What if you were having trouble finishing a major project at work and your boss suggested you "come to Jesus" because it would help you deal with your challenge? And let's say you were a Muslim, a Hindu, a Buddhist, or an atheist, and you really didn't want to come to Jesus?
In the workplace my friends, this is a big fat no no.
Legally you are not allowed to push your religion down anyone's throat at work. You also can't put down a colleague's religious faith and you can't hinder an individual's right to practice their faith if it doesn't impede day to day business.
Pretty simple, no?
Well, not quite.
Discrimination in the workplace is alive and well. Actually, it's at record levels when it comes to religion and the disabled, according to a report on 2009 bias charges released yesterday by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. And I recently wrote about how religious expression in the workplace is frowned upon.
Are you surprised? Probably not if you had the pleasure of hearing Fox News newsman Brit Hume's comments recently to Tiger Woods.
Hume put down the golfer's faith of Buddhism and suggested he turn to Christianity to help him deal with his philandering problem.
"I don't think that faith offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith," Hume said. "So my message to Tiger would be, "Tiger, turn to the Christian faith and you can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world."
The fact that a journalist -- and I use that term loosely as it pertains to Hume -- would go on a national news show and put down another high-profile individual's faith should tell all of us that religious bigotry, and bigotry as a whole, is a growing problem in this country.
The numbers released by the EEOC yesterday are disheartening.
Religious bias charges increased to 3,386 in 2009, the highest number in the last decade. And charges for disability discrimination jumped to a record 21,451 last year, up from 19,453 in 2008. National origin bias is also on the rise, with charges climbing to 11,134 in 2009.
I asked EEOC spokesman David Grinberg why he thought bias was on the rise.
"The increases in national origin and religion charges may be an outgrowth of the fact that the American workplace has become more ethnically, linguistically, and religiously diverse," he said.
Clearly, people like Hume don't seem to much like the diversity. And have you listened to the constant anti-diversity rhetoric oozing from a host of commentators since the Christmas Day attempted airplane bombing.
This from Retired Lieutenant General Thomas McInerney:
"If you are an 18-28-year-old Muslim man, then you should be strip searched. If we don't do that, there's a very high probability that we're gonna lose an airliner."
When I hear stuff like this, I'm not surprised there's discrimination in the workplace. Isn't the workplace just a reflection of the country as a whole? If it is, it's looking like a pretty ugly mirror image right now.
Follow Eve Tahmincioglu on Twitter: www.twitter.com/careerdiva
Also, it's interesting how people of Christian faith are lambasted and skewed in this nation on a daily basis, on boards such as these and in other venues and formats. I don't like the militants of any cause, be they a religion or anything else. but Christians in this country are subjected to attacks that their attackers would not DARE utter against any other religion. I'll bet those numbers referenced about "Religious bias charges...." had few, if any, such charges directed against those slamming Christians (or related denominations).
I hope if Woods takes anyone's advice for such 'redemption' via religion, it is for the right reasons, and not for a phony PR campaign ala Bill Clinton post Lewinski (being filmed toting that huge Bible everywhere became a bit much!). Remember, Woods committed no crimes that we know of, and he's not a politican spouting about family values, he's a pro athlete, hence, he's an entertainer. My guess is if he returns to golf and wins some majors, his image will be rehabilitated.
Quit trying to shove your bibles down our throats and imposing your biblical laws on non-believers. Just quietly go about your lives and no one would criticize you.
Enjoy that Kool-aid. Mmmm mmmm good......
I'm a Buddhist and I can speak to one aspect; all things arise and pass away, this too.
Hume later reiterated this claim on another news show.
As for what Brit Hume said being "bigotry" let's take a closer look. Tiger is clearly suffering from his own excesses. Buddhism would tell him that the solution is within him, but in fact that's where the problem lies. A philosophy without a faith, it's "love without a God" and will not offer him any sort of redemption. And Brit Hume can offer that in the marketplace of ideas so long as sponsors don't desert his program.
I ask you, What is keeping you from giving up your sinful life and honestly turn your life from God? Ms Eve Tahmincioglu , whoever she is is obviously hung up on some deep problem hidden from us in her posting. She missed the whole point Hume was trying to make.
Her response? "You'll roast in Hell!" (Click!)
In a reincarnation based religion you'd pick up "bad karma" and would actually have to earn forgiveness.
I mean, this is America - you don't want to actually work for something, do you?
back to business as usual. the golf channel makes a donation to some sex-addiction foundation............
see? this had nothing to do with a "come to jesus" moment in the religious sense...
it was a "come to jesus" moment in the "get with the program,save your business interests" sense.
called playing to your base............who badly want to move on and get back to normal relations with the sinner.........the pedestal, buying the sponsers products, pretending they too can play golf......
Had any newscaster ever said philandering and lying Governor Mark Sanford should have abandoned Christianity in favor of Buddhism, he'd have been fired in a minute.