And as I said, it is stupid, and only trying to impose your self-proclaimed moral superiority onto others. The self-righteous rabblerousers outside telling everyone they’re horrible people if they eat there is what makes it bad for business. If not for them, eating at such a restaurant would simply mean that you are hungry, not that you endorse or condone the employee’s personal beliefs.
3 Likes
That’s why restaurants used to have a dress code that forbade visible tattoos. Plus I guess when there were lots of workers to pick from and the typical tattooed person was vaguely sketchy, this was a fine way to weed out employees you might not want.
1 Like
Ahhhh, the good old days of consistent standards and expectations for everyone.
Now, it’s discriminatory to forbid someone from their desired means of self-expression…unless they’re expressing something “we” dont like, then it’s clearly discriminatory to allow such self-expression to occur.
1 Like
Nowadays I’m surprised that young people, not only men, but even girls display hideous tattoos without thought of anything. Maybe one day these people will be embarrassed, but probably not.
Our most famous young woman, Gabby had a personal tattoo “Let it be”. That’s one I thought was very meaningful for her.
My husband has a small tattoo, obtained during his time in the service many years ago. I believe he was drunk at the time, but he wishes he hadn’t gotten it.
Only time will tell. Display or not. 
1 Like
Do you think it is the job of women to cover themselves and dress modestly to appear less attractive to men because it is women’s fault if the men are driven to impure sexual thoughts for seeing their exposed skin or tight clothes? If not, does that mean you will immediately walk out of a middle eastern restaurant if you see a woman working there wearing a hijab?
Do you think women are unclean and should not be allowed to touch their husbands when they are on their period? Do you think that young girls should have their marriages arranged by their parents? If not, does that mean you would refuse to patronize a store if you saw that they were always closed on saturday and all the men working there wore yarmulkes and styles consistent with those worn by hasidic jews?
See how concerning yourself with the viewpoints of people whose viewpoints don’t matter can make us into a more divided society?
5 Likes
There you have it. Hang 'em high.
Might be true for a realtor, but it hasn’t hurt the foresquad member from NYC, and a couple of other districts. And it isn’t much much more likely. Their anti-Semitic views have been publicized before … granted, in the conservative media, but it was out there.
Hmm … I’m curious why you left omitted the far left? Are you under the impression that they don’t plant bombs, incite insurrection (even if only among idiots), shoot people?
So, are you saying that employers have the right to discriminate against people with tattoos?
And, I’m old enough to remember when the only people with tattoos were sailors. Sometime in the 50’s, bikers and toughs joined the crowd. That was pretty much the entire population until the late 80’s and 90’s. Then, they must have started giving them as participation trophies.
Today, everyone under the sun thinks they won’t be “special” without a tattoo. “Special” used to mean something entirely different, frequently described with “bless his/her heart”. Now, you’re a tough if you don’t have a tattoo, or maybe you’re a free thinker, or individual, or 'er something.
3 Likes
I impose nothing by simply refusing to do business. I would impose if I stood outside with a protest sign, but that is not what I’m discussing and was not the question I asked, yet you keep going back to it.
Morality is a social construct and it differs across people and time. As with anything, the “society” decides what is and is not moral. And at this point in time and in this society, a swastika is immoral. That’s neither self-proclaimed nor superior, it is self-evident.
Even if nobody protested outside the business or said anything at all, but simply chose to not do business there because an owner’s or employee’s morals are socially unacceptable, that owner or employee is bad for business.
A hijab is not a hate symbol and I have no way of knowing why she’s wearing it. There’s more than one reason to do so, not all of them as ominous as you describe.
Again, not a hate symbol. I disagree with their self-oppression, but I don’t see it as being dangerous to society at large.
I have no problem dividing the swastika tattoo wearing people.
And again, that’s stupid and the underlying problem. You are denying that person the right to earn a living by imposing your morality on them. The restaurant doesn’t suffer because its food sucks, it suffers because of something entirely unrelated to why you are at the restaurant.
If that waitress was instead massively obese and that made you uncomfortable to the extent you refused to eat there, every finger would be pointed at you for being intolerant, and the restaurant would be punished should they label that waitress bad for business. Because as long as she brings you your food, it doesn’t matter what she looks like. Standards are standards. Someone’s tattoo isn’t hurting you or affecting your meal any more than any other physical characteristic of that employee.
This entire response is imposing your beliefs into others. “This is what I think and I believe I am right, so if you disagree you must be wrong!”. That simply is not how opinions work; your opinion is no more or less valid than anyone else’s. Some of us understand this, and understand that we have to live with people whether we agree with their opinions or not. Others, apparently such as yourself, want to eradicate the opinions they disagree with. This is what is “dangerous to society at large”. You are effectively doing proactively to that person, exactly what you fear that person might do to you.
Again, sticks and stones matter. Words and “symbols”, not so much - simply because they, and their meaning, is wholely subjective. To point, I can’t possibly understand how you could deny that a hijab is a “hate symbol” against women? That’s more dangerous to society, as it is religious men imposing their beliefs onto their women. As opposed to putting a tattoo on your own body, which doesnt hurt anyone except the person being tattooed.
Right, AFAIK the equal rights stuff applies at the employer level, not the customer level. So if all your racist/hateful customers decide they won’t buy from any store that has any black staff, what are you supposed to do? I guess let all the business go to the racist employers who will discriminate in hiring somehow and the customers reinstate segregation that way? Or I guess you could go the restaurant route and make nearly all your staff’s pay based on tips and let it happen that way without it being your fault?
1 Like
Easy to say when it’s not your paycheck on the line. Don’t know where you live but here, realtors are dime a dozen. Firing one from your agency for the potential bad PR is a no brainer move to prevent potential loss of revenue. And you can hire their replacement quickly. Boycott is a significant risk in cases where there’s ton of competitors that do exactly the same job nearby.
Given the choice, I’d certainly avoid this realtor and by association the agency that supports them. Just like I’d never go eat at a restaurant where servers have Nazi tattoos. If the owner allows it, I’d assume they agreed with it. I’m not dictating their views or their actions as long as legal. I’m just free to not do business with people who hold beliefs that are repugnant to me if I don’t have to.
2 Likes
Of course not - because it is an unrealistic example. I thought I was talking to you, not bender, so don’t be disingenuous. That is the reason I gave the examples I gave - they are real life things you would actually encounter. I’m willing to bet no one on this board has ever met a person in a public facing job with a tattoo of a swastika on their face. The extreme cases aren’t important for setting policy - they can more often than not be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. It’s the day-to-day common cases that matter.
So you’ll assume the best about a family owned business that, based on that symbol, is more likely than not oppressive of women, but you won’t do that for other symbols? Why is that?
“Self-oppression?” Wow. Some real cognitive dissonance going on here.
So how is it not dangerous to society at large to treat women the way these men treat them, day in and day out, but it is dangerous for Christians to not want to participate in a gay wedding the one or two times a year gay activists try and force them into it?
(not to mention the fact that many of those businesses wouldn’t participate in a gay wedding either, but it’s much more acceptable to go after the Christian business owners)
If you said you would just as well not patronize a muslim or hasidic owned business as you wouldn’t a fundamentalist Christian owned business, I would have no leg to stand on in this argument. Why is it so easy for @glitch99 @xerty and @Honkinggoose to see the inconsistency, but you can’t see it?
3 Likes
It’s easy to say because it is historically true. Boycotts don’t work and people have short attention spans and don’t really care about that nonsense.
So you support firing people when the press prints an unsubstantiated story about them that they deny? What if it turns out to be false? If you are worried about businesses’ bottom line, you are missing the forest for the trees. They’ll end up losing more in litigation for wrongful termination than they would in lost business if they just kept them and let the news cycle move to the next dumb thing.
Your belief, that an employer agrees with the views of all its employees, that have nothing to do with the business they are in, is not the view of most of society. The rest of us know that seeing someone employed somewhere does not mean that their employer supports all their viewpoints. Why do you think it does?
There are some women that wear hijabs that work at lowes. More likely than not, some of those women oppose US military involvement in the middle east and US support of Israel. Would it make sense for me to assume that Lowe’s agrees with those women’s viewpoints on US foreign policy?
again with the unrealistic scenarios
2 Likes
Exactly - they’re afraid of losing their paycheck, because of “you”. It’s fear of incurring your wrath from not submitting to your demands and expectations, demands and expectations that have nothing to do with the product or service being provided by the business. Fear of failing despite being the best at what they do, simply because of what they believe outside of work.
Freedom at its finest!
2 Likes
If it was my business, I probably would yes. Whatever is in my best interest. More so if I disagree with the beliefs in questions and there is a significant chance my employee was indeed responsible for what they’ve been accused of doing.
As a business owner, once it’s become known to all in the community that one of your employees promotes antisemitic or white supremacy views online to the point of registering domain names, do you argue that not doing anything about it is signalling to customers that you’re fine with this? I’ve seen it happening. People boycotting products because the company endorse planned parenthood or shoes because the promoter was blasphemous. Just look what Nike did about this last example…
Isn’t it though? Customers’ freedom not to patronize someone they strongly disagree with on an issue. Especially in markets with little differentiation between providers. You can disagree with the practice but there is no question that it’ll affect the businesses’ bottom line. So just like when dealing with annoying/difficult customers, businesses have to put up with it for the sake of their bottom line.
1 Like
But it’s not just that. It’s the handful of rabblerousers threatening to firebomb (again, maybe literally but more figuratively) that business and threaten to label anyone who does patronize it. Customers choose to stay away out of fear of being called out for supposedly supporting such things, moreso than they give a second thought to someone else’s tattoo they may or may not even notice.
Hitler was free to do as he did, too. When you are being excluded from participating in society, not because of breaking a law, but solely because your opinion doesnt coincide with those who are screaming the loudest, that is a distinct lack of freedom being imposed by those doing the screaming.
“Dont judge people based on their appearances. Unless I dont like their appearance, then you must judge them harshly!”
“Offensive things should be excluded from society. Unless you are offended by something about me, then you are at fault and must be punished for being intollerant!”
“This place has great food, everyone should go there! Unless I dont like the tattoo the cook has, then it’s a terrible place and you are a terrible person for eating there!”
The hypocrisy is mind-numbing.
1 Like
3 Likes