Discrimination in the Workplace

At one point in each of our lives we have been discriminated against in regards to our personal character. This discrimination could be in reference to our age, gender, race, or even our sexual preference. None the less we have been discriminated against, and that just is not right. The issue of discrimination usually takes center stage in the office and the policy of discrimination is usually followed by the classic policy of sexual harassment. With this issue now at the forefront of most employer’s employee handbook, companies are taking the time in explaining the problems associated with discrimination to their employees. Since discrimination is such an issue we will be looking at the moral and ethical obligations that a person of authority has to keep in mind when deciding claims of discrimination. I choose to look at Riordan Manufacturing company in this analysis of the company’s policies that are in effect in an attempt to combat discrimination. Discrimination is all around us and yet few of us really know what it feels like to be discriminated against. Usually, when the term discrimination is thrown out their people look at the obvious forms of discrimination: gender, sex, age, or sexual orientation. No one stops to consider the less popular forms of discrimination: Religion, pregnancy, or even medical disabilities. When one thinks of discrimination they think of the Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) act that keeps companies from discriminating, yet they do not know how this act came to be. In 1963 the then president John F. Kennedy proposed the civil rights act, this was the same year the Martin Luther King gave his famous speech in Washington D.C. In 1963, the discrimination to African Americans and other minorities was obscene. They were not given equal education, and when they were, they were not hired as an equal. If they were hired they were not paid as an equal, they were not promoted as an equal, and instead they received harassment.