Atlanta Ousts Fire Chief Who Has Antigay Views

tres borrachos said:

This was your post:

if i go to work tomorrow and give some co workers copies of a book I wrote and in the book it says that i hate a gender, race, religion etc or that i think women, blacks or christians are vile dirty people guess what . . . . im getting fired LMAO

Please cite the HR rule that would enable your employer to fire you for giving your coworkers a copy of a book you wrote that disparages someone.

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all you have to do is read my post again slower and you will see how you can get fired for this, sorry this reality bothers you but its not going to change
thank you for reposting what i wrote further proving your stramen failed

tres borrachos said:

So I could be fired if I wrote a book that was published and I gave copies of it to my team? Not as far as I know, without an employment agreement specifically prohibiting it.

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It depends on the social effect of the action. If the workplace feels hostile, then yes there could be consequences.

jmotivator said:

So you don't think the Mayor advocated a point of view by firing him?

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no the mayor discriminated against him because of his religious views. which is a violation of the law.

ludin said:

you have presented your opinion. I have presented facts.

you can't fire someone over their religious beliefs. this is a protected class.
which his exactly what happened.

the book he made outside of work on his own time for a bible study for his church.
the 1 page that drew critizism was a chapter on sexual mortality. in which the bible is clear on sexual morality.
in the same chapter he talked about sex outside of marriage and other things the bible says on sexual morality.

he didn't target just gays.

he book he passed out he gave to friends that he had a personal relationship with.

the city violated the law and I hope that he sues them for millions of dollars.

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lol, ok come back to me when you have had to deal with these types of issues on a professional level, you obviously have not and I can't explain color to the blind so to speak.

Aren't there Bibles in hotel rooms, jails, etc... The Bible says a lot of things, but they're just words. Sticks and stones people.. This **** bothers me to no end.

Tim-

ludin said:

that has nothing to do with religious rights or free speech.
prove he signed any of these things.

also I dug a bit further into this. It seems that he made the book for his bible study class. The chapter in question that people are up in arms about
is on sexual morality in the bible.

In the same chapter he also mentions sex outside of marriage.
the whole reason this came up is that someone went and got the book then took it to one of the openly gay council members.

the people that he passed it out to at the fire station were people that he had a person relationship with.

this city is in deep trouble if he chooses to pursue a law suit. religion is a protect class and the state just violated it.

so it seems once again the liberal media doesn't have half the facts that they think they do.
he was fired for being a Christian and expressing a religious belief outside of work. that is a violation of not only the 1st amendment but
it is also religious discrimination.

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no
let's get this right
it was not that he was expressing his Christian views
it was that he was expressing very rigid, very intolerant views, that got him in trouble
he leads what is likely a diverse group of employees
using that book, a person with LBGT inclinations (as but one example) who was not promoted could then claim their promotion was denied only because of their sexual orientation. an orientation that the chief, in his own words, found abhorrent
the book does give the employer HR problems because it gives employees a basis to challenge disciplinary and non-selection actions, despite that discipline and/or non-selection being for legitimate reasons

AGENT J said:

all you have to do is read my post again slower and you will see how you can get fired for this, sorry this reality bothers you but its not going to change
thank you for reposting what i wrote further proving your stramen failed

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nope can't be fired for religious view points it is against the law.
so unless he was berating people that were gay in the firehouse or he was making their life more difficult or insulting them
he wasn't creating any kind of hostile work environment.

creating a book outside of work for a bible study that contains a chapter on what the bible says about sexual morality can't get you fire.

ludin said:

plenty of books contain harassing content. you can't be fired over it. more so it if it part of it is religious in nature.
2nd this guy didn't hand it out to everyone but only to people that he had personal relationships with that probably wanted copy of it.

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If someone who works for me writes a book on "The Awesome David Duke" and brings copies of it to work and distributes it to the other team members, I'm not sure I would be able to terminate him exclusively for that reason, but I'd have to check.

tres borrachos said:

This was your post:

if i go to work tomorrow and give some co workers copies of a book I wrote and in the book it says that i hate a gender, race, religion etc or that i think women, blacks or christians are vile dirty people guess what . . . . im getting fired LMAO

Please cite the HR rule that would enable your employer to fire you for giving your coworkers a copy of a book you wrote that disparages someone.

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Here's part of my HR policy that would probably land under:

5.0 Key Definitions

Harassment means any derogatory, abusive, or inflammatory remarks or conduct, based in whole or in part on age, disability status, race, national origin, color, religion, sex, protected veteran status, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, pregnancy, breastfeeding or lactation status, citizenship status, or any other class protected by laws that has the purpose or effect of creating an intimidating, hostile, or offensive work environment, or of unreasonably interfering with an employee's work performance or employment opportunities.

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So if I wrote a book, the act of handing it out would fall under conduct, that makes condemning or derogatory remarks about sexual orientations and has the effect of creating a hostile or offensive work enviroment, I would violate my HR policy and be fired. I cannot speak for other companies though.

tacomancer said:

Prove that someone employed by a governmental organization signed a common hr policy? This is a very reasonable assumption and proof is not required. This is like asking to prove whether the sky is blue...

I am going to ignore this stupid attempt at an argument from you and and just assume you never had an actual job at this point because that was just asinine.

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way to ignore the rest of it. prove he violated he didn't violate anything.
however the city violated his religious beliefs. seems like you only want to enforce the rights you agree with and ignore the ones you don't.

ludin said:

1.)nope can't be fired for religious view points it is against the law.
2.) so unless he was berating people that were gay in the firehouse or he was making their life more difficult or insulting them he wasn't creating any kind of hostile work environment.
3.)creating a book outside of work for a bible study that contains a chapter on what the bible says about sexual morality can't get you fire.

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1.) good thing that wasnt done
2.) thats a nice opinion but its worthless to the many cases out there that disagree with you including this one
3.) correct, he wasnt fired for this either

less strawmen and more reality

Hicup said:

Aren't there Bibles in hotel rooms, jails, etc... The Bible says a lot of things, but they're just words. Sticks and stones people.. This **** bothers me to no end.

Tim-

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did you just equate a bible being in a public hotel room, in a drawer, where people volunteer and pay to go . . .to . . . a superviser handing out a book to coworkers with his own words it condemning employees own religions, lifestyles and sexual orientations?

sorry those arent analogues on any planet.

ludin said:

way to ignore the rest of it. prove he violated he didn't violate anything.
however the city violated his religious beliefs. seems like you only want to enforce the rights you agree with and ignore the ones you don't.

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If you are right, I am sure we will see the lawsuit shortly.

americanwoman said:

Here's part of my HR policy that would probably land under:



So if I wrote a book, the act of handing it out would fall under conduct, that makes condemning or derogatory remarks about sexual orientations and has the effect of creating a hostile or offensive work enviroment, I would violate my HR policy and be fired. I cannot speak for other companies though.

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you're post is probably a waste of time as some will ignore it

tacomancer said:

lol, ok come back to me when you have had to deal with these types of issues on a professional level, you obviously have not and I can't explain color to the blind so to speak.

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come back to me when you stop being a religious bigot.

religion is a protected class you can't fire someone over expressing their religious views. come back and talk to me when you figure out what the law says on religious views.
more so religious views outside of the work place.

you evidently don't know half of what you think you do.

that or you only enforce the rights you agree with and to tell with all the other rights that people have if they disagree with you.

ludin said:

no the mayor discriminated against him because of his religious views. which is a violation of the law.

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this lie and strawman completely fails too

tres borrachos said:

So I could be fired if I wrote a book that was published and I gave copies of it to my team?

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It's absolutely possible, however what you're providing here isn't enough content to suggest one way or another. For example, is the situation in your hypothetical happening in a right to work state? If it's not, yeah...it would be pretty easy to come up with a reason to fire you regarding that.

Another example where context is lacking, I most likely absolutely could be fired if I was a supervisor in the federal government, wrote a book concerning political views, and then on the clock gave it to my subordinates. That would quite possibly be a hatch act violation in that particular case.

I know, in a general sense, most businesses place a greater requirement on supervisors regarding actions towards subordinates than they do coworkers, as there is a natural suggestion of power there and an inherent potential for retaliation.

It seems you want to just pretend that the content of the writing doens't matter with your continual and non-stop attempt to reframe it simply as "a book". The reality is the content matters in certain situations. Political Positions and the federal government, as I pointed to above, is an example.

I've not suggested this guys firing was right or wrong. I honestly haven't looked at it deep enough to understand the full context and facts surrounding the case. However, I did know enough about it that the hypothetical you kept trying to suggest with your repeated statements of "co-workers" was an inaccurate one when trying to compare to this situation.

Why you decided to avoid my question and strawman me by responding as if I said he could or should be fired is beyond me...other than perhaps you simply not wanting to actually address what I said. My question wasn't whether or not this guy should've been fired. My question was regarding your attempted arguments which kept using a hypothetical that included a work relationship (co-workers, implying peers) that was significantly different than the situaiton at hand (boss and subordinates).

ludin said:

however the city violated his religious beliefs. seems like you only want to enforce the rights you agree with and ignore the ones you don't.

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100% false his religious beliefs/rights are intact. He still believes them and has them right now.
facts win again

ludin said:

come back to me when you stop being a religious bigot.

religion is a protected class you can't fire someone over expressing their religious views. come back and talk to me when you figure out what the law says on religious views.
more so religious views outside of the work place.

you evidently don't know half of what you think you do.

that or you only enforce the rights you agree with and to tell with all the other rights that people have if they disagree with you.

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may I ask how old you are?

ludin said:

which has nothing to do with what happened. the city screwed up big time and discriminated against his religious beliefs.

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So passing out a book that condemns say...homosexuality...wouldn't create a hostile work environment for gays?

I'm sorry, wrapping homophobia, bigotry, misogyny etc. in the blanket of religion doesn't mean you have the right to push it at the workplace. You can do whatever you want to in your private life but it's not meant for the workplace. The workplace is for working, not proselytizing.

ludin said:

no it is a matter of you distorting what was done to push an agenda.
you can't fire someone for passing a book out to his friends.

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No, you can't.

Take legal porno magazines to work tomorrow and hand them out to people. Let us know how that works out for you. Maybe distribute books about how to hook up and swing with co-workers. Stand up in the break room at work and read 50 Shades of Gray out loud to your friends everyday during lunch.

Honestly, tell us, do you believe any of the above ^^^ would go unchallenged at work? Would doing the above be a wise career move or do you think it would be a rather stupid career move or do you believe it would have no bearing on your career whatsoever?

more so a book that he made for a bible study group at his church on his own time away from work.
you can't fire someone over their religious beliefs we have laws that prevent that sort of thing.

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The issue is not what happened away from work. You are being disingenuous. Nothing I have read states that he was fired for writing a book on his own time away from work. If you know that is true please post a credible city government source that contains more information than we've seen so far. Otherwise, what you are asserting is not factual.

You see, the problem is we do not know all the details. We do know that the media, and unfortunately religious organizations, have chosen to label the issue as everything from Cochran distributing a "homosexual book" to, and most prevalently, Cochran being fired for his religious beliefs. Google it and see for yourself.

Just spend a few moments reading what very little information is available and make an attempt to be objective.

justabubba said:

no
let's get this right
it was not that he was expressing his Christian views
it was that he was expressing very rigid, very intolerant views, that got him in trouble

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he wrote a book for his bible study group at church. please tell me how that is not expressing his religious views?

he leads what is likely a diverse group of employees
using that book, a person with LBGT inclinations (as but one example) who was not promoted could then claim their promotion was denied only because of their sexual orientation. an orientation that the chief, in his own words, found abhorrent

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in the same book he also talked about sex outside of marriage. because it was a chapter on what the bible had to say about sexual morality.
they have to prove their promotion was denied because of it. there is no report that he did any of the things you mentioned you are making stuff up.

the book does give the employer HR problems because it gives employees a basis to challenge disciplinary and non-selection actions, despite that discipline and/or non-selection being for legitimate reasons

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They have to prove he was actually doing that he wasn't. religious views are protected by law. he can't be fired for expressing those views.

now if he was using those view points to actively hold people back or punish people then yes he should be fired, however there is no such report of such a thing.
he was fired for doing a bible study which included a chapter on what the bible says about sexual morality and not just homosexuality but all sexual morality.

the city committed religious discrimination and opened up themselves to a lawsuit.

AGENT J said:

all you have to do is read my post again slower and you will see how you can get fired for this, sorry this reality bothers you but its not going to change
thank you for reposting what i wrote further proving your stramen failed

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Your post said you would be fired for bringing in a book that you wrote that contained offensive material and distributing it to your coworkers. Your post is right there. No strawman. Those are your words, not mine.

americanwoman said:

Here's part of my HR policy that would probably land under:



So if I wrote a book, the act of handing it out would fall under conduct, that makes condemning or derogatory remarks about sexual orientations and has the effect of creating a hostile or offensive work enviroment, I would violate my HR policy and be fired. I cannot speak for other companies though.

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I understand. But in the application of the law you would have to prove that the intent was harassment and creating a hostile etc work environment. I'm not sure where in the story of the Atlanta FD there was clear and proven intent to harass or disrupt the work environment.

tres borrachos said:

Your post said you would be fired for bringing in a book that you wrote that contained offensive material and distributing it to your coworkers. Your post is right there. No strawman. Those are your words, not mine.

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nope i said MORE than that, proven by my QUOTE, but that alone could easily get a person fire lol
and please dont say you didnt post TWO strawman because i will just quote them and further prove your post wrong.