WWoman fired for being too attractive. That's OK, court says

@Mame,

Mame wrote:

Small Business. Wife jealous. Doesn't matter if wifey had grounds or not, this is their business and she wanted Melissa out. He gave her a month's pay which I do consider cheap given the longevity; however, it's his business and he has a right to hire whom he wants. He just has to give proper notice. Just because you hired someone doesn't mean you have to keep them on forever.

She disagreed and went to court and lost. End of story.

I'll bet it's not.

The thing that's so wrong about this is that the owner is completely ignoring his accountability for anything.

I'm a horndog and can't do anything about it. I just can't resist you, it's beyond my control. It's your fault I say these things to you.

Shouldn't he have to get some sort of medical diagnosis for this? The fact that he is not responsible for his own actions?

What is he was an unstable diabetic, and he had an employee who every day came to work with all sorts of baked goods and sweets, and ate them during their lunch and breaks?
Would he and the wife have the right to fire someone because he just can't resist something that might kill him?

That's his problem, not her's.

A months severance is an insult after this. After leaving on good terms with my former employer after 12 or 13 years, it took me a solid year, including a couple of missteps to acquire equal employment. It ain't easy out there. I have a feeling though this person won't have a hard time finding a job. If I were a dentist I'd bring her on in a heartbeat, apologizing how shabbily one of my peers treated her.

Re someone's comment on him not losing business over this, I disagree. Part of how I judge if I want a health care provider is how they treat their patients AND their staff.

1 Reply

@Ceili,

Believe me, in "at will" you need a paper trail, with all the appropriate warnings write ups, etc.

Saying "at will" doesn't amount to anything if a former employer wants to lodge a complaint.

btw ceili, I've agreed with everything you've said. Not just the having to play along business, but other things.
You know, you work with a group of people for 10 years, you have a type of friendship going on, maybe only a professional friendship, but you don't know 10 years without some personal dealings with others.
It's difficult to say to someone "stop that" when you get along famously 99% of the time, and there are times when you both have had a laugh over something that an outsider would scratch their head over.

The fact that this is a small business, and the offending person is your boss, makes it even more difficult for the employee. There isn't an HR dept to go to, or a supervisor. There's no one but the person who's your boss, and they could be the problem.

It's easy to say "quit, find another job" Not so easy to find another job when you're asked why you left.

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@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

he also it appeared actively killed his business because he could not deal with the flirting between the bartenders and the customers, so he outlawed it thus driving customers and good bartenders away. it is sad when owners erotic problems get in the way of business, and it has here again.

Tangent alert....

I hated how he used to put all these ((((((huggy))))))) symbols everywhere.

I'll bet he would use his comforting hugs to get a little gropey gropey action going.

Believe me, there are some people out there I'd love to get a little huggy action from, but is it was him I'd slap the crap out of him.

1 Reply

@Ceili,

Obviously the applicable laws are the ones in Iowa where this happened. This is why the questions of whether the employee acted inappropriately were never answered. The judges ruled they were inappropriate.

Almost all of the information we have access to is from one side of the story. It is the plaintiffs lawyers who are talking to the press. And in the summary judgment only the plaintiff's point of view is considered (since that it how summary judgments work). It possible that there are facts in the case that would have led to the same result in Canada. Since we don't have the facts, we will never know.

I can say with certainty that the issue wasn't gender. The decision specifically discusses this issue. The court stated that the fired employee was replaced with a women and that this dentist had other female employees who didn't have this problem.

But we can't say very much more about the case. The wild speculations here say more about the people making them than about what really happened.

This is made up outrage spurred by a manipulative lawyer and a salacious press. The court clearly did its job applying the law based on the facts of the case. People are all too willing to jump on this type of story even though there aren't facts to support the outrage.

1 Reply

@maxdancona,

From the ruling:

In the meeting, Dr. Knight told Steve Nelson that Melissa Nelson had not done anything wrong or inappropriate and that she was the best dental assistant he ever had. However, Dr. Knight said he was worried he was getting too personally attached to her. Dr. Knight told Steve Nelson that nothing was going on but that he feared he would try to have an affair with her down the road if he did not fire her.

Plus he stated that his relationship with her was a detriment to his family. He was taking care of his family. He was attracted to her and didn't think he could control himself. What was he supposed to do? If the roles had been reversed, and she was the boss, he may have quit.

That is why he fired her, NOT because she was too attractive, and NOT because she was being discriminated against because she was attractive and a woman. All the other employees there were women.

I do think, since it wasn't her fault, he could have given her a larger severance, a good reference (which she may get anyway), and perhaps help her find another job.

I also think, given other statements in the ruling, that HE was totally out of line and completely unprofessional, asking her about how often she had sex, did she orgasm, etc.

I also find their texting habits to be ridiculous. She sees him at work every day - why update him about 'innocuous' things such as kids' activities during the evening when she was with her family??

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@chai2,

chai2 wrote:

Not so easy to find another job when you're asked why you left.

Or when you unsuccessfully sue him for discrimination. Good luck on her getting another job with a male dentist.

3 Replies

@chai2,

Quote:

I'm a horndog and can't do anything about it. I just can't resist you, it's beyond my control. It's your fault I say these things to you.

This is Chai's fantasy, not based anything in the case.

And this is the interesting disconnect here. The outrage is not based on reality. It is based on the emotional baggage of those being outraged. They are getting themselves all upset based on their own imagination, the the point of inventing internal dialog of both parties.

We really have no idea of what really happened between these two people. Not even Chai, for all of her outrage, has any clue of what really happened. She is making it up.

We have a legal system that has the job of making decisions based on the law and the facts as uncovered in an objective legal process. The judges did their job. They explained their reasoning and showed how this was consistent with previous rulings.

The outrage is really crazy.

No one has given any reason based on reality that these judges were wrong about the laws or the facts. And the wild speculations about what these two people were thinking are just plain nuts.

This is why we have a justice system with the authority to make reasoned decisions in spite of the passions of the unruly mob.

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@chai2,

chai2 wrote:

Tangent alert....

I hated how he used to put all these ((((((huggy))))))) symbols everywhere.

I'll bet he would use his comforting hugs to get a little gropey gropey action going.

Believe me, there are some people out there I'd love to get a little huggy action from, but is it was him I'd slap the crap out of him.

I don't know about the idiot in question, but we have sure recently seen how those who claim to be the protectors and the champians of the victims turn out to be the biggest perv/abusers...sandusky and that chap at the BBC being but two examples.

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@Mame,

Mame wrote:

chai2 wrote:

Not so easy to find another job when you're asked why you left.

Or when you unsuccessfully sue him for discrimination. Good luck on her getting another job with a male dentist.

I don't think it would be hard if the new male employer refrains from telling her how she gave him a bulge in his pants, asking her about her orgasms, or says it was her fault that he said that, and anyway can't resist her, which is her fault also.

Did the devil make him do it?

Why not just say you stabbed someone because you just couldn't help yourself because they were so annoying? Oh, because we're supposed to control that impulse. Seriously, is there something mentally or physically wrong with this man that he feels he has no choice but to make certain words come out of his mouth, or that he would have no choice but to try to have an affair with her?

As far as texting.....he made the sex references in texts, not her. At least it doesn't say she made any in what we can read, and that's all we can go by.

My boss was off on Friday, and I had to text her about something during the day. At the end of the business related part of the text, I asked her how her xmas shopping was going.

She replied to my question, then responded that she just bought a certain toy for one of her kids.

What if I texted her at 4:55, but didn't get a response from her until 5:15 or 6:30?

Was she not supposed to tell me she bought her kid a toy? Was I not supposed to ask?

I didn't ask her in the text anything about her orgasms btw.

1 Reply

@chai2,

Quote:

I don't think it would be hard if the new male employer refrained from telling her how she gave him a bulge in his pants, asked her about her orgasms, then said it was her fault that he said that, and anyway can resist her, which is her fault also.

As far as texting.....he made the sex references in texts, not her.

This is more speculation.

The woman's role in these conversations is rather important. If she was a participant then she wasn't a victim. We don't even know if she started the conversation about their orgasms or commented on how he made her aroused.

All we have is comments made by the lawyers of one side of the case.

Chai's fantasy about what happened is outrageous. The facts .... not so much.

2 Replies

@maxdancona,

Without reading back, I believe you pointed out she filed on sex discrimination. That's all the court could rule on. She could have likely come up with a different basis and done better. I would thought this comments on bulging pants and organisms would have substantiated "hostile work environment" or something, but that wasn't her complaint. Her lawyer dropped it.

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@maxdancona,

Just to clarify, we have a legal system which relies on each side getting a chance to make their case in front of a panel of judges. The judges are there to consider the case of each side impartially based on the facts and the law.

What happened is that after the plaintiff presented their side of the story (and before the defense even gave their side) the defense argued that the plaintiff hadn't met their burden to make their case and that their arguments were so weak that it wasn't worth proceeding. The judges agreed and issued a summary judgement without even hearing the defense side of the argument.

That is why this wild speculation is irresponsible. You can't take one side of the story as unchallenged fact, particularly when the people telling the story (i.e. the plaintiffs lawyers) have an interest in making the story sound as outrageous as possible and the defendant, since the case is over, has no interest in responding.

It is just a fantasy.

0 Replies

@roger,

My guess is that a big part of her pissed off comes from her liking this job so much and thinking that she had a great relationship with this couple. As such she likely told a lot of people over the years how much she liked her job. Going back and trying to rewrite history because she is pissed about one event at the end is never going to fly in court.

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@roger,

I asked this question before, and I didn't get an answer. So I will ask again.

Given the fact that she made no claim of harassment and claimed she was happy working there. What could she have sued for?

A claim of "hostile work environment" is awfully hard to make when you say on record that you are happy working for the person who is allegedly victimizing you and maintain a friendly relationship with him outside of work.

Admittedly my speculation is no better than Chai's. The fact that these quotes were cherry picked out of context by the plaintiffs lawyer to make their case as strong as possible makes me suspect that there was more to the story. Sexual banter sometimes happens in the office that doesn't constitute harassment. My reasoning behind this argument is that if there was a case to be made for harassment, they would have made it.

If you can prove hostile work environment then you have something. But the facts have to support it. And they don't.

You can't just make up charges because you got fired. So other than gender discrimination (which didn't work) and harassment (which doesn't match the facts), what complaint could she have filed?

2 Replies

@maxdancona,

My reading is that the state would have to deny that this woman had the right to consent to being in this work envionment in order to make this into a crime. America is willing to do that for sexual relationships just fine, but has not yet expanded this theory in order to jump into regulating the employer/employee relationship. We shall see if this restraint holds.

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@roger,

This was exactly my point in saying that either she had poor legal advice, or chose to proceed against the legal advice she received. The court's ruling clearly shows why she had no basis for a case of sex discrimination in her termination, so her attorney was either remiss in reviewing the applicable case law, or she insisted on proceeding despite her attorney's advice. She might have had a basis for a civil case--i'm not saying she did, i'm not an attorney. But it is clear from the text of the ruling that she did not, and could not meet the burden of proof for a case of sexual discrimination. The rules of evidence for civil cases are different, and it becomes a he said/she said matter. It is possible in a civil suit that, insisting on a jury, she could have won an award. Once again, i'm not an attorney--but it seems to me that would have been her best course.

1 Reply

@maxdancona,

I was conceding your point.

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@Setanta,

Huh Setanta? This was a civil case. Suing your employer for sexual discrimination is a civil suit.

The civil suit failed.

I don't think there was a basis for any kind of legal action in this case. What she did was her best shot and it failed.

This woman simply had no legal recourse. The employer acted completely within his rights. There was no successful suit of any kind possible.

I think the difficulty here is the false notion that you can successfully sue anyone just because they are an asshole (and there is no question this guy was an asshole). But the law doesn't work that way. You need grounds for a suit, and there are no grounds that apply to this case.

1 Reply

@Mame,

Quote:

Or when you unsuccessfully sue him for discrimination. Good luck on her getting another job with a male dentist

.

If I was a male dentist in town I would surely hired her and make one hell of a big deal of doing so in the local papers and state if any of his patients are unhappy with him due to his actions they are more then welcome as a new patient of mine.

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@Mame,

There are several options open to her since she was "fired." She can collect unemployment insurance while seeking another job. She can also "dress more modestly" in the future.

Depending on the employer, it shouldn't matter "why she was fired." She did nothing inappropriate - except for the texting. That's not illegal.

2 Replies

WWoman fired for being too attractive. That's OK, court says

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