We don’t want equal oppression for all, so stop attacking M&S

Lots of brouhaha the past few days about the apparent M&S policy (later back-tracked upon) of allowing Muslim staff not to serve pork or alcohol.  Why, though?  M&S presumably has orthodox Jewish staff whom it does not insist must work on Saturdays?  Why would we be any more outraged if it let some staff not serve booze?

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Melanie McDonagh

When will the BBC stop adapting Julia Donaldson books?

Obviously such an accommodation could be done poorly.  If there’s one thing certain to rile a Briton it’s a violation of queuing etiquette, and making someone stand in a queue only to discover at the end that you’d have to queue again at another counter just because the person at the desk didn’t want to touch your goods would be quite out of order.  That could obviously be worked around by having other staff available to stand in, but perhaps then the staff member that refused to sell certain items ought to be paid less, since doing less in the job, otherwise other staff might think it unfair.