Fired over blond highlights, former Hooters waitress wins $250K arbitration award
A former Hooters waitress who says she was fired over her blonde highlights after a manager told her “black people don’t have blonde hair,” has won more than $250,000 in an arbitration award.
The hair-color policy “was implemented in a discriminatory manner adversely affecting African-American women,” wrote arbitrator Edmund D. Cooke Jr., finding that those in charge of a Hooters restaurant in Baltimore had violated federal and state civil rights laws.
In a written statement, Hooters criticized the award to Farryn Johnson and says it may appeal, reports the Baltimore Sun.
The company said it does not discriminate, and included a comment from Hooters of America senior brand manager Ericka Whitaker to back that claim.
“As a former Hooters Girl who happens to be African-American, I, like countless other African-American Hooters Girls today, regularly wore my hair in various shades of blond, or any other color consistent with our ‘girl next door’ image,” she said.
The company also said most of the money awarded went to Johnson’s attorneys and she herself got only $12,000, the newspaper reports.
