CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Two officials suspended by NASCAR are accused in a $225 million lawsuit of exposing themselves to a former co-worker, the Associated Press has learned. Tim Knox and Bud Moore have been placed on indefinite administrative paid leave. NASCAR will not reveal the identities of the officials sent home Friday from Kentucky Speedway, but a person familiar with the investigation confirmed to AP on Saturday that Knox and Moore were suspended. The person requested anonymity because NASCAR's investigation is ongoing. "Even if we take action on any official in this investigation -- we might discover something entirely different that has been going on that has nothing to do with the claim, this lawsuit, but still is in violation of our policy. That would get you in trouble with us.".... Mauricia Grant filed her suit Tuesday, alleging 23 specific incidents of sexual harassment and 34 specific incidents of racial and gender discrimination during her time as a technical inspector for NASCAR's second-tier Nationwide Series. Grant, who is black, claims her October 2007 firing was retaliation for complaining about the way she was treated on the job from her January 2005 hiring.
You'd think that in this day and age, when your average workplace is rife with diversity training and hypersensitive to anything even remotely redolent of sexual harrassment, that this sort of aggressively stupid, immature sexism would be obsolete. Nice try, ace....
Now, with NASCAR in full CYA mode, denials are flying fast and furious. Apparently, somehow NO ONE in NASCAR's leadership had ANY idea that employees were dangling their Johnsons in the general direction of a female employee who just happened to be one of the few African-Americans employed by NASCAR. Wow, imagine that, eh? Good ol' boys just have some good clean fun with the womenfolk? No harm, no foul, eh?
There's a part of me that keeps hoping that somehow we'll figure out that treating people with respect and dignity really isn't all that difficult, and in fact it really should be second nature. That some still seem unable to grasp this simple reality only proves to me just how little progress we've made over the years.
When a woman can be chased from a job she loves because a few knuckle-dragging troglodytes see her as a plaything and a source of cheap amusement, we all lose. And while this might seem like an abstract academic exercise to some, what if Mauricia Grant was your wife or daughter? Would you finally be ready to stand up and demand that those who insist on waving their shortcomings in the breeze be called to account for their ignorance and misogyny?
I mean, really....can't we all just get along? And won't we all be better off if you just keep it in our shorts?? The last time I saw something that small, it had an eraser on the end of it....
