Felix Upton on April 26, 2023
WWE has an eclectic roster and fans all over the world who they want to connect with. Sometimes, Vince McMahon’s booking was seen as a bit tone-deaf regarding political correctness. Now, it looks like they might have to answer to that in court.
According to a story from Bloomberg Law, WWE is facing a lawsuit from Britney Abrahams for allegedly discriminating against a Black female writer. The lawsuit also alleges she was objected to “offensively racist and stereotypical jargon” that was used in scripts for “Black wrestlers including Bianca Belair and Apollo Crews.”
Bloomberg Law wrote about the lawsuit and noted that Britney Abrahams was “pretextually terminated” from the company over taking home a chair from WrestleMania. Those same chairs are given to fans in the front row and sold on WWE’s online store.
Britney Abrahams’ multiple complaints were ignored, and she was pretextually terminated for taking home a WrestleMania-branded chair, according to the complaint filed in the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York on Monday.
Britney Abrahams started her career with WWE in 2000 as a writer for RAW and SmackDown. One of the lines that was noted in the complaint was Bianca Belair saying, “Uh-Uh! Don’t make me take off my earrings and beat your ass!”
The lawsuit also called out WWE’s Nigerian gimmick for Apollo Crews. It is alleged that the accent Crews used was “stereotypical and exaggerated Nigerian accent.”
Britney Abrahams also alleges in the lawsuit that she had been exposed to “several” racist proposals, including one on a Slack thread with Vince and daughter Stephanie McMahon, in which “other writers suggested a Black male wrestler should dress in drag.” However, the proposal was eventually abandoned when a white writer raised concerns that it would “perpetuate harmful stereotypes that would offend viewers.”
In another instance, a writer suggested revealing a Muslim wrestler’s secret to be that he was “behind the 9/11 attacks.”
Britney Abrahams claimed that she was terminated for opposing these “racist, sexist pitches,” and is seeking “reinstatement, damages, declaratory judgment, and an injunction restraining defendants from engaging in such unlawful conduct.”
There is certainly a lot to unpack in this story, and we will keep our eyes peeled for more updates right here at Ringside News.
What’s your take on this lawsuit? Does WWE need to just settle this and get it out of the way? Sound off in the comments!
April 26, 2023 12:05 pm
Disqus Comments Loading...
