From a faithful reader:
Although I firmly agree with you that discrimination against employees for sexual orientation is wrong, I suspect that Darden Restaurants isn't the best example.
I had received a forwarded message that included a boycott notice that
referenced the same Washington Blade article you read. Since about 90% of the
forwarded e-mails I get art either complete bunk or so outdated as to be
useless, I looked into this. I eventually spoke to one of their PR guys. Given
that he was a paid mouthpiece, he seemed like a pretty reasonable guy. Their
point of view is roughly this:
They fired an employee for performance reasons. The employee cried "discrimination!" and sued. Their lawyers, in standard lawyerly tactics, challenged everything, including the laws under which the suit was brought. Once they found out what their lawyers had done, they were horrified, as they think diversity is a swell thing. They told their lawyers to knock it off, and then apologized.
Subtracting his spin, it sounds like a plausible story. I know exactly zero about the validity of the employee's complaint, but they seem pretty sincere about their desire for diversity; he claims that they have a zero-tolerance policy for any sort of irrational discrimination, and a gay-basher would be fired just as quickly as the next bigot.
The thing that convinces me is that they put out a joint press release with a number of gay rights organizations, including the Illinois Federation for Human Rights. They say, "Red Lobster responded quickly and responsibly to our concerns and company representatives worked diligently to resolve the issues we raised." I've attached the full press release below, along with the forward I got.
My advice? Check things carefully before you alert the world. As the Urban Legends editor at MiningCo can tell you, things like this take years to die out once they get going. Of course, you may want to avoid these restaurants anyhow, if only for the food and atmosphere; I'm not a big fan of chains, myself and haven't been to one of these places in a decade.
Regards,
William
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