It is a regular pastime for co-workers to chat during a coffee break, at a union hall, or over a beer about workplace issues, good grilling recipes, and celebrity gossip. Yet a recent ruling by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) allows employers to ban off-duty fraternizing among co-workers, severely weakening the rights of free association and speech, and violating basic standards of privacy for America’s workers.
I guess when your party doesn’t back you the sharks start closing in.
UPDATE: As an ironic aside, Wapo has this article
The president departed Tuesday for his longest stretch yet away from the White House, arriving at his Crawford ranch in the evening for a stretch of clearing brush, visiting with family and friends, and tending to some outside-the-Beltway politics. By historical standards, it is the longest presidential retreat in at least 36 years.
The August getaway is Bush’s 49th trip to his cherished ranch since taking office and the 319th day that Bush has spent, entirely or partially, in Crawford — nearly 20 percent of his presidency to date, according to Mark Knoller, a CBS Radio reporter known for keeping better records of the president’s travel than the White House itself.
What in the fucking hell?!?
Are they defining fraternization as any contact whatsoever?
It seems pretty vague. I wonder what happens when two employees are married.
I’d like to see this one in court.
Can anyone say “ACLU”.
Are they defining fraternization as any contact whatsoever?
The short answer is no. [longer answer below].
Hells Bells, even piss ants hang out and talk after work, did’nt they see the movie???? “ANTS”
I read that article this morning..had to read it several times to get the full impact of the thing..once again workers get shit on as big business was ruled ok in this policy…little by little workers ‘rights’ are being taken away. And I can’t begin to imagine how this can even be enforceable.
Then I simply go back to my first reaction on reading this which was WTfuck is going on here anyway.
Well…maybe we finally found an issue that will send the people to the streets in protest.
We need someone else to try this stunt and turn a lot of light on it while it’s happening.
at the very least we can get bar and restaurant owners to lead the way…if this actually spreads, their happy hour business will plummet…
Once everyone’s employed by Wal*Mart, noncommercial society itself would be illegal.
This is actually a really bloody scary decision. The ruling claims that the rule in question only applied when employees were wearing uniforms – something it manifestly did not. As another poster pointed out, it makes no allowance for married couples, and seems to imply that, if they want to stay married, one must quit. Even more frighteningly, the ruling claims that this does not interfere with the employees’ right to collective action, something they should know is protected… Even though no-one is actually required to inform them of this, and the rule may actually prevent employees informing each other. (As that is not strictly related to unionization.
I would not have even looked at it twice, thinking that it was a sure thing for the employees.
What’s really funny is that they based the decision off a hotel rule… That banned fraternization with customers… While on-duty and in-uniform.
The fact that this rule was different because it covered activities outside of work and uniform never seems to have occurred to them.
The case is 344 NLRB No. 07, available from the NLRB website (Endnote in article). This is the offensive fraternization work rule:
This is how they ruled:
==
Moreover, as the judge noted and our dissenting colleague ignores, the Respondent’s rule is designed “to provide safeguards so that security will not be compromised by interpersonal relationships either between Respondent’s fellow security guards or between Respondent’s security guards and clients’ employees.”
Note that in context even a third grader would understand the difference between protected organizing behavior, and hustling a date. Left out of the article was the Board’s ruling against Guardmark on the no-solicitiations-in-uniform rule. The Board gave the company 14 days to create and publish an “Appendix”, to be post at all their facilities nationwide:
This ruling doesn’t even rise to the level of mildly irritating, much less “profoundly affecting labor”. While the Pres appoints NLRB members, and they are indeed Reeps, this one is a labor dog that don’t hunt.
That they could EVER tell me what to do when they aren’t paying me.
That’s exactly what I find unreasonable. There are some things that would be reasonable there – for example, NDAs. But banning all association with co-workers and employees of clients, even off-duty and out of uniform? What gives them the right?
Where’s the constitutional restriction?
… we believe that employees would reasonably understand the rule to prohibit only personal entanglements, rather than activity protected by the Act.
Assumes the employees actually read their contract before they went to work there.
I believe that you can’t sign a contract giving up your basic human rights. One of those rights is freedom of association. This rule is saying that you can’t associate with your co-workers in any capacity (except those explicitly protected by law), even on your own time, in your own clothes, on your own property. How is it remotely ethical or reasonable to allow a company to impose a ruling like this on its employees?
If a company wants to dictate what I do outside of work hours, the only ethical way for them to do this is to pay me for that time.
Please read the decision again. The company’s rule is intended to prevent “personal entanglements” – period. There is a distinction between “fraternize” and “associate” implicit in the rule.
So where is the line between fraternization and association? Note that fraternization does not have anything to do with romantic entanglements. The word has nothing to do with them, and the rule explicitly mentions romantic entanglements separately. Fraternization means “friends”.
In other words, what they’re saying is that I can’t make friends with anyone in my workplace, even if all my socialization is done off the clock and out of uniform.
I think slavery is considerred unconstitutional so yes.
Its not a contract unless there is any exchange. If you are off hours the suggestions is that you are not being paid…where is the exchange…there is none.
After seeing what this administration has turned loose for the corps, and reading the comments.
I have to agree that there is probably not much legal stance on this issue, however, if not kept in check, these items will surely run rampant, and give them more leverage over workers in legal battles.
Remember back in the winter when the company fired workers for smoking? (of work, at home, in private, they were tested) What happened to that case? Anyone have any info?
It will be interesting to see if it stuck, and the people are still working, which I doubt.
All this is designed to abolish workers rights, granted is sounds crazy right now, but if a voice is not heard about it, then it will become a valid point of law for future diminishing of rights.
It makes me sad that even within this thread there are people that think it would be ok for me to direct their behavior even when I’m not paying them as long as they bare the title of “employee.” The employee/employer relationship is just another business transaction – time and actions for cash.
Do the lawyers on both sides take directions from clients for time not billed? We know that they don’t! The client could try to direct their action during non-billed time, but there would never be any enforcement of those actions.
How is this relationship any different? The answer is that there is no difference!
I hope you are right, but remember, this group seizing power, don’t give a shit about what we think. FACT
I went to National Workrights Institute to see if they had anything up on this, doesn’t seem so yet. They did have more articles to make me furious though-nurses being forced to wear personal tracking devices to record their time spent at various tasks? Genetic testing? Broader drug screening? I had no idea it had gotten as bad as this.
Link to the National Workrights inst.
http://www.workrights.org/in_the_news.html
Worrisome stuff.