You know, we don’t have great labor laws in the United States. We’re the only nation in the world that has “at-will employment” and, in many areas (and federally), employers with 15 or few employees can do pretty much anything they want to their workers without fear of a lawsuit. But you know what they definitely can’t do? What no one, anywhere, can legally make you do? They can’t make you ingest cleaning liquid. Even if they mix it with ice cream.
Now, I’m going to figure that it has probably never occurred to you that anyone would mix cleaning liquid with ice cream and then force their employees to eat it. It didn’t occur to me, either. But that’s exactly what allegedly happened last week at Dairy Queen in Campton, Kentucky.
According to parent Angela Patton, her 17-year-old daughter was called in to a mandatory meeting at the fast-food restaurant, at which the manager demanded that they eat the tainted dessert.
“They were told by the manager that whether or not they liked chocolate ice cream, they were going to eat it today,” said Patton told told WKYT.
The incident involved about eight employees, many of them minors, several of whom had to seek treatment at the emergency room afterwards. Many, including Patton’s daughter, quit their jobs.
“Some of the kids had complained that they had a burning sensation when they swallowed the ice cream,” Patton said.
At this point, there’s not a lot of information about why the manager did this, if the workers were made aware of what was in the ice cream when they were told they had to eat it, or if the unhinged manager has been arrested yet, but the owner of the franchise says that the manager who did it is no longer employed there. Do you think?
The incident occurred just days after the Kentucky House approved a bill loosening child labor laws in the state, which would eliminate restrictions on how many hours 16- and 17-year-olds can work and allow them to do more dangerous work than is currently legal in the state — because to now anyway, Kentucky’s child labor laws are actually better than the federal ones! (In Kentucky, you need a simple 50 percent plus one to override a governor’s veto, which is bananas. How does Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear stop anything?)
“HB 255 presents numerous safety concerns, removing several guardrails on what is already outlined in law as safe work activities for youth, allowing them to participate in hazardous work duties,” Jill Midkiff, a spokesperson for the Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet, said in a statement. “This presents a risk to the safety, and possible exploitation, of children in the workplace. These issues need to be thoroughly addressed to ensure our commonwealth upholds the fair labor standards we value, especially for our employed youth.”
Republicans who supported the bill, like Rep. Matthew Koch, R-Paris, claimed that Democrats were vastly overstating the potential dangers of loosening up these laws, and acting as though “we were getting ready to put 12-year-olds working 80 to 100 hours a week down in the coal mines.”
“Let them 16-17 year olds get out there and do this. They can manage this. We don’t give them enough credit of what they’re capable of doing,” Koch said.
One of the major issues with loosening child labor laws is that minor-age workers are more susceptible to having their rights as workers (and humans!) violated because they don’t know what they are allowed to say no to and are not as aware of their rights as older workers might be.
While it’s certainly not going to be every day that one may encounter a boss hoping to become the Jim Jones of Dairy Queen, this is one reason why it is important to teach kids (and adults!) to question authority and to understand that they do actually have rights as workers, particularly when their health or well-being is on the line.
It would, of course, also feel great if all workers felt that they could safely tell their manager “No, thanks, no poisoned ice cream for me, thanks!” without fear of losing their job.
PREVIOUSLY:
This isn’t just assault. This is a lawsuit for every single person involved in this. You can’t make your employees eat poison, even in at will employment!! It shouldn’t take a union to tell you this, but gosh if only there was some way to collectively organize an effective response. Perhaps there would be some way to work collectively to demand not only poison free dairy treats, but also better pay and working conditions!
"“Let them 16-17 year olds get out there and do this. They can manage this. We don’t give them enough credit of what they’re capable of doing,” Koch said."
"Bitch, please"
- Sinclair Lewis
"Oh, for fuck's sake"
- Charles Dickens