Sony Sexism Class Action Gains 8 More Plaintiffs

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Sony Sexism Class Action Lawsuit Overview:

• Who: Nine current and former employees at Sony are suing the company, alleging the company discriminated against women at an institutional level.
• Why: The plaintiffs claim women were passed over for promotions and faced sexual harrassment and discrimination based on gender stereotypes.
• Where: The class action lawsuit was filed in a California federal court.

Nine current and former Sony employees are suing for gender discrimination, saying the company has a culture of sexism that reaches the highest levels.

On Mar. 15, eight additional women joined the class action lawsuit against Sony originally filed by former PlayStation IT security analyst Emma Majo in November 2021. 

In Majo’s original complaint, she alleges she was fired after speaking up about gender bias at the company. Majo said her contract was terminated soon after she filed a signed statement to her employer detailing the sexism she had experienced at Sony.

Majo alleged her managers would not be in a room with her unless the door was open, that they would not speak to her if a male colleague was present and that she had to relay messages to her managers through male interns who were subordinate to her. 

She was not granted any sort of promotion in six years despite repeatedly asking for guidance on how to achieve it. 

Sony filed a motion to dismiss in February, which stated Majo’s claims were too vague and that it could not stand as a class action as no other women backed up her allegations, Yahoo Finance reports. However, the addition of eight other plaintiffs is likely to strengthen her case. 

The new plaintiffs are current and former employees of Sony.

Sony Employees Allege Systemic Sexism Against Females

Plaintiff Marie Harrington worked at Sony for 17 years. She said women were overlooked for promotions and that, during annual review sessions, Sony Interactive Entertainment engineering leaders rarely discussed female employees as potential “high performers.” 

She alleged that in an April 2019 annual review session, only four of 70 employees under review were female, and while all the men in the group were marked as high performers, only two of the women were. 

“Further, when two of the females were discussed, managers spent time discussing the fact that they have families,” Harrington’s statement reads. “Family status was never discussed for any males.”

Harrington said, when she left Sony, she told the director of HR the reason she was leaving was “systemic sexism against females.” 

“The Director of HR simply said, ‘I understand.’ She did not ask for any more information. I had spoken with the Director of HR many times before about sexism against females,” Harrington said.

Sony’s request for dismissal will be heard in April. 

The news comes as Riot Games recently agreed to a $100 million settlement to resolve claims that the game developer’s workplace was filled with system gender discrimination and harassment against female employees and temporary agency contractors.

Sony is also facing a class action lawsuit alleging the company sold PS5 controllers containing a manufacturing defect.

What do you think of the allegations of gender bias in this case? Let us know in the comments! 

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