CALIFORNIA EMPLOYEES CANNOT BE FIRED FOR HAVING HISTORICALLY BLACK HAIRSTYLES, OR EVEN BRAIDS

July 1, 2019 Governor Newsom signed into law The Crown Act, formerly Senate Bill 188. Crown is an old fashion word for head. The Crown Act is supposed to prevent discrimination based upon one’s hairstyle, but it is far more complex. The Crown Act indicates it is a necessary employment law because European societal norms are thought to be classy and perhaps black hairstyles are not. However, a lot of non-blacks have dread locks and afros. The Crown Act claims dread locks are associated with being black. They are more associated with Bob Marley than solely being black. The number of whites and Latinos who have dread locks are substantial.

Clearly The Crown Act prohibits firing blacks due to afros, cornw rows, and dread locks. It is less clear whether it is illegal to fire a marijuana smoking white who has bedbugs jumping out of his dread locks which are falling into an organic lettuce salad he is making in a vegan kitchen. In all seriousness, this law is stupid and purports to put a stop to something that does not exist anymore in California. Nobody cares if somebody has an afro. Nobody in 2019 in fired for having an corn rows.

California Government Code Section 12926 of the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) has been amended to include definitions regarding alleged black hairstyles which cannot be discriminated against which include afros, corn rows, and dread locks. The Crown Act goes further, it prohibits employment actions based upon braids, locks, or twists. It even prohibits discrimination based upon hair texture!

Presumably, under the Crown Act, an employee sporting a herringbone ever growing berber toupee that is actually nylon cannot be fired. But what if he is an optometrist and nobody can concentrate on the exam because they cannot stop laughing? What if an employer seriously objected to a sixty year old goth employee’s pitch black braids on the basis it was not a professional look? That she’s a pediatric nurse and she is scaring the daylights out of the kids? And what exactly is a hair twist? For more workplace legal humor listen to the Karl Gerber, Workplace Lawyer Show. https://workplacelawyer.org/pastepisodes

A LAWSUIT DUE TO HAIRSTYLE?

The California legislature has passed too many Labor laws. The Crown Act is a perfect example of an unnecessary Labor Law that merely burdens the law books. Questionably, the law’s purpose is offensive to a black person who now is told dread locks are associated with blackness which is not entirely true, and blackness can be interpreted as an offensive term.

In the real world of courts, judges, and jury trials it stretches credulity to imagine a case about somebody being fired because they have dread locks. One, there would have to be an employer who felt so strongly about the hairstyle they fired somebody for it. Really? The new client case inquiry lines of the Employment Lawyers Group has received more new client inquiries from employees than any other law firm, but they have not run into a lot of blacks calling in believing they have been fired from their jobs due to their hair style. While it is possible these sorts of things happened well before the firm’s start in 1993 in California, and happened in another part of the country, there is virtually no evidence that in recent years blacks have been plagued by being fired for having black hairdos in California.

How would a jury react to a case in which an employer fired somebody because they had an afro? In all likelihood, the jury would think the employer was a jerk. Should an employer who fired an employee for having dread locks end up with punitive damages? Be liable for lost wages years into the future? What if the employer genuinely thought unwashed dread locks posed a health risk?

The Crown Act is a very strange employment law. While its intentions may be good, it may be misplaced in 2019 and may be misplaced as to believing dread locks are mostly worn by blacks, hair texture is primarily a black issue (it is not), or anybody in California in 2019 objects to corn rows which appear to be a particularly well groomed, precise style. It also goes too far in trying to legislate hair texture; if braids were not enough.

Notwithstanding the absurdity of The Crown Act, The Employment Lawyers Group would relish in the opportunity to represent an employee, or even a class of employees who were fired due to their hair texture. Imagine that! Employees who had coarse hair and got fired when all they had to do was use hair condition!

CALL +1 (818) 783-7300 NOW IF YOU HAVE BEEN FIRED DUE YOUR HAIRSTYLE ASSOCIATED WITH BLACKNESS, OR JUST YOUR HAIR TEXTURE BECAUSE YOU DID NOT USE HAIR CONDITIONER, OR THE RIGHT HAIR CONDITIONER

Episode 65: YOUNG MAN WRONGFULLY TERMINATED DUE TO NOT WEARING A MORE TRENDY EVER GROWING BERBER TOUPEE THAT IS ACTUALLY NYLON