Most Americans are at least familiar with the restaurant chain Hooters. Their wait staff are young, attractive, and very female; their uniforms are tight-fitting but not sleazy. Hooter's primary market is the BroDude demographic, and it's easy to see why. I've been to Hooters a time or two myself - purely for journalistic research, you understand. You can see, now, the lengths to which I will go to, to bring you all responsible reporting. I admit that I can see the appeal in being served beers and (actually quite good) chicken wings by an attractive, cheerful, and vivacious young woman.
But there's a wrinkle. In New York, a former regular Hooters customer - a dude - applied for a job as a server - shorts, tight t-shirt, and all. There's a problem, though. The applicant is now claiming to be a "transgender woman" - still a dude - and not only that, he's a dude who engaged in some unwelcome actions as a customer before his "transition." Now he's suing Hooters, charging discrimination. I'm not buying the discrimination claim, and neither should the court.
Here's why, and I'm going to tell you.
An upstate New York transgender woman is suing Hooters for repeatedly refusing to hire her — while the restaurant claims she was booted for inappropriate behavior starting before she transitioned.
Brandy Livingston told NEWS 10 that she applied three times to work as a tight-topped staffer at the chain’s diner in Colonie — despite alleging that she was harassed by staff there as a regular customer.
“They would use male pronouns — they would refer to me as ‘he,'” alleged Livingston, who only recently transitioned to female.
“I overheard one of the servers after I left the restroom talking to one of the managers and said, ‘Why are you allowing him in the women’s restroom?’ And the manager said, ‘Oh, I don’t like it any more than you do,” Livingston alleged.
Here's the dude in question. See for yourself.
Transgender server sues Hooters for rejecting employment application because, well, you knowhttps://t.co/9xCyT0AEUx
— Not the Bee (@Not_the_Bee) October 31, 2024
Sorry, that doesn't look like a Hooters waitress candidate. That looks like a big, homely dude in a wig. I mean, this guy's got a head like an Easter Island statue, and he wants to be a Hooters waitress? Doesn't seem to fit the Hooters business model - and Hooters, I remind you, is a private company, and should be free to set their hiring practices as suits them. They do not discriminate, I can tell you from personal experience, based on ethnicity - I doubt they discriminate on religious grounds, although I have no way to measure that other than the fact that I've never seen a Hooters waitress wearing a burka. (With any luck, I never will.)
But that's not the troublesome part.
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There is, of course, the other side of the story.
A hiring manager didn’t even care if she had suitable experience, she told News 10. “He said, ‘Oh, we don’t care about experience. We hire on the basis of personality. And there’s an image that needs to be met,'” she alleged.
Hooters, however, painted a vastly different picture — alleging that Livingston was asked to not return to the restaurant for alarming behavior starting before she transitioned.
The wannabe worker made multiple servers uncomfortable by proposing marriage and discussing masturbation — and even threatened to go to a gun range to practice for the next time she visited, Hooters told the outlet via lawyers.
I don't care who this person is or how they "identify." That's the kind of behavior that should get one barred from the establishment permanently, under threat of trespassing charges. This guy - I'm not buying the "transgender" bit, I'm of the considered opinion that this is a troublemaker looking for a payday - discussed masturbation in front of young women, most of whom are probably in their early 20s and not experienced in dealing with perverts?
Hooters was not only within its rights to not hire this person, but it would have been within its rights to forcibly eject him from the establishment the first time any of this behavior cropped up - and honestly, the "gun range" comment sounds an awful lot like a threat of violence.
In a sane world, Hooters would win this case, easily. But this is New York, after all, so we'll have to see what happens.
Sadly, there isn't a Hooters anywhere in the Great Land. There is one, though, a few short miles from where my in-laws live in Colorado. Maybe next time we visit the lower 48, I'll have to do some more research. I do enjoy me some great chicken wings. And Hooters does them up right.
