Friday, January 22, 2010
Settlement reached in TV discrimination cases
Hollywood Reporter: "Seventeen TV networks and studios and seven talent agencies have reached a $70 million settlement of 19 legal cases that alleged age discrimination against TV writers over the age of 40."
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4 comments:
i definitely agree that the writers who were involved earlier deserve more money. It kind of seems pointless to join the class action suit if your only getting $250. it doesn't seem worth the time and effort put in even if they joined in the past year. I cant even imagine why it would have needed to take 10 years. those writers were/are only getting older, but im glad they still got money out of it and they are setting up grants. That will help.
What always interests me about lawsuits in the U.S. is the number and kinds of cases. I like American legal system as long as the legal practice is not abused as a business. I admire the spirits of no discrimination again race, ages, sex, marital status etc... upon employment and its process speed of the case. In principle, everybody can stand to fight for the right.
What can be seen in this matter is that this case makes a kind of financial circle. TV companies involved are not actually facing the discrimination issue. People know that sometimes the aging can not help but affect their job performance. Especially in the TV industry, the trend passes by very fast. If they can divert the complaints by just paying that much money, that would do. This seems to be nothing other than attorneys' clever business making.
But anyway, the situation of each plaintiff's case aside, as long as this class action functions to protect the elders financially and our rights, it would be OK...!?
The really telling fact h ere is that the lawyers are getting 25 million of the 70 million dollar settlement - over a third. I don't know the details of the case, age discrimination is definitely a real thing, but it shares an uncomfortable overlap with networks' goals to appeal to a younger audience. Trending towards programming for a younger demographic may lead to hiring of younger writers, not because of their age, but in correlation to it. Even if there was a systematic, explicit system established (the article makes no effort to establish the guilt of the networks) settling out of court is a way to make it abundantly clear that a lawsuit is about compensation not principal, and NDA's, which the article alludes to, further reduce the credibility of plaintiffs as 'fighting for what's right.' Again, I don't know details of the case, but this article smells a whole lot like profiteering by litigation, not fighting for equitable treatment of writers of all ages.
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