fallout of "the tsunami song"

hot97 ended up firing radio personality todd lynn for saying he would "start shooting asians" on the hot97 morning show and producer rick delgado for penning and producing the song that spoke of "screaming chinks," "chinamen swept away," and children being sold into child slavery. they also suspended all the other radio personalities without pay (with the exception of "miss info," who spoke out against the song on air only to be trashed by her co-workers for "feeling superior because she is 'asian'").

according to angry asian man, miss info is looking into suing hot97 for fostering a hostile work environment. angry asian man suggests that miss info should "leave [hot97] with her dignity and respect intact." honey, that is some old school asian shit. we're in america. old school asians might swallow their pride and attempt to "save face" (c'mon YOU *KNOW* that's what you were thinkin'...). but asian-AMERICANS are AMERICANS, and guess what americans do when they are kicked around? they fight back.

AND THEY SUE THE SHIT OUT OF EACH OTHER. litigiousness is an american value! and ther e is nothing shameful about it. :)

all right... "hostile work environment" is a claim under title VII of the civil rights act of 1964 and can therefore be brought in federal court. the second circuit, in which new york city is located, has held that

"a plaintiff alleging a hostile work environment must demonstrate either that a single incident was extraordinarily severe, or that a series of incidents were sufficiently continuous and concerted to have altered the conditions of the working environment. To decide whether the threshold has been reached, courts examine the case-specific circumstances in their totality and evaluate the severity, frequency and degree of the abuse." Alfano v. Costello, 294 F.3d 365, 374 (2d Cir. 2002).

this would include a work environment "permeated with discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and insult" Harris v. Forklift Sys., Inc., 510 U.S. 17, 21, 126 L. Ed. 2d 295, 114 S. Ct. 367 (1993).

anyhow, a lot of these hostile environment cases failed, because the employees were unable to show that they were discriminated against because of their race (or in some cases, gender). often times, there had to be an inference made with very little evidence -- but in this case, there is no need for such an inference. one of the exchanges took place ON AIR with a coverage area of several million people, and in these exchanges, miss jones and todd lynn were clearly berating her because of her race. in fact, the exchange was recorded by asianmediawatch.com and is being circulated over p2p for posterity. this incident, which can be called "severe," is, however, not the only documented incident. in a previous episode of the morning show, miss jones said that she would like to make a game called "chinkopoly." in addition, during the furious exchange over the tsunami song, miss jones noted to miss info that miss info and the rest of the crew had been beefing for a while because of the race issue (could this be indicating a pattern of racially-motivated conduct?)

listen, miss info, you may have the seeds of a case here. even if it doesn't go to court, you can $$$ettle BIG TIME.* oh yes! BRING DOWN THA HOUSE!!!!!!

*this is, of course, not legal advice. i am a law student, not a licensed practitioner.