6 Tomas Lopez was fired from his lifeguard job at Hallandale Beach, Miami in 2012 because he left his post on the beach to save a person from drowning in an unsupervised area of the beach.

In 2012, while doing his job as a lifeguard at Hallandale Beach in Miami, Tomas was informed of a swimmer who was drowning in the unsupervised section which was1,500 feet away from him. Tomas didn’t think twice and rushed to the unsupervised section of the beach to save the swimmer.

Mr. Lopez didn’t leave the swimmer afterward until the paramedic team reached the spot. His action of going beyond his designated “patrolling zone” was counted as a violation of company rules, and upon arrival back to his station, Lopez was fired by his manager.

“We have liability issues and can’t go out of the protected area,” Susan Ellis of the lifeguard provider Jeff Ellis and Associates mentioned to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. Tomas had no regrets about his actions.

His co-workers supported his heroic act, and quit their jobs in protest against the system. (source)

7 In 2012, 14 employees of a law firm in Florida were fired by their new management team for wearing orange clothes on certain days of the month, a tradition employees had been practicing for several months before the new management came in. 

Employees of a law firm based in Florida followed a tradition of “happy hour” for several months by wearing orange-colored clothes on paydays until the new management came. In 2012, the new company executives fired 14 people for wearing orange dresses on certain days of the month.

According to the new executives, the culture created by the workers was a form of protest against the organization, despite knowing that the old management was completely fine with it, and most importantly, there were no such rules against wearing orange in the first place.

Eight of the fourteen former employees were baffled by the decision and filed a lawsuit against the company. (source)

8 Diane Tirado, a teacher, was fired in 2018 from a K-8 school in Florida after she gave a 0% score to the students who didn’t submit the assignment she asked for. The school authority said her action was against the school’s grading system.

Diane Tirado served for 17 years in Port St. Lucie, Florida, as a teacher. In 2018, she started teaching social studies to eighth-grade students at West Gate K-8 School. But Diane wasn’t allowed to teach there for long.

The school management followed a weird school policy to sack her from her job on September 14, 2018, after she gave a 0% score to some children who failed to submit their assignment.

According to the school rule book, a student’s grade can not be lower than 50%. Her disagreement with the school authority on this aspect led to her termination.

Later, she wrote an emotional note to her ex-students, explaining her situation. (source)

9 A McDonald’s store in the Netherlands fired an employee for charging her co-worker for a hamburger, and not for a cheeseburger when the coworker asked for a slice of cheese after buying a hamburger. 

In 2009, a McDonald’s store in the Netherlands made the headlines when they fired a waitress for giving a slice of cheese to a coworker after the person asked for that along with his hamburger.

The famous fast-food company tried to justify their action by arguing that the employee should have charged her co-worker for a cheeseburger, and not for a hamburger.

The company added more to their arguments and said their employee didn’t obey the staff rules, which restrict staff members from providing gifts to friends and family. The employee took the matter to a district court, seeking compensation money for her remaining contract.

The district court ordered McDonald’s to pay their former employee 4,200 euros. The court also said in its written judgment: “The dismissal was too severe a measure. It was just a slice of cheese,” according to news agency reports. (source)

10 In 2016, a worker from New Jersey was fired from his job at the Trane plant in Trenton when he asked his boss for permission to get his asthma inhaler from his house, which was three miles away from the worksite.

The worker from New Jersey, whose identity wasn’t released, was experiencing shortness of breath while working at the Trane plant in Trenton. When he asked his supervisor for permission to leave and go to his home which was three miles from the plant to get his inhaler, the supervisor asked him to get out of the plant with his belongings.

When the worker arrived at the worksite after a week’s suspension, he realized that his employee badge had been deactivated. Later, the company reported that the man was sacked because he walked away from his job, not because of his asthma.

When the OAG’s Division on Civil Rights looked into this matter, they discovered that the company was aware of his asthmatic condition and his need for an inhaler. The company was ordered to pay the man $45,000 for lost wages and damages, the amount he would have earned in two years. (1, 2)