I'm in agreement with you there, and I'm not even sure what her point is... It seems that she's just making up outrageous claims with the vague end of claiming that not only is it the right of the cashiers to refuse to do their jobs, but we should all celebrate it.

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

That, and apparently we should inconvenience ourselves by HAVING to go to another check out line simply because the cashier's decided on a whim not to scan something he/she doesn't like due to whatever reason.

Oh, and guess what - we get told this AFTER standing in a long queue ... remember, store policies don't state it either.

I find this particularly interesting because of what happened to me that I explained earlier. After waiting in line for about 10 minutes at the store to buy a bottle of vodka, I finally got to the clerk. At this point, the clerk told me that she was too young to ring up my order (damned if she didn't look 21) and I was told to get out of line and go stand in another ten minute line. I found this completely aggravating (she could have told me when I got in line in the first place, or had someone else ring up the vodka), and since then, I have not returned to that store, even though it's across the street from me. It had nothing to do with religious tolerance or anything else (except for the US's silly alcohol laws), but my experience was bad and so I take my business elsewhere.

If clerks want to refuse to ring things up (or cause me inconvenience in general), I'll go elsewhere. The subsequent loss of business is a matter to be resolved between the employer and employee.

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

Fully agree. That's another reason I was saying the employer is stupid for not firing or at least discipling them (that I know of) since they are causing the store to lose business in the long run. People can't really get away with that sort of behavior in a country like the US where there are plenty of stores to choose from.

In your particular situation, IMO, you'd be well within your rights to throw a fit, OR ask the store why they had someone underage at a counter which serves alcoholic products.

Yep, the drinking laws in the US are stupid ... Legal drinking age should be 18.

Oh, and I wonder how many of the Muslims would happily stand in a long line, only for a Hindu cashier to tell them "sorry, I can't serve beef because my religion prohibits it".

Religous beliefs are 100 percent fine and acceptable ... so long as they don't inconvenience others. I really think people take things to giddy limits sometimes, as in this particular case of the Muslims refusing to serve pork.

Over here in the UK they handle things slightly differently. A person under 18 on a till simply gets permission from a responsible adult ( usually the person on the next till ) to ring up the alcohol.....and does so. I saw this the other day when I was buying a bottle of posh port as part of my sisters birthday prezzie. The young chap on the till simply yelled " jenny" ( or whatever it was ), held up the bottle, she looked at me, could see I was over 18, gave him the nod and he rang it up.

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England has no eternal friends and no eternal enemies, only eternal interests - Palmerston

Off topic, but just out of curiosity, would liqor stores in the US generally accept a passport as proof of age? I'm generally never carded (or was never carded) there anyway, but just curious ... some idiot in MS refused to accept my driver's license from NY - he gave the reason that "we only accept ID's from this state". A load of hogwash if there ever was one, but it was a private store, so they make the rules ...

This silly issue of ID doesn't arise in Asia though, and thankfully so. Neither does it in Europe provided one's over 18 - it's pretty easy to tell by looking a person whether he/she is over 18.

Mind you I once got asked to produce ID when I was 23....irony being I was actually the oldest person in the group. I chose to be flattered

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England has no eternal friends and no eternal enemies, only eternal interests - Palmerston

They don't have to actually team up, i. e. meet somewhere and talk about how they're gonna screw customers over.

The owners of each store in a neighborhood/residential area know what they must do to maximize profits.

If store X across the street provides ho-hum service, what incentive is there for store Y to do any better?

They are expendable, but it still costs more to find and train a new employee than to just have another cashier scan the pork purchase.

Add to that it isn't always easy to get good help in certain neighborhoods.

I suspect these Muslim cashiers must be very hard workers, compared to many of the others the stores could find in their area of operation.

The turnover rate is high, of course. And that just further proves my point. If the store tells the cashier she must scan the pork product against her wishes, she might just quit. In fact, every other Muslim employee may just quit in protest. Then there would be a community uproar. The store could hire a bunch of non-Muslim cashiers, who would be less hard-working at every other aspect of their job, given the wages they get. The ex-cashiers, of course, would've found other jobs by then. In the end, the store is worse-off.

Low-wage employees can get away with doing a bad job because they know that no one else who worked the same job would have an incentive to do any better, or that they would do worse.

Like I said, I suspect these Muslim cashiers are very hard workers, compared to the other laborers in the area where these stores operate.

Hardly, because if it were absurd, then these cashiers who refuse to scan pork would not be able to keep their jobs. But they do.

They can't. Because then they would have to wait for a whole new order, and that costs them time. Better just eat the salad and get back to work.

Now that's

I do not have derision for them. I understand why they do a ho-hum job, and why they screw up orders. Most of them are kids who are paid a low wage and are overworked and tired. So the way I see, it's OK for them to mess up a whole bunch of orders.

In fact, employees that do a so-so job are smart, because they have realized that they shouldn't have to work harder than they must to keep their jobs. I'm proud of them . They've learned how to beat the system! I just love walking into a Taco Bell or McDonald's and seeing a bunch of young people screwing around, listening to iPods, chillin' out, socializing, etc.

Workers of the world, run to the top of the mountain!!

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Life only becomes meaningful at its extremes

-- S

The Liquor/ID laws vary from state to state (probably just to make them more irritating). Here in Illinois, they can and have taken my passport or license from Illinois. In fact, I've never tried to use my passport or license somewhere and had either one refused.

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

This one question about sums up the stupidity of your argument. Um, maybe so that store Y can take away all of store X's business?
More unbacked up nonsense. There are hard working folks of all religous beliefs.

Rot. How can you say EVERY other Muslim employee would quit? I'd be willing to bet that given the current state of the economy, someone would take the job, even if just as a stop gap measure till he/she found something better.

And your statements about non Muslims being less harder working is unproven and nonsensical.


Jesus Christ, I really haven't seen SUCH an ignorant post in a while. With all due respect Solletica, I don't think you've ever been to a store/restaurant where peopel are just screwing around and not serving the customers. In ALL instances, I've left the place quite aggravated, and so did the people I was with - and neither went back to that particular restaurant or TacoBell (which seems to be famous for what you say, by the way).

The point is my statements are consistent with reality

whereas your wishful thinking about how cashiers who don't scan pork are gonna be fired does not reflect reality, because they aren't being fired.

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Life only becomes meaningful at its extremes

-- S

If that's the case, then who don't these stores fire all these non-pork scanning cashiers and hire someone else?

Are you suggesting the owners of these stores don't know what they're doing?

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Life only becomes meaningful at its extremes

-- S

As far as I know, the federal law says people below 21 can't buy liqor and stores have to card (check ID for purposes of age verification) people so that they know how old the person is, but does it say WHAT ID, so long as it's valid? A passport is valid for international travel. A NY license is valid everywhere in the US. I would say both should be acceptable.

Or do many states have additional laws which stipulate what form of ID it must be? That's most retarded, if you ask me - so long as it's valid Id in a language one can understand, it's valid ID ...

LOL, not a bad thing really then for you. I used to have problems when I first went to the US at 17 - but quickly discovered that the longer of a beard I grew, the less likely I was to be carded ...

Never did go the fake ID route though.

Could be many reasons ... Yes, they might not know what they're doing. OR, they might not be wiling to let them go at that point in time. Oh, and what do you mean by "all those non-pork scanning cashiers"? Its' not like all of them refused to scan pork.

I have. I used to work for such a Taco Bell long ago. It was fun. One day, I just left during my shift, because I found another job.

btw, in American culture, are you supposed to notify your employer if you quit?

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Life only becomes meaningful at its extremes

-- S