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A seemingly innocuous comment about the behaviour of Iranian soccer fans during the 2018 World Cup has cost a BC video game company $60,000 after it told an employee who raised concerns about the comment that they were being oversensitive.

According to a July 8 BC Human Rights Tribunal decision, it wasn't the comment itself that led to the Tribunal ruling the company had discriminated against the computer programmer because he was from Iran, but a series of events afterwards where the company tried to get him to sign a document agreeing to a "reality check process" which he would follow before raising similar concerns.

The Tribunal ruled that the employee’s privacy interests outweighed the public interest in knowing his identity, so the employee's name and the name of the company weren't provided in the decision.

The decision said the computer programmer was from Iran and working for the video game company while the 2018 World Cup took place.

During the World Cup the night before a match between Iran and Portugal, some Iranian fans gathered outside the Portugal team's hotel and made noise to disturb the players in the hope it would affect their game.

The following day the match was on in the lounge at the offices of the video game company and the programmer's supervisor said that the Iranian fans' behaviour was "kind of cheating."

The company's president then emailed everyone at the company saying the Iranian fans’ tactics had "almost worked." The game ended in a 1-1 draw.

"(The) employee felt uncomfortable in response to (the) supervisor’s and president’s comments (and) felt that the comments were negative ones about the Iranian fans, highlighting that they had done something that others might perceive as wrong," the decision said.

The computer programmer didn't think the comments were discriminatory but was uncomfortable enough that he raised them with his superiors.

The supervisor didn't understand why the programmer was uncomfortable because he didn't intend any harm to him personally and was just ridiculing the Iranian fans.

There was a misunderstanding as the two spoke about the issue and the conversation became heated. It led to the supervisor yelling, "I didn’t say your country is shit."

The decision said the supervisor didn't understand what he'd said to trigger the employee's hurt feelings.

"He was concerned that (the) employee appeared oversensitive to workplace comments that (the) supervisor believed were innocuous, and (the) employee’s concerns might impact others in the workplace," the Tribunal said.

The programmer emailed the company president saying he was irritated by people mentioning the Iran fans' behaviour.

"I think we should be more considerate of each other’s feelings," the email said.

The president told the supervisor to deal with the programmer's "oversensitivity" and to get him to agree to a "reality check process," which he would follow before he raised similar issues.

A draft document was drawn up, which underwent six changes over two months. The programmer never signed it.

The lengthy 30,000-word decision goes through a play-by-play of account of what happened next and how the company's behaviour was deemed discriminatory.

Email chains show that the company president said the other Iranian staff members weren't offended and repeated that the programmer was being "oversensitive."

The company tried to get the programmer to sign a document but in the process discriminated against the employee.

"The (company's) assumption that the employee had no legitimate basis for his concerns because other Iranian employees were not concerned, supports an inference that stereotypes informed how they treated the employee. (The) supervisor and the president, and the other leads immediately concluded that the employee was oversensitive compared to the other Iranian employees. This suggests that the president and the supervisor held underlying beliefs that an ideal Iranian employee, who did fit in at the company and in Canada, would have taken comments about the Iranian soccer fans in stride, and the employee did not fit that ideal," the Tribunal ruled.

"Treating someone as if they do not belong in Canada, or in their workplace, because of where they are from, may be an adverse impact on any employee no matter where they come from," the Tribunal said.

The Tribunal ruled the company treated him as if he didn't understand values like freedom of expression because he was from Iran.

"Despite having no intention to discriminate, the (company) reacted defensively because they did not understand the employee’s concerns or relate to his perspective," the Tribunal ruled.

After the programmer filed a human rights complaint, he was fired.

The Tribunal ruled the company had discriminated against him in fallout after the World Cup game and then fired him in retaliation.

The company argued he was part of company-wide layoffs as they were running at a loss, but the Tribunal didn't buy it.

The company president also argued the company shouldn't be responsible for the discrimination and that it lay with the supervisor. Again, the Tribunal dismissed the argument.

Ultimately, the Tribunal ordered the company to pay $26,000 in lost wages and $35,000 as compensation for injury to his dignity, feelings, and self-respect.

The decision said the supervisor has since left the company and argued it should pay his legal costs, saying the case was about "inferred exaggerations" and the programmer's "lack of emotional control." The Tribunal dismissed the argument.

Read the full decision here.

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