NEWARK, N.J. — Making jokes and comments about a person’s religion can create a “humiliating and painful environment” and be a form of on-the-job discrimination, New Jersey’s highest court ruled July 31.
The New Jersey Supreme Court said remarks about someone’s faith — even as a form of ribbing or “breaking of chops” — cannot be tolerated in the workplace. Clarifying anti-discrimination laws, the court declared that a person claiming religious-based harassment does not face a higher legal hurdle than people who claim they were discriminated against because of their sex or race.
“It is necessary that our courts recognize that the religion-based harassing conduct that took place … in this ‘workplace culture’ is as offensive as other forms of discriminatory, harassing conduct outlawed in this state,” Justice Jaynee LaVecchia wrote for a unanimous court.
The ruling holds the borough of Haddonfield in Camden County accountable for discrimination claims made by a Jewish police officer whose co-workers made crass comments — claimed to be poor attempts at humor — about his ethnicity and pasted stickers of the flags of Israel and Germany on his locker.
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