Let's not be hyperbolic here. Serving food that doesn't happen to contain meat isn't forcing you to be vegetarian any more than serving only soft drinks at an event would be forcing you to be a teetotaler.
All I want to convey is that I believe eating an omnivorous diet is an equal dietary preference to eating a herbivorous one. Deserving of the same protections, if any.
We can all try or not. Screw coercion, especially in excess.
They can even choose to go outside and eat meat, they have freedom of choice.
I mean, I'm pretty sure that most jobs that come with expense accounts also happen to come with a decent amount of, what do you call it, income. I sort of doubt that this sort of policy is headed to the per diem world.
EDIT: Fair enough! Not contrarian, just finding the line. What interesting times we live in.
Though you might find it gets even more resistance. Plenty of people eat burgers, but almost all of them would expect it to be served on a bun, maybe with a condiment or two. I hear french fries are also popular.
(to be clear, I fully agree with GP)
I'm a responsible human, as are my coworkers.
I'm not a huge fan of a company changing its behavior because it wants to avoid risks that are just inherent in dealing with people (the logical conclusion is to pretty much treat all your employees like children to avoid anyone causing trouble) but I can at least respect it if they're up front about their motivations.
I'm not sure how a restaurant would react if one ordered a meal and asked for the the meat in that meal to be put on a separate check.
So it's an analogy, but not a great one, I think.
Sure it is. There will be situations where employees have no choice but to eat company-sponsored food. Mandatory working lunches, dinner with potential clients (I’d love for them to take me to dinner as a potential client/partner and tell me I can’t order a steak...), etc. In those situations, they are indeed “forcing you to be a vegetarian”.
If the company refused to pay for an escort, they aren't forcing me to be celibate. They aren't affecting my identity they are just choosing not to pay for a certain act.
It's pretty not-normal for companies to pay for escorts, just like it's pretty not-normal for you to pay for escorts on your own time. Some people pay for escorts, but it's pretty well outside social norms, and I can't imagine a business situation requiring an escort anyway.
In fact, it would be like a company who normally does pay for escorts, but then deciding they'll own pay for opposite sex escorts, instead of allowing same sex escorts.
They'd rightly be pillared for allowing one but not the other.
I've known lots of companies to pay for escorts, but only the “walk you from the building to your car at night” kind and not the “euphemism for prostitute” kind.
Companies are not required to dole out free food. Them changing their policies to only reimburse certain kinds of food can be met with you leaving the company if it matters that much to you.
You can bring your own food or pay for it out of your own pocket if you need to. They have stated people with medical/religious requirements that need meat will have their needs met.
Options available to me are changing jobs, asking for a policy shift because of medical issues, etc.
If you have to eat a more ethically sourced and less savory meal because of work I don't see that to be a large issue.
Comparing working from home to eating is two totally different things.