So what's the alternative when you fire someone?

FUCKING HUMANITY.

They've got you convinced that employers do not owe employees any compassion whatsoever, that this is an entirely one-sided equation, and that as soon as you've decided an employee is infected, your best move is to stab them in the fucking back because why on earth would you hire someone if you have to treat them like an adult, extend them the slightest bit of trust, and give them the opportunity to part in a mutually-agreeable fashion?

They don't fire executives this way and you know it. You sign a paper saying "if this doesn't work out, you get this and we get that and if you do anything to fuck it up we keep your money." This is why executives usually "leave to pursue other opportunities" while nurses have a guy with a billy club waiting with a box. There is ZERO reason this level of humanity can't be extended to anyone. and you fucking know it you're just so cross-eyed from their bullshit you fucking forgot.

Healthcare? Fuckers are in EPIC, bitch. I can lock someone out of any goddamn level of EPIC I choose with a note to IT. IT flips their permissions set from "employee" to "transitioning" and suddenly they have read-only access to everything they need for however long it will take me to exit them. For that fucking matter, every time they touch a fucking file I can be notified on my fucking phone and I'm rolling a $600 network appliance, not a $900m EHR. I don't have to trust them to do shit - I can absolutely 100% see everything they're doing 100% of the time.

Worse? If I'm laying them off because of circumstance I probably want them to leave on good terms, knowing that it definitely isn't about them, and that fucking hell as soon as things turn around I'm going to do my level best to bring them back on board because I've sheep-dipped them into my culture and I don't have to blow two months training them. So why the fuck am I treating them like a criminal because my wallet is light?

What's the alternative? Give me a fucking break. If I hire you, I'm paying you to do my bidding. I have an arrangement with you whereby I am responsible for your livelihood and you are responsible for my success. I didn't enter into that arrangement lightly and I should leave it with every bit as much consideration yet you take it as normal that "employment" means "the guy who signs my checks should be able to murder my career in the dark without the slightest bit of consideration."

You have drunk the fucking kool-aid.