From the Va4Marriage:
Harrisonburg Man Fired for Supporting Marriage Amendment
RICHMOND – A Harrisonburg man was fired from his job last week apparently for displaying a sign in his personal vehicle that showed his support for Virginia’s Constitutional Amendment defining marriage.
“It appears that Mr. Padilla’s civil rights have been violated in an egregious act of viewpoint discrimination and violation of his right to free speech,” said Victoria Cobb, spokesperson for va4marriage.org. “It is abundantly clear that those who seek to impose same-sex marriage on society are not at all interested in tolerance of other viewpoints. And they are willing to go so far as to destroy a man’s family and take his livelihood to get their way. I believe that when they hear this story, the people of Virginia will be appalled.”
Luis Padilla, an employee of Cargill, a large employer in the Harrisonburg area, was fired from his job last week for displaying a sign on his personal vehicle. The sign read, “Please, vote for Marriage on Nov. 7.”
Upon receiving an initial warning from his employer about the sign, Mr. Padilla removed the sign from his personal vehicle, replacing it only after driving his vehicle off company property. Mr. Padilla’s boss had led him to believe that this would be an acceptable course of action. When he returned to work the next day, Mr. Padilla was careful to park his vehicle outside the company parking lot so as to minimize the “offense” the sign allegedly caused to co-workers.
Despite these efforts to comply with his superiors’ demands, company officials terminated Mr. Padilla’s employment, citing concerns about harassment as the basis for their actions. Rita Dunaway, senior Legal Advisor for the Valley Family Forum, a local grassroots chapter of The Family Foundation of Virginia, sent a letter to Cargill urging his immediate reinstatement.
Yesterday, Cargill responded with a letter rejecting that plea. In their letter, Cargill stated, “Cargill is not required to allow Mr. Padilla to impose his beliefs on his co-workers.”
“It is appalling that a company like Cargill that claims to value diversity would terminate an employee for merely expressing an opinion about the Marriage Amendment,” said Mrs. Dunaway. “Companies that truly value diversity encourage, rather than punish, the benign, respectful type of private expression for which Mr. Padilla was fired. There is simply no way that this sign could have been considered harassment.”
“The action taken by Cargill against Mr. Padilla, the father of two young children, is a tragic example of political correctness run amuck,” according to Valley Family Forum Director Dean Welty. “This action exposes the hypocrisy of people who claim to stand for ‘tolerance’ but who instead do all they can to silence all opposing views. In this case, those who accuse Mr. Padilla of ‘harassment’ have themselves become the ‘harassers’.”
“va4marriage.org and The Family Foundation are currently talking with attorneys to determine what legal options are available to Mr. Padilla,” added Cobb. “We hope this action won’t be necessary and that Cargill will do the right thing by reinstating Mr. Padilla immediately and taking aggressive steps to ensure that this kind of employee harassment and intimidation does not occur again.””
So much for free speech and tolerance from Liberals. Another reason to vote for Marriage in Virginia. Send a message to those who would silence any dissent from Political Correctness.
Update: The Daily News Record has published a story this morning confirming the broad outlines of the Va4Marriage account. But there’s more detail about Cargill’s reasoning. Said a Cargill spokesman: “When ordered to do something relatively simple — remove from his truck two signs that other employees could have reasonably construed as a show of hostility and intolerance toward homosexuals — Mr. Padilla decided to ignore the warning and disobey the order. By refusing to obey the order, he demonstrated that he could not be trusted to enforce and promote our employment policies because his personal beliefs mattered more to him.”
— Jim Bacon
By the way, see what kind of Web page you land on when you type “VA4Marriage.com” into the address line of your browser. It’s not the same as when you type “VA4Marriage.org.” Cute.