Six Flags Great Adventure sued for pat downs and revoked membership by women wearing hijabs
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A mother and daughter from Staten Island have filed a lawsuit against Six Flags Great Adventure in Ocean County, claiming they were discriminated against for wearing hijabs and ultimately lost their membership to the theme park when they complained. After placing their phones in lockers, the two waited on a line for the Jersey Devil Coaster ride and were immediately questioned several times by ride attendants regarding what was in their pockets, states the suit. The suit says the mother told an attendant that she and her daughter only had their membership cards in their pockets. They were patted down anyway, which caused the daughter to cry, according to the suit.
Read more from NJ.com.
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That ride op had to be a special kind of stupid to think it was OK to pat down anyone, let alone a woman. So much fail.
Jeff - Editor - CoasterBuzz.com - My Blog
A pat down? Really?! If some teenager puts their hands on me or anyone from my family to check for contraband before boarding a freakin roller coaster, there's going to be a problem.
Chris Baker
www.linkedin.com/in/chrisabaker
“Other guests who were not wearing hijabs were not being questioned regarding the content of their pockets,” the lawsuit says.
This particular statement is untrue. They interrogate everyone about the contents of their pockets at the entrance to Jersey Devil (as well as Kingda Ka, El Toro, and Joker). Normally they don't pat anyone down, but they will ask you to pat yourself down/squeeze your pockets.
Mr Six is correct. I've had them do it to me getting on El Toro. I didn't get a pat down, but I felt harassed for having Cargo Shorts. They kept having me pull the pockets out to show that there wasn't any in there.
I'm not going to deny what happened to the women. I could see that happening there. We let our season passes go the season before Jersey Devil opened since it was delayed. We still haven't been back to ride Jersey Devil, and not in a rush to return Because of how bad the experience is at Great Adventure.
We had talked about trying to go on a weekend early in the season to finally get to ride, but I'd much rather go to parks where it's a pleasure able experience.
I think its interesting how park experiences can vary. Our visit in October was pretty good overall experience, but our expectations were low because it's Six Flags. But operations wise, I was shocked at the fast dispatches on Nitro and Superman.
However that one thing that doesn't differ... I can attest to the strictness of Jersey Devil and loose articles. The person working the gate would not step aside and allow me to enter until I turned out my pockets on my shorts. I could see really anything happening there that could be interpreted as harassment.
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