My best employee quit because I wouldn’t let her go to college graduation

It sounds like they took the wrong message away from a 'Pets or Cattle?' talk.

This is just a case of "shitty person acting shitty" and unfortunately in this scenario that shitty person was in a position of leadership. It's tempting to try to learn from these stories but often it is a complex environment-driven issue that will not translate 1:1 to our own lives. The simplest advice that I always try to remember when reading stories like this is just to be kind to other people. If you do that 9 times out of 10 it'll come out ok.

When capitalism is functioning correctly, both sides of a trade benefit.

When a negotiation fails, it's not unusual for the purchaser (or employer in this case) to be more upset than the seller.

If she's a quality employee that just graduated college, it stands to reason she'll be able to find more gainful employment...

But one has to wonder if this is just an elaborate troll.

It's an obvious joke, isn't it, why is everybody falling for it?

Plus it says she's the employee with the lowest seniority, but worked 6 years there, that's hardly believable, the whole thing is hardly believable.