Thread: Workplace Segregaton - Its Spreading

I recently wrote an email to a friend detailing this phenomenom and its growing spread in Kansas City. The following details the new workplace segregation being imposed by restaurant owners across the country.

The face of racism in this country is changing, the actors are different but the hate and the desire to segregate are the same. All the while those who practice this new type of racism cry out that if you disapprove then you yourself are racist. It has taken me months of fact finding and soul searching but I have concluded that there is no way that asking all races to be able to openly communicate in a work environment is racist and there is no way that hiring only people of one racial background to do a particular set of jobs and cannot speak a certain language is not racist.

While in KC I spoke with a 30-something white girl who had been down on her luck. She said she was turned away from various fast food restaurants because she could not speak spanish. She finally landed a job at the cash register but stated that many times she makes a mistake on an order and the kitchen staff cannot understand her to change the order causing a potential health hazard. Her exact quote was "They are so worried about us washing our hands and keeping counters clean... but we give people the wrong orders all the time which could and has caused allergic reactions.. so far just minor....."

Why Workplace Segregation is Wrong:
1. Separation of employees based on linguistic ability and therefore based on race and national origin is wrong.
2. English is the ONLY National language of the USA and the language spoken by all of its citizens
3. Lack of the ability to communicate could cause potential health problems such as asphyxiation due to an allergic reaction.
4. American workers are now unfairly being discriminated against because they do not speak a foreign language and therefore are discriminated against based on their race and national origin which in many cases amounts to a sort of 'legal racism' in which companies can segregate their kitchen workforce. A practice known as "Workplace Segregation".

Solutions:
1. Major companies like McDonald's, Burger King and Taco Bell as well as pretty much every other Fast Food chain and sit-down restaurant chain are guilty of Workplace Segregation in some form or another; the most common being that kitchen and cleaning staff be non-english speaking hispanics. They force a division which they claim is based on those willing to do a job but which inevitably is based on racial backgrounds, putting american lives and health at risk for profit gains. This also makes it much harder for Americans to find jobs that they may need in these areas and which many teenagers and college students are now left out of. Too alleviate this these companies need to provide as a condition of employment that any immigrant workers take english courses payed for by the employer. They also need to provide that all workers speak english in the workplace while working on company time to ensure a smooth and constant flow of communication with no risk of causing the public health problems. This will also open the kitchen, and other jobs normally done out of view of the public, back to normal American citizens of all races, ethnic backgrounds and national origin. As English is a requirement of Citizenship to this great nation it seems a simple thing that we ask all those who come here, and those who hire them that we ensure they are able to communicate in that language... at the very least at work.

I should point out that above I attack restaurants but Food Processing and Meat Packing plants have practiced this for nearly 20 years shoving American Citizens out of jobs and driving wages down roughly 30%. However, these companies use two or three foreign labor sources at each plant location. For example one might be Cambodian, Hispanic and Somalian etc.....

Just like the fast food industry there is not desire to teach them english and American workers are forced to sit through training programs with headphones on that a translator is talking through for their training.

Other industrys affected are construction, landscaping and hotel/hospitality. The landscaping industry is approximately 98% non-english speaking nationwide minus some rural areas. This has made it virtually impossible for any white, african-american, asian, arabic etc... to be hired in this field to which colleges still give out degrees (landscape design) without learning a foreign language.

You would think this is common sense.

Common sense is the LEAST common of all the senses.

LIVE FREE OR DIE IN 2008!!!!

I know some folks here in Vegas that use to be in construction

Not anymore , Construction here in Vegas is 99.9% hispanic and
if your not hispanic they make your life hell on the job

Also most jobs here , in the service sector and construction
will only hire you if you speak spanish

We even have a chain of hispanic supermarkets , full tilt supermarkets
that put out all their weekly adds in spanish
They even went to the city counsel trying to get permission to
slaughter live chickens to order for the customers

That one didn't fly

However, these companies use two or three foreign labor sources at each plant location. For example one might be Cambodian, Hispanic and Somalian etc.....

Now THIS I'd pay to see!

You now have Cambodians, hispanics and somalians working together. each speaking their own language. How does any work get done? Since you can't force them to speak English and it would be racist to tell them to learn Spanish..... anyone else see any problems with this?

When I lived in Vegas back in the 70's and 80's I hung a TON of drywall out at Cimmaron West. It paid 5.5 cents per square foot. I looked for piecework in Vegas 6 months ago before I settled in Arizona and guess what???

It STILL pays 5.5 cents per square foot.

Tell me the illegals don't depress wages...

usanevada, you are so right this has happened to a lot of my friends the illegals make it impossible to work there.

The work these illegals do is crap! A friend of mine hired a construction company to build a deck and retaining wall. While my friend was on vaction the owner of the construction company hired illegals to do the block work. When my friend got home he found the wall was a mess they had really messed it up. Other people here are finding the the new house they bought that were built by illegals have all kinds of problems. Wall settling and cracking causing gaps around doors and windows.

If they don't speak English I don't do business with them! I will wallk out right out the door!

A few big-time lawsuits would help!!!!!

Originally Posted by Bad_Hand

usanevada, you are so right this has happened to a lot of my friends the illegals make it impossible to work there.

The work these illegals do is crap! A friend of mine hired a construction company to build a deck and retaining wall. While my friend was on vaction the owner of the construction company hired illegals to do the block work. When my friend got home he found the wall was a mess they had really messed it up. Other people here are finding the the new house they bought that were built by illegals have all kinds of problems. Wall settling and cracking causing gaps around doors and windows.

If they don't speak English I don't do business with them! I will wallk out right out the door!

Ohhh there will be MILLIONS of those houses across the country. We absolutely have refused to buy a newly built home, no matter what the incentives are. For the amount of money they charge, you can be your own contractor and have one custom built for you alot cheaper, using American labor. No more profit in the pockets of developers, instead it's split between the builder and the homeowner.

I am an American who speaks TWO foreign languages, Spanish and Portuguese. But it is JUST as NEXT to IMPOSSIBLE for ME to FIND work as it is for Americans who know only English. The SAME holds true for my LEGAL resident Brazilian friend who speaks FIVE languages, the three I speak PLUS French and German(and she has a BACHELOR'S from the UNIVERSITY of Tennessee in those languages!) And NO doubt there are LOTS of OTHER multilingual Americans and legal residents in the SAME deplorable fix!