Has religious sensitivity gone too far? This just seems a bit much for me.

“Are these fundamentalists taking away my right to commerce?”

Sounds to me like they’re taking away their own right to be hired as truck drivers. Kind of like the classic example of the Amish guy who applies to be a bus driver… I think it’s ok to discriminate on religious grounds if the religion prohibits the person from actually performing the duties expected of them on the job.

Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword
Like punching underwater
You never can hit who you’re trying for
Some need the exhibition
And some have to know they tried
It’s the chemical weapon
For the war that’s raging on inside

Setting aside for now the analogy about doctors and druggest who won’t dispense birth control, because I think that is a more complicated issue, generally I think business should accomodate this sort of thing if it is reasonable. A very smal business might not have the staff to do it, so then the Muslim would not be hired, because he could not meet the needs of the business. But, if it is a large business, and other staff can do the alcohol route and no one feels they have an unfair amount of labor being thrust upon them, then why not accomodate it? It is the same as Jews not working during the sabbath. The same as Christians working on Yom Kippur and Jewish employees covering for Christians on Easter and Christmas. Christians take some of this for granted, because in many industries the business is closed Easter and Christmas, they don’t have to ask for the favor of the day because of their religion.

My Orthodox Jewish employee worked every Sunday, a day my other employees were happy to have off. I think the question is, is there an unfair burden on the business or other staff if the alcohol truck routes are not given to Muslims. If there is the business has justification to let that employee go. If there isn’t, then as the employer just do unto them what you would want done unto you. Why make an issue when there isn’t one.

@JLeslie ”...generally I think business should accomodate this sort of thing if it is reasonable”

I totally agree with this, and it is exactly how I’ve seen similar situations (particularly regarding the holidays) handled in the small and large businesses that I’ve worked for.

Well, good for them. They can haul potatoes and be happy if they get that job.

More work for those indiscriminate infidels.

The same opinion I have about christian pharmacists that refuse to sell contraceptives or doctors that refuse to perform abortions for “religious reasons”: If you do not want to do it, find another job.

I try very hard to keep my personal and business life as seperate as possible, that being said, I have gone against my religion for business purposes before.

Could I work in an abortion clinic? No way.
I guess we all have to draw personal boundaries somewhere that makes sense to us.

If these guys feel so strongly about it, and there is no way to haul other goods for this business, they should find another job.
I could not seek work in a slaughterhouse or in a restaurant cooking meat, and I wouldn’t insist that these businesses change what they do to accomodate me. On the other hand, I have happily prepared meat in soup kitchens because it was volunteer work.

I’m with @JLeslie here. If accommodations can be made, they should.

Would this be an issue if it were Christians instead?

@jerv – from my point of view, christians or muslims, no difference. Still an issue. They don’t have the right to assert their religion on my business.

But your analogy is flawed. Catholics are known for the drinking.

Had you said Mormons or Jehovas Witnesses or Southern Baptists, your question would have been better.

Accommodation can be made for religious preferences if it doesn’t adversely affect the business.

For example, when I was 18 and Pentecostal, I worked in a nursing home as a maid. Uniform required khaki pants. I wore a khaki skirt instead. Accommodated my religious preference, didn’t affect my job performance one iota.

If my religion had said that I couldn’t enter a room with a man without a male relative present, I wouldn’t have taken the job, because I wouldn’t be able to bring my brother to work with me in order to clean the male residents’ rooms.

@elbanditoroso Yep, and smoke cigs, too, you should see the parking lot after church- lol
Priest’s often have really nice liquor cabinets, too.

@KNOWITALL – I went to a Catholic college and lived next door to a Jesuit. Liquor was a large part of the neighborliness.

@elbanditoroso How does a trucker refusing to haul a certain product assert their religion on your business?

If I can’t get a delivery of liquor because the wholesaler and/or the trucking company has employees who refuse to transport my goods.

@elbanditoroso Give me a break. Unless you live in Dearborn, MI I doubt it is much of an issue, and even there it is still majority Christians. I’m sure there are plenty of distributors that will deliver your alcohol. There are blue laws and dry counties still all over America. The Christian blue laws can interfere with the sale of your goods. You probably would fight those laws also, my only point is it isn’t like the Muslims are asking or doing something much different than many many other religions have been doing in America for many many years.

What she said ^^^^. Just get another trucking company. No big deal.
In the overall scheme of things, if a trucker refuses to transport a particular item they will be replaced.

This is what bothers me – there seems to be a feeling that the employee (whatever religion and whatever belief) is deserving of accommodation, and the hell with the business people who pay the bills.

@Dutchess_III , @JLeslie , and the others make an automatic assumption that the employee’s feelings/religion/beliefs trump the needs of the company. I have a real problem with that assumption and that dynamic.

Without the company paying a salary, the guy wouldn’t have a job.

That’s the point. The guy won’t have a job.

@elbanditoroso Really? Did you read my answer? I said if it negatively affects the business then it is justification to let the employee go, or (and I didn’t specifically say this, but it is implied) not hire them to begin with.

Geez, my oldest friend has a trucking company and 60% of his business is delivering wine to restaurants all over the SF Bay Area. If someone said they can’t haul wine, he’d say “I guess you don’t want to work here.”

@elbanditoroso ~I forgot; only Protestants are Christians.

@elbanditoroso I also fail to understand your outrage here. If the company can afford to accommodate a few employees who have religious boundaries on the work they can do, and if the company wants to accommodate them, why shouldn’t they? I am guessing they also close for Christmas, which is an accommodation for Christian employees. Big deal.

If they can’t afford to accommodate these employees, or have no interest in accommodating them, then presumably they will not hire workers who have these restrictions. Again, what’s the big deal?

@glacial I’m with you, I if they can accomodate, why shouldn’t they?

@glacial The big deal is that these companies do fire employees for choosing to not do the job for which they were hired, and do not wish to accommodate their religious preferences at the detriment of their business, and are thus being taken to court in the name of “Equal Opportunity Employment”.

@Seek_Kolinahr Well, then let them be taken to court… that’s what the courts are for, to determine whether or not such dismissals are justified.

If I were a religious Jewish truck driver, I would refuse to drive betweet friday at sundown and Saturday at sundown because of Sabbath observance. I would be able to transport pigs, pork or other food I consider unfit for me to eat. I don’t know what restrictions Islam imposes on the faithful, but they certainly have the right to decline to carry cargo that their faith prohibits but they must accept the employment consequences of such limitations on what they will carry. Perhaps it varies depending on whether the driver owns the trailer in which the cargo is carried. If their employer has many other loads with which the driver is conforatable, it seems some accomodation can be made. If the employer can, but won’t make such a reasonable adjustment, that would be evidence of their willingness to persecute the driver on account of his faith when the well-being of his business is not compromised. If pork and pigs is all the company transports, then clearly this job does not suit the driver’s way of life.

Why must the employer accomodate or alter the business to suit an employee? I would say if an employee doesn’t like the way the business is run, they have 2 choices, buy it and run it their way or get a new job. Here it is so hard to fire anyone it is crazy! It really makes you think twice or 300 times before hiring anyone. Then if you hire one person instead of another, the rejected one will take you to court for some sort of discrimination.

I think all “sensitivity” has gone nuttso!

This has gone more than far too far. In Germany we had a case of an overzealous Muslim grocery clerk refusing to restock alcohol shelves. He was fired and sued the employer. The court ruled against him. The firing was okay.

In some ways it has.