Sunday21

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  1. I see. And where would you like us to draw this line? Are you coming for Thanksgiving? It’s in October. There will be no candied yams. No marshmallows in anything. Pumpkin pie but flavored with brown sugar. Can you bring pasta salad? Well actually, we need to branch out a bit. Employment law Ontario. Saying insulting things about another in the workplace would be Harassment and that’s illegal under Bill 168 of the Occupational Health and Safety Act. I believe that most provinces have similar legislation. When I go to conferences, us profs tell me that States are gradually enacting similar legislation but...I really don’t know about this area of us law at all. There was a time when states refused to enact these laws so the process may be very gradual indeed. Statute Law if not enforced ...well that is tricky. Is a law enforceable if it: is a new law? Hmm. In Canada, we are gentler when laws are in the process of changing attitudes. For example, a few years ago, Ontario released a policy statement about sexist dress standards. Ontario was signally that polices of asking women to wear short skirts, high heels, and low tops was unacceptable. At some point in the future such policies will be illegal. In BC it is currently illegal on safety grounds. Are we not all enjoying our foray into Ontario Employment Law? Have to make up a lecture! Night nite!
  2. Clarify? 1) saying something is hate speech. Is this the government having a law against hate speech? My current Canadian law is fine with me. In fact admirable policy. 2) Is this an individual making a threat of violence against another? I only know employment law so...threats of violence against another in the workplace is a dismissible offense, 3) actual violence against another. Illegal.
  3. Ok. Interesting difference in cultures. Isn’t it nice that we found this out? I remember talking to an American female accountant who lived in Canada who was very angry that she could not conceal a handgun on her person. Now she had never owned a handgun, but the fact that she could not was disturbing. The dinner party tried to explain why we felt that giving up handguns in our purses made us all safer. She was very unhappy. But such differences just make us all more interesting right? Fluttering of eyelashes. Are we not now a more interesting neighbor to have? Lets be honest. None of you were ever going to move here anyway, right? So really none of us have lost anything. Your neighbors ro the north are just interesting and fascinating people. Try to find us quirky and delightful!
  4. No. We are running a condominium and we want people to feel safe and happy. Outside of employment law, I know nothing about the law. But there are libel and slander laws in both our countries? Okay. We have found a difference between US and Canadian culture. I am cool with hate speech law and you are not. Could we decide to find this an interesting difference in cultures?
  5. Actually, our first source in crafting employment law is the US. We worry about you guys. There is quite a bit of intermarriage and most people that I know have visited the US and have positive experiences.
  6. I do not mean to be flippant. Suicide is a serious matter. In case, the situation is as described, I will be respectful. A counselor that I knew many years ago, described to me a form of therapy in which they build happy memories for depressed patients. For women they used chocolate or ice cream. Patient is asked ‘What is your favourite ice cream flavour? ‘ Next session, counselor and client eat ice cream. In subsequent session, the counselor reminds the client of this happy experience and gradually they build happy memories. I suspect that chocolate would have a similar effect. Happy memories can be triggered by watching a favourite childhood show or even playing a fovorite childhood game. Many things can bring love and comfort to a woman, and sex is rarely the first item on the list! i use this happy experience technique when visiting depressed friends. I talk to them about anything that they have told me that they like. Eg decorating pictures from a magazine, country music, anything they have had a positive experience with. If I am desperate, I bring chocolate. Layering pleasant experiences really can help!
  7. @Vort People are only fined after years of cajoling, nagging, and probably pleading. Happens very very rarely as a last resort.
  8. These are two young women. Please France, send me more!
  9. I am blessed with two French exchange students this term. They are the same age as my homegrown students but...much more mature, more hardworking and resolute. No whining. No excuses. France must be doing something right.
  10. So far I have persuaded exactly zero people to move to Canada. My ward is 😞. I tried to persuade some saints when I worked in the temple. 😞 No luck!
  11. Well...in Canadian Employment Law, you can only be discriminated against if you belong to a group represented under prohibited grounds. Not sure how this works in the states. I know nothing whatever about US or Canadian consumer law. In the US there are laws that outlaw denying service based on race etc. This is statute law. The question is, how are these laws interpreted? - tort law. There are golf clubs that do not allow female members. From this article it seems that they do so by denying memberships to women. https://www.si.com/golf/2019/07/01/private-golf-clubs-muirfield-augusta-women-discrimination Back to employment law! in Canada, it is almost impossible to become a counsellor for alcoholics unless you have been an alcoholic. This is an issue of Bone Fide Occupational Requirement (BFOR). Similarly, Organizations can decide that you need to be Jewish to work in a Jewish community Centre. So could you limit a job to white males using BFOR? I think so. Is there some affliction that tends to afflict white males? Quite likely. In this case, counselors for this affliction could be restricted to white males using BFOR.
  12. I would never claim fairness as a justification for any laws. Laws are not fair. I teach employment law and thus am only concerned with what courts do. You know the saying about ‘things that you don’t want to see made’: laws and sausages. Lots of compromise and lobbying goes into the making of statute law. Then along comes tort law and things go really crazy. One of the points that James D made was that if he walked into the HR department, he would be treated a lot less sympathetically than a woman who did the same thing. Such an outcome is the intention of Canadian Human Rights Law, and James is claiming that the same things occur in the States. Perhaps he is right. Every year, I ask students under which circumstances, they can legally ignore a direct order at work, students tend to respond that they can ignore an order if the order would cause something unethical to occur. Not true. Ethics have nothing to do with it.
  13. Not sure moving to S A will help Affirmative action falls under the Employment Equity Act. In South Africa, affirmative action makes sure that qualified designated groups (black people, women and people with disabilities) have equal opportunities to get a job. They must also be equally represented in all job categories and levels of the workplace. https://mywage.co.za/decent-work/fair-treatment/affirmative-action Once you have a policy which says that blacks must be equally represented at all levels, this suggested that formerly predominately white companies need to start hiring blacks over whites. BUT it all depends on how the law is enforced. If companies need to meet certain standards before obtaining a contact from the government then this is a level of enforcement. The government may not do anything to companies that do not have these contracts. How the law is interpreted and enforced really determines what can be done. In Ontario, we passed a law to reduce violence in the workplace, the effects of domestic violence affecting employees at work, and bullying. The part of the law which has been rigorously enforced is the violence part. Even very indirect threats count and are severely punished. In addition, certain sectors of the economy can collectively approach the government and beg for a separate deal. You never know where the law will take you. Statute law is part of the puzzle but it depends on the details which brings us to the messy reality of tort law. Tort law reminds me of anatomy class. You look at the picture in the textbook and it all looks so clear. The liver is there. The heart is here. How hard can it be? And then you open up the body and what a mess!
  14. I don’t know. There is this policy of Affirmative Action: National Summary What is affirmative action? An affirmative action program (AAP) is a management tool designed to ensure equal opportunity in recruiting, hiring, training, promoting, and compensating individuals. A good AAP is a diagnostic tool that evaluates the composition of the workforce, compares that with the composition of the relevant labor pool, and then includes practical steps to address underrepresentation of specific groups. https://hr.blr.com/HR-topics/Discrimination/Affirmative-Action This policy sounds a bit like Employment Equity, here in Canada. Under EE, companies that have contracts with the Government over a certain size have to report the % of this staff in 4 categories: women, disabled, aboriginals. Visible minorities. If the % of those in the company are less than % in the local population then the company needs to commit to increasing these percentages by a certain time. The company provides a schedule. But! The devil is in the details! It is entirely possible that the laws are not routinely enforced unless there is a lawsuit. I know for certain that no one in my university is keeping track of % of disabled. I know because the questionnaire that was sent out to assess had fields that did not work. I pointed this out and got Avery rude response from HR employee. I raised this issue at a higher level and received a profuse apology but the survey was never resent. Likely I am the only person who opened the survey!
  15. Are you sure? Looking at the sections that I posted from the article, it seems that only ‘disadvantaged’ or ‘protected’ people can be discriminated against. In C only those who fall under ‘prohibited grounds’ can be discriminated against which is why I am wondering. Here we go! Reverse discrimination. So it seems that you can claim discrimination if you are part of the dominant group. https://brobertsonlaw.com/reverse-discrimination/
  16. From Gizmodo article above: I think [Damore’s] odds are terrible,” AJ Bhowmik, managing partner at San Diego’s Blumenthal Nordrehaug & Bhowmik law firm, told MarketWatch soon after the filing. “The judge will absolutely consider the facts. We’re moving in an upside down world where an individual can claim discrimination for being a white male” when Google is disproportionately staffed with both whites and males. “It’s a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of free speech,” Sanford Heisler Sharp LLP chairman David Sanford told Forbes in 2017. “...What [employees] don’t have the right to do is say any stupid thing that pops into their head. For conservatives to say they’re ‘shocked, shocked,’ they should look at the constitution and some case law.” Cole Schotz litigation department special counsel Neoma Ayala told Forbes that in Damore’s memo, “If you replaced ‘woman’ with ‘black person,’ we wouldn’t even be having this conversation.” Normally, Human Rights Law protects the ’protected group’ eg black people but does not protect the general population eg white people BUT and this is a big BUT, judges could decide to extend to the general population. For example, the man who was offended by an ad for a female server. The judge extended this right to the male complaintant. Looking at the comments from the article above it seems that Rights are normally not extended to the general population in the states. This is only my inference however from reading this article . As we know law involves both statute and tort law. Tort law is based both on statute law and on tort so the only people who know what’s going on are those who follow cases very closely. Even if one follows the law very closely judgements can be a surprise which is why, as the saying goes: If it gets to court, you have lost. It will be interested to see the outcome of this case! But the case can be overturned on appeal and subsequent judges may interpret the law slightly differently. Judges cannot go too far off the rails thought or their judgements will be overturned on appeal. So many things can happen. For example if the case is settled out of court, this result may not be a part of tort law. Another interesting wrinkle, would the judge deciding this case be elected? In C, judges are not elected but appointed so this procedure likely affects the outcomes of trials.
  17. @Vort Have to get to profy stuff. But thank you for your interest. If I could possibly interest my students in the same way I would be delighted! Feel free to keep going and I will try to keep up. I have to move slowly as I have a serious illness and a full time job, but feel free to keep going. What is more interesting than employment law? By the way, employees can be fired for activity away from work (in both of our countries) so if James had posted the same info on his Facebook page, he could have been fired for that. Every summer a teacher or cop is fired for moonlighting as a stripper (or maybe it just seems that way to me). By the way, have you heard of a tv show called the Guild? Just wondering.
  18. This is the latest info I find on James D. If you have anything more recent, or from a better source I would be interested https://gizmodo.com/google-fails-to-have-lawsuit-originally-brought-by-jame-1835351078
  19. Utah antidiscrimination law What kinds of discrimination are against state law in Utah? The UtahAntidiscrimination Act makes it illegal for an employer to discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, gender, religion, age (40+), sexual orientation, gender identity, pregnancy, childbirth, pregnancy-related conditions and disability from https://www.workplacefairness.org/file_UT https://laborcommission.utah.gov/divisions/AntidiscriminationAndLabor/employment_discrimination.html Hello @Vort ! What state did you say that you lived in?
  20. Yes the concept of prohibited grounds explicitly gives more rights to specific groups. These specific groups have more protection under the law than others. California state law and us federal law same idea. An IT worker famously wrote an email complaining about this and also stating that women, as a class, were not as suited for it careers as were men. Quite a ruckus ensued. I can try to find the case if you are interested.
  21. Fantastic news! Wishing you all the best! Kudos to you and your family.
  22. Massive congratulations! Also very cool gift!