Dearborn McDonalds Sued Over the Hijab

A landscape of tort as far and wide as the eye can see has an impact on the decisions that corporations make when they determine what is appropriate dress for the workplace.

Liability insurers demand that the insured, especially employers whose employees work directly with the public, and/or work around or operate dangerous equipment, diligently observe their working environs for hazards. If you want to see someone in the grocery store scramble, spill a little cooking oil in aisle 4.

Carriers of worker's compensation insurance also make demands on employers so they can avoid injury to workers thereby keeping their costs lower. I know I am not the only one in this country tormented by the painful memories of having had to achingly sit through tedious safety meetings, time after time, month after month, yawning, nodding, rubbing the eyes, listening to the same monotonous topics being droned on, and on, over and over and over again, to fulfill these insurer driven requirements--in an effort to prevent needless injury. These meetings have a tendency to be a tad boring.

OSHA and MiOSHA (in Michigan) also get into the act by carrying out spot inspections to try and keep workers safe. Also, depending on what the business is, different governing bodies do routine inspections to guarantee safety to the public when it comes to things such as food manufacture, storage, distribution and preparation. In fact, there is a whole army of taxpayer compensated bureaucrats out in the field every day making sure that the evil employer does not take advantage of the innocent employee with barely enough common sense to show up to his manure shoveling job in sequin encrusted flip-flops.

Dress codes and uniforms are often times a part of these safety efforts. Steel toed boots, clip-on ties, no loose clothing, hair-nets, etc., are all commonly required in many industries to keep the worker or the customer, or both, safe.

Employers also routinely set and enforce strict dress code policies for a number of other purposes too that might include preserving the corporate image, simple continuity of color, not grossing out the clientèle, and because, simply, they figure it is their business and they can do whatever they want to do in their business.

I am reminded of a sign that hung in the office of the boss where one of my high school friends worked shortly after college, this before his career of shoveling horse manure in sequined flip-flops really took off. The sign read;

This is not Burger King. You do not get it your way. You get it my way, or you don't get the sonofabitch at all.

Here comes the curve...

Businesses are being sued (this time McDonalds) for daring to require that employees adhere to the dress code, or for not hiring people who affirm they will not adhere to the dress code, because, they say, their religion requires them to dress in a manner that is inconsistent with the requirements, and because, golly, it hurts their feelings not to be hired for that reason.

So, today's litigation amounts to "May I have $10,000,000.00 please, for your refusal to hire me?" Tomorrow's might very well be, "May I have $10,000,000.00 because the sleeve to my hijab was caught in the slicer." This, further complicated by another suit, this one from a customer who was exposed to unsanitary conditions when the hijab's sleeve was accidentally dragged through the special sauce and deposited on the McRib.

Safety is on the mind of industry every day, they cannot afford it not to be and, as a result, many uniform and dress codes are required and enforced for reasons that supersede feelings and some pedestrian's arbitrary desire to seek a career of flipping burgers rather than one working at a greenhouse or shoveling manure.

h/t Dhimmi Watch