According to New York Magazine, seven black employees are expected to join a racial discrimination lawsuit against Fox News next week that claims black employees were forced against their will to participate in accounting department arm wrestling matches against white employees.
New York Magazine singled out Tammy Efinger, an accounting director who, according to one of the plaintiffs, forced a black female to arm wrestle a white female employee. Fox News has declined to comment on the matter.
Jim Crow era 'battle royals' at Fox News
"Forcing a black woman employee to fight for the amusement and pleasure of her white superiors is horrifying," said the employee who filed the suit.
Her lawyer added that it is was a humiliating act "reminiscent of Jim Crow era battle royals."
The black-on-white arm wrestling allegations come on the heels of another racial discrimination lawsuit filed last month by two other black female employees. The women claim in their lawsuit that Fox News comptroller Judy Slater was directly responsible for fomenting a culture of "top down harassment." at Fox Headquarters.
The two employees who filed suit against Slater after they were fired from the company's payroll staff claim that she questioned them about the paternity of their children and reprimanded them for mispronouncing words.
According to New York Magazine, the alleged black-on-white arm wrestling matches were held in Efinger's office on the second floor, just down the hall from Roger Ailes.
A culture of discrimination, or a culture of frivolous lawsuits?
Although the legitimacy of these claims -- as well as the sexual harassment claims leveled against long-time host Bill O'Reilly -- have yet to stand up to judicial scrutiny, New York Magazine apparently believes that the recent deluge of lawsuits against Fox News reveals "just how deep the culture of discrimination and harassment may have been during Ailes's reign."
On the other hand, the company's string of legal woes may reveal just how deep the culture of litigation has become in an era when baseless allegations are often settled for vast sums of money in order to minimize negative publicity and avoid long, expensive, drawn-out court battles.
Just ask Bill O'Reilly, who was unceremoniously fired by Fox News from the top-rated program he had been hosting since 1996 amid a slew of sexual harassment accusations. The accusers agreed to settle in exchange for a multi-million dollar payout. As is the case with most settlements, the accusers are not permitted to go public with details of O'Reilly's purported actions, thereby keeping the facts of what really happened, or didn't happen, a mystery.
Should Fox News decide to settle the interracial arm wrestling lawsuit in a similar fashion, the public may never get a chance to find out what really went on at Fox Headquarters.
