Posted on 02/06/2005 3:44:20 AM PST by MisterRepublican
In last year's remake of the 1970s classic science fiction file, "The Stepford Wives," a group of techno-weirdos set out to transform imperfect women into perfect wives. Of course, the plan fails because of... well, a lot of reasons.
But the point is, the world remains as full of weirdos today seeking to create the perfect person as when Pygmalion tried many centuries ago. Now, the "Stepford Search" has come to corporate America.
Weyco Inc., a Michigan company, has decided to fire any employee who smokes. Not just any employee who smokes on the job. Any employee who smokes anywhere, anytime, anyhow. Why? To help the employees make healthful life choices and become better persons; to help the employees "manage their health care."
How does the company ensure its employees remain truly and permanently "smoke free?" Mandatory "drug" tests. If traces of the "devil weed" tobacco are found, the hapless employee who thought he or she lived in a free country — one in which a citizen could practice such horrible habits as lighting up a cigarette or cigar in the "privacy" of his or her home — is summarily fired.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the decades of my misspent youth, we harbored the illusion such menaces as nuclear war or communist invasion were the real enemies of freedom. How wrong we were. The good folks running America just four or five decades later, including the Weyco Gestapo, know the real enemy of man is not the trivial nuclear holocaust, but smoking. And they will leave no freedom unturned in their zeal to root it out wherever it might still lurk.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Oh yes! Maine for one!
It's called "If you smoke, you better not go to jail." A crime deferment. Heh! (Is that the right word?)
* women: the risks are much higher that they'll get breast cancer than men
* those with a family history of alzheimers..........
I mean, they should target all "undesirables." Isn't that a part of the goal: reduce ALL possible risks/costs associated with hiring an employee?
Huh? The company isn't intruding on his private life. He is free to smoke all he wants. And the company is free to fire him if they don't like him for it.
But if you can't fire someone for an unhealthy lifestyle choice called homosexuality, then why fire him for an unhealthy lifestyle CHOICE called smoking?
Excuse me.....but this employer said no smoking at anytime.
He has a nicotine drug test he is pulling on his employee's. If nicotine shows up in their blood stream, they are in big trouble.
He demands they stop smoking or move on.
They most certainly are; all employees cannot smoke at any time, at home, out at their friends, anywhere. The must submit to testing to see if they are in compliance with the "no-smoking policy."
This is why Weyco is singularly unfit to manage health benefits. They CLAIM to want to manage flexible spending accounts and other means to get us back to inexpensive indemnity insurance.
Clearly they want the nannyism to survive this transition.
Drive them out of business!
I have a client who is in a rehab program, which by all accounts I've heard, is an excellent program with a fairly high rate of success. I have a theory that what accounts for most of the failures is their strict no tolerance policy for any substance, legal or illegal, including tobacco and caffeine, so not only do you have people who are suffering the effects of being without their drugs, but they're forced to give up cigarettes, coke and coffee as well. That is extreme, in my opinion. People have self-medicated ever since....well, ever since there have been people. If one substance is curtailed by force, something WILL take it's place, guaranteed, and the substitute may be far worse than the original.
Something stinketh in FR?
What is next? Genetic screening of potential employees? Genetic screening of their spouses? Their children? A ban on "risky" hobbies, such as skydiving, rock-climbing, motorcycling or skiing? Will the employer demand access to your pantry, to ensure you eat only healthy foods and don't drink alcohol?
From where I see it, these WEYCO employers are 21st century NAZI kinsmen, cousins to the worst of Communistic mind and body control. Who makes sure the bosses keep clean and pristine? Of course, the serfs can't. As with the megalomaniac dictators, do as you're told, or face the wrath of your masters.
Where does it stop?
We cannot legislate innate morality or make people WANT to stop doing whatever society/culture deems wrong....that's truly the only reason why there are laws: to give power/tools to law enforcement and the courts, so that those who choose not to do what is morally right/benefitting society as a whole (i.e., driving while under the influence (alcohol/drugs), murder, road rage, stalking, stealing, bribing, lying, kidnapping, raping), can be stopped, involuntarily, and punished.
If people were like the stepfords, we wouldn't need any laws because everybody would always make high moral choices and live by high moral standards...always putting others before themselves.
Dictating how one "should" live their daily life within the confines of the law, whose life is otherwise lived within the parameters of acceptable morals (a good citizen, a good worker, a good parent) is more than ridiculous, it's instrusive and a violation of their Constitutionals rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of his or her happiness.
Well said. Thanks for reminding us.
I wondered why this nut was on DaySide WITH his attorney! What does THAT tell you?
It stops with running these sorts of people out of business. Bankrupt them. Turn them into paupers and ensure they never run another business where they can attempt to exercise their twisted control fetish on a free people.
Well, done Bob! How comforting to know you're on my side once again!
I'm just baffled and amazed at how thoroughly the liberal agenda has actually poisoned the minds of so many "conservatives," and it isn't only relegated to the smoking agenda.....there are many other lefty agendas where the "conservatives" have drank the Kool-Aid.
Today: smoking. Tomorrow?
No matter who you are, unless you somehow remain healthy up to the moment of your death, you will cost health insurers money.
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