London : Making fun of someone based on their physical appearance is considered abuse. But a British court has termed it ‘sexual harassment’. An employment tribunal in its judgment held that calling a person ‘bald’ is sexual harassment. The whole affair started when an employee reached the court with a complaint of being called ‘bald’. Tony Finn, who worked for 24 years at the British Bung Company in West Yorkshire, was fired last year after which he approached the court.
According to the news of DailyMail, Tony Finn made several claims in court, one of which was of sexual harassment. He said that during an incident he faced sexual harassment from factory supervisor Jamie King. Finn alleged that in July 2019, King had abused her by calling her ‘bald’. The judge said that men tend to lose more hair than women, so using the term for someone is a form of discrimination.
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Saying ‘bald’ is like commenting on a woman’s breast
The three-member panel delivered its verdict on a dispute between an experienced electrician and the employers of his company. The court compared calling a man bald with a comment on a woman’s breast. The panel, led by Judge Jonathan Byrne, considered the allegations as to whether the remarks on her baldness were just insults or were in fact harassment. “In our judgment, there is a correlation between the word ‘bald’ and a protected characteristic of sex,” the panel said.
Court said abusive behavior
“We find it inherently sexually related,” he said. King made this comment on Finn’s appearance to offend him, which is often found in males. The Tribunal therefore held that the use of the word ‘bald’ for Finn was a derogatory practice. This has hurt Finn’s dignity and created an atmosphere of fear for him. Finn has won over claims of biased dismissal, wrongful dismissal and sexual harassment.