While working at a San Jose State VIP alumni event a few weeks ago, I saw a female worker arrive dressed as instructed with the exception of wearing her hijab for religious reasons. A director—older, male, with what sounded to me like a European accent—began harassing this woman, telling her she cannot wear her hijab and she would have to remove it. The woman said that she couldn’t remove it, and the man began threatening that she would end up having to wash dishes or clean up behind the scenes instead because she couldn’t be serving food in front of people with a scarf on her head. I have been asking around to see if anything has been done, but it seems that nothing has. This is so wrong that a worker would be discriminated against because she was wearing a religious article of clothing.
I Saw You is an anonymous “man on the street” column. Email your rants and raves about co-workers or any badly behaving citizens to [email protected], or send to 380 S. First St, San Jose, 95113. Submissions should stick to about 100 words.
