Amazon.com’s Whole Foods Market doesn’t want to be forced to let workers wear “Black Lives Matter” masks and is pointing to the recent US Supreme Court ruling permitting a business owner to refuse services to same-sex couples to get federal regulators to back off.

National Labor Relations Board prosecutors have accused the grocer of stifling worker rights by banning staff from wearing BLM masks or pins on the job. The company countered in a filing that its own rights are being violated if it’s forced to allow BLM slogans to be worn with Whole Foods uniforms.

Amazon is the most prominent company to use the high court’s June ruling that a Christian web designer was free to refuse to design sites for gay weddings, saying the case “provides a clear roadmap” to throw out the NLRB’s complaint.

The dispute is one of several in which labor board officials are considering what counts as legally-protected, work-related communication and activism on the job.

  • Lifted_lowered@beehaw.org
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    1 year ago

    When I worked at a big box store for years I wasn’t allowed to wear my BLM shirt or anything “political” but my Trumper coworkers got away with wearing their Trump shirts or Let’s Go Brandon shirts, and they even put Let’s Go Brandon stickers up all aroubd the employee facing areas. If you told managers about it they addressed it as a dress code violation and regarded you as a snitch.

    • Saik0@lemmy.saik0.com
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      1 year ago

      Why is it “fuck the courts”? This whole thing is about what a worker can do while on the job… If a company doesn’t want to be associated with something it should have a right to employ whatever restrictions on dress it wants. That’s kind of the point of dress codes with companies to begin with.

      • Blake [he/him]@feddit.uk
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        1 year ago

        Do workers have the right to refuse to be associated with something that the company want them to display on their dress code? For example, a corporate sponsor? If no, why do companies deserve more rights than people?

        • Saik0@lemmy.saik0.com
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          1 year ago

          Do workers have the right to refuse to be associated with something that the company want them to display on their dress code?

          Yes… by leaving/quitting/etc…

          • Blake [he/him]@feddit.uk
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            1 year ago

            So that’s a no, then - you don’t have a right for something if you have to leave the system to exercise the right. For example you wouldn’t have the right of freedom of speech if I said “yeah you can say whatever you want if you leave the country!”

            So, why do companies deserve more rights than people?

            • Saik0@lemmy.saik0.com
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              1 year ago

              So, why do companies deserve more rights than people?

              They don’t… It’s their property. Just like you would have a right to ask someone to leave your property at anytime for any reason.

              • Blake [he/him]@feddit.uk
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                1 year ago

                Okay so imagine that you’re on Elon Musk’s private jet, 36000 feet in the air, and he asks you to strip down into a thong and perform an erotic dance for him. It’s his property, he has the right to tell you what to wear. If you don’t like it, you’re free to leave; of course. Do you think that’s acceptable?

                • Saik0@lemmy.saik0.com
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                  1 year ago

                  Yes you would have a right to leave at any time. Failure on Elon’s part to allow you off the craft promptly and in safe manner would literally be kidnapping or unlawful detention. Which I believe would be up to 3 years of imprisonment… and generally a felony.

                  Also, would probably be soliciting and probably a whole slew of other illegal actions here if that situation would occur.

                  Did you think you had a gotcha there?