Thread by @JasonBraier

In an interesting ET claim - Plaut v University of Exeter - a Jewish female academic of Ashkenazi heritage argued it was direct race discrimination to dismiss her for shouting at others in circumstances where being an Ashkenazi Jew makes you liable to speak loudly & gesticulate.

The claim failed (though she won an unfair dismissal claim) on the basis that if people thought she shouted at them, then that was their perception & her ethnic origin was irrelevant to that perception.

Alas no indirect discrimination claim was brought, but there's an interesting question about cultural behavioural norms & what account to take of them in misconduct proceedings & when it might be unjustifiable indirect discrimination to ignore them in considering sanction.

Mind you, as an Ashkenazi Jew myself, I'm hopeful that - save from around the Friday night dinner table with older relatives - I'm pretty well versed in not shouting and in reining in my hand gestures!

Here's the ET judgment: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/61a5f3f2…