should religion dictate who we perform our duties at work?

there was an uproar in britain recently when a pharmacist refused to give a customer the morning after pill because the pharmacist was a muslim and it was against his religious beliefs to dispense the drug.
there has also been talk of supermarket bosses making allowances for those employees who cannot handle alcohol, pork, or beef etc., due to religious beliefs.
is this the way to go for a secular society, considering that the same thing would never occur in sweden, france, or the netherlands?
are the majority selling out to the minority just to appear politically correct?

 

Personally if your religion interferes in any way shape or form with your duties on the job I personally feel you need to find a new line of work

 

I think that if religion is interfering with someone's job then they should quit/be fired.

If they can not do their job properly then they should not have it.

I'm sure there is another job out there that they could get that would not interfere with their religious beliefs.

 

I'm also sure there is a worker out there willing to do the job that wont have beliefs to interfere with the duties of the job

edit
The rep you just got was from me, was supposed to be green I hope it was! Damn pointer slipped and clicked the submit button by mistake before I could type!

 

If a religion stops you from doing ANY part of your job then your employer should be able to ask you to leave. I don't think many would disagree with that.

 

Ah, it's green, thanks ^_^


And yeah, that's true. If you can't do the job properly there will always be someone to take your place.

I know that if I was denied something because of someone else's beliefs - I would be pretty upset to.The Brits have full right to be upset - especially the customer that was affected.

 

i agree with all the above, but in britain a pharmacist is by law allowed to refuse to serve a customer if he/she feels it impinges upon their religious beliefs.
which in my opinion indicates that we need to change the law, not the consumers freedom of choice?

 

Religion is the tool of all evil, i recently had a talk with someone about religions whom have hell and heaven, god is meant to be all loving and caring and all knowing and being all knowing when he was to create one of his children he would know that they would sin, therefore he is creating someone to punish them, and would a all loving god do this. i dont think religion should interfere with anything in life, as well as all this pc stuff, why should one person get extra breaks or whatever to pray to their gods?

 

If thats the law then I think it should be changed OR the pharmacist has to put up a notice saying they won't serve those items and provide the address for the nearest pharmacy that will serve them.

 

If the pharmacist owns the pharmacy, then he is well within his rights to refuse the sale of any item(s) he chooses.

If he's just an employee, then it's a whole different matter altogether.

 

I don't know pharmacy law but I am shocked since it's a medical profession which requires a license that they can simply decide what to stock.

It's not like they are standard merchants, some people might be in a life and death situation. Go to the closest pharmacy to them and find out 'oh ghee we don't stock that' because I don't believe in it?! I mean wtf.

 

I'm not sure about the legal requirements either, especially in the UK, but honestly, if it's a "life and death" situation, I seriously doubt the person is going to be walking into the nearest WalGreens to pick up a prescription. They would most likely be in the hospital.

As a side note, I wouldn't think a "morning after" pill would be considered a "life and death" prescription (except for the fetus if conception had occurred).

 

#1 many times a life and death can simply be getting your prescription on time
My cousin a diabetic for example was without her insulin. She did not need a hospital, even though she was in risk of her health pretty badly, all she needed was her insulin prescription forwarded to a pharmacy near my dads place a few months ago when she was visiting. She lives several hours away and forgot to bring her insulin with her.
#2 no this case of the morning after pill is not life and death, who however would consider which case is?..

 

Whats wrong with Morning after pills? Why does his religion(In this case Islam)not permit him to give the pills? Islam doesn't approve family planing?

 

It's not just Islam. I read a similar story a few months back about a Christian at a Walgreens or CVS who denied the same thing on the grounds it was killing life and she was against it.

 

Yep I thought there have been a few in the states as well.

 

#1 is a great point and example. It was however not a life and death situation at the time. If she'd gone into hyperglycemic shock, it could very well have turned into a very dangerous situation that would possibly have required a hospital visit. (Glad to hear she didn't run into a pharmacist who's religion prohibited insulin use )

#2 is a good question that I don't have an answer for.

 

So according to these religious nuts, family planing is equal to homicide.. interesting...

 

People like this are just plain nuts. It has no bearing on the person dispensing the medication. If it interferes with your moral compass, find another job where you won't be put into this type of situation.

The pharmacists job is to dispense legal prescriptions, not make moral judgments on the people getting the prescription.

 

This.

I agree wholeheartedly. You probably wouldn't take a job in the porn industry as a devout Christian, because you would find many things wrong with it. That's your freedom, but you can't expect the world to change for your beliefs to accommodate you, as long as you aren't being discriminated against. Same thing here. If you don't feel morally right prescribing medication such as this, find a new field of work.

/As an aside, if the business itself allows employees to exercise their own judgement, or if policy of a company says that it will not prescribe medications like this, so be it. Legal, but shitty, as that company will lose a LOT of business.