In what may be a milestone ruling, Swedish furniture manufacturer IKEA has lost a court case in Poland against one of its employees whom the company had fired for speaking out against LGBTQ indoctrination within the firm.
Janusz Komenda, a Krakow employee, had criticised an internal letter by the company’s management to staff in 2019 which stated that it was every employee’s duty to be ‘LGBT+ inclusive.’
Komenda used two quotes from the Bible regarding homosexual practices to express his criticism, after which he was fired from his job. First a district court and then a regional court ruled that his dismissal had been unjustified, and most recently, the supreme court also refused to hear an appeal filed by IKEA.
The courts had opined that the workplace should be free from ideological indoctrination, and that “it should not—even in the name of tolerance in the broadest sense—lead employees to feel coerced into changing their beliefs.”
The supreme court said participation in an employer’s social initiatives beyond job-related duties should be voluntary. The court also stated that IKEA was in effect going against its own “rhetoric of inclusivity” by firing someone due to his religious beliefs and differing worldview.
IKEA has been known to promote leftist ideology in its advertising, including LGBT propaganda and climate change concerns. It has also boycotted conservative news outlets such as GB News in Britain and TV Republika in Poland.
After the regional court verdict in 2023, the leading conservative party in Poland, Law and Justice (PiS), called IKEA’s actions “legal and economic violence against those who do not want to share the values of pro-LGBT activists.”
Regarding the most recent ruling, conservative legal group Ordo Iuris, which has been representing Komenda, stated that “the decision strengthens the barrier against big companies imposing leftist ideology on their employees—disciplining and ultimately firing those who refuse to conform.”
Olivier Bault, director of communications at the Warsaw-based institute, told europeanconservative.com:
The supreme court’s decision to reject IKEA’s reasoning is an important ruling. Admittedly, in the Polish court system, lower courts are not required to take this ruling into account, but the authority of the supreme court will undoubtedly influence similar cases.
Olivier Bault stated that Ordo Iuris is currently dealing with a similar case: an IT specialist from Warsaw was fired from an international corporation for internally criticising the decision of the company to make it mandatory for its employees to attend a so-called “Equality Parade.” The man stated that inviting employees to the “Pride Parade” is not the role of an IT company, which is not a political party and should not influence the political views of its employees.
Olivier Bault added:
We frequently hear that large corporations—especially Western ones—go to great lengths to impose certain values, most often associated with left-liberal views of the “DEI” sort, on employees in their Polish branches.
