments may be filled with hostility or bullying or bad behavior, that doesn’t automatically create a “hostile work environment” as defined under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act or 42 U.S.C. Section 1981. Those two laws, by the way, are the primary statutes that provide protection against discrimination, harassment, and retaliation against employees based on race, sex, religion, color, and national origin. (Other federal laws address disability and age.)
What Is a Racially Hostile Work Environment?
Under these race discrimination laws, a job becomes a racially hostile work environment when the employee is (1) harassed at work (2) based on the employee’s race; (3) the harassment was sufficiently severe or pervasive so as to alter the employee’s conditions of employment and create an abusive work environment; and (4) the company knew or should have known of the harassment and took no actions to stop it.
“Severe” acts of racially harassment are normally racial slurs, such as the n-word or other racial epithets (“porch monkey,” for instance, was used by a manager to an employer in a case called Boyer-Liberto v. Fountainbleau Corp., and the court found that those words were enough to create a hostile work environment). “Pervasive” acts would include conduct that continues and continues, such as racial jokes in the workplace, racially tinged posters on the wall, or nooses hung up in the workplace.
Gathering Evidence and Seeking Damages
For employees subjected to this type of treatment, you can help your claim by gathering evidence of the harassment through photos, videos, emails, or text messages.
You can also report the harassment (in writing and from your personal email address, preferably) to HR or your manager. If you are terminated for making this protected complaint, then you would have a new and separate claim for retaliation. Other employees who may have observed the harassment would be witnesses to the claim. And remember, your own testimony is evidence of the harassment.
A jury can award damages for lost wages, lost benefits, emotional distress damages, and punitive damages for racially hostile work environment claims.
If you have been subjected to this type of treatment, you should know that it is illegal and that you are not required to work in a workplace like that. You should speak to a South Carolina racial harassment lawyer at (864) 233-4351 to discuss the particular facts of your situation and to see whether you have a viable legal claim against the company.
