Link tot he judgment because FUCK the Guardian. People really struggle with this bit of the UK Equality Act. The Guardian is not a reliable source for stories involving protected characteristics....
Link tot he judgment because FUCK the Guardian.
People really struggle with this bit of the UK Equality Act. The Guardian is not a reliable source for stories involving protected characteristics. Weirdly, the Equality and Human Rights Commission - the independent enforcer - is even less reliable.
Use veganism as an example. Imagine two people. One person has studied the evidence, they've read the science, they've listened to the debates, and they've formed an opinion based on all of that reading. They go to tribunal and say this and that they've been discriminated against because they're a vegan and they have a protected belief. It's likely this person would lose (there are a few cases where people did lose in this situation) because they don't have a protected belief, they have an opinion formed on the available evidence. Now imagine a different person who goes to tribunal and who says "I don't care what the science says, I haven't read it, I just know it to be true that animals and animal products should not be exploited" - this person is likely to win tribunal (and again, there are cases where this has happened). I say this because anti-trans campaigners really like to claim they're evidence based, but they also like to claim they have a protected characteristic, and the two are incompatible.
Does a protected belief mean the person has a belief that most, or even many, people would find to be acceptable? No, but that's the point of the protection. We don't need to protect the nice fluffy beliefs ("be kind to each other" or "Thou shalt not kill"). We need to protect the abhorrent beliefs -
Violent Christian fundamentalist homophobia hidden behind spoiler tag"homosexuality is an abomination and gay people will burn in hell for all eternity" -- the court found he had a protected belief, even though what he was saying was foul. He probably could have been removed from his social work course but his university botched their paperwork by not have strong enough codes of conduct, and they botched their investigation. Again, I say this because anti-trans campaigners claim the protected belief means a respectable belief, and it doesn't. They also claim it means they can't get fired for expressing their belief, and that's incorrect because the company just needs to have policies in place and be scrupulous in following them and documenting what they're doing.
It's difficult to talk about this because I don't want to dump a load of hate opinions into Tildes, but some other examples of vile things that ended up as protected beliefs are
Not sure what you have against the Guardian? I am really surprised by how incompetent a lot of in house lawyers (and other employees) are when it comes to doing technically illegal but basically...
Link tot he judgment because FUCK the Guardian.
Not sure what you have against the Guardian?
his university botched their paperwork by not have strong enough codes of conduct, and they botched their investigation... they also claim it means they can't get fired for expressing their belief, and that's incorrect
I am really surprised by how incompetent a lot of in house lawyers (and other employees) are when it comes to doing technically illegal but basically correct things. For example when Coutts Bank wanted to get rid of Nigel Farage, if they had a bit of sense they would have verbally discussed wanting to get rid of him for his repungent views, and then formally written something along the lines of "Nigel Farage is too poor to bank at Coutts". Then you can say "of course we are aware of Mr Farage's views, and we may have discussed them over lunch because – well – he regularly makes the headlines but of course we are professionals and we terminate professional relationships when they don't make commercial sense for our bank".
Same thing with the anti-trans nuts – you just use the same tactics for getting rid of anyone else (give them boring work, put them on a "performance improvement plan", etc) and then hope they quit or eventually just fastidiously note every little incident on their file and eventually fire them.
Link tot he judgment because FUCK the Guardian.
People really struggle with this bit of the UK Equality Act. The Guardian is not a reliable source for stories involving protected characteristics. Weirdly, the Equality and Human Rights Commission - the independent enforcer - is even less reliable.
The Equality Act introduces the concept of "Protected Characteristics". One of these is "Religion or Belief". The explanatory notes are useful.
Use veganism as an example. Imagine two people. One person has studied the evidence, they've read the science, they've listened to the debates, and they've formed an opinion based on all of that reading. They go to tribunal and say this and that they've been discriminated against because they're a vegan and they have a protected belief. It's likely this person would lose (there are a few cases where people did lose in this situation) because they don't have a protected belief, they have an opinion formed on the available evidence. Now imagine a different person who goes to tribunal and who says "I don't care what the science says, I haven't read it, I just know it to be true that animals and animal products should not be exploited" - this person is likely to win tribunal (and again, there are cases where this has happened). I say this because anti-trans campaigners really like to claim they're evidence based, but they also like to claim they have a protected characteristic, and the two are incompatible.
Does a protected belief mean the person has a belief that most, or even many, people would find to be acceptable? No, but that's the point of the protection. We don't need to protect the nice fluffy beliefs ("be kind to each other" or "Thou shalt not kill"). We need to protect the abhorrent beliefs -
Violent Christian fundamentalist homophobia hidden behind spoiler tag
"homosexuality is an abomination and gay people will burn in hell for all eternity"It's difficult to talk about this because I don't want to dump a load of hate opinions into Tildes, but some other examples of vile things that ended up as protected beliefs are
Anti-Asian hate
Saying "Asians are greasy" and claiming StoicismSo far there appear to be just two things that are automatically not protected beliefs, and those are holocaust denial and white supremacy.
It's useful to read the entire judgment because employment tribunal judges usually go into a lot of detail about their thinking.
Not sure what you have against the Guardian?
I am really surprised by how incompetent a lot of in house lawyers (and other employees) are when it comes to doing technically illegal but basically correct things. For example when Coutts Bank wanted to get rid of Nigel Farage, if they had a bit of sense they would have verbally discussed wanting to get rid of him for his repungent views, and then formally written something along the lines of "Nigel Farage is too poor to bank at Coutts". Then you can say "of course we are aware of Mr Farage's views, and we may have discussed them over lunch because – well – he regularly makes the headlines but of course we are professionals and we terminate professional relationships when they don't make commercial sense for our bank".
Same thing with the anti-trans nuts – you just use the same tactics for getting rid of anyone else (give them boring work, put them on a "performance improvement plan", etc) and then hope they quit or eventually just fastidiously note every little incident on their file and eventually fire them.
The editors of the UK Guardian are rather anti-trans. I seem to recall a row between them and the American editors on that subject.
Virulently anti trans, to the point their American colleagues wrote an open letter.