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30 Santa Clara L. Rev. 951 (1990)
Employment Discrimination against Overweight Individuals: Should Obesity be a Protected Classification

handle is hein.journals/saclr30 and id is 967 raw text is: COMMENTS EMPLOYMENT DISCRIMINATION AGAINST OVERWEIGHT INDIVIDUALS: SHOULD OBESrrY BE A PROTECTED CLASSIFICATION? I. INTRODUCTION Consider that you have just completed an employment related' interview. Your qualifications are equal to, or better than, any other applicant. The only difference between you and the other candidates is that you are obese.' What are your chances of obtaining this job? What should they be?3 There are three viewpoints from which to analyze the protection of obese individuals from employment related discrimination. The first category includes those individuals who are handicapped or disabled because they are obese and they also have a related medical condition.4 Much of the litigation surrounding discrimination based on obesity at- tempts to classify obesity as a handicap. These litigants gener- ally bring suit under federal or state laws that protect handi- capped or disabled individuals from employment discrimina- tion based on the handicap. Since most of these obese per- sons had a medical condition related to their obesity, they fell within a handicap statute more easily than if they had not suffered from a related medical condition. The second viewpoint considers those individuals who do not have a related medical condition but claim that they are handicapped on the basis of their obesity alone.5 These indi- © 1990 Donald L. Bierman, Jr. 1. For purposes of this comment, employment related includes interviews or consideration for new employment, promotion or transfer. 2. See infra notes 32-48 and accompanying text. 3. Discrimination based on obesity is regularly becoming more publicized and being brought before the general public. This was evidenced by tile fact that it was the subject of an episode of LA Law. LA Law: Beauty and Obese (NBC television broadcast, Feb. 11, 1988) (Production number 5K13). 4. See infra notes 71-80 and accompanying text. 5. See infra notes 81-104 and accompanying text.