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Courts second-guessing choir membership decisions

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Pretty soon we're going to have to hold auditions entirely by lottery, at least in Ireland:

A YOUNG man with an intellectual disability has been awarded €2,500 compensation against Wexford Male Voice Choir for ejecting him from their membership.

The 24-year-old former member who was born with a rare genetic disorder was asked to leave the choir in October 2008.

The Equity Tribunal decided that the young man was discriminated against on the grounds of disability. It awarded him €2,500 and ordered the choir to re-admit him as a full member.

After singing with the choir during a probationary period of eight months, during which he missed more than 25% of rehearals, disrupted rehearsals, and "failed a voice test," whatever that means, the choir gave him the boot, as probably would any choir. But since he has some sort of disability (the article doesn't say what it is exactly), the Equity Tribunal, a government agency specializing in discrimination cases, ruled that his dismissal was discriminatory. 
 
Evidently there was no concern about his singing ability. But it seems the Tribunal decided that showing up and following directions are not essential to choir participation: 'I am satisfied that the complainant's disability did not adversely affect his ability to participate in the choir and therefore he did not require any special treatment or facilities in order to physically participate in the choir,' said the Equality Officer.
 
Update: I received the following message from a member of the choir:
Good afternoon Dr Allen,
 
I am a past chairman of the Wexford Male Voice Choir , I am most perturbed at the outcome of the recent finding of tribunal in our country in relation to the young man who was refused full membership of our choir.
 
This is no more than a Quango set up some years ago but was given more teeth as time past. The hearing is chaired by a single person who hears both sides of the situation and then decides on an outcome which is binding on both parties. There is no need to take an oath in giving evidence at this tribunal and it was set up for the sole purpose of hearing cases of discrimination.
 
We as a choir have a situation where we have an open recruitment to new members and we have a solid and well defined constitution. We upheld all points in our said rules and the final decision is as should be that after a period of probation the musical director is asked to commend or not any person to be a full member of the choir .
 
We have been performing as a choir since 1941 without any such problems in the past. I am of the opinion that this tribunal which is under great pressure to exist has to justify its existence.
 
I will end with one major point and that is , we were never told of any preexisting disability prior to his application to join our choir. WE WILL continue to SING and perform. We have also down the years contributed approx €100k towards such charitable causes.
 
Michael Fox
 

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Comments

  1. Thanks for providing those additional details, Marie. It goes to show that there’s usually “more to the story” and that initial impressions, based upon just a few details/highlights of any story, are often under-informed or even wrong. This is what really bugs me about media “talkers” (on radio and cable TV). They express outrage and strong opinions, often based upon only a cursory understanding of the facts of a given situation. They fill in the gaps through speculation, and instead of saying, “we can’t be sure,” they decide right and wrong. It’s that old dichotomous thinking at work again–everything must be black or white, up or down, right or wrong, while few things in this world are that simple.

  2. I reread the link to the news item Allen included with this ChoralBlog posting and have  pasted a portion at the bottom of this response. I think it may be enlightening.  We may never know the real reason why this young man was asked to leave the choir–but it is something to think about, isn’t it?

    Marie

    The complaint was made arising from an incident in October 2008 when he turned up for rehearsals and was asked not to sign in but to leave the premises. He had joined the choir about eight months earlier.

    The young man told the tribunal that he was informed he had missed rehearsals, had failed a voice test and was disturbing other members. He said he was shocked and upset at this development as he had never been reprimanded about his behaviour during his time as a member.

    He had studied singing with a well-known soprano and voice coach since 2006 and had performed with other choirs.

    His mother said she complained to a choir officer who contacted her subsequently by telephone to inform her the choir had decided at a meeting that the decision would stand as her son was disruptive and unsuited to an adult male choir.

    They received a letter confirming this decision in November 2008.

    The young man rejected the choir’s claim that it was unaware of his disability.

    A former member of the choir gave evidence that in his opinion, the young man was a ‘fine singer’. He said he did not witness any disruptive behaviour.

    He expressed his horror at the decision to eject the young member and said he ultimately resigned from the choir over it.

     

  3. I agree this is absurd and like your comparison to practicing medicine.   What it points out to me is the value of choral organizations having a non-auditioned ensemble where people can go if they do not make it into the auditioned choir.  I find the Joyful Noise movement here on ChoralNet to be inspiring in this regard.  I can see every community chorus around the world also having a place where those with cognitive and other disabilities can find a sense of belonging.   It could also serve a legal purpose if the the Irish wild woods of choral music legal precedent catches on elsewhere.  

  4. As Liz suggested. the whole thing was mis-managed from the beginning. Knowing this young man was (this is the term we use in this country) “developmentally disabled”, the Board of the chorus or the conductor certainly should have known to ask questions about him.  If he could often be ill because of his disability, it could have been agreed  a certain number of absences would be tolerated and NO MORE.  As far as musical standards are concerned, I assume the WHOLE CHORUS is held up to this high musical standard.  If he was disruptive–why?  Did he ask too many questions or sing at the wrong times?  There’s disruptive and then there is disruptive.
     
    I would strongly disagree with John’s comment–who’s to say the young man DIDN’T know anything about singing and music?  How can we know that? This is a community choral organization and not a professional group, so all should be welcome, right? And having a  license to practice medicine is wholly contingent on attending medical school, going through an approved residency and internship as well as other requirements. so let’s not compare the two.  As much as we believe music to be important- it’s not brain surgery. But, if you mean keeping “these people” out of a choir or a community because you feel uncomfortable, I have a problem. I am the mother of one of “these people” and if we want our loved ones to be able to live up to their potential, they have to be allowed to participate in the community’s life.  Please visit the ChoralNet Community “Friends of Joyful Noise” and see what I mean–I am the editor of the Community.
     
    All of that being said–if this young man disrupted rehearsals, was absent a lot and couldn’t sing his part, he should be kicked out if those were the standards he was being held up to. And if it APPEARED he was kicked out because of his disability, THAT was wrong.  Even THESE PEOPLE have feelings.
     
    Marie, Mom to Russell whose birthday is Monday and who has autism.  He has taught me toleracne and patience and unconditional love and I am a better person because he’s in my life–and he LOVES music.

  5. what next.  absolutely absurd.  perhaps they’d let him practice medicine just because he wanted to, despite the fact that he did not know anything about medicine or a license to practice.  what’s wrong with these people!

  6. To be fair, it sounds as if the choir mismanaged the situation too. People do need to be told if they are not meeting expectations during a probabtion period in time to do something about it, and not telling someone they’ve failed their probabtion so they come back expecting to continue is a great recipe to generate outrage.
     
    Still, attendance policies are pretty objective things. I have had to ask a singer to stand down from a choir when she just wasn’t well enough to meet our attendance requirements, and it was hard. She was skilled, and a great contributor when she was there, and we really wanted to be sympathetic to her difficulties. But when we found ourselves reorganising parts to adjust balance on the assumption she wasn’t going to be there, it became clear that the point at which to stop making allowances is when it undermines the choir’s coherent operation as an ensemble.
     
    I hope the outcome of this sorry saga is that the choir sorts out its monitoring and feedback processes to make probation a process of training people into the required norms rather than a means to guillotine anyone who doesn’t manage to work them out for themselves. It’s possible the guy could turn around to be a real force for good in the choir if the relationships haven’t been too hopelessly soured (which I can imagine they might have been – especially with cost to the choir of the compensation payment). There’s clearly a good degree of gumption there – it would be good to see it used to the choir’s benefit rather than against them.
     
    liz

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