Keep on riffin Vic!

Good Day Readers:

For reasons even unbeknownst to CyberSmokeBlog this next story reminded it of slightly sleazy private investigator Vic Arpeggio (Joe Flaherty) who was hired by wealthy southern plantation owner Martin Short to solve a murder. So Vic had to go underground to become a black man to solve the case. He's beyond hilarious.

Sincerely,
Clare L. Pieuk

Biracial woman fired because of her skin colour wins human rights case 

Nova Scotia woman was terminated partly because of her skin colour, commission finds

Gemma Kaistens-Smith/Staff Reporter
May Warren/Staff Reporter

Saturday, August 9, 2014

Rachel Brothers, seen here in a Facebook photo filed a human rights complaining against the Black Educators Association in Nova Scotia after she was fired. She said she believed she had been discriminated against because of her fair skin, and the commission has filed a ruling in her favour. (Facebook)

A biracial woman was fired from her job at the Black Educators Association in Nova Scotia in part because she “wasn’t black enough,” the province’s Human Rights Commission has determined.

Rachel Brothers filed a human rights complaint in 2008, claiming she had been discriminated against when she was fired from her job as a regional educator with the Black Educators Association in December 2006.

Donald Murray, chair of the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission, said in a written ruling issued this month that the non-profit organization “accepted colourist thinking” in 2006, and that Brothers’ skin colour played a part in her termination.

“Rachel Brothers lost her employment at the BEA in part because of decisions at the BEA in which her skin colour was a factor, and the problems that her skin colour created in her office for another BEA employee,” Murray wrote.

The Black Educators Association was ordered to pay Brothers $11,000 plus interest.

Read the full decision here

When contacted by the Star for comment, Brothers said, “I don't think there is anything else to say, the facts are the facts and I am happy with the decision.”

Brothers worked for the organization for nearly a year in 2006, based out of the Kentville, Nova Scotia office. Her work was “destabilized,” however, by Catherine Collier, an employee she supervised who consistently undermined her, Murray said in his summary of the evidence. Collier said Brothers “wasn’t black enough” to connect with the black community, and caused problems for both Brothers and her administrative assistant, another biracial woman.

“It is clear to me that Ms. Brothers was undermined in part because she was younger than, and not as black as, Ms. Collier thought that Ms. Brothers should be,” Murray wrote.

Another employee made “colourist” comments to Brothers, saying that she “should go work for whitey.”

The comments and Collier’s behaviour created “an unpleasant work environment” for Brothers, who brought the issue to the attention of head office. The organization’s executives were “persistently deaf” to the complaints and failed to act, Murray wrote.

Executives from the Black Educators Association said Brothers was fired for financial misconduct, but Murray wrote that no evidence of financial misconduct was presented to the commission. Instead, he determined the organization fired Brothers because Collier had a better relationship with the Black Educators Association’s head office.

The Black Educators Association, which exists to help students from the black community benefit from Nova Scotia’s education system, did not return requests for comment.

Related on thestar.com: Toronto principal alleges ‘systemic discrimination’

Skin colour bias cuts both ways: DiManno