Ethnicity Discrimination

Federal and state laws prohibit ethnicity discrimination in the workplace. This is a type of national origin or race discrimination, and it can include any type of adverse employment decision taken against you due to your ethnicity. If you face mistreatment at your job, the experienced Austin ethnicity discrimination lawyers at Wiley Walsh, P.C. can offer knowledgeable legal counsel and representation. A national origin discrimination attorney can help you determine if you have a claim and assert your rights against your employer.

Ethnicity discrimination typically relates to a worker's culture, ethnicity, or skin color. It can relate to the way that you speak or what you look like. Ethnicity discrimination claims can be complex, and it is important to work with a knowledgeable attorney to defend your right to an equal opportunity to work.

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Texas Labor Code Chapter 21 prohibit ethnicity discrimination as a subset of national origin discrimination. Discrimination can take various forms, including job advertisements that exclude people of a particular ethnicity, failing to promote someone because of their ethnicity, terminating someone because of their ethnicity, not recruiting someone because of their ethnicity, harassing a worker because of their ethnicity, paying someone less because of their ethnicity, or failing to hire someone because of their ethnicity. For example, failing to hire the best person for the job because they are Persian or Iraqi would be ethnicity discrimination. Similarly, refusing to put someone in a customer-facing position because they are Somalian and have a dark complexion would be ethnicity discrimination.

Ethnicity discrimination can occur during the hiring process, or it may happen after many years of employment. Harassment based on your ethnicity happens if the workplace becomes offensive or hostile because of severe or pervasive acts by coworkers or supervisors. For example, if your coworkers start sending you violent or graphic images of people of your ethnicity in order to get you to quit, this would be hostile work environment harassment. Similarly, if your supervisor routinely makes negative comments about people of your ethnic background, this could be hostile work environment harassment. An ethnicity discrimination attorney can help Austin residents determine whether they may have been subjected to a hostile work environment.

Your employer can be strictly liable for a manager or supervisor's harassment, but a more complex analysis must occur when coworkers are harassing someone for their ethnic background. Your employer can only be liable for harassment about which it knows, so it is important to report the harassment according to the grievance procedures found in your employment manual or otherwise put in place.

You can also be a victim of ethnicity discrimination if someone has the perception or belief that you have a particular ethnicity, even if the perception is not accurate. For example, you could be a victim of ethnicity discrimination even if you were an Indian person who was mistaken for being Iraqi or Afghani and therefore not hired. Furthermore, you can be a victim of ethnicity discrimination if you are treated differently because you associate with someone or an organization for people of a particular ethnicity. For example, if you are harassed because you married a Pakistani woman, this could be ethnicity discrimination.

Retaliation is also prohibited under Title VII and the Texas Labor Code. Retaliation occurs when an adverse action is taken against an employee for engaging in a protected activity. To establish retaliation, you will need to show that you engaged in a protected activity, your employer took an adverse action against you, and there was a direct causal link between the protected activity and the adverse action.

For example, if your employer terminates you because you complained that you were subjected to ethnicity-based harassment, this is retaliation. Retaliation creates an independent claim against an employer, meaning that your employer may be liable for retaliation even if a court decides that you were wrong about what you thought was discrimination or harassment, as long as you had a good-faith belief that you were being subjected to retaliation.

An employment discrimination attorney can help you pursue a claim of ethnicity discrimination at a Texas workplace. Damages that you may be able to recover if you successfully prove your case include back pay, compensatory damages, out-of-pocket costs, and punitive damages. The Austin ethnicity discrimination attorneys at Wiley Walsh, P.C. represent people in cities such as Georgetown, Round Rock, Cedar Park, Pflugerville, Leander, Del Valle, Kyle, San Marcos, San Antonio, New Braunfels, and Fredericksburg. Call us at (512) 271-5527 or use our online form to set up an appointment.