Religion, like one’s genitals, should be kept to one’s self and not shoved down others’ throats.
That’s a fine pithy statement, but doesn’t really contribute much to the discussion. Is wearing a cross shoving religion down others’ throats? A Star of David? Asking for breaks to be scheduled so that someone can pray?
Wearing a hijab, especially since it’s not like she wasn’t wearing it when she was hired, is not shoving religion down anyone’s throat, any more than wearing a cross is.
Are A&E customers really so shallow that glimpsing a stockroom employee in hijab will cause them to flee in terror? They don’t actually have to, you know, talk to her…
(Actually, I haven’t visited an A&E recently. I’d be surprised if the store in Houston’s Galleria didn’t get Muslim customers. We’re a pretty diverse city & have lots of international visitors. And I’ve seen many a stylish Muslim lady, adapting her version of traditional dress to international fashion.)
In many cases, yes. These are the people paying $50.00 for ripped blue jeans.
Like the people who shop at Abercrombie & Fitch would deign to pay $50 for ripped jeans.
If they’re not paying at least $150, they feel like their being cheated.
That’s not the point. The point is the brand or mystique they are trying to create in order to set themselves apart and have people shop there instead of someplace else. They’d like everyone to be attracted to their brand. That is not the same thing as not controlling their brand.
The trouble I see here is that they hired her with the tacit understanding that her hijab was ok, as long as it was in the company colors. If they had a problem with her wearing the thing that should have been made clear before they hired her. Assuming the case is as clear as stated and there are no other factors I’d say A&F is likely to lose some money on this one…and well deserved, if the facts are as presented.
-XT
Nitpick: a tacit understanding is an unspoken one. At least according to the plantiff, she was explicitly told she’d be OK wearing the hijab.
Also, I’m not sure thats the only problem with firing her. A&F is required by law to try and make reasonable accommodations for its employees religious requirements. For a floor employee for whom part of their job is to model clothing, I can see that being impossible, but its pretty hard to buy that letting a stockroom employee wear her head scarf is an undue burden. Even if she’s out stocking shelves occasionally, I don’t think a judge is going to buy that the A&F brand is so ephemeral that the brief appearence of a woman with a headscarf putting a dress on the shelf will shatter the effect.
Also, as a practical matter, I’m not sure A&F deciding San Francisco was the best place to try and exercise their no headscarfs policy was particularly brilliant.
Doesn’t really matter.
If management feels that customers buy more if they see employees modeling the clothes, and so require them to wear certain types of clothing, that is managements prerogative.
Many places I have worked had a uniform or dress code that was required, and enforced for all employees. And many times I thought that was silly. (Programmers hidden away on a secret floor not even reachable by the public elevators have to wear a collared shirt and tie?) But the dress requirements were managements right, and so I either complied with them or went to work elsewhere.
Imagine the shit storm if some shirtless boy-whore were forced to take of his crucifix to adhere to a ‘look policy?’
Actually, they are. No jewelry or buttons that conveyed a ‘political’ or ‘religious’ message were allowed. So crucifixes had to be removed (or at least turned around so they were in the back of the neck). This from a friend who worked there several years ago, but I think that is still the policy.
And none of them are “shirtless”. How can the store sell shirtless?
They are required to wear a shirt, of the A+F style. Preferable one actually for sale in the store; they get big employee discounts to encourage them to wear the store products. (My friend said some of the employees took the job more for the employee discount than the pay!)
I once applied for part-time work at The Sharper Image, and they told me (in writing) that my application was not being considered because as a smoker I was not in line with the public image (heh) they wished to project.
But there is a difference between enforcing a dress code, and allowing something to be worn only to fire them for violating a dress code for a different category of employee, no?
One of the football plays I had a crush on in HS worked at A&F. He sure spent alot of time shirtless for someone who was supposed to be selling & modeling clothing. He did have St Christopher metal he always wore. A better analogy where if a male employee were hired with the understanding that he might on occasion be asked to work shirtless or otherwise in revealing clothes, but then refused to citing Christianity. He ended up being dismissed because of a tatoo he got.
Actually, I really doubt that they could disallow hijabs on the grounds of “showing off the clothing” or whatever, provided the employee is willing to wear a hijab that matches the clothing (and potentially is designed by A&F). There’s absolutely no grounds to believe “Everyone must match the dress code” is a BFOQ — otherwise, an entire society could effectively disallow Muslims from working. On the other hand, for an actual runway model, the BFOQ is pretty obvious. This is somewhere in between — but AFAIK, A&F sells pants, shirts, etc., right? So their employees aren’t wearing an outfit that someone would buy as a whole, but a combination of this blouse you can buy, these pants you can buy, etc., right? Common sense would say that no, wearing a hijab does not make an employee unable to demonstrate the attractiveness of the individual A&F products, and further does not substantially detract from her ability to match the style of the week (/month/season/whatever). Ergo, not a BFOQ.
I also was curious to what extent different protected classes are distinguished from one another. I can’t help but notice that, when people propose “dress code” or “uniform” BFOQ’s, the arguments they make could just as easily be applied to having the wrong skin colour (more easily, even, since a hijab can be changed and arguably creates less of a difference in appearance anyway). But nobody would defend that application, right? So why defend it against Muslims?
(ETA: I would assume that you could refuse to hire someone on the basis of skin colour for a modelling job. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.)
Because it conflicts and detracts from the image they create to set themselves apart from everyone else. There image happens to be the healthy All-American look. (A&F actually has deep roots in America as an outdoor sports outfitter). They spend tens of millions on this, trying to get it right. and that’s no small task. They spend a fortune on design and photo shoots all with that one image in mind. They’d be fools to allow an employee detract from that image because they insist on wearing a different form of dress.
Low-hanging fruit. For lots of Americans, a “healthy All-American look” is… white.
If she’s observant enough to wear a hijab then she probally has other modesty restrictions she follows. Like not wearing short sleaved blouses or always wearing long trousers/ankle lenght skirts. Of course if she can make an outfit like that out of clothes that are for sale in the shop A&F wouldn’t have a leg to stand on. I suppose they could claim she’s wearing clothing that’s “too big for her” (ie not tight enough) or that employees need to be willing to model specific garments (like whatever’s in season or on sale) and not just clothes in general.
As it happens, many Muslims do in fact wear hijabs along with short sleeves, shorts, or otherwise moderately revealing clothing. That objection did flash through my mind, but it just isn’t true. And yes, they could claim that she needs to wear tighter clothing or specific garments, but as far as we know, they have not done so, and for all we know, she does wear tight clothing and specific garments.