Unintentional discrimination or disparate-impact occurs when a protected group of people is adversely affected by an employer’s practices, procedures, or tests, even though they do not appear to be discriminatory. Lyle’s claim of racial discrimination would fall under this due to the fact the the scriptwriters were unaware that Lyle found their words offensive. In their minds, they were just doing their job of writing a script for a television show that did include this adult humor. Lyle was not intentionally discriminated against because she was given the job initially.

Amaani Lyle cannot show prima facie in this case. In order to show this, she must meet and prove the following:
She is a member of the protected class.
She applied and was qualified for the job in question.
She was rejected by the employer.
The employer continued to seek applicants for the position or filled the position with a person not in the protected class.

She in this case can only prove one of these four requirements which is that she is a member of a protected class. Amaani was given the job because she claimed she was qualified.

The fact that it was later discovered that Lyle could only type fifty words per minute, would have a huge impact on her case. She was hired under the false idea that she could type eighty words per minute. She applied and was hired for a job that she was not in fact qualified for which led to her termination. Lyle was fired because she could not type fast enough. She claimed her termination was based on racial discrimination but it was because of her lack of typing skills.

The defense the employer could assert discussed in this chapter would be business necessity. The writers claim that their behavior was essential to the creative process of writing for Friends because the television show contained sexual innuendos and adult humor. Warner Brothers