Tyson Foods, a large corporation, has decided to break Federal Law and not celebrate Labor Day. At the Shelbyville, Tennessee plant they will get Eid al-Fitr off instead. The next thing you know they will do will be to force their employees to work on Christmas.
Workers at Tyson Foods' poultry processing plant in Shelbyville will no longer have a paid day off on Labor Day, but will instead take the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr in the fall.
A recent press release from the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU) stated that a new contract at the Shelbyville facility "implements a new holiday to accommodate the ... Muslim workers at the plant."
The RWDSU stated that "the five-year contract creates an additional paid holiday, Iidal Fitil, a Muslim holiday that occurs toward the end of Ramadan."
You know that if there were Jews working at this plant they would not be doing the same thing for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
Eid al-Fitr falls on Oct. 1 this year.Tyson's Director of Media Relations, Gary Mickelson, stated that while the new contract does not provide an additional holiday, as the union claimed, "the new contract includes eight paid holidays, which is the same number provided in the old contract."
"However, the union leadership did request and receive Eid al-Fitr (which is apparently spelled various ways including Id al-Fitr and Eid ul-Fitr) as a paid holiday in place of Labor Day," Mickelson confirmed in an e-mail to the T-G.
"Since all Team Members will still have eight paid holidays, the change will not affect production," Mickelson said.
Eid al-Fitr means "Festival of the Breaking of the Fast" in Arabic, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, and marks the end of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting.
That doesn't excuse them from breaking Federal Law. Labor Day is a Federal Holiday mandated by Federal Law.
We as consumers can do many things. Firstly contact Tyson and tell them you are unhappy with this decision of theirs. Their address is:
Consumer Relations CP631
2210 West Oaklawn Drive
Springdale, AR 72764-6999
Tell them that you plan on boycotting their foods and will join in with this National boycott of their products. And then do not buy Tyson products, go to a restaurant that serves Tyson products, etc...
Companies have to know that they don't have the power, we do. It is our money.
3 comments:
I voted at RCP for everybody's articles. I had not gotten over here. I'm going to use the boycott address. Good point on the Jewish holidays also.
Debbie Hamilton
Right Truth
Excellent point about the Jewish holidays, I mean, we really do not have a Christmas holiday anymore - only a winter holiday.
The Union lied. They said this was an additional paid holiday. Tyson denied this. The employees do not get the first Monday in September off. They get to holiday only whatever day the Muslim holiday falls for that year.
My blood pressure is UP.
The non-Muslim employees, which are in the minority need to walk-out.
Maggie
Maggie's Notebook
Ms. Thornton said that "we really do not have a Christmas holiday anymore."
True. But as a Christian, that doesn't bother me any more.
I've worked places where one year, we had a Christmas tree, then the next year it was a holiday tree. And when the Kwanzaa nonsense appeared with a Menorah on a table in the lobby, I simply purchased a Nativity scene and put it there.
The world thinks it is harming Christianity but its attempts to shut out, if not do away with, any mention or display of Christmas.
I've even read in the blogosphere that some say it no longer belongs to Christians.
And that's OK, too. In fact, it doesn't, but it does in a very special way.
And as the princes of the world thought, when the crucified the Messiah, that they were stamping out His message, they only ensured its life on this earth.
That's what's happening now. And the more the world, especially secular America, presses to deny the liberty we have to celebrate, the more we will.
The more their oppressive attempts will make the news--thus allowing the name of the Christ and Christmas to be publicized even more.
That said, the union should be the object of ire and concern, not the Muslims. They just asked.
But, you're right, too. The non-Muslims might consider walking out, depending on their convictions and if their pocketbooks can afford it.
Regardless, what the union has done and what Tyson has agreed to, stinks.
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