Friday, August 20, 2010

Muslim Disney Employee Files EEOC Complaint Over Wearing Hijab

The Orange County (CA) Register reported on Wednesday that a Muslim employee at a cafe in a Disneyland resort hotel has filed a compliant with the EEOC charging discrimination. Imane Boudlal says she was sent home four times for attempting to wear a hijab in her work as a hostess at Storytellers Cafe in Disney's Grand Californian Hotel.  Disney, which has a strict dress code, says it offered Boudlal a behind-the-scenes job temporarily while an accommodation was worked out, but she refused.  Boudlal says she wrote Disney requesting permission to wear the headscarf, but received no response. So she filed her discrimination complaint and held a press conference to call attention to the issue. Disney says the hotel union with which it is in a contract battle is using this issue to distract attention from the real issues faced by their members.