Religious Discrimination Throughout Cultures and the Workplace

Religious discrimination refers to the treating of an individual unfairly because of his or her religious beliefs (Kerner). P. Smith (2017) defines religious discrimination as the adverse treatment of an individual who is either an employee or any other person considering the religious beliefs of the person rather than the merit of the employee. Additionally, religious discrimination can refer to the unjust, or the prejudicial treatment of a group of people or just an individual because of his or chosen faith, creed, sincere beliefs which may not be relating to an established faith system (Fox et al.

2015). This essay seeks to discuss religious discrimination including the various forms of religious bigotry and how religious discrimination affects the today's world.

In today's world, religious discrimination is prevalent in workplaces. The forms of religious discrimination in workplaces can be either direct religious discrimination or indirect religious discrimination. The direct religious discrimination in where an individual may be an employer treats someone may be his employee less conductively because of his or her religious beliefs ("What Is Religious Discrimination at Work?"). The most understandable form of direct religious discrimination in a workplace is where an employee decides to take unlawful action against another worker based on their religion (Kerner). The illicit activities include remunerating an employee less because of their religion, sucking a worker because of their religious beliefs, deciding not to give an employee a chance for employment because of his religious beliefs even if he meets the requirements of the job position.

Indirect religious discrimination entails setting of rules and policies that apply to everyone, but with the aim of unfairly disadvantaging employees with certain religious beliefs. Some of the typical examples of indirect religious discrimination include the setting of a particular dress code in a workplace even if the dress code would exclude people who wear items of clothing as part of their faith. Another example is where a boss sets unfair work schedule that inhibits employees taking time off to observe their religious practices. Additionally, the unfair banning of wearing specific religious items such as symbolic bracelets which is common among the Roman Catholic.

Harassment is also a type of religious discrimination. Harassment refers to the situation where one party humiliates, offends or even degrades the other because of their difference in religious beliefs. An example of bullying in regard to religious discrimination is when someone from an Islamic religion visits a restaurant, and every time the person goes to the restaurant, one of the staff makes comments about him being a terrorist, an act that he finds offensive and upsetting. Victimization is also a form of religious discrimination under the Equality Act in the American Constitution. Victimization refers to getting of ill-treatment because of making a complaint that relates to discrimination under the Equality Act. An example of victimization in the work environment is when a boss in an organization harasses one of the employees because she dresses by her religious belief, and One of her colleagues get threats of suck upon attempting to support her co-worker's claims of harassment.

Religious discrimination negatively affects the world today in many ways. Some of the categories of the effects of religious intolerance include the political impact, social consequences, and economic impact. The social implications of religious discrimination in the world today include the destruction of property. Due to religious discrimination, elimination of many properties takes place including that of books and buildings. In some of the Islamic states of the world like Iraq, there is the destruction of several books because of their none-Islamic nature.

Additionally, many buildings undergo destructions because of religious discrimination. In America, the 1995 bomb led to the destruction of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The bombing was related to a terrorist act whose primary cause was religious discrimination. To continue, the destruction of the World Trade Center in 1993 also contributes to the number of buildings that have undergone destructions as a result of religious discrimination. Apart from the destruction of buildings, property like trains and even airplanes also make the list of property destroyed as a result of religious discrimination. Examples include the bombing of the American Airlines Flight 11 on 11th September 2001 and the 2004 Madrid train bombing.

The other social effect of religious discrimination is the increase in death rates. Due to religious discrimination, the parties discriminated in different capacities tend to take revenge on the people or countries that discriminate against them. The act of revenge is what contributes to the increase in the number of deaths in the world (Basedau et al., 2017). For example, when the world trade center in America was destroyed in 1993, close to seven people died, and over one thousand persons got severe injuries. To continue, the 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City in America claimed one hundred and seventy deaths, indicating that religious discrimination contributes to an increase in death rate.

Religious discrimination also contributes to an increase in social vices such as prostitution and crimes. In a country where people get employment by one's religious beliefs and not merit, qualified persons tend to remain unemployed because of their religious faith, and this leads to an increase in the level of unemployment. To meet daily lives' expectations, the unemployed persons tend to indulge in vices like prostitution and criminal activities so that they can earn a living and even take care of their children who also need basic human wants.

The economic effects of religious discrimination include economic instability of the world's economy. Religious discrimination contributes to war in many countries. When there are war different economic activities such as trade, come to a stop. When economic activities stop, the economy of the world tends to lack the resources that keep it running efficiently, and as a result, the economy becomes unstable. Additionally, religious discrimination slows down the economic growth of the world. Due to religious discrimination, essential buildings such as the World Trade center get destroyed. The destruction of the building makes the government spend a lot of financial resources in reconstruction activities instead of investing the funds on other projects that could improve the economy of the country and that of the world.

Religious discrimination in the world contributes to the rise in the level of unemployment across the globe. Research shows that in some countries like the United States, some organizations consider religion when recruiting new employees. The practice of religious discrimination continuously leads to the reduction in the quality of services that these organizations give to clients because the organizations tend to have less skilled employees to serve customers with high expectations.

The political effects of religious discrimination in the world are the rise in political instability in a country like Nigeria, a country located in the West of the African continent ("'Religious Discrimination Workplace' Essays and Research Papers"). Onapajo and Usman (2015), notes that some of the attacks by the Boko Haram militia group in Nigeria were politically motivated. The militia group had the intention of making the government headed by Goodluck Johnathan unstable because he was of the Cristian faith. The group succeeded in making the government unstable by making several attacks on the people who were working on oil companies, which is the backbone of the nation's economy. Additionally, the militia groups attacked schools in Nigeria, leading to them kidnapping two hundred and seventy-six school girls in Chibok, Nigeria.

Additionally, religious discrimination continuously leads to political coups and the overthrowing of governments in different parts of the world. In the Central African Republic, the political coup which saw the leader of Seleka militia group headed by Michel Djotodia become the first Muslim head of state in the Central African Republic. The coup was because of the difference in religious belief between the Islamic community of the country and the Christian community of the nation. Michel Djotodia claimed that the president from the Christian faith, President Francois Bozizze did not serve his people to their expectations, valuable research by Arieff (2014) show that the Muslims wanted to be the leaders of the country even though their population was slightly below fifteen percent.

Conclusively, the essay begins with a brief definition of religious discrimination. The essay goes ahead to note the various definitions from different authors as per the first paragraph. The article proceeds to highlight the various forms of religious discriminations and gives a broader classification of religious discrimination as either direct or indirect discrimination. The paper continues by classifying the effects of religious discrimination in the current world as either political, social or economical as highlighted in the body of the essay.

References

1. Arieff, A. (2014). Crisis in the Central African Republic. Congressional Research Service.
2. Basedau, M., Fox, J., Pierskalla, J. H., Str?ver, G., & V?llers, J. (2017). Does discrimination breed grievances"and do grievances breed violence? New evidence from an analysis of religious minorities in developing countries. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 34(3), 217-239.
3. Fox, J., & Akbaba, Y. (2015). Securitization of Islam and religious discrimination: Religious minorities in Western democracies, 1990??“2008. Comparative European Politics, 13(2), 175-197.
4. Onapajo, H., & Usman, A. A(2015). Fuelling the flames: Boko Haram and deteriorating Christian??“Muslim relations in Nigeria. Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, 35(1), 106-122.
5. Smith, P. (2017). Religious Freedom, Religious Discrimination, and the Workplace 2nd Edition.

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