Time to be sued for gender discrimination
LONDON, U.K. – President Donald Trump’s favorite publication is being sued for gender discrimination. Time magazine, is being sued for gender and age discrimination. According to the suit, Time violated discrimination and civil rights law by maintaining a culture of male cronyism. Despite moving women into prominent positions, the suit contends that Time magazine discriminated against high performing journalists on the basis of their gender.
Catherine Mayer, the co-founder of the Women’s Equality Party, recently filed suit in Federal court against Time Magazine, her former employer, alleging gender and age discrimination. Time is just the latest major publication to be sued for sexism. Recently, BBC’s salaries were published, causing outrage of both gender and racial discrimination when the report showed huge disparities pay along gender and race lines. This report came a year after the TV giant Fox News was thrown into turmoil amidst allegations of sexual harassment at the highest levels. Mayer is a phenomenal journalist, recently publishing a controversial biography of Prince Charles, and is on the very short list of Orwell Prize contenders. Mayer’s suit was filed in the Southern District of New York, covering her final three years of employment, up until her dismissal in 2015.
According to her suit, Time started a campaign of gender discrimination soon after she was appointed European regional director. Despite begin promised that she could build her own team, Time’s foreign editor appointed Matt McAllester to be her deputy. Soon after her appointment, Mayer claims McAllester began a campaign to undermine her, with the eventual goal of taking over her position, despite her repeated complaints.
Mayer asserts that Time systematically took away her job responsibilities as European Editor, eventually she was forced to relinquish her title which the company gave to McAllester. According to her suit, Time favored male correspondents, especially former war correspondents, in dismissal and promotion decisions. In her suit, Mayer alleges that McAllester, the current editor-in-chief at Newsweek, poisoned the atmosphere in the London office so bad that certain employees were terrified to be alone with him. McAllester maintained a culture of bullying where the “non-macho men” and women who did not conform to traditional gender roles did not farewell. Mayer made multiple complaints to the international editor, Jim Frederick, Mayer felt like she didn’t have any choice but to file suit. “I’m not going to try and pretend that I started out doing this for other women… [But] if this is happening to me, what is it like to be someone less well-defended than me?” Mayer stated.
Filing in the US Court system is a difficult choice as everything that happens in Court is public. Being a dual citizen of both the U.S. and Britain, Mayer originally wished to settle the suit as quietly as possible. However, once it was clear that Time had no interest in settling, Mayer decided to fight the complex legal battle in U.S. Courts and filed suit.
Gender discrimination rears its ugly head in every industry, at every level. The skilled sexual harassment attorneys at the Derek Smith Law Group, PLLC, have years of experience litigating claims based on gender discrimination. Working with our Philadelphia, Miami, and New Jersey attorneys, we have received some of the largest jury verdicts in recent New York City history on behalf of our clients. If you feel you have been discriminated against on the basis of your sex or gender, give us a call at (800) 807-2209 for your free consultation.
