Reply #90: Reply to whole thread [View All]

[Ms. Toad]

Boycotting is absolutely a good liberal tradition - but the boycotts need to be consistent with our core moral values.

My office got a call outing me because I worked publicly against one of the constitutional amendments banning my marriage.

My employers will stand by me, even though some of our clients are republicans, and even if they vocally demand my resignation. My employers would do the same for an employee who worked in favor of the constitutional amendment if folks from DU started calling. Both are good things, but not necessarily the norm for an employer.

What we employees do outside of the office is our own business, and we will not be punished in the workplace for expressing our political opinions on our own time. Although my letters to the editor (my own, and those I signed on behalf of my church) were to printed, had they been printed and someone took the time to search to find out where I worked, there would not have been any employment consequences.

However, if I were working against the constitutional amendment on company time, or lobbying company clients that were not also personal friends, or deliberately associating my personal political views with the company I expect that I would be asked to stop making that association (even though they agree with my position). That is also appropriate - this particular business needs to remain neutral since we have clients in a wide variety of political flavors.

Back to the Atlanta realtor - from this thread it appears that she deliberately brought her work in to the discussion (perhaps not by company name, but by providing enough information so that the company was easy to figure out).

Without violating my core principles, it is certainly consistent for me to bring to the employer's attention that her comments were offensive and not consistent with a business with which I want to spend my money. It would also be consistent to visit my local gay newspaper and select a realty company that is deliberately reaching out to my community. Also consistent with my core principles would be to not use that particular agent.

I cannot, however, make the leap to calling for a boycott of the business without confirming that the woman's actions were condoned by the employer. Neither can I make the leap to demanding that she be fired without expecting the same treatment for my outside political activity.

As angry and disappointed as I am about the recent election, I firmly believe that the means by which we win are the ends. If we cut off the targeted minorities in our midst because that is what it takes to win, if we adopt a pro-life position, if we adopt a pro-war position, if we advocate terminating employees for exercising political speech, and so on, when we win our own government will be exactly like the one about which we are so bitterly complaining and we will have lost despite being back in the White House, Senate, or House.