From: alvin@netcom.com (Alvin H. White)
Subject: Re: Constitutional Right to Wear Headphone?
Date: Sat, 12 Sep 92 21:49:14 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 

delisle@eskimo.celestial.com (Ben Delisle) writes:

>	Well the question is, was the work you were doing on your
>own time or on their dime? Are you a government employee or contractor
>and were you doing a job for them at the time they told you to remove
>your headphones?

       I was employed by the County of Santa Clara at the Santa Clara
Valley Medical Center as a clerk typist in the Food and Nutrition
Services Department (Kitchen office) of the hospital. 

>	An employer can dictate when he is paying you to do a job
>for them what you may or may not wear.	

        At first thought I do not think that your statement here is
perfectly true in all cases.  On second thought, I may agree that
the "employer can dictate." What I have problem with is that I do
not believe that an employee is under legal obligation to do 
everything that an employer "dictates." What first comes to mind
here are acts that are not contractual and that endanger the lives
of the employee, co-workers and members of the general public. 

>	Note - in this state it is illegal to drive on the roads with
>headphones, a safety issue.

       In my State of California from a several times read but memory
now Vehicle Code there is some wording fairly close to "may not
wear earphones covering both ears..." and "earplugs in both ears 
such as to be unable to hear a warning horn or siren..."

       Having read daily in our hospital library for 6 years prior to
the question, and having agonized over death, injury, health care
costs, medical ethics, legal, constitutional, scriptural and 
cultural precedents I arrived at a situation where my conscience told
me that God and history would show that I would err were I to act
in accordance with the dictates of the employer.

       In the hospital I worked in we were the government institution
of last resort for the poor.  The budget constraints were such that
almost every step was a decision of how many  would die or suffer from 
resources directed elsewhere. Questions like how many would die from 
insufficently screened blood, how many would die from insufficiently
trained doctors, how many would die from insufficient nursing staff,
how many would die from errors made in medical charts by overworked 
staff, how many would die from improper nutrition, how many would die
from hospital acquired infections because of insufficient housekeeping
staff how many would die from sub optimal xrays, cat scans, mri or
pet scans, how many would die from inadequate laboratory tests, etc,
etc, etc.

      I lived in a world of death. Insufficient police staff, 
insufficient, emergency communications dispatchers, insufficient
firefighters, insufficient teachers, insufficient jailers, 
insufficient social workers, insufficient food, insufficient
housing, insufficient education, insufficient libraries, insufficient
jobs, insufficient computers.

      My health was failing, I was in so much pain I was sometimes
taking 3 aspirin every three hours and had extreme head aches, etc.
My mother had said "when everything else fails you, turn to God."
I studied the Bible, the Quran, the Bagavad Gita, the sutras of the
Buddha, the works of Confucious.  Here in the San Francisco Bay Area
we have a large number of people coming from many cultures and 
languages of the world. 

      Anyone who could get off an airplane and hit by a car was our
potential customer and we had to provide health service in every 
language on earth at a moments notice. 
 
      I have two very painful injuries, 1. an back injury such that
I suffer greatly if I bend over, actually just sitting in a bad 
chair, etc. 2. I have the symptoms of something called chronic
fatigue were just the slightest physical effort results in flu
like pain and associated is a sleep problem that if I don't get
near 10 hours sleep a day I have very bad headaches.  My medical
insurance, Kaiser Permanente, in Santa Clara California was 
unable to help. 

      The massive constant doses of aspirin were causing internal
bleeding. My work performance evaluations had falling far below
other workers in the unit although I had given up all social life
and worked every waking hour to preserve my job, seven days a week
from the time I awoke until the time I couldn't keep my eyes open
at night. There was nothing left but death.

     My mother had told me that if all else failed God would help.
The only way I could think to improve my performance was to
listen to the word of God and training tapes while on break, at
lunch, while commuting to and from work. I wore the device much
of the time except at work.  One day I was talking with someone
working with refugees who had great difficulty because they
did not speak the language. I mentioned that I had made audio
tapes that were stereo in two languages simultaneously to help
people in emergence situations operate in other than their
first language. 

     I had no idea that anyone would object but simply wore them
as on weekend so that I would have them to demonstrate to the
person at lunch.  When the department saw them they ordered me
to remove them although they did not interferre with my work.
I, because of conscience, and the belief that it would cause
my untimely death, the death of members of my family, and the
death of many innocent members of the community refused to
comply with the order for which there was no contractual
authority and where I believed that the "right to life"
provisions of the United States Constitution would protect me.
I was fired.

alvin

Newsgroups: alt.politics.usa.constitution