If I had to guess, Adria at least has a pretty easily won harassment lawsuit against SendGrid for this. She was fired for speaking out about an instance of sexually inappropriate humor while she was acting in a professional capacity. Um? Even if you think the way she spoke out was not appropriate, you can't fire someone for this without running some serious risks of large lawsuits.
For anyone who's curious, the texts I'm working off of are http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/retaliation.cfm and http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/facts-retal.cfm. It seems pretty clear that Adria is a covered individual and that an adverse action has been taken. SendGrid is almost certainly a covered entity. The remaining question is whether Adria has engaged in a protected activity and if that is what she was fired for.
The protected activity I think most closely matches what she did is, "Complaining to anyone about alleged discrimination against oneself or others." Now, in the case of this document, what they mean by alleged discrimination is any harassing behavior. But, I believe it is also typically only such behaviors by someone working at the covered entity. So the open question in my mind is whether the law covers adverse actions for complaints about harassment by third parties. I guess we'd have to ask a lawyer.
To the question of whether that is what she was fired for. If it isn't, it's quite a coincidence. I think it would be hard for SendGrid to convince a judge that she was fired for something other than her complaint.
It's retaliation if Adria filed a charge against SendGrid and then was fired.
"because they filed a charge of discrimination, because they complained to their employer or other covered entity about discrimination on the job, or because they participated in an employment discrimination proceeding"
Yeah, if this is a total statement of the law's provisions, then it is probable that this is not retaliation. However, if discrimination covers making complaints about the discriminatory behavior or harassment of third parties (i.e. the gentlemen she posted the picture of), then it would. I would be interested to find out.
For anyone who's curious, the texts I'm working off of are http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/retaliation.cfm and http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/facts-retal.cfm. It seems pretty clear that Adria is a covered individual and that an adverse action has been taken. SendGrid is almost certainly a covered entity. The remaining question is whether Adria has engaged in a protected activity and if that is what she was fired for.
The protected activity I think most closely matches what she did is, "Complaining to anyone about alleged discrimination against oneself or others." Now, in the case of this document, what they mean by alleged discrimination is any harassing behavior. But, I believe it is also typically only such behaviors by someone working at the covered entity. So the open question in my mind is whether the law covers adverse actions for complaints about harassment by third parties. I guess we'd have to ask a lawyer.
To the question of whether that is what she was fired for. If it isn't, it's quite a coincidence. I think it would be hard for SendGrid to convince a judge that she was fired for something other than her complaint.