THE EEOC SUES ALBERTSONS GROCERY CHAIN FOR REQUIRING ITS BILINGUAL EMPLOYEES TO SPEAK ENGLISH

THE EEOC SUES ALBERTSONS GROCERY CHAIN FOR REQUIRING ITS BILINGUAL EMPLOYEES TO SPEAK ENGLISH WHEN AROUND ENGLISH-SPEAKING CUSTOMERS: 

Seems like  an extreme interpretation of liability under Title VII to me (and indeed several federal courts have agreed).

A few years ago, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights asked employers why they chose to require their bilingual employees to speak English while at work, and their responses seemed sensible: First, it’s human nature that when some people hear others speaking a language that they don’t understand, they worry whether the others are talking about them. So it’s rude speak in a language that others don’t understand. When customers (or even fellow employees) are the one’s who feel uncomfortable, it’s bad for business. Second, sexual harassment law makes an employer liable for “hostile environment.” But if the employer or the employer’s managers speak only English, it is much more difficult to supervise and to ensure employees are not being abusive to each other. And there were other reasons. I wrote about the topic in my Commissioner Statement in the Report of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights on English-Only Policies in the Workplace.

I can’t help but wonder if Americans would have a more favorable attitude toward immigration if the federal government hadn’t been zealously pursuing anti-assimilationist policies for so many decades. Attempts to impose bilingual education and affirmative action are two of the biggest ones. (Why identify with the majority if your one of your grandparents will get you diversity points?) But in a small way these “Speak English, please” rules are another example. (By the way, the EEOC seems to be going out of its way to “interpret” the Albertsons rule to be more demanding than it really is. It is not the intent of the rule to prevent Spanish-speaking employees from assisting Spanish-speaking customers in Spanish if they happen to be within earshot of an English-speaking customer.)

While all this is happening, Trump’s appointees to the EEOC are still awaiting Senate confirmation. And it’s 2018. Tick, tick, tick.

https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/295966/