Stalinist journalist Claud Cockburn famously said, “never believe anything until it has been officially denied.”
That adage could prove useful now that New York Times lawyers are denying virtually every allegation in an ex-employee’s race and gender discrimination lawsuit.
In her federal complaint, first reported by the Daily Caller, 51-year-old Tracy Quitasol charges that a top Times executive purged dozens of older workers of color and fired her for complaining about a male underling’s sexist behavior.
Virtually everyone ousted by Meredith Kopit Levien, now the New York Times Company chief revenue officer, was replaced by younger whites, Quitasol alleges.
But Times spokeswoman Eileen Murphy told New York Post media columnist Keith Kelly that Quitasol’s allegations were “malicious and false” and she was fired “for cause.”
Touchy, touchy.
Employers almost never comment on discrimination lawsuits. But it seems that the Times mouthed off about Quitasol because she fingered one of their top people.
In new court papers, The New York Times basically repeats Murphy’s line.
The paper’s attorneys denied almost every allegation in the complaint, including the charge that, as advertising vice president, Levien singled out older advertising department employees for dismissal at a meeting attended by Times managers and Quitasol.
That denial is curious because Capital New York reported last year that about 40 senior employees left the department after Levien took over in 2013.
Somebody is not telling the truth.
The Times also denies Quitasol’s claim that virtually all the older employees of color pushed out the door were replaced with younger whites.
How about some proof?
The Times is consumed by a veritable diversity fetish, so how “diverse” is the paper’s advertising department? Is it short on melanin, like Quitasol, who is Asian-American, alleges?
Spokeswoman Murphy told The Daily Caller that, “we do not intend to litigate the details of the case in the press.”
That’s rich: The New York Times does not talk to the press about their own workforce?
They just publish articles lambasting everybody and everything–from national parks to mortgage bankers–for insufficient “diversity?”
Quotas for thee, but not for me?
The lawsuit is slated for mandatory mediation.