Posted on 04/26/2009 11:26:11 AM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
A BRITISH air stewardess was sacked for refusing to fly to Saudi Arabia after she was ordered to wear a traditional Islamic robe and walk behind male colleagues.
Lisa Ashton, a £15,000-a-year stewardess with BMI, was told that in public areas in Saudi Arabia she was required to wear a black robe, known as an abaya. This covers everything but the face, feet and hands. She was told to follow her male colleagues, irrespective of rank.
Ashton, 37, who was worried about security in the country, refused to fly there, claiming the instructions were discriminatory. She was sacked last April.
“It’s not the law that you have to walk behind men in Saudi Arabia, or that you have to wear an abaya, and I’m not going to be treated as a second-class citizen,” Ashton said last week.
“It’s outrageous. I’m a proud Englishwoman and I don’t want these restrictions placed on myself.”
Saudi experts and companies that recruit women to work in the country say it is a “myth” that western women are required to walk behind men. There is no requirement for them to wear the abaya in public, though many do.
Earlier this year an employment tribunal in Manchester ruled that BMI was justified in imposing “rules of a different culture” on staff and cleared it of sexual discrimination. Ashton has consulted Liberty, the human rights organisation, and may seek a judicial review of the decision.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
ping
I am reading this and can't help but think that a little bit of the old British empire lives within this woman. Queen Victoria would be proud.
Yeah, but bureaucrats in Britain are craven wusses anyway.
Kudos to this woman. Integrity rocks.
What is wrong with the people who claim to run these companies? Profit is more important than individual rights.
I hope this lady sues them for millions.
These Kowtowing cowards at British Air, have no right, forcing british citizens to succumb to the culture or “Laws” of these Barbarian Herdsmen.
its an outrage.
BMI wanted to force this woman into subjugation
She's better off without them, but I hope she wins whatever appeal she files and lives happily ever after with a big chunk of BMI's money.
Good for her. At least she’s kept her self-respect, unlike the owners of that stupid airline.
The only pleasure one can take in the Left’s destruction of western culture is that its most enthusiastic supporters—feminists, gays, minority race-baiters—are not going to fare well under what comes after. Not well at all.
Good for her.
Thats whats so insane about them... the very ones they cheer on to destroy our civilization will eradicate them...
Female employees of our American corporation and wives of employees were required to follow similar rules in Kuwait (in public places) when they were working there some ten to twelve years ago.
It was their insistence that she belly dance that crossed the line.
Perhaps, as has been the case in the past — the Brits are overrun with homosexuals.... Too many of their real men were lost in the wars....
This would explain much of their demeaning of woman, and their cowardly support of Islamist “traditions”......
It is no secret that homosexuality is even MORE widespread in Arab “culture”..... Much to the relief of the sheep.
Bureaucrats everywhere are craven wusses!
I think she was a bit bloody cheeky and they wanted to get rid of her. Can’t have a proud Englishwoman working around other women, you know. Might cause some Saudi Woman to demand women’s rights.
BCLU?
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