NYC sues Hasidic stores over “modest dress required” signs

“Exhibiting a complete lack of common sense, the city’s Human Rights Commission is determined to take seven Hasidic-owned stores in Brooklyn to trial for the high crime of requiring modest dress of their customers.” Signs the HRC deems “discriminatory” include “No Shorts, No Barefoot, No Sleeveless, No Low Cut Necklines Allowed.” [editorial, New York Post] But shops catering to a secular clientele routinely post demands that their customers button up: no shirt/socks/shoes, no service, business attire only, and so forth. “Which means the city is targeting the Hasidic stores because of religion!” [Ann Althouse]

4 Comments

  • The irony here is that the Human Rights Commission is violating the “human rights” of the Hasidic shopkeepers … This episode also raises a larger question: Does New York City even need such a commission?

  • I don’t think it’s too unreasonable for a business owner to have a dress code. What about restaurants and clubs with dress codes?

  • One did not have to be Nostradamus to see where “public accommodation” laws would end up…once government begins infringing on property rights, it ends in the absurd.

  • Friggin absurd. Waste of tax payers money. Lets the store owners do as they please!