Fired for being hot

[betsy]

Only Manny, NewTeddy and jbg on this thread seem to be explicitly saying that this ruling is not fair - that the woman should have to be responsible for how her employer felt about her, and the risk to his marriage. I also feel that it's not fair.

Anybody else out there ?

For those of you who think this is fair, would you find it fair if a man was fired for the same reason ? What about a man fired by another man ? What about a man fired for similar reasons ? Fired by another man ?

At what point in these analogies does an employeer seem to have too much control over ones life ? At what point do the temptress/employees portrayed make this seem like Sharia law ?

Yeah....you're a white male, and they wouldn't hire you even if you're the only qualified applicant among the lot, because they've got to fill the quota to hire more women, or visible minorities.

We're not talking about fairness here. We're talking realities.

Edited December 24, 2012 by betsy

[betsy]

MHardner, if you're the husband/employer...and the presence of this woman is causing some serious problems with your marriage....what would you do?

[cybercoma]

Yeah....you're a white male, and they wouldn't hire you even if you're the only qualified applicant among the lot, because they've got to fill the quota to hire more women, or visible minorities.

We're not talking about fairness here. We're talking realities.

The unemployment rate amongst white males must be staggering, as compared to women and ethnic minorities then.

Oh but wait... it's not.

[BC_chick]

And lose because the company met the legal requirement for termination. It's not a wrongful dismissal if they pay you severance and termination.

So what you're saying then is that as long as an employee is given severance and notice they can't sue for wrongful dismissal? That's just not true, people sue all the time and get more than their severance pay (ie pay for six months, 1 year).

Google wrongful dismissal and see how many lawyers do exactly that in Canada.

This would be a slam-dunk case given the dentist's (naive?) honesty in court for his reasons. He should have changed his own behaviour or he really couldn't, I hate to agree with BC_2004 on this but he would have been better off finding a different pretext to fire her

[Guest]

Only Manny, NewTeddy and jbg on this thread seem to be explicitly saying that this ruling is not fair - that the woman should have to be responsible for how her employer felt about her, and the risk to his marriage. I also feel that it's not fair.

Anybody else out there ?

You missed mine.

[BC_chick]

MHardner, if you're the husband/employer...and the presence of this woman is causing some serious problems with your marriage....what would you do?

Control yourself, not fire the woman who has been working for you for 10 years. Sheesh, are you for real?

[betsy]

So what you're saying then is that as long as an employee is given severance and notice they can't sue for wrongful dismissal? That's just not true, people sue all the time and get more than their severance pay (ie pay for six months, 1 year).

Google wrongful dismissal and see how many lawyers do exactly that in Canada.

Here we go again.....

Could it be they just happened to have grounds to sue? Like a breached ironclad written contract?

Read the Canada labor laws. It's been explained plainly and clearly.

Edited December 24, 2012 by betsy

[cybercoma]

So what you're saying then is that as long as an employee is given severance and notice they can't sue for wrongful dismissal? That's just not true, people sue all the time and get more than their severance pay (ie pay for six months, 1 year).

They can sue, but the courts aren't in the business of giving people windfalls. If the statute says the employer can dismiss you without reason, so long as they pay X number of weeks severance, then you can't win a case by arguing they fired you without cause.

There are particular incidents where you can sue for "wrongful dismissal" and those include not following the dismissal procedures that are present in the contract (there may not be any), discrimination (ie, race, gender, ethnicity, religion), retaliation (ie, employee files a claim against the employer and the employer fires them in response), or firing the employee because they refuse to break the law.

Firing someone without cause is completely legal, so long as appropriate notice is given to the employee (appropriate is determined by local legislations) or severance is paid in lieu of notice.

The only condition that could possibly be met in this particular case is discrimination. As sad as it may be, she was not discriminated against because she was merely a woman--they hired a woman after she was terminated. It's possible that in her contract there were particular termination procedures, but I highly doubt it as the lawyers would have gone that route as well, incorporating both reasons into the lawsuit.

So, yes. People can sue for "wrongful dismissal" but there are very particular circumstances where that is applicable. This case it is not.

[WIP]

Yeah....you're a white male, and they wouldn't hire you even if you're the only qualified applicant among the lot, because they've got to fill the quota to hire more women, or visible minorities.

We're not talking about fairness here. We're talking realities.

Thanks for providing the evidence that conservative christian white women are their own worst enemy! Always willing to work directly against their own interests, and especially the interests of younger women and girls who have the most to lose if women's rights keep getting chipped away at!

[betsy]

Control yourself, not fire the woman who has been working for you for 10 years. Sheesh, are you for real?

I'm not simply talking about just the man here. His wife works in the same location....most likely a business partner to boot. Sure you can ignore your wife, but guess what gets hurt in the long run. Your marriage, your family....and your business! You've got a lot at stake! A lot to lose!

[betsy]

So what you're saying then is that as long as an employee is given severance and notice they can't sue for wrongful dismissal? That's just not true, people sue all the time and get more than their severance pay (ie pay for six months, 1 year).

Google wrongful dismissal and see how many lawyers do exactly that in Canada.

This would be a slam-dunk case given the dentist's (naive?) honesty in court for his reasons. He should have changed his own behaviour or he really couldn't, I hate to agree with BC_2004 on this but he would have been better off finding a different pretext to fire her

Of course a lot of them run to the Human Rights tribunal.

[WIP]

So what you're saying then is that as long as an employee is given severance and notice they can't sue for wrongful dismissal? That's just not true, people sue all the time and get more than their severance pay (ie pay for six months, 1 year).

Google wrongful dismissal and see how many lawyers do exactly that in Canada.

This would be a slam-dunk case given the dentist's (naive?) honesty in court for his reasons. He should have changed his own behaviour or he really couldn't, I hate to agree with BC_2004 on this but he would have been better off finding a different pretext to fire her

I tried to scan through as much of the six pages of this thread as I can, and I think it's not even worth bothering to wade into the weeds and get the issue muddled down with technical, legalistic bafflegab, that is mostly irrelevant anyway! The same dynamics occur in workplaces that were formerly all-male, and start integrating women into the workforce....just let's say, a lot of guys don't know how to act! And are either openly hostile or try to seduce them....which apparently a lot of women who are new on a job consider just as stressful. Whatever! If there isn't a law there should be - that if we are going to have a real gender-equal society, every workplace has to be safer and less threatening to women, and guys who can't tell the difference between a girl saying "hello" and a girl who wants to have sex with them, need to be sent to special training seminars so they can learn how to separate doing a job, and looking for sex.

And re: this example, I personally don't give a rat's ass whether or not the wife was threatened by a young, attractive woman in her husband's practice. Fact is, that if a dentist is a womanizer - looking for what's available on the side, or finds himself in his 40's - in the middle of a mid-life crisis, and gets a new sports car, starts competing in triathalons, and starts an affair with his receptionist, any strategies of these matrons to try to keep temptation away from their husbands is doomed to failure!

The attitudes and strategies of Christian matrons in our society are not any different than the way matrons in patriarchal Muslim societies act as the glue to hold patriarchy together! And also are the enablers for polygamy, child-marriage, public stonings etc. because they benefit somewhat from patriarchy, and most of the harms are to the new brides. Just saying....women who attack laws protecting women in the workplace, from domestic violence, equal pay, access to birth control etc., are the great enablers for evil in our society......and who knows where that will lead to in a couple of generations along this trend! Progress is not usually ever upward. Sometimes, reactionary forces drag everyone backwards again.....may happen here too, if everyone who is progressive is just asleep at the wheel and allows the reactionaries to just chip away at every social progress that is made.

[jacee]

I'm not simply talking about just the man here. His wife works in the same location....most likely a business partner to boot. Sure you can ignore your wife, but guess what gets hurt in the long run. Your marriage, your family....and your business! You've got a lot at stake! A lot to lose!

Only a month's pay?

Pretty cheapskate!

[betsy]

Only a month's pay? Pretty cheapskate!

Tell the labor board.

[Michael Hardner]

That's not what I've said. I said that I believe the boss-employee relationship went beyond professional, and since the wife, also an employee, was uncomfortable with it, it affected the work place. The fact that she was texting her boss outside of the work place, about personal issues as well, and that the wife found these texts, goes beyond "how her employer felt about her," IMO.

I'd feel the same in all instances if the circumstances were the same.

She had some control over this. Had she not been texting her boss, the wife would not have found the texts - and asked that she be fired. I've pointed out that some of their discussions were definitely beyond the professional boss-employee realm. Since the wife found "how often are you having orgasms" texts from her husband to another employee, I can understand how that would make the work place rather uncomfortable.

But the employer himself engaged in these exchanges. Is that fair ?

[Michael Hardner]

MHardner, if you're the husband/employer...and the presence of this woman is causing some serious problems with your marriage....what would you do?

You're asking me to imagine being someone else.

[MiddleClassCentrist]

But the employer himself engaged in these exchanges. Is that fair ?

Absolutely, she crossed the line and had more to lose. Is the dentist going to shut down the practice just to end it?

If that were a man in the same situation, this wouldnt even be newsworthy. Thats what is pathetic about this. The man probably would just suck it up, as men are supposed to do, and move on after getting to close of a relationship with a female of authority. This is only news because it happened to a woman.

[MiddleClassCentrist]

If some guy was constantly texting my wife, sharing intimate details of our personal life and she spent a lot of time with him... I'd see him as a threat to our marriage. If he was an employee of hers, It would be appropriate to fire him

[jbg]

Only Manny, NewTeddy and jbg on this thread seem to be explicitly saying that this ruling is not fair - that the woman should have to be responsible for how her employer felt about her, and the risk to his marriage. I also feel that it's not fair.

My view is that people should be held to adult standards at work. There has to be better ways of dealing with these kinds of problems.

[Rue]

So called "At Will" employees may be terminated at any time for any reason that is not contrary to state or federal law...or no reason at all. Even with an employment contract, there may be at will provisions for termination of employees. Similarly, at will employees are free to terminate their employment whenever they choose.

Not in Canada. You can put someone on probation and in essence fire them during probation without cause but the case law says once probation is up to dismiss someone you must have just cause and you can not put people on indefinite probation which a fire at will clause is.

To prove just cause to dismiss someone in Canada you have to follow what we call the doctrine of culimating incident. First there must be a verbal warning followd by a writen one and then at least a second written warning that must offer remedial measures to the person (education workshops, or anger management or rehab) and then yet a third letter saying the remedial measures didn't work and if it happens again, you are gone.

To be able to fire someone on the spot, the incident has to be so severe as to knowingly or with gross negligence endanger a fellow worker's health or safety or constitute a crime or have an element of violence or gross insubordination.

Even the "at will" clause you have talked about has been ignored by numerous Judges in the US who have the discretion to do so.

The problem is in Canada like the US by the time you hire a lawyer to represent you its usually not worth it.

In Canada each province has an Employment Standards Act that prescribes the minimum level of benefits, vacation pay and severance all employers must conform to and can not contract out of.

In the case BC speaks of, you can not in theory anyways, fire someone simply because you find them sexually attractive the same reason you can't fire them for being ugly. Dismissal must be based on documented incompetence or insubordination as I stated above or such a serious act as to require immediate dismissal.

Acts of blatant racism, sexism and violence have been found to constitute dismissal on the spot as have operating machinery while drunk or stoned and then going on to injure someone., Acts of sabotage or having sex at work have also been found to constitute immediate dismissal.

The Charter of Rights in Canada guarantees a certain level of privacy and therefore inability for employers to arbitrarily harass employees but they can ask in advance for blood tests if it can be shown these blood tests are applied equally to all people driving or operating dangerous machinery.

There is a degree of privacy allowed in bathrooms, i.e., surveillance in washrooms is considered an invasion of privacy without consent of workers but once you go on a computer or telephone, there is zero expectation of privacy and surveillance in public or open work places is allowed.

I will send my bill later. BC will be interested to know the Supreme Court of Israel has upheld numerous unfair dismissal claims of sexually harassed Muslim and Jewish women in the workplace in Israel. They can not hide behind fundamentalist religious beliefs to discriminate in the work place. In Canada the Charter is construed in a way where more and more fundamentalists are trying to justify their discrimination claiming religious freedom in the Charter. Push come to shove the Supeme Court is going to in the future have to make it clear religion can not be used to justify sexist hiring and firing practices. In the US they have thrown out religious attempts to justify sexist behaviour.

Its an emerging area of litigation though.

Edited December 25, 2012 by Rue

[jbg]

Its an emerging area of litigation though.

Great, just what we need more of. Litigation and areas of litigation. </sarcasm>

[cybercoma]

To prove just cause to dismiss someone in Canada you have to follow what we call the doctrine of culimating incident. First there must be a verbal warning followd by a writen one and then at least a second written warning that must offer remedial measures to the person (education workshops, or anger management or rehab) and then yet a third letter saying the remedial measures didn't work and if it happens again, you are gone.

This is not at entirely true. This is only if you want to fire someone with just cause and not have to pay out severance. If you pay them out severance, you avoid the just cause problems entirely. Moreover, just cause doesn't necessarily need to follow this particular criteria. Your contract may state that you will be given a warning for an infraction and following that warning you may be terminated if the same infraction occurs again. If that's what it says in your contract, that is what's binding. If that's the company's policy, then that is what's binding (although you may be able to make the argument that this was not clear in your contract of employment). Basically, the company has to follow the termination process that it says it will follow. Barring that, the courts typically see a reasonable termination process as one verbal warning, one written warning, then termination.

Edited December 25, 2012 by cybercoma

[cybercoma]

Great, just what we need more of. Litigation and areas of litigation. </sarcasm>

Isn't your bread buttered on that side?

[jbg]

Great, just what we need more of. Litigation and areas of litigation. </sarcasm>

Isn't your bread buttered on that side?

I can make my living with meritorious litigation that serves a purpose. I am not an ambulance chaser.

[cybercoma]

I can make my living with meritorious litigation that serves a purpose. I am not an ambulance chaser.

Are you suggesting that clarifying Charter rights is akin to "ambulance chasing"?