Free Republic

A born-again Christian who was fired from South Tipperary County Council has been awarded €70,000 compensation after the Equality Tribunal found he was discriminated against over his religion. According to the council, John McAteer was dismissed after repeatedly failing to comply with senior staff members who told him to stop speaking about his faith to workers and members of the public during office hours. Mr McAteer said the tenets of his religion require him to speak to people about Jesus and share the Gospel with them. The complainant had been working as a civil engineer in the Clonmel Borough Council...

The business community in an Irish village has hit back at a cafe owner who has refused to serve "loud Americans". Peter Fitzgerald of Waterville, County Kerry, annoyed villagers when he posted a notice in his cafe banning coach parties and loud Americans. The story went viral on social media and was picked up by dozens of newspapers around the world. The village, however, has assured all, loud or not, of a warm welcome. Business people and residents took to the streets on Tuesday to send out a strong message to visitors. Albert Walsh, chairman of Waterville Business Association, said:...

The European Court of Justice has pointed the finger at unequal retirement plans between men and women in the French civil service. EurActiv France reports. According to a judgment by the ECJ (17 July), the French retirement system for civil servants is discriminating against men. “French rules on certain pension-related advantages granted to civil servants give rise to indirect discrimination on grounds of sex,” the court decided. […] French law states that if a civil servant has raised at least three children, he or she can benefit from early retirement. It also outlines “service credit advantages” to parents working in...

President Barack Obama's LGBT workplace discrimination order has revealed a rift among Democrats over whether religious freedom trumps gay rights. The Republican-controlled House of Representatives could exploit that rift by bringing the Senate-passed Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which has a religious exemption, to the floor for a vote. ENDA, which would ban workplace discrimination based upon sexual orientation and gender identity, was passed by the Senate in November with the support of 54 Democrats and 10 Republicans. The bill likely would not have passed if it had not contained a religious exemption. The exemption was a major point of contention during...

President Barack Obama issued an executive order Monday prohibiting workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity for federal contractors. What does this mean for Christian organizations that remain faithful to the biblical teaching on homosexual behavior? Here are two main points that those groups need to be aware of: First, the order only applies to government contractors and sub-contractors, it does not apply to groups that receive government grants. Most religious non-profits that provide services for the government do so through a government grant. They would not be affected. A grant recipient is awarded money for general purpose,...

President Barack Obama's executive order of July 21 has installed workplace rules forbidding the firing of gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender people by the federal government and federal contractors -- a key provision in the Employment Non-Discrimination Act languishing in Congress. The U.S. bishops have opposed the bill, known as ENDA, which was passed by the Senate last November but was never scheduled for a vote in the House. The bill has been introduced in almost every Congress since 1994. "Today's executive order is unprecedented and extreme and should be opposed," said Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore, chairman of...

Don Mullen: Why don’t America’s hotels provide hair products for black as well as white hair? Is there a way to get them to correct this “micro-aggression”? Jenée Desmond-Harris: Thanks for your question. I thought about the issue of hotel toiletries when I was writing the Race Manners column that answered the question, “Is Using Lotion a Black Thing?” In my opinion, the tiny moisturizer that most hotels provide is very clearly not designed for those who want or need to use it on their entire body (read: most black people). But off the top of my head, I’m not...

US policy regarding the UN picks who becomes US refugees. Christians are being refused refugee status and face persecution and many times certain death for their religious beliefs under the sharia, while whole Muslim communities are entering the US by the tens of thousands per month despite the fact that they face no religious persecution. It is horrifying that Afghan Christians are being refused refugee status by the UN and many Western nations, including Britain. The UN claims that Afghan Christians do not meet the criteria for refugees under Statute 6B of the UN High Commission of Refugees (UNHCR), which...

A federal appeals court panel ruled Tuesday that the University of Texas can continue using race as a factor in undergraduate admissions as a way of promoting diversity on campus, the latest in an ongoing case that made it to the U.S. Supreme Court last year only to be sent back to lower courts for further review. In a 2-1 ruling, judges from the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that barring the university from using race would ultimately lead to a less diverse student body in defiance of previous legal precedent that promoting diversity was an important part...

‘New analyses of the human genome establish that human evolution has been recent, copious and regional,” writes Nicholas Wade in his recently published book A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race and Human History. That sounds reasonable, and Wade, a science reporter and editor for many years at Nature and the New York Times, seems an unimpeachable source. But many well-meaning people will regard his words as provocative and even dangerous. For they fatally undermine the idea, widely shared by so-called progressives, that any apparent differences between groups of people are the product of nurture rather than nature, of social conditioning rather...

Whites in Zimbabwe can own businesses and urban apartments but not land, according to the country’s president, Robert Mugabe, who called for the removal of white farmers in a fiery speech to a group of supporters on Wednesday. “We say no to whites owning our land and they should go,” the 90 year-old Mugabe told the crowd, gathered in Mhangura, a farming village, according to the Christian Science Monitor. “They can own companies and apartments…but not the soil. It is ours and that message should ring loud and clear in Britain and the United States.” “Don’t be too kind to...

A major document by the Vatican has said that unjust discrimination against gay people needs to be avoided and that children of same-sex unions must be cared for as any other, but it still maintains opposition to same-sex couples adopting children and has affirmed traditional teachings on marriage. The Instrumentum Laboris is a result of Pope Francis' call in October 2013 for Roman Catholic bishops around the world to convene and discuss matters of family and the Christian faith. "On unions of persons of the same sex, the responses of the bishops' conferences refer to Church teaching. 'There are absolutely...

Joy Pullman entitles her excellent column on The Federalist this way: "Discrimination Is Healthy And Normal – Sex Confusion Is Not." She begins her piece by pointing out how the left has hijacked a perfectly good word and twisted its meaning: "Discrimination sounds so terrible. Shouldn't people with power stop it in every form? That sounds plausible, but like the other arguments offered by LGBTQ activists (when they offer arguments instead of appeals to emotion), it's wrong and hurtful." She goes on to point out that "non-discrimination" ordinances, which sound so constructive at first blush, are actually "anti-science, anti-reason, and...

Some Christian groups are worried that President Barack Obama's forthcoming executive order guaranteeing the protection of LGBT individuals from employment discrimination with businesses that have federal contracts may not have sufficient religious liberty protections. While the order has not yet been written up, concerns have been leveled by various individuals that the order might not include a religious exemption and would force faith-based groups to engage in hiring practices that are in opposition to the teachings of their faith. "The big question is: will the Executive Order drive out faith-based organizations out of federal contracting?" Stanley Carlson-Thies, founder and president...

Bowdoin College’s evangelical group will no longer be recognized by the college starting next fall. The New York Times reported Tuesday that the college is demanding that any student should be able to run for leadership for any student group, regardless of his or her religious beliefs, but the Bowdoin Christian Fellowship disagrees. “It would compromise our ability to be who we are as Christians if we can’t hold our leaders to some sort of doctrinal standard,” recent Bowdoin graduate and former leader of BCF Zackary Suhr told The Times. The incident at Bowdoin has occurred at many other colleges...

The New York Times today reports on a disturbing development at Bowdoin College: For 40 years, evangelicals at Bowdoin College have gathered periodically to study the Bible together, to pray and to worship. They are a tiny minority on the liberal arts college campus, but they have been a part of the school’s community, gathering in the chapel, the dining center, the dorms. After this summer, the Bowdoin Christian Fellowship will no longer be recognized by the college. Already, the college has disabled the electronic key cards of the group’s longtime volunteer advisers. … The students, who plan to meet...

Commenter Stephen B has offered a response to my previously published article concerning same sex marriage. Stephen writes, “Sorry Jonathan, but this is not a category error, and your objection doesn’t work. Here’s the comparison: White man marrying black woman / man marrying man. If you want to describe it in terms of ‘actions’ then the former is marrying someone of the opposite race; in the latter it is marrying someone of the same gender. If you want to describe it in terms of ‘behaviour’ then the former could be described as ‘being attracted to the opposite race’; in the...

First Lady Michelle Obama has agreed to sponsor a future submarine named after her home state that will be staffed by an all-female crew. The White House has announced that Mrs Obama has accepted an invitation to be the backer of the USS Illinois, a Virginia-class submarine being built in Groton, Connecticut, and Newport News, Virginia. The new nuclear-powered boat is expected to join the fleet in late 2015.

The sense's ability to discriminate differences serves us daily; it saves lives. When approaching an intersection, the color of the traffic light lets you know whether to stop or continue. Whether you admit it or not, your ability to discriminate differences between people you encounter can also serve you well. In its extreme, discrimination of difference has also resulted in bigotry and the holocaust that killed millions. That's why Mark Cuban's candid comments on racial discrimination in an Inc magazine interview are both courageous and important in this time of division and rampant political correctness. In measured tones, he observed:...

In the sixth year of the presidency of an African-American, and long after Jesse Jackson, Sr. is considered relevant to anything, Silicon Valley's biggest companies are rushing in to resuscitate his career as tribute artist. Jackson once again has resorted to his anachronistic but apparently still effective playbook. He issues an ultimatum for more "diversity." As he sees it, the company has a choice: 1) expand hiring, marketing and other activities in ways that favor nonwhites; or 2) get ready for a boycott, picketing, a lawsuit or other bad publicity, even though it has been years since he has...

A lawsuit alleging that the IRS discriminates against pro-Israel groups will be allowed to move forward, a federal judge ruled this week in Washington, D.C. The IRS has been fighting to quash the lawsuit filed in 2009 by pro-Israel group Z Street, claiming the court does not have jurisdiction to hear the matter. However, Judge Ketanje Brown Jackson rejected the agency’s request to dismiss the case on Wednesday and ordered the IRS to respond to Z Street’s complaint within the next 30 days. Z Street says its constitutional rights were violated by an IRS policy that allegedly singles pro-Israel groups...

- FrontPage Magazine - http://www.frontpagemag.com - Canada On Verge of Banning Christians from Professional LifePosted By Lea Singh On May 30, 2014 @ 12:15 am In Daily Mailer,FrontPage | No Comments An intense struggle is happening in the realm of professional licensing in Canada. The religious freedom of Christians and others is colliding on a grand scale with the “equality rights” of the LGBTQ identity group, and as the tide turns in favor of equality rights, we are starting to witness socially accepted ostracism of Christians by professional bodies.On April 24th, the law society of Canada’s largest province voted against...

Google Finally Discloses Its Data On Diversity, And The Numbers Aren't Great Karyne LevyMay 28, 2014, 7:05 PM Google today released a report that details the ethnic and gender makeup of its employees. Until now, Google — as well as other companies in the Silicon Valley — had been reluctant to show diversity numbers. And after seeing the report, it's easy to see why. The company also shared even more numbers with PBS NewsHour: Women account for only 21% of the top positions in the company, which has just under 50,000 employees. Google announced that it was going to release...

What would you think if your 8-year-old came home and told you that “white privilege is something that white people have, meaning they have an advantage in a lot of things and they can get a job more easily”? You would have heard that at the recent 15th annual White Privilege Conference in Madison, Wisconsin, attended by 2,500 public-school teachers, administrators and students from across the nation (http://tinyurl.com/lkoqj9b).The average parent has no idea of the devious indoctrination going on in classrooms in many public schools. What follows are some of the lessons of the conference.In one of the workshops, “Examining...

The number of careers and professions available to practicing Christians is shrinking by the day. You can add a career in public health to that list. Dr. Brendan Bain, one of the leading AIDS experts in the Caribbean, has been unceremoniously cashiered from his post for having the temerity to tell the truth about the cause of AIDS. A long-time and highly respected professor at the University of West Indies until his retirement in 2012, Dr. Bain was praised by all as a "pioneer” in the effort to combat HIV/AIDS, which is at epidemic proportions in Caribbean nations. Since his...

One government agency has decided that the results of employee ratings are too discriminatory, and eliminated the process entirely. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announced on Monday that it will now award all employees the highest rating regardless of performance reviews. The CFPB, which oversees transactions in the financial sector for the federal government, decided to no longer conduct employee reviews because there were just too many apparent “significant disparities” between the races, ages, and locations of its employees. According to American Banker, this new policy is set to cost over $5 million dollars, as it will now pay employees...

Bank accused of discrimination after telling Muslims they would escape overdraft charge of up to £80 a month Lloyds Bank has been accused of religious discrimination after offering free overdraft accounts to Muslims. The bank sent customers a booklet this month explaining new charges. While many will have to pay up to £80 a month if they go into the red, Muslims were told they would escape the charges. The document said: “We are removing the monthly overdraft management fee of £6 from our Islamic Account, Islamic Student Account and Islamic Graduate Account. So, if you use an unplanned overdraft...

A pro-life legal group is having to go to court to help the state of Arizona protect its law it passed to ban race-based abortions. Here’s the ironic rub: the NAACP filed a lawsuit against the bill, which stops abortions done specifically if the baby is African-American (or any other specific race or gender). It makes one wonder if the NAACP, which, for years has held a pro-abortion position and which recently won a court order to silence a black pro-life who was writing at LifeNews to expose it’s abortion advocacy, should be called the National Association for the Abortion...

A former employee of Magic Johnson says the basketball legend fired her for being seven minutes late to work — a delay she blames on his request for a turkey sandwich. Lanita Thomas filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court this week saying her dismissal over tardiness was actually a “pretext” for ageism. She is 45 years old.

An Indiana-based energy distribution group that operates in Ohio has informed the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) that the company will not hire homeschool graduates, a situation that may not only reflect discrimination, but also the possibility that, with a nationalized set of standards such as Common Core, homeschoolers could be shown the door when they apply for jobs in the future.

This week the US Supreme Court ruled 6-2 that voters in Michigan have the authority to outlaw racial discrimination in State University admissions. Justice Sonia Sotomayor castigated this decision calling it “a return to the Jim Crow era.” “It is simplistic thinking that discrimination can be ended just by ending it,” the Justice wrote. “It may take centuries of counterbalancing discrimination to even the scales of justice. The idea of letting people vote to end discrimination and negate decisions made by University experts elevates mob rule over reasoned judgment.” if you missed any of this week's other semi-news/semi-satire posts you...

Late yesterday afternoon, ACLJ filed a lawsuit on behalf of Brandon Jenkins against officials of The Community College of Baltimore County (CCBC) in Maryland for denying Brandon admission to its Radiation Therapy Program in part due to his expression of religious beliefs. As one faculty member explained to Brandon, on behalf of CCBC, the “field [of radiation therapy] is not the place for religion." Brandon first applied for admission to the Radiation Therapy Program in April 2013. He met the standards of a competitive candidate and scored the maximum points allowed during his observation. During the interview process, college officials asked Brandon,...

In a move with major legal implications, The California Supreme Court Advisory Committee on The Code of Judicial Ethics has proposed to classify the Boy Scouts as practicing “invidious discrimination” against gays, which would end the group’s exemption to anti-discriminatory ethics rules and would prohibit judges from being affiliated with the group. “The Committee’s invitation ignores the fact that the change also encompasses other youth organizations whose membership is limited on the basis of gender, e.g., the Girl Scouts, as well as the military, which continues to practice ‘discrimination’ on the basis of gender,” wrote Catherine Short, legal director of...

Check(list) your privilege.

The U.S. Department of Justice sued the Town of Oyster Bay and Town Supervisor John Venditto Thursday for allegedly discriminating against black people in two affordable housing programs -- one aimed at first-time buyers, the other at senior citizens. In a complaint filed in federal court in Central Islip, prosecutors said both programs violated the federal Fair Housing Act because preferences were given to residents, or their children, living in the town, which has few black residents. To ensure that black people were not discriminated against in the selection process, the town should have given equal treatment to prospective occupants...

Google wants public high school students, especially girls, to discover the magic of coding. Each eligible female student who completes our computer programming lesson will earn DonorsChoose.org credits for your classroom. [ ... ] You’ll receive a $100 DonorsChoose.org gift code for every female student who completes the course. When 4 or more female students complete it, we’ll email you an additional $500 gift code

“When women gained their equality, they lost their superiority.” ~ Unknown It’s nobody else’s danged business what an employer pays any employee, provided both parties have freely entered into the arrangement without force or fraud. Despite the unfortunately already existing abundance of passed legislation in this area, and especially despite much more actual and urgent problems facing our country, it’s really none of the government’s damned business at all–but of course the cultural Marxists in the Obama administration and the Democrat party are at it, full-force, again. Out comes the stale, overused Democrat media script bemoaning Republicans’ broad (pun intended)...

Under the heading “Brendan Eich steps down as CEO,” Mozilla has posted the following statement in the name of executive chairwoman Mitchell Baker. Eich has “stepped down” from his position at Mozilla days after his appointment, following the revelation that he contributed $1,000 to the campaign supporting the passage of Prop 8 in California six years ago. The Wall Street Journal covers the story here. Baker’s statement is must reading, though it requires some translation. It is not exactly straightforward. Using the mandatory shibboleths, the statement refers to a corporate culture of “diversity and inclusiveness.” If you’ve read 1984, you...

A man accused of causing a crash that killed a 22-year-old Miami Heat dancer in 2010 has been found guilty, but the verdict is being withheld while the court investigates allegations of juror misconduct.... At issue is whether the jury of six men made remarks about Careaga's gay lifestyle that could have influenced their decision...

It's a common for people in the acting, modeling and music industries to feel pressure to maintain a young appearance. Actors and actresses over 30 and 40 complain they cannot get roles. Now, all that anxiety is coming to Silicon Valley. In The New Republic, Noam Scheiber illustrates just how severely ageism plagues parts of the tech business in California. "Silicon Valley has become one of the most ageist places in America," Scheiber writes. Dr. Seth Matarasso, a plastic surgeon that administers Botox treatments in the Bay Area, told Scheiber that he frequently treats middle-aged Silicon Valley workers, saying the...

First Amendment enthusiasts are thrilled that Mike Adams, a criminology professor at the University of North Carolina-Wilmington, won his lawsuit against administrators who denied him a promotion because of his conservative, Christian views. Adams joined the university in 1993. He was an atheist at the time. By the year 2000, he had converted to Christianity and become an outspoken political conservative. He eventually wrote columns for Townhall.com. In 2006, he was denied a promotion. Administrators were retaliating against him for his conservative views, he claimed. The jury agreed. Adams’s lawyers said the victory is an important one for free speech...

New York City reached an historic settlement with the Vulcan Society of black firefighters, agreeing to pay $98 million in back pay and benefits to minority FDNY applicants without acknowledging intentional discrimination at the fire department.

Today, as most of you sit in your offices pretending to work while reading my column (thanks, by the way) I'll be taking the stand in federal court in a First Amendment lawsuit against my employer, UNC-Wilmington. The trial will be over in three days, thus ending a seven-year legal battle with important implications for academic freedom. Some have asked how the outcome of the trial will affect my work in the campus free speech movement. I'm writing this column in response to those inquiries. There are three possible outcomes to the trial this week in Greenville, NC. We could...

WASHINGTON – Errico Auricchio produced cheese with his family in Italy until he brought his trade to the United States more than 30 years ago. Now, the European Union is saying his cheese isn't authentic enough to carry a European name. As part of trade talks, the EU wants to ban the use of names like Parmesan, feta and Gorgonzola on cheese made in the United States. The argument is that the American-made cheeses are shadows of the original European varieties and cut into sales and identity of the European cheeses. Auricchio, president of Wisconsin-based BelGioioso Cheese Inc., says he...

OLYMPIA, Wash. -- An attempt to fight racism at a community college may have backfired. A group of employees at South Puget Sound Community College sent out an invitation to all 300 staffers. The "Staff, Faculty and Administrators of Color" encouraged employees to reply to the invitation to find out the confidential date and time of what was being called a "happy hour" to "build support and community" for people of color. The invite made it clear white people were not invited. The email read: "If you want to create space for white folks to meet and work on racism,...

This weekend I was listening to a talk radio show discussing the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), where the subject of “women’s rights” came up. Sirius XM radio host David Webb had a liberal and a conservative guest providing opposing perspectives on the purported pay disparity between men and women. While it has been conclusively discredited that, as of current, women are being paid less than men as a matter of systematic discrimination, what never ceases to amaze is how liberals continue to parrot the charge that this is indeed the case. It appears that no matter what evidence is...

As innocuous as they might seem, bakeries have been the center of controversy in America for some time. Oregon and Colorado bakers have been told recently that refusing to make a cake for a same-sex wedding is tantamount to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and therefore punishable by fines or other sanctions. These kinds of cases were the cause of the controversial changes to the Arizona Religious Freedom Restoration Act that Governor Jan Brewer vetoed in February. But there are some services a bakery is still free to deny, and no sane person would deny them the right...

Israelis Detained on Board Norwegian Jade as Cruise Ship Docked in Port of Tunis Israeli tourists were denied the right to disembark from the Norwegian Jade, a vessel operated by the Norwegian Cruise Line, when it stopped in the Port of Tunis, Tunisia recently, Jewish human rights organization B’nai Brith Canada said on Sunday. As passengers prepared to get off the ship to visit the North African republic, the Israelis were quietly told that they were not welcomed by the Tunisian Government, the group said in a statement. The cruise line did not advise the passengers in advance that Israeli...

The good news coming out of the just-concluded legislative battle in Arizona is that religious freedom remains what it has been there, undiminished by Governor Jan Brewer’s veto of a bill meant to protect it. The bad news is that the debate over religious freedom has taken an ominous turn. Here are six takeaways from the controversy. The media cannot be trusted to report accurately on social issues. I mention this first not because it is the most important part of the Arizona story — though it is very important — but because it has made understanding that story...

The rejection of Condoleezza Rice as a commencement speaker at Rutgers by its faculty council won’t surprise many Hot Air readers. It doesn’t surprise Fox News commentator and generally liberal Juan Williams, but he’s not shrugging it off, either. Williams, who has written about the shocking treatment of black conservatives by his supposedly enlightened liberal brethren, makes sure to note this episode as yet another marker in a long arc of hatred and bigotry against African-Americans who dare to challenge liberal orthodoxy — even Juan Williams himself: There is a disgraceful double standard amongst liberals, particularly those in academia, in the...