What are a whistleblower's rights in a hostile work enviroment?

Whistle blower cases are reserved for people that work for companies that receive some form of governmental funding.  It sounds like you work for a for profit company, not a company that is funded by the government.  In any event, I understand your issues here.  You need to know that your company's policies are solely for the benefit of the company, and a violation of a company policy may not and probably does not result in harm to the general public.  What you are doing here is complaining about a supervisor, which may result in the employer not giving you what you want as the company does not have to move you to the counter of your choice.  I do not think that you have a valid cause of action here. 

There is no law that mandates that your employer have to move you to a cosmetic counter of your choice; no matter what they may have told you.  Absent an employment contract, union agreement or stated company policy to the contrary, they are not breaking any laws by keeping you where you are.  At least if such action is not discriminatory; in other words, as long as you are not being treated differently because you are in a protected class.

Retaliating against a whistleblower might put you in such a class.  There are laws that forbid certain kinds of mistreatment under certain circumstances.  These laws provide protection against retaliation for those who report violations of laws, or participate in investigations or serve as witnesses in particular types of cases.  Those activities are really at the core of what lawyers are thinking about when they talk about whistleblower protections.  Whistleblowing can consist of reporting crimes or fraud (or possibly unethical conduct) to government agencies (or even sometimes to the company’s management). Also, whistleblowing can consist of serving as a witness in many different types of cases, or assisting in investigations of many different types. However, not all whistleblowing-type actvity is protected from retaliation. Simply reporting violations of company policies and procedures would not typically qive rise to legal protection.