A former employee of Meta has taken legal action against the company for incidents of sexual harassment, gender discrimination, and retaliation, as detailed in a lawsuit filed this week in Washington State.
Kelly Stonelake, who dedicated 15 years to Meta and achieved the position of director, claims in her lawsuit that she endured a continuous pattern of gender-based harassment and discrimination from shortly after her recruitment in 2009 until her dismissal in January 2024.
In her complaint, she asserts that Meta ignored her reports of sexual harassment and assault, retaliated against her after she identified a video game product as potentially harmful and racist, and frequently overlooked her for promotions in favor of her male colleagues.
At the time of her termination, Stonelake states that she was on extended medical leave due to post-traumatic stress disorder. The alleged hostile work environment at Meta significantly impacted her mental health, necessitating ongoing medical treatment, according to the lawsuit submitted to the King County Superior Court in Washington.
A spokesperson for Meta, Tracy Clayton, opted not to comment, citing the ongoing legal proceedings.
This lawsuit emerges during a period of transformation for Meta and its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, which seems to be aligning more closely with right-wing politics. Zuckerberg was seen behind President Trump during the latter’s inauguration, appointed UFC president Dana White, who has ties to Trump, to Meta’s board, and has started recruiting public policy staff from conservative news organizations.
Moreover, Meta has dismantled third-party fact-checking initiatives and ceased its significant diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, a move that reflects Trump’s policies. In another instance, Zuckerberg voiced on Joe Rogan’s podcast that businesses required “masculine energy,” suggesting that an excess of “feminine energy” made workplaces less effective. Currently, around 90% of CEOs in Fortune 500 companies are men.
Stonelake expressed alongside her attorney that the experiences described in her lawsuit highlight a broader issue of abuse within Meta.
“I made the decision to file this lawsuit when I recognized it was likely the most effective, if not the only, way to hold Meta accountable,” she shared with TechCrunch. “Meta holds the potential to inflict harm on a scale that only tech giants can.”
“It was meant to be the environment where we could unwind”
Stonelake joined Facebook in 2009, at a time when features like the “like” button and “tagging” friends were relatively new concepts. The company was yet to go public and had not yet been dramatized in the film “The Social Network.”
She was based in the Palo Alto office, collaborating with older male colleagues to create pathways for businesses to leverage Facebook, as per her account and legal complaint.
Stonelake claims the incidents of sexual harassment began almost immediately upon her hiring.
Within her initial weeks on the job, Stonelake reports in the lawsuit that a colleague groped her during a company event referred to as the “League.”
The League was a well-liked gathering for employees to socialize amidst their demanding work schedules. High-profile individuals such as Zuckerberg and former COO Sheryl Sandberg often participated, according to Stonelake.
“I frequently played beer pong with Sheryl [Sandberg],” Stonelake recounted to TechCrunch. “It was intended to be a space for us to unwind since everyone was working so hard.”
Through a spokesperson, Sandberg refrained from commenting.
Stonelake recalled her shock when her colleague touched her inappropriately, yet she hesitated to report the incident to Facebook’s HR department.
“I believe that is a common experience for women, particularly younger women,” Stonelake commented. “A large part of that comes from past experiences where reporting such incidents did not lead to any improvement.”
Despite this, Stonelake chose to stay with the company, motivated by Zuckerberg’s vision for a more interconnected world. However, she alleges that she soon encountered sexual harassment from her manager.
During a business trip in 2011, she alleges in her lawsuit that her manager took her to dinner and then led her to her hotel room, where he attempted to force himself on her, putting his hands down her pants. In the lawsuit, she claims that this same manager later told her she would lose a potential promotion unless she slept with him. After refusing his advances, she was not promoted.
Stonelake asserts the harassment persisted, prompting her to transfer to Seattle from Palo Alto in 2012. She reported her manager’s misconduct before the move, yet no actions were taken, and he remained employed by the company for years without repercussions, according to the lawsuit.
Promotion postponed, promotion denied
After relocating to Seattle, Stonelake steadily advanced in her career, achieving the director position in 2017. In this new role, she alleges that her manager continued to harass and discriminate against her, repeating the cycle she had hoped to escape.
In her lawsuit, she discusses an incident during the Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests in 2020, where she confronted her manager for changing his Facebook profile picture to a Blue Lives Matter symbol, which is often perceived as a counter to BLM. She pointed out the potential negative impact this could have on their diverse team, noting that Meta views employees’ personal Facebook pages as reflections of the company.
“As senior leaders, we are explicitly told to consider our personal Facebook pages’ implications,” Stonelake informed TechCrunch.
In response, her manager allegedly remarked, “Black boys start out innocent, but between that and getting shot by police, they end up in gangs and resort to crime, with the real issues stemming from social services and education,” as stated in the lawsuit.
Stonelake reported this to Meta’s HR department but claims she received no assistance. The lawsuit contends that she was overlooked for promotions twice while her male colleagues advanced.
“We lacked a plan for ensuring safety”
In 2022, Stonelake transitioned to Meta’s Reality Labs to spearhead product marketing for the virtual reality social network, Horizon Worlds. She expressed to TechCrunch her excitement over participating in a crucial product within Zuckerberg’s envisioned metaverse.
Stonelake asserts she developed strategies to bring Horizon Worlds to wider audiences, which included enabling access for teenagers, tapping into international markets, and accommodating mobile devices.
However, as she took the lead in rolling out this product, Stonelake raised concerns regarding Horizon Worlds’ insufficient safety mechanisms to prevent underage users from accessing the platform. She also pointed out troubling patterns of racist behavior occurring on the app, exacerbated by a lack of effective content moderation.
“The leadership team was made aware that one test revealed that it took an average of 34 seconds after entering the platform for users with Black avatars to experience racial slurs like the ‘N-word’ and ‘monkey,’” the lawsuit claims.
“We were rapidly expanding yet lacked a strategy to ensure user safety,” Stonelake told TechCrunch.
Following her concerns, Stonelake states she was kept out of weekly leadership meetings. Subsequently, she was again denied a promotion in January 2023.
Afterward, Stonelake had to go on emergency medical leave to seek treatment for suicidal thoughts and post-traumatic stress disorder, as stated in her lawsuit. She was later informed that she would be laid off in January 2024 during widespread layoffs at Meta.
Reflecting on her years at Meta, Stonelake recalls the sense of pride she felt watching Zuckerberg march alongside LGBTQ+ employees and supporters at San Francisco’s Pride celebrations in 2013. She felt empowered by Zuckerberg’s Harvard commencement speech in 2017, where he stated: “Every generation broadens the circle of individuals we consider ‘one of us.’ For us, it now includes the entire world.”
Now, Stonelake contends that such actions may have been merely superficial.
“I believed that as I advanced and gained more responsibility, I would be able to advocate for others and instigate cultural change,” said Stonelake. “However, my experience revealed that as I moved up, so too did the seniority of my peers, and I noticed a decline in tolerance among higher-ranking men when faced with challenges.”
Compiled by Techarena.au.
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