NathanAllen, MaxxLarge, Shadowin, TypoFlyspray, Ant, slofut -- You bring a tear of hope to my non-theistic eye. ...sob...sob....

fstp wrote:
"Why should this great company bow down to this towel head, They have a mission as a company. They need to stand by that mission no matter what, if there is something in the company policy that ich-bob-the camel driver doesn't like then he can fry burgers somewhere else."

Well, they should bend over for this guy because if the story is accurate, they violated federal statutes with respect to religious discrimination. He should sue the hell out of them and then use the money for purposes of which the dumb-arse fundies wouldn't approve. Hope he reams them good.

DannySpaz
Maybe that's because I've never had a hindu come to my door at dinner time to 'spread the good news'

or had some idiot public servant decide he is solely responsible for getting me into heaven.

Maybe it is because hindis would happily sell me a bottle of beer on sunday.

Maybe it is because hindis would prefer their children educated to the fullest instead of praying to their oh so merciful god that their baby/aids/herpes would just go away and well, if it doesn't you get what you deserve for having a vagina/penis.

i want a job there - sounds like an easy case for me to win! praise satan!

Ironbar
Dude, freepers? What's up?

YES SUE THEM!

Just like to point out that Title VII is just an extension of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th amendment, so the right not to be discriminated against is a right (statutory based on constitutional).

Also, most of the delay in filing the suit is because you have to file a charge of discrimination with either the EEOC or your state anti-discrimination agency. This has to be done within 180 days, so he was on the ball. The agency then investigates and finds "cause" or "no cause" for an administrative suit. You can also terminate the investigation by the agency and request a "Right to Sue" letter which allows you to sue in federal court. If you don't go through this process you can't sue. So it's not like he waited two years, he has been going through this process.


/end of civics lesson

Ok I'm quite oblivious to constitutional law, so here's a dillema: 1)It is OK for any agency to fire employees for any functional reason or whim. 2)It is OK for private businesses to fire employees for their political beliefs. 3)It may or may not be illegal for private businesses to fire employees based on their cosmological inclinations. 4) To make a hypothetical arguement, lets say that I am a student of Neo-platonism and devoutly belief in the premises of determinism and because of my particular situation, do not believe in democracy or any facsimilie thereof. Do the previous legal distinctions both still apply in the manner Chick-Fil-A has embarked upon?

"Not to play the devil's advocate, but what about the business owner's right to free speech? If he wants to run a Christian restaurant, I say go ahead. If the muslim doesn't like it, he can go work elsewhere, just like if I went to work for a Middle-Eastern deli, and I didn't want to pray to Allah five times a day."

That's a really good point, actually. It's my understanding that an animal has to be facing Mecca (the holy land, not the really cool Sega Master System emulator programmed by Zoop) before you can slaughter it to make it halal, or available for Muslim consumption. What if you didn't want to do that, though? What if it conflicted with your own beliefs? Could you sue for that? Probably not. But this guy can sue Chick Fil-A. I think there are two reasons for this. The first is reverse discrimination, and the second is that Middle Eastern delis are pretty small and family owned. If we were talking about a small town diner with Christian managers, they probably wouldn't be subject to the same lawsuit as Chick Fil-A. You look a lot worse obliterating a small family owned restaurant than taking a small chunk out of a fairly large corporation.

JR

You can't fire someone for their religion, sex, or race in the US. In many states, you can fire them for being gay, however.

I propose feeding anyone who says "anywho" to an hungry pack of lions.

grew a moustache and a mullet
got a job at chic-fil-a
citing artistic differences
the band broke up in may
and in june reformed without me
and they'd got a different name
i nuked another grandma's apple pie
and hung my head in shame

Alaska is considered a "work at will" state. Which means that essentially a employer AND an employer must share the will for continued employment. So, an employee can quit for any reason, and an employer may fire for any reason.
But thats just up here...

Stupid Christians! Always trying to force their F'd up religion on everyone. Good, I hope the Muslim dirt-bag sues the Christian dirt-bag into total bankruptcy!

Stupid religious people, cause most of the worlds problems.

Employment law is a crazy thing - it's gotten pretty hard to fire people even for gross incompetence. Did you ever wonder why there always seems to be some asshat who always farks stuff up that you have to end up fixing? It's because your boss either doesn't notice, or if he/she does, it's dang near impossible to do anything about it.

I've seen some of the paperwork that has to be filled out to get rid of someone in the corporation I used to work for. It was amazing... not doing something their job well just wasn't good enough, the asshat actually has to do something explicitly forbidden in the employee handbook (that they signed a statement acknowledging they've read and understand) or completely fail to do something explicitly spelled out in their job description. Even had they done one of those two things, it was still likely to be a two month process before they could be let go.

Regardless, this guy has a valid lawsuit. Fire someone a week after you give them a review calling them a "great manager" without a solid reason, and you should end up in court, because something stinks.

Anyway, I don't go to Chick-Fil-A. Their sandwiches are good but way overpriced, and all you get is a bun and a piece of chicken - no condiments, nothing. For the cost of one of their sammies, they could at least throw on some lettuce and tomato.

JQPublic: Amen!

Knowing that Chick-Fil-A is really more like "Jack Chick-Fil-A" has me thinking...
* Wouldn't it be cool if the Employee Manual were drawn/written by Jack Chick? Or maybe Chick-Fil-A coupon books that the CFA employees would sneak into KFC and McD's (the way Xians used to sneak Jack Chick comix into my favorite Austin bookstore)?
* When they fire someone at Chick-Fil-A, does the manager dress up like a Jack Chick angel and pitch the sinner out into the parking lot?
* I wonder what the giveaway was that Aziz Latif wasn't on the "Chick" team? Did he respond to the group prayer with a hearty, demonic "HAW, HAW, HAW"?

Wouldn't anyone be complaining if the store were called "Jesus and Biscuits"?

i'd pick 'Good lord an' butter!" instead... (berke breathed reference)

I quit eating at this place when I heard that a fundraiser held at a new Chick-Fil-A here in Houston was benefitting two of the largest churches in the area. Why not smaller churches? Or schools? Or hospitals? Or daycare centers?

Jesus H. Christ on a bun.

Why oh why did Lincoln think it was so important to keep
the south in the Union? We could have annexed them as a
slave nation, like Mexico!

It's not to late, folks... bring back the secession
movement!

"Not to play the devil's advocate, but what about the business owner's right to free speech? If he wants to run a Christian restaurant, I say go ahead. If the muslim doesn't like it, he can go work elsewhere, just like if I went to work for a Middle-Eastern deli, and I didn't want to pray to Allah five times a day."

The business owner can run Chick-Fil-A by christian principles, but he must still adhere to laws concerning employment discrimination, including those related to religious discrimination. Basically, unless they can prove that prayer is a bona-fide job requirement, they can't fire a manager for refusing to pray on the job. The manager's job is to run a fast-food restaurant that makes fried chicken sandwiches, so they'll have a tough time proving that prayer is a crucial part of him doing his job properly. Incidentally, they *did* give him a very good review just before they fired him.

In contrast, let's consider a middle eastern deli, or a business that slaughters animals for Halal meat. A crucial requirement of Halal slaughter is that the slaughter must pronouce Allah's name as he slaughters the animal. Without this rite, the resulting meat is not Halal. It would be tough to imagine a christian or jewish employee doing this in good conscience. In this case then, being a muslim would likely be a bona-fide job requirement.

Remember, we're talking about fast-food and fried chicken sandwiches. They should spend less time making sure that their employees are praying on the job, and more time making sure they're not pissing in the mayonaise.

Doesn't that firm have the right to do as they want regarding religion? It's a free country. The Muslim dude is an employee at will. It's not like he's being forced to work there.

Whose rights takes precedent??????

All the religion-sniping aside, this guy has a case. Being fired for not praying is not being fired for being incompetent. Whether or not the chain wishes to glorify the Judeo-Christian God, I don't think it can legally discriminate on the basis that an employee refuses to engage in the religious practices that are tangential to the execution of his duties.

Put another way, imagine you're Jewish, you get a job at this place because you need the cash. They don't ask you about your religion when they hired you - because they can't, it doesn't matter. Chick-fil-A later fires you because you won't pray to Jesus - you're Jewish, after all, he's just a fellow Jew that got a lot of attention.* No other reason to turf you, you're a great employee, you don't abuse the customers - just because you're a Jew.

Get it now? Discrimination is wrong. It's like being fired from a bank because you won't go to a rally for a Republican.

* Unless you're Messianic, but let's not go down that road tonight.

I'm tired and I think I'm getting sick, but I still want to put in my two cents...

Whoever thinks putting those nasty pickles on chicken sandwshichs is good, well, EW! Though their wraps are good. I'd rather eat at McD anyway.

And... ever since it opened and I was felling really tired, I've been calling it chickendoodle... and i'm 26...

methinks i need my meds now...

BOOBIES!

Not to play the devil's advocate, but what about the business owner's right to free speech? If he wants to run a Christian restaurant, I say go ahead.

This isn't really a valid arguement. The Muslim gentleman isn't saying he wants Chick-Fil-A to change anything about the way they do business; he's not asking that the business owners rights be infringed at all. He just wanted to keep his job.

If the muslim doesn't like it, he can go work elsewhere, just like if I went to work for a Middle-Eastern deli, and I didn't want to pray to Allah five times a day.

Once again, he's not saying he didn't like it, or that he had an issue with what Chick-Fil-A employees were doing - or the corporate mission - as long as he wasn't required to participate in prayer sessions that went against his personal religions beliefs.

As a Georgia native, I went to high school right down the road from Berry College (aka Chick-Fil-A University). I opted for Emory instead (Coca-Cola U.).

The company has a right to practice what they want. They shouldn't have fired the guy, who should have had more sense not to work at Jebus-burger anyway, not being a Christian.

I vote with my $ and Domino's, Chick-Fil-A, and Walmart don't get my coin.

First: As it's been said, the concept of "voting with your $" is bullshiat if you fall outside a majority. It's like voting Libertarian (oh, the quasirony) - it won't make any sort of noticable difference.

Second: I hope he doesn't run them out of busines... Eeee, so overpriced but so good, damnit. Best FF chicken, ever. If you need to drive a fast food chain to hurting, why not McDonald's? Really... shiatty food (excepting their fries), shiatty service, they get the bottom of the barrel of the pool of the employees they hire ... Seriously, every McDonalds I've been in has had poor food and poor service. The best I hope for is an apathetic but somehow compitent cashier who's not sure on the concept of "special order" ... Walk into a wendy's, however.. Every time, curteous service, won't even bat and eye when I rattle off "number six combo, light on the mayo, I'd like that Biggie sized but with a large frie, thanks."

Where was I? Oh yes - libertarians!

Whether the freedom to engage disciminatory employment policies is RIGHT or WRONG is irrelevant, the fact is it's against the law. And thus while he may or may not should be able to win, chances are he will and should be able to (as it is legal and all)

I hope he does drive them out of business. Nothing I'd like to see than every Christian business go bankrupt and out of business, and all them damn bible thumpers live in the gutters and die of starvation. They deserve it, the rat-bastards!

Why would a non-Christian want to work in a Christian establishment? Well, it's been stated over and over that Chick-fil-A is closed on Sundays. How many fast food places/retail chains can guarantee that you're going to get a constant day off every week? Sounds pretty good to me.

The corporate office of Chick-fil-A can have their Christian values and still uphold Title VII. An employer really can fire an employee for anything except discrimination based on sex, race, religion, creed, or a disability. This dude really has a case and I hope he gets a nice tidy settlement.

JQPublic

Gee .. nice stereotyping. Asshat bigot.

KickKat,

Yeah, I'm an Atheist and despise Christians, you gotta problem with that? I didn't think so. Now go f yourself and the God you rode in on. Asshat bible thumping moron.

Go jerk your Jesus in someone else's salad.

Atheism is dumb. Religion is more so. Agnosticism is the worst. You poor bastard.

Genericdefect,

You gotta pick one of the three Dumba55!