Right now, things look to stand between a hijab and a hard place for Disney employee Imane Boudlal and the Walt Disney Co.
You can have a six-foot mouse in red shorts, a duck with a sailor hat and dwarves in multi-colored headgarb, but, according to a complaint filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Disney doesn’t want its female Muslim employees wearing their hijab anywhere visitors can see.
Boudlal, who has worked for as a restaurant hostess at Disneyland’s Grand California Hotel for two years, told the media and other onlookers Wednesday that things came to a head when the 26-year old showed up for work at the Storytellers Café on Aug. 15 wearing the religious headdress in a sign of modesty in observance of Ramadan.
The holiest month in the Islamic calendar began Aug. 11 this year and runs to Sept. 9. Boudlal says when she arrived at Disney on Sunday she was told to take the hijab off, work out of sight or go home. Choosing the latter and getting the same response the following two days when she reported for work, Boudlal sought and received the support of her union and Muslim groups and took her action to the federal government.
According to Ameena Qazi, a Council on American-Islamic Relations attorney providing Boudlal with legal representation told the AP, the Moroccan-born Disney employee only recently became aware that she had a right to wear the hijab while studying to take her U.S. citizenship examination.
After that discovery, Boudlal approached Disney with her desire to wear her hijab in June. She claims she was told the company would find a way to accommodate her. Boudlal’s representatives say the employee was in fact fitted earlier in the summer for a headdress that melded well with her Disney uniform but that she has not been provided with a final version.
A Disney spokesperson says the company “values diversity and has a long-standing policy against discrimination of any kind” but, long story short, Boudlal’s hijab is no Mickey Mouse ears.
“Typically, somebody in an on-stage position like hers wouldn’t wear something like that, that’s not part of the costume,” Disney’s Suzi Brown said in a statement. “We were trying to accommodate her with a backstage position that would allow her to work. We gave her a couple of different options and she chose not to take those and to go home.”
In 2004, Disney settled out of court with another female employee over a similar hijab matter. According to reports, that employee did not return to work at the media giant.
