BARBELITH underground
 

Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.


Underground > Switchboard >

Working where you're not wanted

  
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
13:36 / 09.04.02
Gay workers facing sack if lifestyle undermines 'ethos' of employers

I really don't know where I stand on this. I suppose I'm fortunate that I'm able to work in a sector where generally speaking my personal life remains just that. Is it unreasonable for an organisation that spends it's time saying 'ugh! gays are bad!' to employ them? The report above seems rather vague though, as though Brian Souter would possibly be able to use this legislation to stop 'undesirables' working for his 'family-orientated' company.

(And before anyone complains, yes discrimination IS wrong, but I can see a way in which this legislation may help to further stigamtise companies and organisatons which decide to use it.)
 
 
w1rebaby
17:18 / 09.04.02
Who's to say what counts as a lifestyle being at odds? This seems like a terrible piece of legislation. You could be sacked if your boss didn't like the colour of your living room and felt it was at odds with the design ethos of the company.

I can't see how making it legal to discriminate against people at work will stigmatise the discriminators more than if it was illegal. For a start, they'd be able to get away with it without challenge and thus with less publicity.
 
 
Shortfatdyke
06:42 / 10.04.02
the legislation is appalling. i've seen dykes driving souter's stagecoach buses (a job i wouldn't do unless i was desperate anyway, due to his support for section 28). are they likely to be sacked? wouldn't that be an infringement of their human rights?

on the other hand, my workplace has an equal opps policy. on paper, racists, sexists, homophobes are 'not wanted' - a good thing, definately. however, people get away with appalling racism, especially against a yugoslavian woman, which no one seems to consider as racism because she's white and there are two vocal homophobic factions here - the 'backs to the wall' lad types and the religious fundamentalists. the management do absolutely nothing about any of these people. although i'm sure the likes of brian souter would lose no time in sacking anyone that didn't fit his narrow definition of 'family'.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
08:05 / 10.04.02
That's fucking disgusting- apart from the obvious "discrimination is bad" argument (whose obviousness, I hasten to add, makes it no less true), I don't like the idea that anything conducted outside the workplace/working hours is any fucking business of the employer. If your freetime is conducted under the rules of your workplace, you should be getting paid for it.
 
 
Morlock - groupie for hire
12:08 / 10.04.02
ALthough i agree the report is vague, it looks to me like the directive is little more than a formalisation of existing prejudices inherent to the religions around which some organisations are based. It's kind of tricky to condemn someone as a hell-bound sinner on one hand and be expected to employ them on the other.

Which is not to say this is the best idea since sliced bread, since it will reinforce those prejudices in the short term at least, but I don't see how they could enforce any other standpoint, what with religion being so open to debate and all.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
15:15 / 10.04.02
To me it all comes down to the actual wording of the legislation. If it is such that a Christian organisation is allowed to discriminate against potential employees then let 'em. If they're still making the same mistakes they've been making for a couple of millenia then leave them to it and they'll die out all the quicker. If it allows a non- religious organisation to suddenly drape itself in the Turin Shroud in order to sack a troublemaking employee, that I'd not be happy with.

But where does this stand with regards to the European Human Rights legislation?

And I wouldn't be surprised that any company or organisation would be happy to employ pretty much anyone if their singing from the same hymnsheet. And I'd guess that most companies would rather find some other reasons for sacking someone than 'because they were a poof'.
 
  
Add Your Reply