The Glade 4.0

OR, you could advertise that you care so much about health that you even make sure your employees are as healthy as can be.

Which is fine for hours which you are at work. When they chose to extend that to beyond the hours of work, it is discrimination.

Your idea of ‘element of choice’ is so board in this sense that it can be associated with anything, even religion. I mean all you had to do was take the 'choice' to stop practicing what ever religion they don’t want to associate themselves with and pick a new one. Is that really a choice?

What about hair colour? I mean you could ‘chose’ to change that with a dye. Body weight, that’s a ‘choice’ too. What about not touching alcohol as long as you work for them. Or the ‘choice’ to change gender, or you just don’t have to work for them.

You should be hired for the skills you have and what you do in your job, anything beyond that IS discrimination.

A certified master mechanic applies for a job as the head mechanic of a taxi cab company. Is it acceptable for the taxi cab company to refuse to hire him on the grounds that he is a registered Democrat?

Instead of a doctor or a nurse, we have an auto mechanic. Instead of a hospital, it's a cab company. Instead of smoking, it's political affiliation (which is a choice - he can always just quit voting for blue people).

It is not the place of an employer to dictate how employees live their private lives. Doctors and nurses working in hospitals are no exception. This is not a free association issue. It is not a company's business what their employees do with themselves when they are not on company time. Smoking tobacco products is not illegal, nor does it negatively impact the performance of a doctor or nurse unless they are smoking inside the hospital.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

Corolinth, it looks like you're becoming less of a libertarian and more of a liberal!

That's because people forget that the libertarian philosophy is based on personal freedom of the individual - which a corporation is not. This is still an attempt to create a nanny state that tells us we can not smoke tobacco and drink alcohol. The fact that it's a corporation doing it, and not the government, does not suddenly make it acceptable. It is still a large organization attempting to restrict the freedom of an individual.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

Hmm. Interesting...

I can certainly sympathize with this viewpoint, but I'm not sure I share it. Where's the dividing line between individual and "large organization?" Can a family of 7 prevent you from moving into their home because you're not part of their family? Obviously yes. What about a church...can a church deny you membership because you don't believe what they believe, or live up to their chosen code of conduct? I would say yes. Churches can get pretty large.

On the other hand, megacorps and multinats are today generally above the government in the chain of command -- it's only by virtue of there being so many of these modern feudal lords and robber barons competing to buy off the politicians that it gives the occasional appearance that government isn't on their side -- so one could make a good argument that large corporations are indistinguishable from government, much as you could claim the church was indistinguishable from government in a theocracy. So I definitely can understand treating them like government.

Except...health clinics and hospitals aren't necessarily large corporations on that scale. They're often closer to ma & pa shops than they are to multinats. This makes it difficult to provide a sweeping statement one way or the other. From a sheer business perspective, allowing a smoker to work in health care is like allowing an avowed atheist to work as a catholic priest, or a member of the RNC to work as a democrat campaign manager. Smoking and good health are mutually exclusive and diametrically opposed, and damned close to a conflict of interest. You cannot convince me you value human life as a doctor if you're in the process of slowly killing yourself.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

Corporations are just groups of individuals choosing to associate with each other. Despite their monolithic proportions, they are not bound by the provisions of The Constitution which limit the powers of Government.

Why should they be excepted from the right to choose who they associate with? In the case of private hospitals or even public hospitals (entities of its state and therefore subject to the provisions of the state constitution not The United States Constitution), their offers of employment are private contracts. Why should The State (Federal) have any say in the terms of this contract?

Moreover, why is discrimination on the part of employers bad? We forget what the word discrimination means and often assign it two discrete, separate connotations when really, all discrimination is equal. Does an employer who chooses a certified mechanic over a non certificate bearing candidate not discriminate when choosing the former over the latter?

What attributes and qualities should be subject to the scrutiny of discrimination should solely be determined by the employer. Those employers which choose irrelevant criteria to discriminate against will be at a competitive disadvantage. But We through The State cannot make those determinations for the employer.

While I think I agree with you, I can answer this much...



Because they rule over you. The actual government is just the arena in which the robber-barons in their boardrooms play their game of chess for control over the resources of nations. You and I are barely even pawns in the battle. They are the real powers-that-be.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

That is the fault of The American Citizen and the 50 states. Instead of choosing elect Congressmen and a President to defend The Constitution, we elect those who can win the Campaign and Politics game. The American People have spoken for a century now and they have said the cost of the unknown, of self sustenance and personal liberties is too great.

That is covered here:

All levels of government in the United States exist, first and foremost, to protect the freedom of individual citizens. Corporations may be composed of citizens, but a corporation itself is not a citizen. Our government does not exist to protect the rights of I.B.M., it exists to protect the rights of the owners and their employees. There is a difference between the two. Apple Inc. is not Steve Jobs. This can not be stressed enough.

As James Madison said, the federal government exists to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority. Large groups of people banding together get the notion that they can enforce their will on smaller, weaker entities. Because the federal government would have such wide reaching political power, the Constitution was drafted to reign that power in and clearly define how it could be wielded.

A business has the ability to wield power over people as well, but it's economic power rather than financial. Your employer is able to rule over you just as surely as your state and local governments are. Now, I'm sure someone will pull out the, "If you don't like it, you can work someplace else," argument. In fact, someone already has. That's irrelevant to the discussion. If I don't like tyrannical despotism, I can always flee to a different country - that doesn't eliminate the need for Constitutional rights to protect me from my government. Likewise, being able to work someplace else if I don't like my work environment does not eliminate the need for certain laws to protect me from the depredations of my employer.

It's right there in the mission statement. The federal government was instituted to protect our personal freedoms. An entity that is exerting economic control over us is, by definition, robbing us of personal freedoms. That's what it means to control someone. You don't suddenly lose your rights and your liberty simply because you're dealing with a private business instead of a government body. That's the very reason why we have government in the first place.

A private individual has the right to hire whoever they choose. They do not have the right to use that position of authority to infringe upon the freedoms of others. An employer refusing to hire smokers is using it's economic power to bully people into quitting smoking. I realize that smoking is bad for you, and the employer is doing them a favor. I realize that smoking is wildly unpopular. Neither of these matter. The fact that it is economic power and not political power is also inconsequential. It is illegal to use a position of power and authority to bully, intimidate, coerce, or extort citizens. That is precisely what this hospital is doing.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

I wonder how far they will carry it..will they test only at hire date? Or will they conduct yearly screening tests of their employees to ensure that they are still a non-smoker. The hospital I worked for instituted the policy of mandatory flu shots...if you didn't get the flu shot, you were required to wear a mask the entire flu season, which is from October till March. If caught without a mask doing patient care, you were reprimanded and then could be fired based on noncompliance.

While I think the idea of doctors and nurses not smoking is probably a good idea (how can you take the advice of a doctor to quit smoking when you smell the smoke on him), I don't like the idea of it being dictated by the hospital.

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Dream as if you'll live forever...
...Live as if you'll die tomorrow

Vivere Senza Rimpianti

Coro:

At what point does the right to associate strip the individuals who have associated by incorperating of their individual rights of association?

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Ezekiel 23:19-20 

Discussions are so much more interesting when one has a certain level of agreement with both sides.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

As long as the smoker doesn't smoke at all during the work day, with a possible exception of during their lunch break, I'll agree with you.

However, the vast majority of smokers that I work with and know go out for smoke breaks multiple times a day. I would say that on any given day the average smoker easily wastes an hour of productive time either actively smoking or on the way to/from their smoking spot. Those are very real negative impacts on their performance.

Then don't give them raises or promotions if they aren't valuable to the company.

After reading Coro's opinion; I can see his point.

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Darksiege
Traveller, Calé, Whisperer
Lead me not into temptation; for I know a shortcut

Alternately:

What is the difference between a customer refusing to buy from someone, and an employer refusing to hire someone? Ultimately this is the same transaction. (or lack of transaction, in this case.) As an employee, you are a selling a service. The employer is buying that service. As a customer, should they not have the same rights to vote with their wallet that you do when at the mall?

(I'm just tossing these ideas out, I don't have a solid opinion on either side.)

_________________
Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

No, they shouldn't, because it's worse for society when potential employees are discriminated against unfairly. Rights are great because free markets are necessary for a flourishing economy, but sometimes they go too far.

<Teal'c>Indeed.</Teal'c> (sorry -- cross-polinating threads)

Anyway, I think you're making interesting points, particularly looking at jobs as what they are -- transactions of the labor market. Some people are looking to sell labor, and some are looking to buy it. It's difficult to see why anyone should have to be forced to engage in a commercial transaction against their will, especially not in the name of freedom. Your reasons don't have to make sense to anyone else, or be "fair". I can, for instance, refuse to buy products made by a particular company because, I don't know -- let's say the CEO had an affair that went public. That has nothing to do with the product or the company really, but so what? That's my liberty as it pertains to my property (money).

Of course, corporations aren't individuals, but how does that really change anything? I don't see how you get to "this company must purchase labor under terms it finds unwelcome" without abridging the rights of the individual(s) who own it. Effectively, you're saying that a prospective employee has a greater claim to the company's assets than does its owner(s). And, of course, the company's (which is really just a collection of assets) may be controlled by a 3rd party chosen by the owners (ex. a CEO, CFO, etc.) but this doesn't change the equation, either. Consider elderly people who have given power of attorney to someone else in order to manage their affairs. Do their rights cease to exist? Of course not.

The argument is usually that having a job is essential to having income, and having income essential to living. Fair enough. But then, if I refuse to by a product from some company, am I not depriving its owners and employees of the income they need to live? That argument doesn't really resolve.

I understand where Corolinth is coming from. I don't particularly like the way these companies are exercising control of their property, but then, I don't like a lot of thing that people do with their money/property. I'd like if there were a better solution to this, but I can't see a way around it without abridging someone's rights. Maybe there's something I haven't thought of.

As an aside, discrimination in hiring isn't, by the way, illegal in the broad sense. It's only illegal when the discrimination is on the basis of race, religion, creed, national origin, etc. And those are not even Constitutional provisions/amendments, but rather state and federal statutes. But even those are a confusing mess of contradictions and exceptions. The ever-popular example of this is Hooters. You'll notice that there are no Hooters Guys. It's blatantly gender discrimination, but they've generally been able to get away with it. I believe they've lost one lawsuit, but won several others. Something about "trademark image" being a bona fide job qualification. I don't really know the details.

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Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

Actually, I was discussing this with Taly last night. It is illegal in the state of Missouri (and possibly other states) to inquire about an applicant's marital status on the grounds that employers were discriminating based on marital status. Married women are (or were, this may have changed since the law went into effect) the least productive members of the work force. They have a tendency to take maternity leave, causing the employer to pay the salary of someone who is not working as well as hire a replacement, and they are noticeably more lax about showing up to work because they are a secondary income. Married men, on the other hand, are the most productive workers.

Married women were being discriminated against in favor of divorced women over the age of 40. More bases for discrimination are illegal than just race, religion, and creed.

This is not a simple matter of free association. Unlike a church or a social club, a business wields a certain amount of power and control over its employees. Real, tangible power, not the perceived power of a man in robes with a fancy religious symbol and a book. The sole purpose of government, as outlined in the founding philosophy of the country, is to secure freedoms for the individual against those with the power to take it away.

A hospital having a no smoking policy is one thing. A hospital dictating that you not smoke on your private time is entirely different. You'll do what we like, or you won't work. That isn't how this game is played. When I'm not at work, that's my time, not my employer's. Now, you might think it's a small thing for one hospital to do it, but then it gets popular and every hospital jumps on the bandwagon. You will do what we like, or you won't work. Now it's no longer a matter of finding a new hospital, I have to find a whole new state, or a new profession, or give up smoking - but giving up smoking is my decision, not yours, and not the hospital's.

This is not a slippery slope fallacy, it's a very real scenario. One hospital is doing it. Two years from now, if this is allowed to continue, others will adopt the same policy. It is, quite literally, a "You will do what we like or you won't work," scenario. Free association does not give you the right to make other people behave in a manner that pleases you. When you are making lifestyle decisions for other people who are not able to deal with you as an equal (which an employee facing their employer is not), then it's time for the law to step in.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

Let them do it. Excluding labor to certain markets raises the cost of labor. Making more negative demands further removes employees and raises it further. Competition will sort out the rest.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

I know. That's why my list was followed with "etc." An exact list would depend on locale. I haven't done that much research even for my own state, frankly. Either way, these aren't Constitutional provisions.


But how is this any different than "you will do what I like or I won't buy your product/services"? Is it simply a matter of scale/power? Should large, organized boycotts be illegal as well, then?

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Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

This wouldn't be an issue if corporations hadn't grown beyond their original scope and purpose. They were never meant to be immortal gigantic entities with all the rights and protections of an individual person. There's something wrong with the way we've allowed this to progress that has undermined freedom at every turn. Unfortunately, changing it now would require something as thorough as the French Revolution's Reign of Terror.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

I don't entirely disagree. But still -- this problem remains: why do my property rights go away because I own a business? And how many employees do I have to have for that to happen? 10? 100? 1,000? It's not a matter of corporations having rights. What I'm saying is this:

1,000 people acting individually have rights. But 1,000 people acting together...don't? Wait...what?

If they were doing something illegal for an individual, then by all means, screw 'em. But let's turn this on its ear: say you're hiring someone to clean your house. Can you refuse to hire someone because they smoke? Why or why not?

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Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

The word tyranny in this thread title looks like tranny every time I see it. That's all I wanted to say here.

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Los Angeles Kings 2014 Stanley Cup Champions

"I love this **** team right here."
-Jonathan Quick