In the past we usually did. White supremacists, POC, leftist, tightest, gays, Christians, etc could all happily cooperate because those issues were outside of a project or companies scope.
Is Twitter extra sensitive because they were the driving force behind the gentrification of the shady part of SOMA? Apparently you can displace the homeless but you just can't voice negative opinions about them.
... "Twitter had hired Greg Gopman, formerly in business development at virtual-reality media company UploadVR and the founder AngelHack, a startup that runs hackathons, to lead its burgeoning VR business" ...
In 2008 I was working on a joint co-production for one of the biggest TV stations in Europe (it rhymes with RTL/Endemol) and we were stationed in Asia where we were shooting a Big Brother show.
One of the colleagues wrote something on his facebook wall (2008, after all) which was set private and he had a tight circle of friends. What he wrote was really bad, comparing his German employer to Nazis or something. Real bad. His, well, our boss then heard about it (he wasn't on his facebook) and guy got promptly fired and dispatched to Europe. The evening he got fired he wasn't even allowed in the same hotel we were at. They transported him immediately to another hotel where he would wait for transportation back home.
That event made me aware of what this thing will be in our futures, but also to always be open and vocal about your issues in all channels of communications or shut up completely.
edit:
I forgot the 'detail' about the story though. What he wrote was before he landed the gig (with that company), and boss found out during the production.
edit: I did not scroll far enough in the article to see his second comment. That one is much worse, but firing people for their opinions strikes me as a dangerous precedent.
In downtown SF the degenerates gather like hyenas, spit, urinate, taunt you, sell drugs, get rowdy, they act like they own the center of the city…You can preach compassion, equality, and be the biggest lover in the world, but there is an area of town for degenerates and an area of town for the working class. There is nothing positive gained from having them so close to us. It’s a burden and a liability having them so close to us. Believe me, if they added the smallest iota of value I’d consider thinking different, but the crazy toothless lady who kicks everyone that gets too close to her cardboard box hasn’t made anyone’s life better in a while.
I hate the contemporary pastime for witch hunts against the bad-think, but that strikes me as a pretty distasteful post. YMMV
Distasteful, perhaps (I would question his use of the word "degenerate"). His phrasing is clearly warped by some long-building anger over a worsening situation. I don't think it's a fire-worthy offense regardless.
In downtown SF the degenerates gather like hyenas, spit, urinate, taunt
you, sell drugs, get rowdy, they act like they own the center of the
city…You can preach compassion, equality, and be the biggest lover in the
world, but there is an area of town for degenerates and an area of town for
the working class. There is nothing positive gained from having them so
close to us. It’s a burden and a liability having them so close to us.
Believe me, if they added the smallest iota of value I’d consider thinking
different, but the crazy toothless lady who kicks everyone that gets too
close to her cardboard box hasn’t made anyone’s life better in a while.
I was confused too at first; there's two quotes, but only the first one is reproduced in the QZ article.
The second one, more tinged with frustration and denigrating language, is not in the QZ article, but is quoted in the TechCrunch article linked form that one.
But, might I ask, why are we so intent on firing people immediately when stuff from the past is dug up? Should they not be given a chance to explain themselves, apologize, or perhaps even claim to stand by the sentiment they expressed?
I can understand this practice for certain very high-profile figures like celebrity endorsements, models, CEOs; situations where there's usually a clause in their contract that 'negative publicity' they incur that's affects the sponsor by association, but for (relatively) average people, this may just produce a chilling effect -- many claim it already has.
This makes me furious. Political correctness run amok. I don't feel safe expressing my opinions publicly for this very reason. I support Donald Trump - could I get fired from my (tech big 4) workplace for tweeting that publicly? That's not entirely out of the realm of possibilities! What is this world coming to? If I don't fit into their mold they fire me. My heart aches - this feels like the road to totalitarianism. These self proclaimed "progressives" and "social justice warriors" are not liberal in the classic sense - they are radicals hell bent on cutting down anyone who does not fit into their world view. A classic liberal would have said "I may not agree with what you say, but I will die for your right to say it." What happened to our country?
Lately that social pressure has been pushing me away from the people that I would otherwise broadly agree with politically. I'd be more likely to vote trump (not American anyway, just a hypothetical) now than I would have been a few years ago because I'm sick of the identity wars SJW's are fighting.
I am glad to know I am not the only one. I cannot tolerate reading news anymore I'm so sick of this stuff. It is making me a depressed fearful hermit. Helps to know I am not alone.
Supporting Donald Trump isn't just a straight up political point of view, it shows that you are at least tolerant of some of the most horrible values he has exhibited during this election. They include promotion of sexism and racism and downright violent behavior toward minority and people with different religions.
If I were your employer, I would definitely consider firing you because I do not believe my company should employ people who are tolerant of racism, sexism, xenophobia, homophobia and political violence.
It's the same reason I would fire any employee who are openly in support of KKK or Nazi. Some people may argue that they disagree with Donald Trump on those things but support his policies. That's like saying it's ok for me to support Hitler because his economic recovery plan for Germany is sound, but I just disagree with the whole genocide business.
EDIT: I do believe in the First Amendment. As long as they don't violate Federal laws regarding hate speech to incite violence, Mr.Trump and his supporters should be allowed to exercise their free speech without fear of government prosecution.
However I am also for the right of any private party to distance and disassociate themselves from Mr.Trump and his supporters, including their employers.
> If I were your employer, I would definitely consider firing you because I do not believe my company should employ people who are tolerant of racism, sexism, xenophobia, homophobia and political violence.
But where does that end? You could use that against line of reasoning against literally any political topic.
You could just as easily say, "I would definitely consider firing you for being pro-choice, because I do not believe my company should employ people who are tolerant of murder".
or "I would consider firing you for being Christian, because I do not believe my company should employ people who are tolerant of discrimination, judgement, and torture."
Being Christian does not imply being tolerant of tolerant of discrimination, judgement, and torture. Being a Trump supporter does mean giving support to Trump and all he stands for.
>Being a Trump supporter does mean giving support to Trump and all he stands for
It means at least you put other things at higher priority than discrimination, torture, and promotion of violence and hatred and you are willing to at least ignore those.
In my eyes, that's simply not acceptable. We aren't talking about economical policies or debate on tax laws here, we are talking about basic human decency.
Please show me verified proof where she publicly threatened violence or jail time or like you claimed, drone strike against her political opponents (they definitely oppose her viewpoints).
But being the secretary of state of the administration that assassinates US citizens without trial (including a 16 year old US citizen) and laughing on television about a world leader being killed and sodomized with knives by a mob on television is acceptable?
We are all complicit in this madness. You should fire everyone and then fire yourself.
Clinton did not order nor promote sodomizing a "world leader" (a brutal dictator, you made it sound like he's an elected leader from a democracy or something).
The killing of the U.S. national without trial was done due to such individual's action. There was no condemnation of violence toward a large group of people due to racism or sexism.
The world is obviously not perfect, but you can't use that as the basis of argument for "everything and everyone is just as bad as each other and things cannot possibly be worse".
No, she just helped destabilize the country until he was killed and sodomized. And then laughed about it, on television. Surely this was the administrations intention all along. Of course they didn't expect him to be sodomized but as long as he died one way or another I really doubt they cared. Of course, now Libya is still embroiled in civil war.
The point is that there are legitimate reasons to support Trump over Hillary that don't involve someone being a racist, sexist, bigot. The world definitely isn't perfect and we have two (major) candidates to choose from that make a lot of reasonable people on both 'sides' existentially concerned about the future of the republic.
I agree with your concerns about Trump. I just think Hillary is even scarier, especially because a lot of the type of people who would protest and politically mobilize against the actions I think she might take support her.
> t means at least you put other things at higher priority than discrimination, torture, and promotion of violence and hatred and you are willing to at least ignore those.
Oh please... You're not being intellectually honest.
As someone who leans heavily Democrat, I disagree. There are many Trump "supporters" who just extremely dislike/disagree with Clinton. That doesn't mean they back "all he stands for" much as I don't personally back the separate email server, HRC's coziness with Wall Street, etc.
We have a two party system. Support doesn't indicate 100% alignment.
>Being a Trump supporter does mean giving support to Trump and all he stands for.
No it doesn't, since when does supporting a particular political candidate mean that you think they are the epitome of perfection? It simply means that you believe said candidate to be marginally better on the issues you care about, than the next most likely candidate to win the election.
I'm fascinated by the histories of rigidly black-and-white, mentally disadvantaged thinkers. How do they arrive at their bizarre positions? Not even from an immediate train of logic perspective, but from a life perspective. Some chain of events led to that bizarre, defective brain state which produces such strange, incoherent thoughts; what events constituted that chain?
Could you tell us a bit about where you're from, how you grew up, whether or not you attended school, etc.? I think a little insight could help us all to be more tolerant of those with limited reasoning abilities.
>But where does that end? You could use that against line of reasoning against literally any political topic.
So according to you all points of view and agenda should be tolerated just because the line is blurry?
In practice the line has to be drawn somewhere. No other politicians I can think of in a Western Democracy actively and explicitly encourages hatred, racism, sexism and violence in the same way Donald Trump does.
Let me be clear, I do believe in everyone's right to first amendment. They should be able to exercise free speech without fear of government prosecution (as long as it doesn't violate Federal laws governing Hate Speeches).
But I also believe in any private party's right to completely disassociate and distance themselves from Mr.Trump and his supporters, including their employers.
"But I also believe in any private party's right to completely disassociate and distance themselves from Mr.Trump and his supporters, including their employers."
It's completely ok to fire someone over outrageous or offensive remarks or hate speech.
Billy Bush was literally just fired by NBC over the Trump tape. You can definitely be fired for openly promoting racism, sexism or violence, those are not protected by US labor laws.
First Amendment does not protect against private party actions either, they only ensure that the government cannot prosecute you.
The California Labor Code prohibits any employer policy: (1) limiting workers' participation in politics; (2) barring employees from becoming candidates for public office; (3) requiring workers to adhere to any particular political action/activity; or (4) "controlling or directing ... political activities or affiliations of employees." California law also prohibits adverse action against employees because of "lawful conduct occurring during nonworking hours away from the employer's premises." Given the apparent statutory/regulatory breadth of "political activity," California employers must be particularly careful in drafting policies. For further information, contact Holland & Knight lawyers Linda
Illinois
An employer is not permitted to maintain a record of employees’ off-the-job political activities. 820 Ill. Comp. Stat. §40/9. For further information, contact Holland & Knight attorney
Louisiana
State law expressly prohibits any employer policy which forbids or prevents employees from "engaging or participating in politics" or from becoming a candidate, and any policy that "controls or directs [employees'] political activities." Employers also are prohibited from threatening to discharge employees who "support or become affiliated with any particular political fashion or organization, or participate in political activities of any nature or character." Significantly, Louisiana law permits imprisonment for violations!
Massachusetts
Employers are prohibited from attempting to influence an employee to give or withhold an employee's vote or an employee's political contribution. Employers are also prohibited from taking an adverse employment action against an employee — or rewarding an employee through higher wages or favorable employment terms — because of the giving or withholding of a vote or a political contribution
New Jersey
State law prohibits employers from attempting to influence employees to vote or to not vote or to vote/not vote for any particular candidate, and from requiring workers to attend an employer-sponsored meeting or communicating about the employer's opinions about political matters (including party affiliations).
> California law also prohibits adverse action against employees because of "lawful conduct occurring during nonworking hours away from the employer's premises."
So no one can be fired for saying something on facebook? Go California, I hope everyone catches up.
Under this rationale if the head of your company is anti-choice and finds out you are voting for Hillary Clinton he/she could say I am firing you because you tolerate the genocide of children.
Plenty of things to knock Trump on but any comparison to Hitler is nonsensical.
>Plenty of things to knock Trump on but any comparison to Hitler is nonsensical.
True.
But then, after eight years of listening to my Republican friends compare Obama to Hitler and young black voters to the new Hitler Youth, maybe the jackboot deserves to be on the other foot for a while.
I mean, unless Hillary wins, then she gets to be Hitler.
Here's what our current VP said in 1979, in a secret conversation with a Soviet official:
> Unofficially, [Senator Joseph] Biden and [Senator Richard] Lugar said that, in the end of the day, they were not so much concerned with having a problem of this or that citizen solved as with showing to the American public that they do care for “human rights.” . . . In other words, the collocutors directly admitted that what is happening is a kind of a show, that they absolutely do not care for the fate of most so-called dissidents.
So a vote for Obama-Biden was a vote for someone who secretly collaborated with the KGB in repressing dissidents. Sounds like cause for firing to me. Granted, the KGB no longer exists. But do the Nazis? The KKK?
The good news: in the future, robots will do all the jobs. We can all fire each other for our historical and political sins, and spend our time worrying about the KGB, the Nazis and the KKK, while our Roombas peel grapes for us.
The way I see it, if someone wants to be tolerant of racism, sexism, homophobia, whatever, well, ok, they're a spineless milquetoast maybe, but ok. I can deal.
The trump supporters I know don't just tolerate his racism, sexism, homophobia, whatever, they endorse and agree with it. That's where I draw the line in terms of things I am OK with.
I don't want to live in a world with racism, sexism, whatever. I will gladly apply whatever pressure I have (mostly social, right now, maybe some day economic, but you know) to discourage people with those views from promoting them, in the hopes that eventually those views fade away.
(I don't even view that as a particularly brave act, by the way, to stand up and say "racism does not belong in the world and you need to stop"--I kinda view it as the bare minimum of what it means to be a decent person.)
> A classic liberal would have said "I may not agree with what you say, but I will die for your right to say it." What happened to our country?
The people on the other end of the spectrum started threatening to shoot them with the guns they already owned.
While that has been going on for quite a while (Phil Gramm and his quote about hunting Democrats with dogs, for example), it's probably within the past decade or so that people have started taking the threats more seriously.
Words matter. Your actions matter more, but words are the precursor and it's impossible to know if the person on the other end of the internet is really kidding or not.
This is some revisionist history. At best, just rose colored glasses.
1) There are still plenty of people that think the way you expect a classic liberal to think.
2) Hearing about it more doesn't mean more people think that way.
3) This country has a long history of persecuting undesirables for one reason or another. Black, hippie, commie, union member. What happened here pales in comparison to our past.
You also forget that hey, guess what? These employers have the same right to associate with whomever they choose. You'd take it away from them. Making everyone work in close company with folks they aren't comfortable associating with.
It just so happens in this case it was due to a Facebook post. Would you be flipping out like this if it was due to water cooler comments on the job?
Yeah.
Perhaps check your supercharged rhetoric at the door.
Absolutely not. You are not allowed to fire someone based on their political beliefs, especially in California. You are forced to accept people in society regardless of your personal beliefs.
Also, plenty of people is a vague term, they are less than 50% of the democratic party to put Clinton and Sanders as their representatives. The soldier who also ran was what was left of the old "liberal" party. He echoed the sentiments of 1990's Bill Clinton and he was left behind with nary a backer.
It is obvious to me you've barely researched what you said. Government and Californians are the only workers with any legal protections around political speech. But the laws are barely enforceable.
Twitter can say "not a culture fit" and not have to really give any more explanation. They can say "decided to go a different way." Effectively my point stands. Companies can pick and choose who they hire. A job offer is not a contract for eternal employment.
Philosophically, that is exactly how it should be. What's the point of forcing an organization to hire people they disagree with? You just flipped it from coddling one group to coddling another. And the other side will stand up and grouse.
I think we really need to rethink the point of "jobs" and how people are expected to contribute in our society. Because "jobs" will be extinct.
It sounds like in your second point you're talking about membership in the Democratic party. The OP was painting in broad strokes about society in general. Classical liberalism was typically a position taken regarding government's role. "Government which governs least governs best." But we're not talking about government. We're talking about a private organization and opinions of free people.
There was no government oppression here. This was free agency of private citizens that created this headline. What does that even have to do with "classical liberalism"?
So above all my points stand. OP was revising history to be, and his argument in general is contradictory and hypocritical.
> It just so happens in this case it was due to a Facebook post. Would you be flipping out like this if it was due to water cooler comments on the job?
He didn't say it around the water cooler; doesn't that make all the difference? He said it three years ago semi-publicly but away from work, deleted it years ago, and has put some plausible effort into moving away from the viewpoint people took offense with. In your world, we're not allowed to make political/social mistakes off the job 3 years ago, even if we change our mind afterward?!
> These employers have the same right to associate with whomever they choose... Making everyone work in close company with folks they aren't comfortable associating with.
I have to believe they interviewed him pretty well and liked him just fine the way he is today and in person. What evidence do you have that anyone he worked with was personally uncomfortable with him? It looks like what happened is, the mobs/journalists dug up reasons to hate his 3-years-ago Facebook persona, and Twitter exercised that "right" so they could save face.
If we apply your apparent rules fairly, even Adria Richards will get fired for her own variety of "dongle" joke[1] on social media literally during that same infamous PyCon[2] 3 years ago.
[1] https://twitter.com/adriarichards/status/312265091791847425 For posterity, someone tweeted "I made it to US and A. I've received my traditional TSA welcoming - having my nuts fondled." and she responded "you should put something in your pants next time...like a bunch of socks inside one...large...sock. TSA agent faint"
That's a much different than what was posted by the (former) Twitter employee, and could be seen as "troll the TSA" more than a "tiny genitals" line.
The person in question was much more specific with their language.
But regardless. The OP was on about the erosion of "classical liberalism" in the US. Which rarely said anything about how private businesses should operate. The philosophy is largely built upon how government should govern.
How is that "classical liberalism"? Which basically hues to the mantra "Government that governs least governs best." FORCING companies to hire whoever doesn't sound like small government.
The other points stand as well. Waving away our awful history of mistreating one group or another, as if we were more fair or tolerant in the past. What?
He seems to think so-called SJW's are growing in numbers without backing it up. More NOISE from that segment does not mean it's growing or usurping anything.
And there are indeed plenty of people out there that still believe limited government is best.
No one is guaranteed a job in this country. It's highly likely that Twitter did fire them over this. But it's up to them to prove it. Twitter can say "not a culture fit" or "rethinking strategy, didn't need the headcount."
And regardless. As if this would be the straw that breaks the camels back and gets people SO riled up over the inequities in our society is laughable. Poor high tech worker! So oppressed.
The point about Ms. Richards' posts is that, even she who thinks dick jokes at work are a fireable offense, has made them "at home." You and she are both right (perhaps to different degrees, in my mind) that doing it at the water cooler or a professional conference are inappropriate. Unlike you though, she seems to feel that doing it "at home" (or on her personal Twitter) is OK. You seem to think it would be perfectly acceptable if one day enough people get huffy about that post and she gets fired or otherwise extralegally punished because of it.
We shouldn't conflate government vs. personal liberal behavior. No, the government shouldn't force companies to hire/retain people who have offensive political opinions. But yes, the public and the people in the companies should be more liberal and tolerant of employees who made offensive political statements 3 years ago, in a non-professional context. The only reason it could have any sort of effect on his ability to do that job, is because people might be determined to punish him and would apply leverage like the threat of boycotts against Twitter. Which, yeah, is their right, but does it really solve anything?
I agree her tweets and this ex-Twitter guy's are different in offense-levels, but when you're satisfying the online mobs or PR advisors, our individual opinions don't matter much.
> As if this would be the straw that breaks the camels back and gets people SO riled up over the inequities in our society is laughable. Poor high tech worker! So oppressed.
The same process that would dig up years-old political posts made by privileged white guys, will dig up the evidence of a secret sexual orientation or gender identity, class/ethnic differences, religion, etc. Your "awful history of mistreating one group or another" will continue as long as we tolerate and encourage this sort of prying into people's lives and punishing them for what we found. No "group" can be mistreated if we collectively refused to allow the would-be bullies to categorize people, right?
It shouldn't matter how sympathetic or not we are with today's victim, or whether the type of persecution they're receiving is less severe than what happened in the past. We should always be striving for more equality and less persecution of any kind, right?
Of course the rank and file routinely not get canned -- but in this guy's case, apparently have their professional lives irrevocably destroyed -- for running their mouth a bit too far in public. A few people online may grumble, but that at the executive and investor level, no one bats an eye about it.
But at their own level? Meanwhile YC can't fire you-know-who, 'cause, you know, "diversity".
If true, the troubling part for me is this sentence from the article:
> He’s since deleted the post, and seems to have spent a better part of the last few years trying to understand and ameliorate the issues of homelessness and mental health in the city.
Basically, it sounds like he said something wrong (awful, even) years ago, recognized it as a problem (sure, perhaps after being told it was), and has spent most of the time since then working to gain a better understanding to avoid repeating that sort of statement.
To me, that sounds like a good thing. Unless there's more to the story, I'd expect he'd be less likely to cause the same (/related) problem again than most other people.
My guess is that Gopman posted something incredibly insensitive in a moment of frustration and probably really regrets voicing his opinion, even if he still believes it. It's hard to have sympathy for him given that.
Still, this argument that we should use someone's past actions against them indefinitely is oddly reminiscent of our penal system. Are criminals inherently incapable of rehabilitation, even with an idealized correctional system? Should we hold their past actions against them indefinitely? If not, what's an appropriate amount of time? What if they seem truly remorseful of their actions?
I don't know that I have a good answer for those questions, but it's interesting to see some of the same people arguing for a more humane penal system simultaneously holding these long grudges against people for their (admittedly incredibly insensitive) actions.
87 comments
[ 3362 ms ] story [ 414 ms ] threadWhile a little harsh, it is not inaccurate.
If I were at Twitter I would have my resume ready and be interviewing already.
Citation Needed.
... "Twitter had hired Greg Gopman, formerly in business development at virtual-reality media company UploadVR and the founder AngelHack, a startup that runs hackathons, to lead its burgeoning VR business" ...
In 2008 I was working on a joint co-production for one of the biggest TV stations in Europe (it rhymes with RTL/Endemol) and we were stationed in Asia where we were shooting a Big Brother show.
One of the colleagues wrote something on his facebook wall (2008, after all) which was set private and he had a tight circle of friends. What he wrote was really bad, comparing his German employer to Nazis or something. Real bad. His, well, our boss then heard about it (he wasn't on his facebook) and guy got promptly fired and dispatched to Europe. The evening he got fired he wasn't even allowed in the same hotel we were at. They transported him immediately to another hotel where he would wait for transportation back home.
That event made me aware of what this thing will be in our futures, but also to always be open and vocal about your issues in all channels of communications or shut up completely.
edit:
I forgot the 'detail' about the story though. What he wrote was before he landed the gig (with that company), and boss found out during the production.
The quote in question:
The second one, more tinged with frustration and denigrating language, is not in the QZ article, but is quoted in the TechCrunch article linked form that one.
But, might I ask, why are we so intent on firing people immediately when stuff from the past is dug up? Should they not be given a chance to explain themselves, apologize, or perhaps even claim to stand by the sentiment they expressed?
I can understand this practice for certain very high-profile figures like celebrity endorsements, models, CEOs; situations where there's usually a clause in their contract that 'negative publicity' they incur that's affects the sponsor by association, but for (relatively) average people, this may just produce a chilling effect -- many claim it already has.
Twitter fired its VR manager because of Techcrunch reviving something he posted to Facebook in 2013
Looking forward to being fired in 2019!
http://valleywag.gawker.com/homeless-hater-greg-gopman-sued-...
Hopefully it's not too late to put the genie back in the bottle.
If I were your employer, I would definitely consider firing you because I do not believe my company should employ people who are tolerant of racism, sexism, xenophobia, homophobia and political violence.
It's the same reason I would fire any employee who are openly in support of KKK or Nazi. Some people may argue that they disagree with Donald Trump on those things but support his policies. That's like saying it's ok for me to support Hitler because his economic recovery plan for Germany is sound, but I just disagree with the whole genocide business.
EDIT: I do believe in the First Amendment. As long as they don't violate Federal laws regarding hate speech to incite violence, Mr.Trump and his supporters should be allowed to exercise their free speech without fear of government prosecution.
However I am also for the right of any private party to distance and disassociate themselves from Mr.Trump and his supporters, including their employers.
But where does that end? You could use that against line of reasoning against literally any political topic.
You could just as easily say, "I would definitely consider firing you for being pro-choice, because I do not believe my company should employ people who are tolerant of murder".
or "I would consider firing you for being Christian, because I do not believe my company should employ people who are tolerant of discrimination, judgement, and torture."
It means at least you put other things at higher priority than discrimination, torture, and promotion of violence and hatred and you are willing to at least ignore those.
In my eyes, that's simply not acceptable. We aren't talking about economical policies or debate on tax laws here, we are talking about basic human decency.
We are all complicit in this madness. You should fire everyone and then fire yourself.
The killing of the U.S. national without trial was done due to such individual's action. There was no condemnation of violence toward a large group of people due to racism or sexism.
The world is obviously not perfect, but you can't use that as the basis of argument for "everything and everyone is just as bad as each other and things cannot possibly be worse".
The point is that there are legitimate reasons to support Trump over Hillary that don't involve someone being a racist, sexist, bigot. The world definitely isn't perfect and we have two (major) candidates to choose from that make a lot of reasonable people on both 'sides' existentially concerned about the future of the republic.
I agree with your concerns about Trump. I just think Hillary is even scarier, especially because a lot of the type of people who would protest and politically mobilize against the actions I think she might take support her.
Oh please... You're not being intellectually honest.
We have a two party system. Support doesn't indicate 100% alignment.
No it doesn't, since when does supporting a particular political candidate mean that you think they are the epitome of perfection? It simply means that you believe said candidate to be marginally better on the issues you care about, than the next most likely candidate to win the election.
Could you tell us a bit about where you're from, how you grew up, whether or not you attended school, etc.? I think a little insight could help us all to be more tolerant of those with limited reasoning abilities.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_True_Believer
So according to you all points of view and agenda should be tolerated just because the line is blurry?
In practice the line has to be drawn somewhere. No other politicians I can think of in a Western Democracy actively and explicitly encourages hatred, racism, sexism and violence in the same way Donald Trump does.
Let me be clear, I do believe in everyone's right to first amendment. They should be able to exercise free speech without fear of government prosecution (as long as it doesn't violate Federal laws governing Hate Speeches).
But I also believe in any private party's right to completely disassociate and distance themselves from Mr.Trump and his supporters, including their employers.
"But I also believe in any private party's right to completely disassociate and distance themselves from Mr.Trump and his supporters, including their employers."
This is illegal. Highly illegal.
It's completely ok to fire someone over outrageous or offensive remarks or hate speech.
Billy Bush was literally just fired by NBC over the Trump tape. You can definitely be fired for openly promoting racism, sexism or violence, those are not protected by US labor laws.
First Amendment does not protect against private party actions either, they only ensure that the government cannot prosecute you.
http://www.legislature.mi.gov/(S(mcducknbaos0ah55x204uumg))/...
California
The California Labor Code prohibits any employer policy: (1) limiting workers' participation in politics; (2) barring employees from becoming candidates for public office; (3) requiring workers to adhere to any particular political action/activity; or (4) "controlling or directing ... political activities or affiliations of employees." California law also prohibits adverse action against employees because of "lawful conduct occurring during nonworking hours away from the employer's premises." Given the apparent statutory/regulatory breadth of "political activity," California employers must be particularly careful in drafting policies. For further information, contact Holland & Knight lawyers Linda
Illinois
An employer is not permitted to maintain a record of employees’ off-the-job political activities. 820 Ill. Comp. Stat. §40/9. For further information, contact Holland & Knight attorney
Louisiana
State law expressly prohibits any employer policy which forbids or prevents employees from "engaging or participating in politics" or from becoming a candidate, and any policy that "controls or directs [employees'] political activities." Employers also are prohibited from threatening to discharge employees who "support or become affiliated with any particular political fashion or organization, or participate in political activities of any nature or character." Significantly, Louisiana law permits imprisonment for violations!
Massachusetts
Employers are prohibited from attempting to influence an employee to give or withhold an employee's vote or an employee's political contribution. Employers are also prohibited from taking an adverse employment action against an employee — or rewarding an employee through higher wages or favorable employment terms — because of the giving or withholding of a vote or a political contribution
New Jersey
State law prohibits employers from attempting to influence employees to vote or to not vote or to vote/not vote for any particular candidate, and from requiring workers to attend an employer-sponsored meeting or communicating about the employer's opinions about political matters (including party affiliations).
And more!!!
https://www.hklaw.com/publications/Hey-Take-It-Outside-Polit...
So no one can be fired for saying something on facebook? Go California, I hope everyone catches up.
Yes, you can't be fired for voting Republican. But you can absolutely be fired for inciting hatred and violence against minority or women.
Being a Trump support goes beyond a mere political stance.
Plenty of things to knock Trump on but any comparison to Hitler is nonsensical.
True.
But then, after eight years of listening to my Republican friends compare Obama to Hitler and young black voters to the new Hitler Youth, maybe the jackboot deserves to be on the other foot for a while.
I mean, unless Hillary wins, then she gets to be Hitler.
> Unofficially, [Senator Joseph] Biden and [Senator Richard] Lugar said that, in the end of the day, they were not so much concerned with having a problem of this or that citizen solved as with showing to the American public that they do care for “human rights.” . . . In other words, the collocutors directly admitted that what is happening is a kind of a show, that they absolutely do not care for the fate of most so-called dissidents.
http://www.city-journal.org/html/hidden-history-evil-13281.h...
So a vote for Obama-Biden was a vote for someone who secretly collaborated with the KGB in repressing dissidents. Sounds like cause for firing to me. Granted, the KGB no longer exists. But do the Nazis? The KKK?
The good news: in the future, robots will do all the jobs. We can all fire each other for our historical and political sins, and spend our time worrying about the KGB, the Nazis and the KKK, while our Roombas peel grapes for us.
The trump supporters I know don't just tolerate his racism, sexism, homophobia, whatever, they endorse and agree with it. That's where I draw the line in terms of things I am OK with.
I don't want to live in a world with racism, sexism, whatever. I will gladly apply whatever pressure I have (mostly social, right now, maybe some day economic, but you know) to discourage people with those views from promoting them, in the hopes that eventually those views fade away.
(I don't even view that as a particularly brave act, by the way, to stand up and say "racism does not belong in the world and you need to stop"--I kinda view it as the bare minimum of what it means to be a decent person.)
Political discrimination has been proven illegal by the courts, and you would be absolutely wrong in the situation that you gave.
The people on the other end of the spectrum started threatening to shoot them with the guns they already owned.
While that has been going on for quite a while (Phil Gramm and his quote about hunting Democrats with dogs, for example), it's probably within the past decade or so that people have started taking the threats more seriously.
Words matter. Your actions matter more, but words are the precursor and it's impossible to know if the person on the other end of the internet is really kidding or not.
This is some revisionist history. At best, just rose colored glasses.
1) There are still plenty of people that think the way you expect a classic liberal to think.
2) Hearing about it more doesn't mean more people think that way.
3) This country has a long history of persecuting undesirables for one reason or another. Black, hippie, commie, union member. What happened here pales in comparison to our past.
You also forget that hey, guess what? These employers have the same right to associate with whomever they choose. You'd take it away from them. Making everyone work in close company with folks they aren't comfortable associating with.
It just so happens in this case it was due to a Facebook post. Would you be flipping out like this if it was due to water cooler comments on the job?
Yeah.
Perhaps check your supercharged rhetoric at the door.
Also, plenty of people is a vague term, they are less than 50% of the democratic party to put Clinton and Sanders as their representatives. The soldier who also ran was what was left of the old "liberal" party. He echoed the sentiments of 1990's Bill Clinton and he was left behind with nary a backer.
It is obvious to me you've barely researched what you said. Government and Californians are the only workers with any legal protections around political speech. But the laws are barely enforceable.
Twitter can say "not a culture fit" and not have to really give any more explanation. They can say "decided to go a different way." Effectively my point stands. Companies can pick and choose who they hire. A job offer is not a contract for eternal employment.
Philosophically, that is exactly how it should be. What's the point of forcing an organization to hire people they disagree with? You just flipped it from coddling one group to coddling another. And the other side will stand up and grouse.
I think we really need to rethink the point of "jobs" and how people are expected to contribute in our society. Because "jobs" will be extinct.
It sounds like in your second point you're talking about membership in the Democratic party. The OP was painting in broad strokes about society in general. Classical liberalism was typically a position taken regarding government's role. "Government which governs least governs best." But we're not talking about government. We're talking about a private organization and opinions of free people.
There was no government oppression here. This was free agency of private citizens that created this headline. What does that even have to do with "classical liberalism"?
So above all my points stand. OP was revising history to be, and his argument in general is contradictory and hypocritical.
That may have been true at some point a long time ago, but it's definitely not true any more.
https://www.dol.gov/ofccp/regs/compliance/posters/pdf/eeopos...
However, political views aren't a protected thing, but religious views are. Seems silly to me, but that's the law.
He didn't say it around the water cooler; doesn't that make all the difference? He said it three years ago semi-publicly but away from work, deleted it years ago, and has put some plausible effort into moving away from the viewpoint people took offense with. In your world, we're not allowed to make political/social mistakes off the job 3 years ago, even if we change our mind afterward?!
> These employers have the same right to associate with whomever they choose... Making everyone work in close company with folks they aren't comfortable associating with.
I have to believe they interviewed him pretty well and liked him just fine the way he is today and in person. What evidence do you have that anyone he worked with was personally uncomfortable with him? It looks like what happened is, the mobs/journalists dug up reasons to hate his 3-years-ago Facebook persona, and Twitter exercised that "right" so they could save face.
If we apply your apparent rules fairly, even Adria Richards will get fired for her own variety of "dongle" joke[1] on social media literally during that same infamous PyCon[2] 3 years ago.
[1] https://twitter.com/adriarichards/status/312265091791847425 For posterity, someone tweeted "I made it to US and A. I've received my traditional TSA welcoming - having my nuts fondled." and she responded "you should put something in your pants next time...like a bunch of socks inside one...large...sock. TSA agent faint"
[2] https://twitter.com/adriarichards/status/312265576896679937 "OMG! you have me blushing here at PyCon!"
P.S. SJW tip: trawl those threads for anyone remotely high-profile who challenged her, so you can get them fired for misogyny or something.
The person in question was much more specific with their language.
But regardless. The OP was on about the erosion of "classical liberalism" in the US. Which rarely said anything about how private businesses should operate. The philosophy is largely built upon how government should govern.
How is that "classical liberalism"? Which basically hues to the mantra "Government that governs least governs best." FORCING companies to hire whoever doesn't sound like small government.
The other points stand as well. Waving away our awful history of mistreating one group or another, as if we were more fair or tolerant in the past. What?
He seems to think so-called SJW's are growing in numbers without backing it up. More NOISE from that segment does not mean it's growing or usurping anything.
And there are indeed plenty of people out there that still believe limited government is best.
No one is guaranteed a job in this country. It's highly likely that Twitter did fire them over this. But it's up to them to prove it. Twitter can say "not a culture fit" or "rethinking strategy, didn't need the headcount."
And regardless. As if this would be the straw that breaks the camels back and gets people SO riled up over the inequities in our society is laughable. Poor high tech worker! So oppressed.
The QQ'ing is strong in this thread.
We shouldn't conflate government vs. personal liberal behavior. No, the government shouldn't force companies to hire/retain people who have offensive political opinions. But yes, the public and the people in the companies should be more liberal and tolerant of employees who made offensive political statements 3 years ago, in a non-professional context. The only reason it could have any sort of effect on his ability to do that job, is because people might be determined to punish him and would apply leverage like the threat of boycotts against Twitter. Which, yeah, is their right, but does it really solve anything?
I agree her tweets and this ex-Twitter guy's are different in offense-levels, but when you're satisfying the online mobs or PR advisors, our individual opinions don't matter much.
> As if this would be the straw that breaks the camels back and gets people SO riled up over the inequities in our society is laughable. Poor high tech worker! So oppressed.
The same process that would dig up years-old political posts made by privileged white guys, will dig up the evidence of a secret sexual orientation or gender identity, class/ethnic differences, religion, etc. Your "awful history of mistreating one group or another" will continue as long as we tolerate and encourage this sort of prying into people's lives and punishing them for what we found. No "group" can be mistreated if we collectively refused to allow the would-be bullies to categorize people, right?
It shouldn't matter how sympathetic or not we are with today's victim, or whether the type of persecution they're receiving is less severe than what happened in the past. We should always be striving for more equality and less persecution of any kind, right?
I'll admit, I'm having a hard time not bringing up the concept of SJW "safe zones" in regards to this statement.
#Apophasis
But at their own level? Meanwhile YC can't fire you-know-who, 'cause, you know, "diversity".
> He’s since deleted the post, and seems to have spent a better part of the last few years trying to understand and ameliorate the issues of homelessness and mental health in the city.
Basically, it sounds like he said something wrong (awful, even) years ago, recognized it as a problem (sure, perhaps after being told it was), and has spent most of the time since then working to gain a better understanding to avoid repeating that sort of statement.
To me, that sounds like a good thing. Unless there's more to the story, I'd expect he'd be less likely to cause the same (/related) problem again than most other people.
erm, no, Twitter's HQ is not in the Tenderloin...
and Greg Gopman's story is pretty well known, if that was really the reason for him being fired, then Twitter's HR should also be fired..
edit: the actual article with the "news" https://techcrunch.com/2016/10/18/in-its-vrar-push-twitter-t... apparently he was just a contractor
Still, this argument that we should use someone's past actions against them indefinitely is oddly reminiscent of our penal system. Are criminals inherently incapable of rehabilitation, even with an idealized correctional system? Should we hold their past actions against them indefinitely? If not, what's an appropriate amount of time? What if they seem truly remorseful of their actions?
I don't know that I have a good answer for those questions, but it's interesting to see some of the same people arguing for a more humane penal system simultaneously holding these long grudges against people for their (admittedly incredibly insensitive) actions.