Discrimination: The Inequality Problem That Affects Us All

Everyone is protected from discrimination. But what if the claim of discrimination is coming from the least likely of people: a wealthy, white male—what about him?

The Austin based attorney Greg Gegenheimer is suing The State Bar of Texas governing board for just that. He claims that the board is denying him a seat on the star board based on both his sex and race. Is his indignation well-founded? Here are the facts:

• The star board has 46 director members in total
• The seat he is vying for is one of four minority director positions
  • e. less than 10% of directors must be a minority
• Under state law, minority directors must be filled by lawyers who are “female, African-American, Hispanic-American, Native American or Asian-American”

In denying him consideration for the minority director position, the board is judging his merit for the position on the grounds of his sex and race. This fits the description of discrimination.

According to a Gegenheimer backer, similar numeric racial and gender quotas have been struck down as being unconstitutional in the past. The law seems to favor the plaintiff’s claim.

On the other hand, white men appoint other white men into positions of leadership far more than they do minorities. If we didn’t have racial and gender quotas like this one, we might have far less minorities in positions of leadership.

The board also isn’t denying him any position, they are only denying him any of the four minority positions. There majority of positions are available for him to pursue, and one of them is bound to open soon.

Dan A. Atkerson is a Dallas employment lawyer who handles issues such as worker misclassification, wage theft, discrimination and other forms of workplace injustice.