Opinion ID: 170111
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Incivility in the Department Meeting

Text: Appellants indicate that they were both offended by comments and actions of various individuals at a department meeting in late February 2003. Appellants claim that they were subjected to extreme public humiliation. Aplt. Br. at 24. This meeting concerned hiring decisions within the department. Appellant Bornstein-Gómez described the humiliation in her deposition as individuals rolling their eyes and laughing at her opinion on the proper standards for making decisions. Aplt.App. 403. Appellant Somoza testified similarly, indicating that he was laughed at, snickered at, and individuals made comments to one another while he spoke at the meeting. Appellants also contend that they endured continued hostility by other individuals. Conduct such as this, if pervasive enough, may in fact rise to the level of a materially adverse action. Medina v. Income Support Div., New Mexico, 413 F.3d 1131, 1136 (10th Cir.2005) (citing Gunnell v. Utah Valley State College, 152 F.3d 1253, 1264 (10th Cir.1998)). However, our precedent tempers this by holding that unruly behavior during a meeting and derogatory e-mails are unlikely to deter a reasonable employee from making a charge of discrimination. Mickelson v. New York Lift Ins. Co., 460 F.3d 1304, 1318 (10th Cir.2006) (citing Burlington Northern). Moreover, the Supreme Court cited the EEOC manual in Burlington Northern when it reasoned that a lack of good manners will not create such deterrence necessary to constitute material adverse action capable of dissuading a reasonable employee from making a complaint about discrimination. Burlington Northern, 126 S.Ct. at 2415 (citing 2 EEOC 1998 Manual § 8, p. 8-13) (internal quotation marks omitted). [2] Therefore, without more, Appellants have not thereby met the standard of the second prong to this point.