Study Case -Hospitality and Employment Law
Joanne Smith was an assistant for a group of male and female writers who created scripts for a popular TV show. During her four months with the show(before she and a male assistant were both terminated for typing too slowly), Smith was required to attend the writers’ lewd brainstorming sessions.
When Smith was hired, she was forewarned that the show dealt with sexual matters and that she would listen to and transcribe the writers’ jokes and discussions about sex. However, after being fired, Smith sued three male writers and 45th Century fox for sexual harassment.
According to Smith’s suit, her workplace was filled with coarse and graphic sexual speech, behavior, and images(one writer had a proclivity for enhancing pictures of cheerleaders). Smith testified that the writers regularly told stories of sexual conquests, altered the texts of scripts to spell sexual organs, and engaged in crude speculation about the cast’s sex lives.
Does Smith’s suit have merit?
Analyze what reasons she might have to win the case versus what reasons she might have to lose the case, and decide how you would rule and why?
