According to reports from the Epoch Times, Chad Scharf, a software engineering executive based in Florida, has taken legal action against his former employer, cybersecurity firm Bitwarden, after being fired for listing faith-based preferred pronouns.
Scharf was the Vice President of software engineering at Bitwarden's Jacksonville, Florida location when the company implemented an "inclusivity initiative" requiring employees to include their preferred pronouns in their profiles on the messaging platform Slack. However, due to his religious beliefs as a Catholic, which hold that there are only two genders and that a person's gender is unchangeable, Scharf initially declined to list any preferred pronouns.
The Epoch Times reports that Scharf faced increasing pressure from his superiors at Bitwarden to comply with the pronoun policy. To satisfy their demands while remaining true to his religious principles, Scharf eventually listed his preferred pronouns as "Assigned By God." However, this choice offended two Bitwarden human resources department employees, who claimed to feel harassed by Scharf's religious statements.
Consequently, Bitwarden's company leaders demanded that Scharf remove "Assigned By God" from his employee profile page. The CEO even warned Scharf that he could legally be fired for refusing to participate in the pronoun policy, based on the advice of three attorneys. Eventually, Scharf was terminated from his position, though specific details about the length of his employment and the timing of his dismissal remain unclear.
In response to his termination, Scharf has enlisted the services of attorney Jennifer Vasquez and filed a lawsuit against Bitwarden, alleging that the company violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits religious-based discrimination. The lawsuit argues that Bitwarden placed Scharf in a disfavored class by promoting a gender ideology that clashed with his religious beliefs, failed to accommodate his reasonable request, and ultimately terminated his employment based on his religious convictions.
Vasquez, who has successfully argued other religious discrimination cases, contends that companies like Bitwarden have prioritized their ESG (environmental, social, and governance) scores over the religious liberties of their employees. She states, "We have a real growing hate against Christians now," and believes that companies are neglecting the rights of employees due to prevailing societal trends.
Despite Vasquez's commitment to Scharf's case, she faces an uphill battle. Previously, she had filed a discrimination complaint on Scharf's behalf with the Florida Commission on Human Relations, which ruled in favor of Bitwarden. Vasquez has already filed an appeal of that decision.
Bitwarden has claimed that Scharf was reprimanded for not using the preferred pronouns of a job applicant whose gender identity did not align with their biological sex. On the other hand, Scharf asserts that he refrained from using pronouns during the interview process and only used the person's biologically based pronouns in internal documents.
The lawsuit was officially filed on May 25 in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, but Bitwarden has yet to respond. The company has also declined to comment on the matter in response to multiple requests from the Epoch Times.
As the legal battle unfolds, how the court will navigate the conflict between an employer's inclusivity initiative and an employee's religious beliefs remains to be seen. The outcome of this case could have implications for the balance between religious liberties and corporate policies in the workplace.
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