Being de-hijabbed better than winning lottery for KC woman

As Walt has explained before in "Hijab, niqab, burqa -- what's the difference?", the hijab -- as shown here -- is the basic or minimum headcovering for a modest Muslim woman. Head hair is considered more private than, errr, other hair. I guess. Add a veil over the forehead and face, and you've got a niqab. Cover everything up, and that's the burqa. But the hijab is the minimum.

If you're a Muslim woman, having your head and hair suddenly uncovered would be shocking, shameful and stressful. Especially if you're a convert, as is Susann Bashir, a former resident of Kansas City, now en route to Anchorage with $5 million in her pocket (potentially), thanks to a jury that awarded her that sum (and more) in a lawsuit she brought against AT&T.

According to her claim, Ms Bashir had worked as a fibre optics network builder at AT&T’s Kansas City plant for ten years before being fired. Sadly, almost immediately after she converted to Islam in 2005, the workplace environment became hostile. Ms Bashir claimed she endured religious discrimination nearly every day of her last three years at ATT. For example, she was called a "towelhead" and a "terrorist", and was asked if she was going to blow up the building.

What really hurt though, she said, was her co-workers referring to her hijab as "that thing on her head". "I was shocked," she told the Kansas City Star. "I thought, what is going on? Nobody ever cared what I wore before. Nobody ever cared what religion I was before."

Everything came to a head [Watch it! Ed.] in 2008 when her boss snatched her hijab, exposing her hair. This was after she filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The EEOC duly launched an investigation, her co-workers got angry, and that led to the final encounter with her boss.

Ms Bashir then asked that her boss be removed or that she be transferred, but neither happened. Thus she became so stressed out, according to her claim, that she was unable to work for, errr, nine months, after which she was fired for some reason.

AT&T says it disagrees with the verdict and will be appealing. [As if AT&T could ever be appealing! Ed.]

Footnote: Ms Bashir is unlikely to collect the entire $5 million in punitive damages, as Missouri law caps such awards at five times the actual damages, which in this case amounted to just over $120,000. So that's about 600 large for Ms Bashir. Plus costs, of course. Better than winning the lottery, says Walt!