 |
|||
John Friso says that every day he went to work at defense contractor DynCorp, he was berated with homophobic slurs. He was called “a f*ggot, a queer” and worse. According to John, his managers watched this happen time and again — and yet they did nothing. John eventually left DynCorp and sued the company, which settled with him. Yet to this day, DynCorp lacks a non-discrimination policy protecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) employees. But since the massive private defense contractor relies on U.S. government contracts (also known as your tax dollars) for as much as 96% of its income — billions of dollars — you have the power to help change the culture of homophobia and unchecked harassment at DynCorp. Tico Almeida is an attorney who devotes his life to strengthening employee protections. Tico was appalled by what he learned about conditions at DynCorp, so he started a petition on Change.org asking that DynCorp initiate and approve an anti-harassment policy to protect LGBT employees. Click here to sign Tico’s petition. Other major defense contractors like Raytheon and Lockheed Martin have protections in place for LGBT employees. A DynCorp spokesperson recently indicated to a reporter that DynCorp might be open to protecting its LGBT employees: “We are always looking for ways to further strengthen our policies and procedures, and this is one area that we are currently examining,” the DynCorp spokesperson said. Now that John Friso’s lawsuit has been settled, DynCorp executives may think there’s no urgency in instituting policies to protect other employees. They need to know that nothing could be further from the truth, and that the taxpayers who finance their corporation expect them to take swift action. Thanks for being a change-maker, – Eden and the Change.org team |
Be a Seed for Change 