A Toronto woman denied a haircut by a men’s barber shop has taken her complaint to the Ontario Human Rights Commission.
Last June, Faith McGregor, 35, walked into the Terminal Barber Shop in downtown Toronto to get a haircut since her regular barber in Kensington Market was on vacation. She wanted a men's cut: short on the sides with a trim on the top.
But Terminal Barber Shop, which have been a fixture at Bay and Dundas streets since 1925, told her the barbers are Muslim and don’t cut women’s hair.
“It was in shock,” McGregor told CityNews. “My initial reaction and what I had said [to them] was I thought it was sexist.”
The owners of Terminal Barber Shop told CityNews they denied McGregor a haircut not because of her gender but because of their faith, which prohibits them from touching a woman who’s not a family member.
McGregor was later directed to the Ontario Human Rights Commission website by a friend, and has since filed a complaint for being discriminated against.
“It’s going to be interesting to see how the human rights tribunal deals with this case,” she said.
One lawyer, Selwyn Pieters, believes McGregor has a good chance of winning.
“This is a case where gender is pitted against religion,” he told CityNews. “One cannot deny services in Ontario based on religious grounds in the manner in which the barber shop did.”
It’s prohibited in the Charter and in the human rights code, he said.
I hope that **** is written on their walls cause this is
I can't wait till they start denying touching "effeminate" males because their religions don't agree with homosexuality. Think people, it's a business not a church LOL. I do agree though she should have found another barber shop.
All this for a ****ing haircut! Yeah, she shouldn't have been rejected but c'mon, grow a pair and get on with it instead of complaining to the human rights board, i think they have better things to do. Ugh.
That is a prime example of doing the most. Death at her automatically pulling the sexist card and completely disregarding these people's faiths.
It isn't even her regular Barber, those people have been there doing business for almost a hundred years, and she decides to waltz in and cause a mess, when she could have just went somewhere else. People will do anything for a little attention.
