posted on Monday, October 15, 2007 10:20 AM
by
Lou Michels
Gender bending
As much as I try to make my entries here informative and useful, occasionally there is a case that cries out for inclusion just for its sheer bizarreness. Like this one.
The employer is a capital management company called SAC Capital Advisors LLC. It is being sued by one of its former junior traders, a male employee who claims that he was ordered to take female hormones in order to effectively implement a trading method that involved a "feminine" approach. Apparently, it didn't occur to the company management to just go out and hire a woman.
In addition to whatever money management skills the hormones were supposed to promote, they also rendered the male employee impotent, and caused him to begin wearing women's clothes.
Along with the suit for wrongful femininity, the employee filed an EEOC charge of discrimination, harassment and retaliation. Presumably the first task the Commission will have is to try to figure out exactly what protected class the plaintiff belongs to.
In any event, the New York state court dumped this one into arbitration as quickly as it could. However, the federal trial may be reported after the charge gets out of the EEOC. Stay tuned.