(Untitled)

[blue_monday]

Gah, this is insane. It's a perfectly reasonable request from BA, and from any other organisations like them, that people in a public facing role should wear a uniform as instructed and not display necklaces or the like. These people who are now complaining about it signed up to the job, and presumably haven't argued the dress code in the past. It

Comments

Help, help, I'm being oppressed!

[pescana]

I am so utterly tired of people claiming persecution for not being able to shove their religion in other peoples' faces.

Okay, so wearing a little cross on a chain around your neck is not quite shoving it into other peoples' faces, but still. It's not persecution of faith, it's a ban of visible jewellery.

The word persecution is going to lose all its power, the way it's so often invoked for things like this.

Re: Help, help, I'm being oppressed!

[blue_monday]

Exactly! Many public facing jobs have a ban on visible jewellery bar one or two rings and plain earrings, some are very specific about what they allow and don't allow, and some just say that you shouldn't have any visible jewellery. In some cases it is for safety reasons as well, but I think when the policies were written there was little thought given to it being called religious persecution.

[lewishamdreamer]

Anti-Christian persecution? In this country? Fucking ludicrous.

Christianity retains a position of total dominance in this idiotic country. Read this.

[cangetmad]

Oh, I'm not sure. As long as I'd be able to show my Darwin-fish necklace (no, but I'm so going to get one). Actually, I really want to see the test cases for atheism under the new law.

[blue_monday]

That could be really interesting actually, how can you cause offence to someone by not believing in something. Hmm...

Also, just having been to look at Darwin-fish necklaces and the like, I'm really amused at some of the things for sale.

[biascut]

It is ridiculous. And the people supporting her are making fools of themselves: it really is just about playing to that Daily Mail But-What-About-Ordinary-Persecuted-People-Like-Us sensibility. Fuck off, Anne Widdecombe.

I also never know whether or not to be pissed off when people compare wearing a cross or something with things like wearing a turban if you're a Sikh. To me, it's pretty damn obvious that wearing a cross doesn't have any spiritual significance beyond the personal: there's certainly no Scriptural authority which enjoins Christians to wear something to remind them of their faith. But then, it's not really as if you can separate the two: some Muslims wear hijab because they believe it's wrong not to, and others wear it because they like having a visible marker of their faith. And there's little biblical authority for vast quantities of Catholic or high Anglican practice, and that's the whole point.

[scoobsuk]

"There's a danger we end up like in France where there's an absolute bar on any expression of faith in public society."

Let's hope so.

Faith should be a private thing. If people want to believe such rubbish they are free to do so in their own time and out of my face.

I'm sure if I wore a God Is Dead T-shirt and claimed it was an official symbol of my militant atheism faith there'd be a holy uproar.

[markadm]

Yes, but whilst faith is a private observance, people ought not to feel that are compelled to live their lives inside a box.

I do have a problem with bling-bling crosses, but not small crucifixes.

[blue_monday]

The point in the cases that they're talking about is not that people should be compelled to live their lives in a box, but that if their employer asks them to abide by clothing regulations they should do it. It just so happens that in this case someone objected because she was asked to wear her crucifix under her clothes. I don't have a problem with people wearing what they want, but if they're working in a public facing role, and that role doesn't have anything to do with a religion, why should they be wearing something that is a visible marker of their faith?

As biascut says, it's a tricky one in many ways as it depends a lot on personal interpretation of the religious texts and teachings.