Oh, sure – let’s consider Steve’s $500 donation as being the only one from that business. I agree with you that if the big donation came fromt he big cheese, that’s legitimate cause for backlash. But what if Steve’s is the only donation from the business?
And whatever negatives you’re OK with, are you still OK if they happen because the donations were to “No on 8?”
The studios didn’t stand up for their workers back in the day, but I’m not sure how that requires us to protect modern companies from getting into situations where they might have to make the same sorts of decisions.
Sure it might be tough on the company to have to take a stand one way, the other, or even no way, but I don’t recall anyone ever having said that life, or the free market, is fair.
Employment at will. Them’s the breaks. Them breaks suck, but they are there.
Personally, if I knew that happened I would never support that business again but at a business level I acknowledge that it is their decision to make.
She’s “a” boss. Restaurant managers don’t own the place. They schedule shifts, order supplies, and the like. There are likely several managers.
From the same article:
Seems to me its SOP when bigots do it, but when opponents of something like Prop 8 do the same thing people start crying “foul,” which is also pretty SOP.
There was a case I’ve seen cited on the boards, where the donor was an employee of a wedding planner’s business, and the fallout wasn’t pretty - the (gay-friendly) owner/manager was torn between losing business and firing a perfectly good employee for her personal beliefs. I don’t know how that one panned out ultimately; when I read about it the owner did not intend at the time to fire the person. Personally I thought the employee was a fool. Working for a wedding planner in California, for pete’s sake, and you’re going to shoot your own employer in the foot by actively trying to eliminate a great big market of potential clients? I might fire her for that alone.
Well sure, Steve’s going to sue, and probably win in California. That’s boucoup bucks for the drill press operator and his lawyer. Maybe the company’ll go out of business, maybe not. Maybe it even bought insurance to cover just such an eventuality.
How are you ever going to make it illegal for people to act on their personal bias towards a company? Should people go to jail for telling the manager of the local coffee house that one of their barristas is an asshole, or for that matter a homophobic asshole? Or perhaps you would draw the line at a complainer who says they will no longer frequent said coffeehouse while the asshole works there?
Except that’s not what’s being discussed. I’m guessing that Jim Abbott owns Abbott and Associates. He’s an owner, not an employee.
It goes back to the question of publicizing names of donors. Prop 8 supporters were more than willing to use the public records to their advantage, but are crying foul and filing lawsuits when it’s used against them. They want it both ways.
You’re correct, but I’m not sure if its a meaningful distinction. If the bigots had replied “Okay, we don’t need the membership rolls. Just give us the names and addresses of everyone who donated to them,” would the end result have been much different?
Well, they’re hardly alone in that. I think that can be said of pretty much every political action group ever.
And what actions are we hypothetically saying happened to Steve? Or the business? Was Steve fired? Well, that’s a travesty, but it happens. Was the business boycotted? All fine and good. People have every right to spend their money wherever they choose. And if they choose to not spend it at McDonald Fabrication, that’s the way it goes.
Sure. But realistically, if these things were to come to pass, then there exists a group of people who support (or don’t) the proposition that I feel certain would flock to that business and make up for any negative that might come due to the owner or even an employee contributing as they saw fit. Now, the hypothetical grocer who was mentioned by someone way back in the long long ago who owned a store on Castro who had to declare bankruptcy because he contributed to “Yes on 8” is probably going to be SOL, but what was little old hypothetical him thinking in the first place? Not being a business owner myself, I don’t know all of the ins and outs, but it seems to me that one of the first things you come to understand is that the people who come into your store (or fabrication place) are the ones putting food on your table and money in your pocket. Jerk them around and they will go elsewhere. And then you wind up bankrupt and whining that the state who made public your name is at fault, which is absolute nonsense.
Gee, I don’t know. There are people with personal biases against concealed carry permit holders - and now the general public in Virginia cannot find out who these people are.
Now, actions against a company are fine and dandy, but if people are being attacked personally they may petition their elected representatives for a redress of grievances. And you cannot predict the form future legislation will take.
Why, because it would have a chilling effect on $500 contributions? Bring it on.
It is unfair to 'ol McDonald, IMHO. But it’s no more unfair than random power outages.
Should McDonald fire Steve (or, to make the example better, a wedding planner who deals with the public?) That’s a difficult business decision. Personally, I wouldn’t call on McDonald to do that, but then again I’m more concerned with contributions totaling, say, $2000 or more.
ETA: Re: the $100 sticker company. Contributing $100 is stating an opinion. Contributing $100,000 is something else.
Probably not. But that’s not what happened. And we’re talking about individuals who donated funds to an organization as opposed to passage of a proposition. I think that’s a pretty meaningful distinction.
Most of the names contributing six figure sums didn’t strike me as the sort of companies that faced the public. When you are dealing with vendors on that level, something tells me you don’t get sentimental when the antigay company outbids the nearest competitor by $ 50,000. If you do, it’s likely your shareholders are going to remove you from your position as CEO.
Owner, employee, whatever. I think now is the time for gays to employ this tactic. It’s all fair.
If anti-gays want to protest gay supporters, let them. Times are changing. They’ll fail. OTOH, now is the time to protest anti-gays, and let all the anti-gays cry “persecution” and make bigger fools of themselves.
I’m a little surprised (OK shocked) at your answer here. Are you saying that it’s OK to discriminate for any reason if it affects your business? Or is this just limited to people’s donations?
Yes, the wider point of the article was that there were problems with the publicizing of names on both sides and he was advocating that this be done away with entirely. . . on both sides.
But the narrower discussion going on at that time was about Bricker’s hypothetical of an owner put in the position of having to decide on what to do with an employee who had contributed in a way that affected his business.
I’m not aware of it being illegal to fire someone for political contributions. Though I may be wrong on that. If I am wrong, then I will change my response.
At will employment is the law in CA, you can fire anyone at anytime for nearly any reason. Why are you shocked that I wouldn’t change that just because it might negatively affect someone I agree with?
Please also see the rest of response where I noted that I would not do business with the company that fired someone for donating to defeat prop 8. I readily admit that I’m biased, because I wouldn’t do the same regarding a company that fired someone for supporting prop 8. But that doesn’t change the fact that I respect the rule of law in this regard.
And again, this thread is, ostensibly, about Prop 8. You are referring to something else, entirely. As well, what happened in the case of the CC permit holders? Were people attacked? Paintballs fired at houses? Tires slashed? I’m not sure I’m comfortable with what happened in your particular instance, but it’s not directly correlative to the issue at hand.
Has anyone been attacked personally? I know that in the earlier instance the restaurant manager said that, “the pressure was intense,” but how so? Did it take the form of personal attacks? If so, I imagine that the article would have mentioned it. To date, boycotts have been the instrument of choice in demonstrating displeasure, and people are free to spend their ducats, shekels or big Yap Island stones however they see fit.