Foot Locker may be Fucked
Foot Locker Stores Accused Of Gay Discrimination_
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
(Columbia, South Carolina)_ A lawsuit was filed Tuesday accusing Foot Locker, Inc. of harassing and then firing a gay employee.
The suit alleges that Kevin Dunbar, 26, suffered antigay harassment and discrimination at the hands of his coworkers, supervisors and customers.
Dunbar claims that when_ Dunbar formally complained that he was being harassed_ the discrimination grew worse. His suit says that he was transferred from one store location in Columbia to another, where his new store manager refused to shake his hand and said, "I heard about your shit, I don't want your faggot ass in my store."
"Once I became a target, every morning when I woke up and I was scheduled for work, I knew that my supervisors and coworkers would verbally insult and degrade me, probably in front of customers," Dunbar said Tuesday. "At best, they'd talk behind my back and make my every task twice as difficult -- just because I'm gay."
Foot Locker, Inc. has a nondiscrimination policy which includes sexual orientation.
"Kevin Dunbar was subjected to a nightmarish workplace and then fired because he is gay," said Greg Nevins, an attorney with Lambda Legal which is representing Dunbar.
"Foot Locker could have addressed this problem, as it clearly promises employees in its policies, but instead chose to ignore it and make it worse.__Our client followed the rules to address the discrimination, and all it got him was a pink slip," said Nevins.
In the lawsuit, Lambda Legal argues that Foot Locker, Inc., breached its contract with Dunbar by violating the company's own anti-harassment, anti-discrimination and open-door policies that are promised in the employee handbook.
Three customers who witnessed three separate incidents of antigay harassment have sworn affidavits on Dunbar's behalf.
One customer approached Dunbar and gave him her name and phone number "because as a Christian woman I felt this was wrong, and the Lord told me to help and heal because the hurt, pain and embarrassment I saw on Mr. Dunbar's face was intense."_
On another occasion, a customer was shopping with her four children and heard Dunbar's coworkers calling him "punk ass" and "faggot."_
After one particularly harsh round of name-calling, a customer was concerned for Dunbar's safety when she heard a coworker threaten, "I will beat his punk ass!"
A spokesperson for the company refused comment on the suit.
In conjunction with the lawsuit, Lambda Legal launched what it calls a "Blow the Whistle on Foot Locker" campaign today, designed to activate people nationwide beginning with a series of town hall meetings set to kick off in Columbia after Labor Day. An aggressive post-card campaign also launched today will encourage thousands of people nationwide to complain to the company.
http://www.365gay.com/newscon04/06/062904lockerSuit.htm
It makes you pretty sick that this kind of thing is stil happening in the freaking 21st century. It's easy for many of us who live in cities with huge gay communities that homophobia still exists. I haven't been called "Faggot" since about 1994. So if any of you have Footlocker stories, pass them on.. let us make a rather harsh exaplme of them.