JPL Employee's Firing Wasn't Due To Intelligent Design Advocacy, Says Judge

SternisheFan writes with an update to a story from earlier this year about a lawsuit in which David Coppedge alleged he was fired from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory for his advocacy of Intelligent Design. Now, a judge has ruled that Coppedge was legitimately dismissed for performance reasons. From the article: "n 2009, he apparently got a bit aggressive about promoting these ideas at work, leading one employee to complain. The resulting investigation found that he had also aggressively promoted his opinion on California's gay marriage ban, and had attempted to get JPL's holiday party renamed to 'Christmas party.' ... Coppedge was warned about his behavior at work, but he felt it was an infringement of his religious freedom, so he sued. Shortly after, as part of a set of cutbacks on the Cassini staff, he was fired. In court, Coppedge and his lawyer portrayed him as being targeted for promoting an idea that is, to put it mildly, not popular with scientists. But JPL's legal team introduced evidence that his aggressive promotion of it at work was part of a pattern of bad interactions with his fellow employees that dated back at least five years earlier."

Comments

Re:Imagine that....

[sribe]

An advocate of Intelligent Design who wasn't competent to work in a scientific organization? I'm SHOCKED!

OK, your sarcasm is on point, but... I wonder... Think about this: is it possible that the level of aggressive misbehavior exhibited by this person was fueled by cognitive dissonance? Was he trying to convince his coworkers or himself?

(Either way, firing him was the right thing to do and he deserves whatever mockery and sarcasm we can dish out.)

Re:Sharia law

[Black Parrot]

The "War on Christmas" is actually a war on inclusive society. It exists only in the minds of people who feel persecuted if they aren't allowed force their ways on everyone else.

Also, I would be willing to wager that the people screaming loudest about the (imagined) incorporation of Sharia into US law are the same people who are demanding loudest to have US law to force *their* religious scruples on the rest of us.