Gay man sues Library of Congress, alleging discrimination

[alp227]

Peter TerVeer was an up-and-coming auditor for the Library of Congress’s inspector general’s office. His boss liked him so much that he tried to set him up with his single daughter.

But when the boss discovered that TerVeer was gay, he harassed him with religious-based homophobia — and eventually got him fired, TerVeer alleges in a federal lawsuit.

The lawsuit, filed Aug. 3 in U.S. District Court in Washington, claims that TerVeer, 30, suffered discrimination based on his sexual orientation and religious beliefs in violation of Title VII of the U.S. Civil Rights Act.

It charges that TerVeer was subjected to a hostile work environment for more than a year by his supervisor, John Mech, who quoted biblical passages to him condemning homosexuality.

“Aside from creating a hostile environment in which he imposed his religion and sexual stereotypes, Mech began creating a paper trail to support his ultimate goal of driving TerVeer out of the Library of Congress,” the suit alleges.

full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/gay-man-sues-library-of-congress-alleging-discrimination/2012/08/22/ad23e0a0-ebca-11e1-9ddc-340d5efb1e9c_story.html

John Mech? Rhymes with BLECH?

[MADem]

1. What an asshole! Why did that guy think he could do that sort of thing and not be challenged?

Years ago, a not-quite-but-nearly similar situation was happening in my workcenter with a couple of civilian employees. There was no real senior-subordinate relationship, even though the harasser was a bit senior, she didn't have hiring/firing ability over the harassee. The harassee was also a way better worker, and the harasser was a dinosaur closing in on retirement.

The woman was very religious and would quote Leviticus to this gay guy in the office, wave a finger at him, and go into this whole preachy thing about how his "lifes-style wuz WRONG!!!!!" The others on staff would tell him he was well within his rights to take a complaint to human resources, and they even volunteered to go with him, sign statements, that kind of thing.

He wouldn't do it, though--he preferred to get back at her with assorted humorous comments. He had a wicked wit and he could usually get the better of her in two sentences or less. I think the fact that the rest of the staff had his back made it less of a hostile environment and more of a noodgy workplace annoyance.