Solutions To Religion Discrimination In The Workplace

In “Working it Out” by Diana Eck, she writes about religious oppression in the workplace. The examples she gives on the many ways people have been fired, or the ways in which people's faiths have been compromised, reiterates that the amendment that states freedom of religion in the United States, is

This says it is unlawful to discriminate against people at work because of their religion or belief. The regulations also cover training that is to do with work.

The United States is one of the most culturally and religiously diverse countries in the world. The founding fathers of the United States wanted to ensure that its people would have the ability to practice their religion with no threat of persecution. In order to accomplish the goal of religious freedom and continue to ensure that all people of any religion would be free to practice their religion, the United States passed Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that prohibits an employer from discriminating based on the religious views of its employees. As the citizens of the United States spend a large amount of time in their places of employment, religious practices that these employees feel are necessary for the true observance of their religion must be accommodated by the employers. This law contends that in cases where the accommodation of religious practices of its employees does not create undue hardships, an employer must make reasonable accommodations for employees to practices the beliefs of their religion. As the demographics of the United States continues to change with more religiously diverse people immigrating to the country, employers are coming under more pressure to ensure they are taking all possible precautions to accommodate the religious practices of its employees. These precautions are important as the once an employee has established a bona fide complaint of religious discrimination, the burden of proof then falls on the employer to prove they

Reasonable Accommodation & Religion: The law requires an employer to reasonably accommodate an employee's religious beliefs or practices, unless doing so would cause difficulty or expense for the employer. This means an employer may have to make reasonable adjustments at work that will allow the employee to practice his or her religion, such as allowing an employee to voluntarily swap shifts with a co- worker.

time off from work to practice their faith and celebrate religious holidays. Employers may face

The definition of religion can be subjective and vary from person to person. According to Gregory (2011), as a society, more and more employees are wishing to demonstrate their faith while at work. He further notes that this will continue as individualism and self-expression are more embraced by todays millennials. In addition, Gregory shows that the filing of discrimination based lawsuits rose 75% between 1997 and 2008. Because of this, Cintas Corporation must create a fair policy that meets the legal obligations of the company.

In the article Religious-Discrimination Claims on the Rise by Melanie Trottman, it is stated that “the EEOC received 3,811 religion-based complaints in fiscal 2012, the second-highest level ever and just below the record 4,151 in 2011” (Trottman, 2013, p. 1). In another article Study: Workplace Religious Discrimination on the Rise by Mike Ward lists similar number of religion-based complaints. The article by Trottman mentions that the EEOC has filed religious-discrimination lawsuits against companies in the fast-food, hair-salon, aviation, hotel, retail, medical and health-services industries. A recent case that the article mentions is about Muslim woman who worked at Abercrombie and was fired by the manager because her hijab violated

There are no set EEOC guidelines to define religious harassment; therefore, steps are not being taken to avoid or prevent religious harassment in the workplace. This was seen in the case Zayed v. Apple Computers when Zayed’s

Recently, there have been multiple situations in which privately owned companies and small businesses have been in court, the defendants in civil suits for discrimination based on their religious beliefs. This paper will address four main topics; are these companies? religious rights protected by legislature? Is a company entitled to be religious and to provide or deny services based on their religion? At what point does the organization?s religion override legislature and vice versa. Finally, how does an ethical issue affect the business, the performance of the business, and the stakeholders of the business?

Another item to take into consideration when talking about freedom of religion is the Establishment Clause. This clause does not allow for any portion of the government to choose to acknowledge a particular religion. As a result, the population is scrutinized for acknowledging religions practiced throughout the world. The government may not support a specific religion, but ultimately owes individuals the respect they deserve, even if they do associate with a particular belief. This happens in order to make religious freedom only a minor idea instead of the greater meaning of it as a right. Many schools and other religious organizations are ultimately not supported by the government, in order to maintain the separation of government agencies and religious doctrine (Your).

Cultural differences in the workplace can sometimes become a challenge in the work environment. In order to facilitate these differences, there must be some form of cultural awareness. Cultural awareness can help employees face the challenge of responding to individuals with different religions in the workplace, expose religious practices, and eliminate stereotyping in the workplace. Awareness of religions, and the beliefs associated with different religions, can be accomplished in many ways, such as training courses, workshops or company handouts (Thomas Kochan, 2003, p. 4). Companies must embrace multiculturalism and diversity.

Religion in the workplace can bring up some of the most difficult issues employers have to face. Resolving these issues requires understanding the law and balancing the business's needs with an employee's desire to practice his or her religion. One of the most contentious conflicts is between an employee's desire to take time off and the potential reduction in productivity and profitability. In ruling on Title VII religion cases, the courts have held that employers aren't required to accommodate employees' religious activities when it involves increased financial costs, transferring supervisory personnel or employees from other departments resulting in inefficiency, or discriminating against other employees or violating seniority systems. Accommodations that don't constitute undue hardship to the employer include voluntary substitutions or employee "swaps," flexible work schedules, floating or optional holidays, staggered work hours, and allowing employees to make up lost time. Transfers and job changes also are options if they don't cause reduced efficiency or

There is discrimination everywhere at anytime, anywhere in the world. Discrimination can occur in many ways due to different opinions and perspectives. One of them occurs by religion of different people. Religious discrimination is to treat someone differently with others in a bad way due to their religion or beliefs.There are lots of religious discrimination around the world. People should be against religious discrimination because it keeps people from harassment on their religious beliefs, prevent less wars happening, and people will correct their stereotypes on others.

Today there are over 900 religious employee resource groups, according to the International Coalition of Workplace Ministries (Cañas & Sondak, 2010). These affinity groups can help encourage religious understanding by offering panel discussions that educate employees on their beliefs. By allowing open discussion, answering religious questions and creating an open, welcoming religious environment in the workplace employees can better relate to one another through shared religious principles (Cañas & Sondak, 2010). When looking at the business case for diversity, not asking employees to hide their faith at work allows for greater productivity, and time and energy focused on business results (Cañas

Imagine attending a local public government meeting and hearing a guest speaker give the invocation. You are a religious leader in the community and you know that you can ask to have your name added to the list of guest speakers. When you apply you are informed that you will not be approved because your religious beliefs do not match the traditional beliefs used at these meetings. This is not legal and is a definite case of discrimination, but you will have to fight through the courts to possibly have your rights upheld. If you do not word your case correctly though, the court can say that your rights under the Establishment Clause do not actually matter and you walk out of court feeling as if you are not a citizen of the United States protected by the Constitution. Unfortunately, this and other cases of religious discrimination happens more often than many would believe.