zatang

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Posts by zatang

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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  zatang

  Let me ask you something, Zatang.

  Are you aware that you are getting more reasonable advice here than if you HAD made it to an "active" or "PRO-JW" board?

  The only thing an active JW poster would have done is to try to convert you into a JW. They could care less if you celebrate birthdays (as a Muslim) or not.

  They just want to convert everybody to their own religion.

  (sound familiar?)

  @james_wood: The response I am getting are sure rational and reasonable but How do I know when I never visited any pro or active JW site ? This site come up in the first page of google search and I thought it a JW site. I never chatted with any JW before so i can't guess what they could have done to me
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  zatang

  "And here I suspect we have found the true purpose of the thread. A devout, fundamentalist Muslim is certainly not going to take ex-JW (or active-JW) advice on how to behave at work on religious matters. Unless, of course, they told him to just do whatever fundamentalist Islam tells him to.

  I believe we have here a not-so-subtle attempt to preach a particular brand of Islam."

  @james-woods: Now let the posters decide who is doing the prejudice, you are openly revealing yours. I never came here with a hidden intention, otherwise I would have posed as a JW, instead of a Muslim. I also revealed my actual geographical location. How do you know what a devout should have done ? Isn't it stereotyping ? I came here because of the commonality of prohibition of celebrating birthdays in faith of JW and in Islam. I came here to seek genuine experiences of people who may have faced similar situations.

  I am not here to preach any kind of Islam, yet if asked, I won't shy from letting the other person know my belief. I don't do internet preaching and I don't indulge in subtle preaching.
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  zatang

  "Religion really always boils down to pride and prejudice. If you can leave those behind, you will not compromise the religion.

  If you still hold on to them, then almost anything can be a compromise of the religion."

  @james woods

  Well, it seems you are an atheist. If yes, then I would say that no one exists without following a particular faith or ideology, even atheism is also a form of 'belief system' which is still to be proved to be true through 'empircal evidence'.

  Not all religious people follow religion only because of certain indoctrination. I only follow because I find logic and rationale in my beliefs and hence I am what I am. Yet, I acknowledge and appreciate the different ideologies people hold. And I am told by my faith that if God wanted, he could have made all mankind as one people. Hence, he tells us to accept people from various backgrounds and work out on similarities and commonalities and not to behave or belief in a manner where I develop a pride that by virtue of my claim of being a Muslim, I am heaven-bound and everyone else is hell-bound.

  The Noble Qur'an - Al-Hujurat 49:13
  O mankind! We created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that ye may know each other (not that ye may despise (each other). Verily the most honoured of you in the sight of Allah is (he who is) the most righteous of you. And Allah has full knowledge and is well acquainted (with all things).

  (sorry, i don't intend to go off-topic but I felt like saying it)
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  zatang

  "The managers where I work recently started bringing a cake to work once a month in honour of everyone's celebrations. It didn't matter whether it was a personal celebration (birthday, wedding, new baby, new house, etc.) or a professional one (achieving an accreditation or certification, or presenting at a conference) the cake was to celebrate everything.

  You have to remember that the goal with these "celebrations" is that you are trying to build and maintain a positive morale among your staff. If you take away something that they are accustomed to doing, how does it benefit morale? Will it make your job of morale building easier or not?

  @Scully: I would be happy to be a part of such celebration as above, which is general in nature and not specific to birthday. In fact, I don't have any problem in individually celebratinng, Wedding, New Baby, New Promition, New Professional achieve, etc

  Understand that your beliefs regarding not observing the kuffar birthdays if it is the company's directive could put you in legal jeopardy for discri1minating against persons on the basis of religion. If you are serious about your beliefs to the point that you cannot stomach the thought of offending Allah by celebrating with the kuffar, you really would be better off seeking employment with a Muslim-only company.

  @Scully: Again I have to say that I feel you have a personal prejudice against my faith. As explained earlier, neither we denote Non-muslims as kuffar nor the birthday celebration has anything to do with the religion of the person. I thank you for giving your time to respond to my posts but I don't think I would need any more of your advise because you are carrying much prejudice and stereotyping againsts Muslims.
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  zatang

  "I have a working solution: swallow your pride & prejudice and go along with the custom as being a secular part of the job.

  NOT as a personal birthday celebration you are taking part in. Feel free to point out that YOU do not personally observe birthdays.

  You will NOT be compromising your religion."

  @james_woods: This is nothing to do with any pride or prejudice. And this is what I decided to do in case I do get a job and land up in a situation where I do have to be involved in birthday celebrations. But, I WILL be comprising my religion.
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  zatang

  “ I guess it depends on the Muslim... perhaps they aren't supposed to, but I know quite a few who do... even birthdays of us filthy kuffar.”

  @Scully

  Those who do, they either don’t care about or don’t know about it. Also, I or any of the Muslim I know from family/friends, call non-Muslims as ‘filthy kuffar’. We call them by their proper names and we find it disrespectful and offending to label someone as such. Quran prohibits us to do so in the following verse

  The Noble Qur'an - Al-Hujurat 49:11

  “ O ye who believe! Let not some men among you laugh at others: It may be that the (latter) are better than the (former): Nor let some women laugh at others: It may be that the (latter are better than the (former): Nor defame nor be sarcastic to each other, nor call each other by (offensive) nicknames: Ill-seeming is a name connoting wickedness, (to be used of one) after he has believed: And those who do not desist are (indeed) doing wrong”
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  zatang

  @james_woods

  It would never be asked in the first place, let alone ommitting it. And if i do get a job, I know I can't deny it. I didn't come here to gain sympathy, i came here to see if I could find a person who has working solution of the prospective problem I could face or people who faced with a similar situation and the kind of behavior they exhibited and the consequent response they received. I wasn't aware that this forum was composed of ex-JWs.
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  zatang

  @ Band on the run: I agree what you wrote but as of now I don't have enough capital to start my own business

  Jokes apart, but the 'secular credentials' of birthday can be throroughly debated. Just to put a brief, the origin of birthday cake and blowing the candles has their roots in greek paganism where birthday rituals were associated with eradicating evil spirits. I fail to understand why such a ritual should be made to be accepted by everyone. Its all about compliance. Its my place and my rules, if you work here, we want full compliance otherwise the exit door is always open.
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

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  2. friends
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  zatang

  @Scully: One doesn’t get any secretary or sub-ordinate when one joins as a fresher in an entry level position. Secondly, No, there’s no difference between Muslims or non-Muslims when the prohibition is concerned. The celebration itself is prohibited, be it’s a Muslim’s or a non-Muslim’s birthday.

  There are hardly any businesses which are owned by Muslims. For the ones that exist, majority of them don’t have any restrictive hiring policy, nor are they headed by ‘practicing Muslims’. As with any businessman, Muslim business owners are just concerned about profits. Holding the tenets of faith never interferes with profits.

  Sorry to correct you but I never had any problem mingling with non-Muslims, nor does Islam prohibits to do so. 95% of my academic life was spent in non-Muslim educational institutes and still today, there are many of my friends who are non-Muslims. Please don’t presume which was never said.
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  57

  Any HR Executive on board ? (How do you manage to not to celebrate employee

  by zatang in

  1. jw
  2. friends
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  zatang

  @Iamallcool : Oh ok, I didn’t know that. I thought it is a forum of JWs

  @carla : I am very much aware that it is part of my job. But necessity is asking me to apply to these kinds of jobs. Actually just to avoid these things, my main inclination was to go into academics, I am qualified (as per the statutory requirements in India for becoming a university lecturer) to do so. But I am not getting interview calls from the colleges/universities I applied. Hence, I decided to broaden my job search to include industry jobs, besides academics

  @cofty: It’s not only someone’s birthday, it’s also about celebrating one’s own birthday. In a brief, the origins of birthday are marred with the greatest sin in Islam, i.e. Shirk (to associate partners with God). I have detailed document regarding why celebration of birthdays is unIslamic. If interested let me know and I would post it here.

  @jgnat: Yes, you are absolutely true. Not all Muslims are as serious about this restriction as others. The problem is that not all Muslims are ‘practicing Muslims’. Most of the Muslims claim to be Muslim as a part of a ‘racial creed’ i.e, they are only Muslims because of them being born to Muslims parents. It was not that they studied Islam and compared it with other faiths and made a rational and willful decision to accept and imbibe Islam as a faith. Anyway, this is off-topic so I would just leave it here.

  Yes, I totally agree that I should be respectful of the traditions of all cultures but there are certain areas where I certainly can’t compromise because of my faith. For e.g., Even it’s an official business meeting, I can’t be party to a gathering where the only drink served is alcohol and it would be considered rude and offensive to deny any alcoholic drink. Anyway, what I feel that the doctrine of multiculturalism is highly subjective and more and less it’s about making one common corporate culture, rather than peaceful coexistence with each other’s way of life, faith or ideology. In today’s context, it’s nothing but superimposition and replication of western culture and western way of life in Indian corporations.

  @ Jeffro I would be considered insane if I declare in job interview that I won’t be celebrating anyone’s birthday. Yes, I am looking somewhere else but I was searching to find a way out, if anything of that sort exists or is being practiced.

  I don’t make any difference between considering birthday celebrations ‘wrong’ or them being ‘not allowed’. They are only not allowed because of their origin.