SDG&E Worker Fired Over Alleged Racist Gesture Says He Was Cracking Knuckles
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
It all started about two weeks ago near a Black Lives Matter rally in Poway when Emmanuel Cafferty, a San Diego Gas and Electric employee, encountered a stranger on the roadway.
The stranger followed Cafferty and took a picture of him as his arm hung out the window of his company truck.
The picture made the rounds on Twitter accompanied by a claim Cafferty was making a "white power" hand gesture made popular by white supremacists groups.
According to the Anti-Defamation League, the gesture -- made by forming a circle with the thumb and index finger, and extending and separating the other three fingers -- has been used in recent years by white supremacists to form the letters W and P, but has also long been used as a sign signifying "OK" or approval. Therefore it shouldn't be assumed to be a white supremacy symbol unless there is other evidence to support those claims, according to the ADL.
Cafferty claims he was just cracking his knuckles.
Soon after the encounter, a supervisor of Cafferty's told him he was suspended and that further action may be taken after an investigation. A few days later, he says he was fired.
Cafferty maintains he was unaware of the hand gesture until the whole controversy started.
"When my supervisor said that I was being accused of doing a white supremacist gesture, that was baffling," Cafferty told NBC 7 on Monday.
"I don't know how long it's going to take me to get over this, but to lose your dream job for playing with your fingers, that's a hard pill to swallow," Cafferty said.
A now-deleted photo posted on Twitter of Emmanuel Cafferty.
Cafferty is Mexican American and says he comes from a diverse family of all races. He says he's proud of SDG&E for taking any allegations of racism seriously, but he wants his job back.
SDG&E said in a statement: "We hold all SDG&E employees to a high standard and expect them to live up to our values every day. We conducted a good faith and thorough investigation that included gathering relevant information and multiple interviews, and took appropriate action."
NBC 7 spoke to the man who originally posted the picture on Twitter. He has since deleted his account and said he may have gotten "spun up" about the interaction and misinterpreted it. He says he never intended for Cafferty to lose his job.
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The left wingers really need to keep this up until November. We all know how posters here get triggered by fingers...
Where is the resident White power hand signal identifier at? Is this even the proper way to do it?
If I were him, I would sue to get the job back.
He's not even doing the "OK" sign. The wrong fingers are touching.
I am a knuckle cracker from way back but I have never done it in the manner described. I just tried it as described and was able to crack my index finger, but that was about it.
Good for you, I guess that is all the proof we needed that a Mexican American is in all actuality a White Supremacist. I guess the article pointing out that the PC culture has run amok went right over your head while you were trying to crack your knuckles. BTW I can crack all my knuckles just by making a fist.
I used to be able to do that too but my hands have lost strength over the years. As far as your proof...Foxtrot Yankee Papa.
AOC Does It !
It's OKAY !
Where's the outrage ? She's obviously a racist.
Depends on the person I suppose.
I know my eyesight isn’t what it used to be but it seems to me that he is touching his pinky and thumb together in the photo.
IMO, The man who took the picture deleted his account because he knows he was full of shit and got a man fired for no reason.
There's a lot of prejudice in the world and people of all colors sometimes dislike others for a variety of reasons but after seeing and hearing this guy only a fool would think he supports "White Supremacy" in any way, shape, or form.
Lol .... a Mexican American White Supremacist.
Now there is some seriously funny stuff there.
Much funnier when Chappelle does it.
One of my favorites
I miss that show ...... I"M RICK JAMES BITCH!
One of my favorites was the Prince basketball game. He made them pancakes after beating them.
Yes. So many one liners from just that one episode.
Yeah, the True Hollywood Stories of Charlie Murphy. We probably watch those once every two months at my house. I have a teenaged son that will belt out an "I'm Rick James" at very appropriate inappropriate times...or F' yo couch. I wish Chappelle and Comedy Central could have made it work. We all lost on that deal.
We sure did. That show always left my side hurt from laughing so much.
I didn’t rub my dirty shoes on Eddie Murphy‘s couch... a sec later... yes I wiped my dirty shoes on his couch, he can afford a new one. Then they pummeled his legs and he crawled away.
This is terrible. This outrage hysteria has got to stop.
Maybe the company found something else out that wasn't so good. It does say that they investigated the situation.
I don't believe them. Corporate executive bureaucracies are so full of shit when it comes to this stuff. They are more worried about public perception than anything, and when it comes issues that upset the most vocal and extreme elements of the political left, they panic immediately.
Lest they be attacked - even for a moment - on social media, they immediately move to fire anyone who has offended someone, no matter how unfair their knee-jerk reaction might be. The employee is expendable compared to the company's reputation.
They can claim they conducted a thorough investigation, but being a private company, they will never be required to prove it to the public.
Apparently I better be careful when loosening my aching arthritis ridden fingers while in the presence of over-sensitive PC police.
Or Scuba Diving giving the "OK" signal.
I've always wanted to go SCUBA diving. I ALMOST convinced my husband into going, but the moment that the SCUBA instructor said something about how beautiful it is to watch the hammerhead sharks from below them... my husband was done and wouldn't even let me do it either.
He and I had only been married a few months and our son was an infant; we were on our honeymoon. He told me that I was lucky that I had convinced him to go snorkeling. He's deathly afraid of the water. If the Caribbean sea was merky, he'd have never gone snorkeling either. Now that we've been married for 11.5 years, he might let me go alone. 
Just kidding... I'll have to wait until I'm a widow and go SCUBA diving. 