Fired

On Saturday, Cynthia was fired from the spa that she works at.

This has been a devastating and emotionally draining event for Cynthia. First, her mother uninvited her to Christmas dinner because Cynthia had the audacity to request that I (her same-sex fiance) attend, and then her employer of more than 2 years fires her without good cause.

Their reasons for letting her go were vague, petty, and untruthful. The real reason that she was terminated is because of her appearance; she is obviously a lesbian.

A little background:

A few months ago, the male owner of the business had actually repeated to Cynthia the "Love the Sinner, Not the Sin" rhetoric, thus indicating that he has a prejudice towards gay people.

And the female owner of the business has always seemed very squeamish about talking to Cynthia about me.

Recently the receptionist had instituted a new rule that the therapists were not to sit in the lobby area and were only allowed to be in the back break room, or in their massage rooms. This posed a huge problem for Cynthia. She has ADD and can not just sit for 8 hours in a small, dark room (massage room) or share a tiny break room with only 1 chair with 6 other therapists. She did not like the new rule, but she complied with it as best as she could, even though she got really fidgety.

On Saturday, she was in the backroom, but not all the way back in the breakroom and was told, rudely, by the receptionist, Vicki, to go to the back breakroom. How did Vicki tell her to go? She pointed her finger to indicate "Get Out". Cynthia said, "I'm going." And apparently Vicki did not like Cynthia's response, because she told her to go pack up her shit and get out.

When Cynthia was talking with Vicki about why she was being fired, Vicki brought up a bunch of other reasons. She stated that clients had complained about her hair being messed up, and that she is "unsanitary." When Cynthia asked her why she never told her about these complaints, she did not have an explanation.

I feel that Vicki was just waiting for an excuse to let Cynthia go, and this incident provided her with the perfect cover. Except for one fatal mistake.

Today when Cynthia went in to pick up her stuff, the owner Kristy told me that there had been ongoing conflicts between Cynthia and the other therapists, and this incident just brought things to a head (cover story), but then she mentioned Cynthia's appearance as one of the reasons that she was terminated. Specifically, she stated, "You have been doing really good lately with hair and makeup, maybe you could help her out with that, you know?"

Aha, so because Cynthia does not wear makeup to make her look more feminine, she was terminated from her employment. I guarantee you that Kristy would not have suggested that if Cynthia had been a male employee, because I seriously doubt that they would agree that male employees need to wear makeup.

Cynthia had been an exemplary employee, with no history of disciplinary action. For them to terminate her based on her sexual orientation and gender identity, is absolutely dispicable, immoral, and illegal.

We plan to take action on this matter.

-Beth