Muslim Bus(ted)

[skeptical]

Wow. I certainly hope you don't have the power to fire employees wherever it is you work, because the turnover rate would be huge. It wouldn't matter how long they've worked for you for, or what the size of the offense committed...one strike, and they'd be out!

You've honestly never heard of 'cautioning' or 'warning' employees? Putting them on probation? Other types of disciplinary action that save the employee from being fired for a first time offense, save you from having to go through the process of hiring another employee, and that keeps morale up (hard to have high morale when you know your first slip up will cost you your job).

Those are for minor offenses and honest mistakes. Purposely not doing your job for personal reasons, supremely inconveniencing the companies customers ON PURPOSE is not a mistake. It is unbelievably poor judgment. I'm quite sure bus employees know they can't stop the bus and kick off the customers because they feel like taking some personal time, religious or otherwise.

Except this isn't a CEO consulting a oujii board to make stock decisions. This is a bus driver, probably a new convert to Islam (though we don't know exactly his situation) asking people to leave his bus for ten minutes so that he could pray (and, as it turns out, he was on his break anyway).

What does his conversion have to do with anything? A bus driver knows what their job is and they _should_ know you can't kick passengers off a bus for your own personal reasons. I hardly think that needs to be explained.

You'd think that if, for example, the leader of a country took his people to war based on false premises that he wouldn't find himself reelected. But sometimes, people who are extrodinarily bad at their jobs, or who show incredibly bad judgment, get to keep their jobs. In the grand scheme of things, the mistake this guy made (or that we thought he made) was on the pretty low end of the scale, and is highly unlikely to happen again. There's no reason to force a lose-lose situation by firing him.

First, don't get me started on Bush and his incompetence, because its neither here nor there. Second, just because some incompetent people get to keep their jobs is not an argument for all incompetent people to keep their jobs. Third, purposely not doing your job and showing incredibly poor judgment is a valid firing offense, period.

Wow. Intolerance, thy name is 'skeptical'...

Yes, I am intolerant of incompetence. I'm doubly intolerant of incompetent people who try to force their personal opinions on others and I'm unbelievably intolerant of incompetent people who try to force their personal religious opinions on others. This guy made a conscious decision that his personal religious beliefs trumped his job and the comfort and safety of his passengers. That is a go directly to the unemployment line offense, and the only reason anyone thinks otherwise is because of some sycophantic deference to "respect" the guys religion. Sorry, not happening.

This is a good time for him to learn that despite what his imam tells him, he doesn't get to tell others how to behave to enforce his religion.

ETA: Well crap, I now see that the story was apparently wrong (Sunni Man's post). Ah well, I am leaving my comments because if the situation had been as described initially, I stand by my comments. Obviously if the passengers were getting off anyway that is a completely different matter.

 

[ddt]

ETA: Well crap, I now see that the story was apparently wrong (Sunni Man's post). Ah well, I am leaving my comments because if the situation had been as described initially, I stand by my comments. Obviously if the passengers were getting off anyway that is a completely different matter.

This begs the question: what do you think of the Sun reporter? Apparently, he hasn't put due diligence in his story, and has opened up his employer to a slam-dunk libel case. Shouldn't he be fired on the spot too?

 

[I Ratant]

Many Muslims carry a small pocket cave so that their posts will echo.

.
Many Muslim country-based airliners have "Mecca pointers" in the cabin, so the faithful will know when not to use the john.
It's these superficialities that make it difficult to see anything but the meddlings of nasty minded old men in the dogma of Islam.

 

[gtc]

This begs the question: what do you think of the Sun reporter? Apparently, he hasn't put due diligence in his story, and has opened up his employer to a slam-dunk libel case. Shouldn't he be fired on the spot too?

That would depend on whether the quote from the bus driver is true or not:

Yesterday the driver, who said his name was Hrun, told The Sun: “I asked everyone to get off because I needed to pray. I was running late and had not had time.

“I pray five times a day as a Muslim — but I don’t normally ask people to get off the bus to do it.”

 

[ddt]

That would depend on whether the quote from the bus driver is true or not:

Yesterday the driver, who said his name was Hrun, told The Sun: “I asked everyone to get off because I needed to pray. I was running late and had not had time.

“I pray five times a day as a Muslim — but I don’t normally ask people to get off the bus to do it.”

And the Slough & Windsor Observer wrote:

London United Busways say they have carried out a full investigation after driver Arunas Raulynaitis rolled out his prayer mat to perform his daily prayers, facing Mecca on the number 81 bus in Langley.

in the article SunniMan quoted before. An interesting discrepancy: they have different names for the driver.

I don't know the reputation of the latter paper, but I'd take just about anything as a more credible source than the Sun. IMHO, it's more likely that the Sun reporter has wholly made up the "quote" of the driver.

 

[Rasmus]

I don't know the reputation of the latter paper, but I'd take just about anything as a more credible source than the Sun. IMHO, it's more likely that the Sun reporter has wholly made up the "quote" of the driver.

If the reputation of the sun is what I think it is, the question changes ever so slightly, doesn't it? Truthful reporting might not be part of the reporter's job description ...

 

[Professor Yaffle]

A London bus driver today accepted £30,000 in damages from the Sun over a claim that he ordered passengers off his vehicle so that he could pray.
The story in March last year caused Arunas Raulynaitis considerable distress and embarrassment, his solicitor, Stephen Loughrey, told Mr Justice Eady at the high court in London.
Loughrey said the newspaper now accepted that the allegations were entirely false and that Raulynaitis did not order any passengers off, there was no rucksack and no one refused to reboard because they feared he was a fanatic.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/feb/26/sun-pays-damages-to-muslim-bus-driver

 

[Safe-Keeper]

Yes, the question of whether or not there was a rucksack involved must have caused him great distress .