:)
Posted on 11/03/2005 8:34:11 PM PST by Calpernia
Let’s imagine for a moment that you are a manager of a car dealership in Anytown, USA. Your salespeople get paid a generous base salary, commission on the sales of each car, and are provided with a car as a perk.
You have a salesman named Joe who has been working for you for years. Over the years, you have stuck with Joe through good times and back. When the auto industry slumped, and other salespeople jumped ship and went to work in more lucrative careers, Joe stayed with the company. When Joe had serious sales slumps because of his bouts with major depression every 9-12 months, you stuck with Joe, giving him time off with pay to seek treatment for his mental illness.
In short, you run a company that cares about its employees.
But recently Joe has been really pushing the envelope.
It started with one of his episodes of depression. Joe was out for two weeks while he checked into the local psychiatric hospital’s day program. When he came back, his depression appeared to have lifted and you thought things were back to business as usual. That impression lasted only a few days.
You are standing in the showroom, mingling with the staff and an attractive young woman comes in the door. You smile, and ask if you can help her. She tells you that she wants to lease a new Mustang.
You tell her “sure – Joe here will be happy to help you find just the right Mustang” and escort her over to where Joe is standing. She holds out her hand to shake Joe’s hand. Joe, sticks his hands in his pockets.
You give Joe a fierce look, and call one of the other salespeople over. “Actually, Jim is our Mustang guru. He’ll get you set up. And Jim, don’t forget to let this young lady know that she has free oil changes and tire rotations when she buys a car from us,” you say in an attempt to smooth things over.
As you walk back to your office, you make a mental note to have the sales manager ask Joe to call the EAP. It appears to you that Joe is still having some mental health issues.
On Friday at 11 am, your sales manager came into the office again.
“Mike,” he said, “we’ve got a problem with Joe. He says he has to have the afternoon off. We’ve got two salesmen out with the flu and I really need him here.”
“Tell him no,” you say.
“I did,” says the sales manager. “He says that he has a right to have Friday afternoon off with pay because he has to go to some prayer service. He says he’ll work Sunday morning instead.”
You are puzzled. The dealership is closed on Sunday mornings – everyone in this Bible Belt town is in church Sunday mornings. Besides, you think, so is Joe.
But enough is enough. You’ve put up with a lot from Joe over the years. You tell the sales manager to tell Joe that if he wants to keep his job he had better work the afternoon, and that in the future he needs to schedule in advance when he needs Fridays off.
When you come back from lunch, the sales manager tells you that Joe left for his prayer meeting. He says that Joe said it is his right as a Muslim to go to the obligatory community prayer service on Friday afternoons, and that he cannot be fired for it.
You look at the sales manager, and say “This is my company. He can follow my rules or leave. Call the newspaper and put in an ad for a salesman. Have Melanie get his final paycheck ready. When he comes in again, send him to me. He’s fired.”
Saturday morning, Joe shows up dressed in a long white robe, with a white skull cap. He looks like he hasn’t shaved.
You meet Joe in the showroom, and escort him back into your office. You ask Joe for an explanation for his behavior the previous day.
Joe explains to you that as a Muslim he can’t touch a female that he is not married to. He explains that he has a religious obligation to pray and that it is protected by US law. Then as a side note, he tells you he’ll be wearing Islamic clothing to work in from now on.
You are fed up. You hand Joe his final paycheck, including a month’s severance pay, let Joe know you’ll cover his insurance for another month, and fire him on the spot.
Joe quietly says “You can’t do this to me – I’m Muslim. You’ll be sorry” and walks out of the office.
Monday morning you receive a telephone call from an attorney. He claims to represent a Muslim organization, and informs you that you are violating Joe’s civil rights. He demands that you give Joe back him job, allow him to wear Muslim clothing, accommodate his refusal to sell cars to women, and allow him time off with pay to go to his Friday prayer services. He also demands that you allow the organization to come in and provide sensitivity training for all of your other employees so that they will not discriminate against Joe, and also says that you need to make an effort to hire more Muslims to work in your dealership. He demands that you make a donation to an Islamic organization for the anguish and suffering you and your employees have caused Joe.
He says if you don’t agree they will not only sue you, but will organize a public campaign against your business.
You are shocked. You call your attorney and meet him for lunch.
By the time lunch is over, you are in a state of total amazement. Your attorney has given you a pamphlet from the Council for American Islamic Relations dealing with the rights that Muslims have as employees. An excerpt from the pamphlet, found on the CAIR website at www.cair-net.org says the following:
YOUR RIGHTS AS AN EMPLOYEE
Federal law makes it illegal for an employer to discriminate against an employee on the basis of religion, race, or national origin. Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act guarantees your right to:
1) Reasonable religious accommodation. The failure of an employer to reasonably accommodate your religious practices constitutes discrimination. “Religious practices” includes wearing a beard, hijab, prayer on the job, and going to Jumah prayer.
2) Fairness in hiring, firing, and promotions. Your employer is prohibited from considering religion when making decisions affecting your employment status.
3) A non-hostile work environment. Your employer must ensure that you are not subjected to anti-Muslim insults, harassment or unwelcome, excessive proselytizing.
4) Complain about discrimination without fear of retaliation. Federal law guarantees your right to report an act of alleged discrimination. It is illegal for your employer to retaliate against you for your complaint.
WHEN FACED WITH DISCRIMINATION ON THE JOB
1) Remain calm.
2) Inform the offending party that you believe his/her actions are discriminatory.
3) Report the discriminatory action in writing to company management.
4) Begin documenting the discrimination by saving memos, keeping a detailed journal, noting the presence of witnesses, and making written complaints (keep copies). Create a “paper trail.”
5) Contact the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and local county or state civil rights agencies to educate yourself about legal options.
6) Contact an attorney to discuss your case.
7) DO NOT sign any documents or resign without an attorney’s advice.
8) Ask to be transferred to another department or job site.
9) Ask for mediation.
10) Contact CAIR to file a report.
You may own your business. It may have been handed down through several generations.
But under the law, you are required to accommodate the religious practices of employees.
I’m not sure if the same would apply if your employee was a member of a Christian sect that required prayer and dancing with rattlesnakes, and your employee needed to have a rattlesnake on company grounds.
I suppose it would if the rattlesnake group had a national organization with as much clout as Muslims do.
Good read ping
well. ain't that special.
Pig ban coming next.
Reaping the fruit of too much government interference in private business?
I got this link from someone who speaks fluent Arabic, looks like one of the 9/11 hijackers and knows Islam inside and out. He also is an American patriot and routinely risks his life doing things I won't detail here.
He says this group is by far the most dangerous one in the United States. He says that with these folks it's real simple, "it's them or us".
Wow! I just had to bookmark this so I can go back over it when I have more time, but it bothers me greatly! Thank you for the link!
It's time for Muslims like this to leave the country
see #6
bump
Excellent read.
BTTT
Pig ban, and even 'pig' terms. No more 'pork futures', trimming the pork from laws or budgets. Commodities markets - will pork bellies and pork futures be permitted with other commodities sales? BLT's - offensive or not? Piggy banks and Porky the Pig? Will they be banned here, too, like Piglet in the workplace in UK? Pig ban goes even further than just pork...
Imagine any other religious group being given such priveleges in the workplace.
:)
Hence the last paragraph. We need to make our own type of ACLU/CAIR.
I’m not sure if the same would apply if your employee was a member of a Christian sect that required prayer and dancing with rattlesnakes, and your employee needed to have a rattlesnake on company grounds.
I suppose it would if the rattlesnake group had a national organization with as much clout as Muslims do.
Nope. Reaping the fruit of too many mooslims in America.
Well, in fact they do. Cedar is right, this is a case of government regulation in private enterprise.
Not long ago, a law firm was sued by a Jewish woman employee, who pointed out that she always had to leave early on Fridays, in order to observe Shabbat. Her employers seemed resentful in accomodating this, and employees who did stay back on Fri evening were unfairly favored over her. She won quite a pay out in compensation.
Solicitors often have to work long hours, and Fri evenings can be very busy, as they need to line everything up to be ready for 9am Mon morning.
In Australia, a leading stock broking firm was sued by a woman employee who had returned from maternity leave. She maintained that her employers had a male-dominated culture which made unfair demands on her, and she was not allowed to leave work early although she had an infant to look after. Moreover, there was a lot of all-male socialising among the stockbrokers, for instance they had "bow tie" days, where everyone would wear a bow-tie, and of course women employees were excluded from that.
Her boss offered to put her in a position of lesser responsibility, with shorter hours, after she came back from maternity leave. He suggested that one of the young men 'who don't mind putting in the hours' should take her job in the meantime. As you can imagine, that suggestion cost his company many thousands of dollars - it is discrimination.
bump for later
Bump for later read
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