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[emmelinemay]

More from the newspapers - from sad to FURIOUS.

Muslim hairdresser who wears a scarf wins £4000 for 'hurt feelings' after being turned down for a job in a super trendy salon

She wouldn't have got that job headscarf or not, quite frankly. It's really near my work, and all the people that work in there are alternative trendy types. So now you're no longer allowed to refuse people jobs if they won't fit in? We can all sue potential employers when we have a bad interview for 'hurt feelings'???

This was nothing to do with discrimination. This is a stupid girl in totally the wrong profession. She was apparently turned down TWENTY FIVE TIMES in total, it was just that this one salon owner was honest enough to mention what all the rest were thinking - how can you be a HAIR STYLIST if you believe your hair should be covered in public??

I am actually incoherent with rage over this issue. I am pretty sure I mentioned it here when the news first broke, but can't find my entry on it.

The tribunal found no religious discrimination, no unfair discrimination, they even accepted thatone of the reasons the head-scarf girl was turned down was that she lived too far away from the salon. And yet, £4000 for HURT FEELINGS???

emperor_tamarin sums up with this comment:
Headline should be: "Self righteous teenager gets payout for belonging to minority religious group that everyone is afraid of offending."

EDIT - Here's the website for Wedge, with some pictures of the stylists.
http://www.wedgehair.co.uk/Pages/Gallery.html
Note - the owner trained at Children Of Vision - some of you will remember their salon upstairs at Kensington Market. This girl would not have got a job there, headscarf or otherwise.

Comments

[sera-squeak.livejournal.com]

"I never in a million years dreamt that somebody would be completely against the display of hair and be in this industry. I don't feel I deserve it."

Sums it up completely.

[ant-girl.livejournal.com]

how can you be a HAIR STYLIST if you believe hair should be covered in public??

I don't think she necessarily believes hair should be covered in public, I think she wants to cover her own hair in public. Which is not quite the same thing.

And also which has absolutely no bearing on her ability to style other people's hair. I simply don't buy this argument that it's essential for a good stylist to have a nice funky hairstyle on display... The chief stylist at the salon I use is a bald man.

If she got turned down 25 times, that to me says that's because the prejudice is so ingrained as to be almost acceptable. In which case, a stylist in a headscarf *might* put punters off... because they are prejudiced too. "How could anybody who covers their hair when out in public be any good at styling hair?"

Sorry for expressing the contentious view! I seem to be the only person who feels this way. ;-)

[madwitch.livejournal.com]

Or she may not be that good at doing hair, or interviews.

[ant-girl.livejournal.com]

Well, she might not be.

But whether or not this is the case, the salon owner openly admitted that the headscarf was a factor, and I don't think this is acceptable.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

I've *seen* this salon, it's right by my work.

Any person with a hairstyle that didn't reflect that salon wouldn't get the job. It really is nothing to do with the headscarf, the religion, nothing at all. It would be like her wanting to work, at, for example, a really gothic piercing/tattoo salon and looking really conventional with no tattoos or piercings.

Personally, I wouldn't get my hair cut by someone whose hair I can't see.

[littleangel-103.livejournal.com]

No you're not alone ant_girl I agree with you on every point. Why does someone's personal beliefs on whether to uncover their hair to strangers or not effect their ability to style someone elses hair? After all I've had my hair cut by people who, if I judged them on their hairstyles, I'd send back to a "My first hair model" toy until they can do something properly.

The racism of the commentary on this case astounds me. Lets review it shall we - person applies for job, person is told her religious beliefs are some or whole of reason why she isn't apponted, person sues under equal rights legislation. I don't see what the problem is - she has freedom of religious expression in this country, it doesn't affect whether or not she can cut hair.

[robtrooper.livejournal.com]

I hope the salon owner appeals.
The headscarf girl is obviously prejudice against her for being the last one to turn her down. Why didn't she take all the other employers to court for the same reason.
If she can get 'hurt feelings' i think it is equally hurtful and prejudice to the salon owner to be singled out.
She wouldn't have sued if that salon owner was the only one who denied her.

easy money

[crazymeandave.livejournal.com]

i am sooo applying for jobs in hairdressers now.

Re: easy money

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

I'm going to apply for a job in a muslim bookshop, and sue for discrimination when they ask me to cover up my tattoos and wear a headscarf.

Re: easy money

[mark13.livejournal.com]

Me too!

Re: easy money

[andyknifton.livejournal.com]

me too!

Just to add to your rage

[unclesatan.livejournal.com]

The Criminal Compensation Commision compensates victims the following for sexual offences:

Sexual assault/abuse of victims any age (if not already compensated as a child)


Indecent assault

– minor - non-penetrative indecent physical act/or acts over clothing 1,000

– serious - non-penetrative indecent act/or acts under clothing 2,000

– severe - non-penile penetrative and/or oral-genital act or acts 3,300

– pattern of repetitive frequent severe abuse over a period

– up to 3 years 6,600

– exceeding 3 years 8,200

– resulting in serious internal bodily injuries 22,000

Non-consensual vaginal and/or anal intercourse

– by one attacker 11,000

– by two or more attackers 13,500

– resulting in serious internal bodily injuries 22,000

– resulting in permanently disabling mental illness confirmed by

psychiatric prognosis 27,000

– resulting in serious internal bodily injury with permanent disabling

mental illness confirmed by psychiatric prognosis 33,000

– pattern of repeated incidents over a period

– up to 3 years 16,500

– exceeding 3 years 22,000

It would seem that forcing somebody to felate you is £700 less offensive than hurting a Muslims feelings or about the same as forcibly sticking your hand into 2 strangers knickers

Re: Just to add to your rage

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

– severe - non-penile penetrative and/or oral-genital act or acts 3,300

You're right, now I'm really angry.

What's your take on this case, as a legal-type-person?

[deviblue.livejournal.com]

My feelings have been hurt by this stupid girls crys of discrimination.

I demand she pays me £4001 immediatly


...oh and she can still wear the headscarf if she wants to...hell she could wear a balaclava and wellies for all I care.
Shes going to be crying discrimination for a long long time cause nowhere is going to hire her with this little incedent in her past.

[shewho.livejournal.com]

it's total nonsense, isn't it? we'll find for the shop owner then penalise her anyway.

wtf?

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

The bank manager hurt my feelings when he charged me for going over my overdraft.

I think I'll sue him.

[unclesatan.livejournal.com]

But there's a man in the pictures wearing a hat

[crazymeandave.livejournal.com]

that's no hat... it's a cutting edge hairstyle

[hotel-noir.livejournal.com]

The court didn’t merely decide that there were hurt feelings, feelings were the justification for a financial pay-out, but the court also upheld that there was a case of indirect discrimination. Taking a vague definition of that as

"when a rule or condition, which is applied equally to everyone, can be met by a considerably smaller proportion of people from a particular group, the rule is to their disadvantage, and it cannot be justified on other grounds."

The only way of avoiding it being indirect discrimination would therefore be to give a solid argument, with evidence, that "we would lose business if we hired this person", but that is very difficult to prove.

An argument that merely states "a certain alternative look is vital to the product we sell and that includes visible stylish hair" is in itself no stronger than "a certain look we have in our gay bookshop means that we only hire people with shaven heads, and as a consequence we don't hire Sikhs or Hasidic Jews" - the second case would almost certainly be indirect discrimination since there is no reason that someone with hair would have less ability to sell books to gay people, there are plenty of gay Sikhs and Jews so it’s a lie to imply that the gay scene is limited to a certain look. To differentiate this case from that one would require evidence that a head-scarf is unacceptable on a hair-dresser, yet people with head-scarves have hair, many go to hair-dressers, and most importantly I’m pretty sure that there are many salons in the country that have stylists who wear head-scarves. Hence this girl is in a pretty good position to argue that “other salons have women working for them dressed like this and it isn’t an issue for them or their business, so why should it be for you?” The argument “because unlike those hair-dressers with their particular clienteles, our clientele are alternative, and the alternative community have issues with hair-dressers in head-scarves to a greater extent than other clienteles who visit more normal salons, and they wouldn’t come here any more.” Well, I’m not sure I’d like to witness the kind of statistical evidence you’d have to get to show that normal people are fine with scarf-wearing hair-dressers but alternative people aren’t. Far better to settle for £4,000 than appeal that issue.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

You've made the most convincing argument thus far for the Other Side!

[angel-emma.livejournal.com]

I remember hearing the salon owner on the radio when this case was first reported. I tend to agree with you, having been in the business for 20 yrs, and I know what salons are like to work in. It's got nothing to do with the headscarf or even the fact that she's not as alternative. She probably just didn't fit in with who they wanted in their team!

It just to me seems like she just kept going until she found one she felt she could sue, to be honest.

Yup, I agree. She probably went home, moaned to her mum/friends who said oh no discrimination SUE SUE SUE.

But with the very reasonable prices that they charge how they hell are they going to afford to pay her the £4k? I would appeal if I were them.

[annomalley.livejournal.com]

Wow. completely off-topic, but it turns out your dancing penguin icon moves in perfect time with Jeremy Smiking Jacket (http://www.myspace.com/jeremysmokingjacket)'s Woman Hits Traffic.

[misstiamaria.livejournal.com]

I felt the need to write. I'm crap at putting an argument across well and always come out sounding dumb or harsh, So I'm not getting invloved, except to say that I've known about this case for a while (she owner is a friend of a friend) and I did lean towards Hotel_noir's way of thinking, but due to lack of being able to put things across well, failed to explain well why i felt that way.

Well put Hotel_noir! You are good at this debating thing!

That is all, I back away now and read on.

[cloudwalker-3.livejournal.com]

I tend to agree with you here I think.

I don't really think there's a lot of racism in the case and I don't think the fact the she's a Muslim has much to do with it. I think it's more to do with the fact that It's a really trendy salon, and the person applying for the job isn't.

Apparently the employment tribunal panel dismissed the 19-year-old's claim of religious discrimination but then awarded her £4,000 damages for "injury to feelings". I'm not surprised she, "refused to comment on the matter" to the BBC. Words that come to mind right now are money, take, the and run!

Whilst it's tough getting a job, just because you don't get it doesn't mean you've been discriminated against.

Presumably, given this case, I could apply for job at the Slimelight club; turn up looking very 'Ivy League', (wearing clothes by Ralph Lauren, etc) and then claim that the evil goth owner was prejudiced against me for cultural reasons?

Sadly, there do seem to be a lot of people now who will sue, at the drop of a hat, pretty much over anything at all.

I've been turned down for loads of jobs because of my dyslexia, so can I have my compensation now please?*


*not quite holding my breath!

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

I've been turned down for loads of jobs because of my dyslexia

I have a feeling that may *actually* be discrimination under the access to work/disability act?