Anniston, Alabama To Censor Employees' Facebook Pages 338
ISurfTooMuch writes "If you're a city employee in Anniston, AL, you'd better watch what you say on Facebook. Under a proposal being considered by the City Council, employees would be banned from posting anything 'negative' or 'embarrassing' about the city. Note that they aren't talking about official city pages here, but employees' personal pages. Anyone care to educate these clowns on the existence of the First Amendment?"
1st A... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:1st A... (Score:4, Insightful)
If I paid taxes in that town, I would be sort of pissed off that the town officials were spending time on something like this, so I wouldn't call it perfectly reasonable.
Re:1st A... (Score:4, Insightful)
8 years ago and counting.
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Re:1st A... (Score:4, Interesting)
The slashdot solution to challenges to liberty: become a homeless, jobless bum.
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But presumably some city official is going to have to spend part of their work day looking over those statuses that have been posted.
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Yeah, this is about workers rights, not 1st A.
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Actually, since states and cities' coffers are payed by citizens' taxes, their employees are public servants, and freedom of speech certainly does apply here.
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(1) A person in the United States enjoys the right of freedom of speech... but not a right to "freedom of speech without any consequences".
(2) Government employees do not have "rights" that do not apply equally to everybody else.
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I don't think your assertion holds water. The right to free speech and assembly are guaranteed. No matter who utters the speech, there are indeed consequences, but the consequences suffered by the government of the City of Anniston might be embarrassment, whistleblowing, and lots of speech that are quite protected. They're not a private employer, they're a public employer, and even government employees have personal lives, although certain parts of their speech can be constrained by federal law-- and are.
Th
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(1) A person in the United States enjoys the right of freedom of speech... but not a right to "freedom of speech without any consequences".
Ah, I get it now! I can say what I like, but it is still free if I get imprisoned for it. Because the "free" in "free speech" is the same as in "free will".
In other news, Jane Q. Public argues that atheism is a crime, because the first amendment only guarantees a freedom of religion, not the freedom to not have a religion.
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"Ah, I get it now! I can say what I like, but it is still free if I get imprisoned for it. Because the "free" in "free speech" is the same as in "free will"."
Don't be an ass. That's not what I wrote. NOBODY in the United States is granted freedom of speech without consequences. As in the famous example of yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, you can indeed be arrested for speech, First Amendment or not.
This is not even remotely the same as shouting fire in a theater. This is the government retaliating against people for speech that it doesn't like, not because of anything to do with public safety.
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(1) A person in the United States enjoys the right of freedom of speech... but not a right to "freedom of speech without any consequences".
By that definition, even people in the People's Republic of China have freedom of speech.
This is far from settled law (Score:4, Informative)
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Actually, it is more or less settled law. The question is the scope of when these restrictions can be applied. Also, labor contracts with unions may restrict this, as might internal state or city regulations. But as a pure matter of First Amendment law, it is settled. The question is whether regulatory law prevents it.
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Which is regulatory law, not First Amendment law.
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Your home would become a Constitution-free zone for your working life?
Telling the world about where certain data lines are vs telling the world your city was over charged for no bid IT upgrades in a very friendly 'deal'?
This is chilling.
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No matter how you slice it, though, it isn't settled. Part of it may be, but other parts are not.
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Or, the city could take the approach that anything they do is a matter of public record.....
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Or, the city could take the approach that anything they do is a matter of public record.....
Then they can pay me 24/7 instead of 8/5.
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no you misunderstood. I mean anything the CITY does is public record and hence should be subject to scrutiny and criticism, especially by its employees.
If the workplace sucks, then the citizens have a right to know that their city treats it's people like crap. If the city is doing something questionable by all means the employees should be able to post negative comments about it.
We have an expectation that government is public and as such it should be held to a higher public standard.
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I think we have to separate that and call it a separate issue. Badmouthing your employer is one thing; blowing the whistle on wrongdoing is quite another.
There are lots of ways an employer can treat people like crap without actually breaking the law. In an open, honest system this is where public embarassment could accomplish what a lawsuit could not. That's where these otherwise separate issues converge.
As a lover of freedom, I maintain that the peoples' right to know what their public servants are doing overrides the city government's desire to remove employees whose willingness to speak out makes it less convenient to be bureaucratic assholes. The g
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That is an issue should be brought up more often: if an employer wants to have control over what I do when I am not at the office, then the employer can damned well pay me for that time, too.
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Mod parent up. That is an issue should be brought up more often: if an employer wants to have control over what I do when I am not at the office, then the employer can damned well pay me for that time, too.
The cynicism that remains within me says that this would only cause more hourly employees to be shifted to salary.
Re:1st A... (Score:4, Interesting)
No, it isn't reasonable at all, not when you're a division of the government. The first amendment exists so that individuals can speak out against government acts with impunity - you can't be held accountable for speaking out against the government. By instituting this rule, they're essentially saying that the first amendment doesn't apply. Legally speaking, they have no right to do it, and morally speaking, it's abject in every sense of the word.
Your employer has no right to censor your speech - period. Even less so when that employer is part of the government who's supposed to be upholding that right in the first place. Conflict of interest.
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No, it isn't reasonable at all, not when you're a division of the government. The first amendment exists so that individuals can speak out against government acts with impunity - you can't be held accountable for speaking out against the government. By instituting this rule, they're essentially saying that the first amendment doesn't apply. Legally speaking, they have no right to do it, and morally speaking, it's abject in every sense of the word.
Your employer has no right to censor your speech - period. Even less so when that employer is part of the government who's supposed to be upholding that right in the first place. Conflict of interest.
That's right. They can't censor your speech.
You also can't insist that they continue to employ you after you call them asshats. Free speech has consequences too, you see.
Re:1st A... (Score:4, Insightful)
In properly civilized countries, you can insist on just that.
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So you have a right to insist that someone keep you employed when they no longer wish to employ you? Awesome! I'm gonna use that to my advantage from now on. I'll never be out of work again!
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So you have a right to insist that someone keep you employed when they no longer wish to employ you? Awesome! I'm gonna use that to my advantage from now on. I'll never be out of work again!
In some cases, yes. That's the basis of anti-discrimination lawsuits.
Do you believe that an employer (especially gov't) should be able to choose to never hire black people? If not, then you have to acknowledge that there are valid reasons to insist on someone keeping you employed when they don't wish to employ you. The debate, then, is whether this is among those valid reasons.
Your objection isn't the instant slam-dunk dismissal you seemed to have been hoping for. Those tend to be extremely overra
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One of those, the skin color thing, presumably does not damage or even affect the well-being of your company (or organization). The other does presumably damage the reputation of your company. So you can't compare the two. They are different situations.
Now, one thing I have not seen discussed much here so far is whether the employee is saying true or false things. Or even just bitching for the hell of it. That does make a differen
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If I hire someone to work for me, and that person is publicly badmouthing or debasing me, I reserve the right to fire that person.
You claim that if I could not fire them, and had to pay them to continue working even though they are costing me customers, is actually more civilized?
If so, I am glad I don't belong to the same civilization that you do.
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It is. Because in that civilization, an employee does not have to live in fear that they will wind up on the street simply because they have a differing or unpopular opinion. The only acceptable reason to fire someone should be that they are not performing their job to satisfaction. That is it.
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If you are talking about a private company, I fully agree with you. This should not apply to government, and I'll use your next line to explain why.
Governments don't obtain their revenues from customers. Governments obtain the
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I'm glad I am in a civilization that acknowledges reasons why government is not at all like a private company.
I take it, then, that you do not live in the United States. There are plenty of politicians here who want to run the government more like a private company.
Re:1st A... (Score:5, Informative)
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And it HAS to be that way, otherwise you run into issues with the Constitutional principle of equal treatment under the law.
Re:1st A... (Score:4, Interesting)
There's a major difference between a private employer and a government employer in terms of speech. IANAL, but this guy is:
The First Amendment applies only to government employers, not to private employers. Government employers are prohibited from terminating employees as a result of their speech on matters of public concern, in most circumstances. However, if the employer can show that it was necessary to terminate the employee to preserve some legitimate employer interest, the termination may be upheld. Speech relating to matters that do not fall within the definition of 'public concern' may be used as a basis to terminate employees, even if the speech occurs on the employee's free time.
As in all things, it's not as simple as /.ers think it is.
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Actually, it's even more complicated than this.
It depends on the type of employee and the subject of the speech. Further, the larger scope of rights given to public employees are regulatory in nature, not constitutional (i.e. First Amendment based).
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it is not reasonable and as a public employer it is indeed different. They are a government, with that comes special powers and special limitations.
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Show me where anything says that public and private employees do not enjoy equal protection under the law... and I'll show you an unconstitutional law.
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It's not quite that simple.
Re:1st A... (Score:4, Insightful)
In Soviet Russia... (Score:2)
No, I don't mean the Smirnoff joke meme.
So you're telling me that basically if the USSR or China or North Korea had made their censorship be just rules of employment, that would override any freedom of speech concerns? I mean, you couldn't even be employed other than by t
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No, it is not reasonable. Picture a man working for a living that simply sweeps floors and cleans restrooms. Would you have him silenced because he says his employer sells a deadly product like tobacco? They buy his hours of sweeping and labor. They have no right or reason to expect loyalty designed to drive profits or success upward.
All laws need to have a funnel effect that forces the criminal and the anti-social actors into
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They're not passing a law, they're making rule of employment. You want a job with us, you don't badmouth us. That's perfectly reasonable, whether a private or public employer. If an employee doesn't like it, they can quit. It's that simple.
No, it isn't. They're a government entity, not a private entity and courts, including the SCotUS, have already ruled that public employers have limits to what rules they can enforce.
http://www.workplacefairness.org/retaliationpublic [workplacefairness.org]
Banning "anything negative or embarrassing" would include many things that are of "public concern" and be over the legally established lines of what public employers may do.
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Actually, no. Some rights are inalienable. That is, you cannot sign them away at all. Even if you do sign something, it is null and void.
Further, government is further restrained exactly because the bargaining position against it is even more slanted than usual. They absolutely, positively cannot block your right as a citizen to engage in political speech or petition government for a redress of grievances.
They will have to tread very carefully there not to cross the line between employer/employee and govern
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I really don't see how its at all reasonable that an employer can have fuck all to say about what you do outside of work.
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For private employment I would agree but for a public government job, you aren't just badmouthing your employee but your government and I don't think you should be forced to choose between your rights as an employee or as a citizen. Furthermore I want people critical of government in the government.
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I would argue that that my criticisms were not directed at the "city" or "company" but rather at the directors, management, councilcritter, and that my criticism in no way brings "Disrepute" to the city, but rather the actions of those whom I'm criticizing are what are bringing the disrepute.
It is all about being smarter than they are. Not that will help you when they can you for being a smart ass.
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I would argue that that my criticisms were not directed at the "city" or "company" but rather at the directors, management, councilcritter, and that my criticism in no way brings "Disrepute" to the city, but rather the actions of those whom I'm criticizing are what are bringing the disrepute.
It is all about being smarter than they are. Not that will help you when they can you for being a smart ass.
All of this is only going to have one realistic effect: it will encourage people to share such information anonymously.
When that becomes more common it's going to weaken that tired old excuse for dismissing something without examination which is usually rendered as "how can I trust someone who refuses to sign their name to what they say." The intellectually lazy do love excuses like that. It makes them feel more comfortable living in a world where every important issue can be condensed into a 30-secon
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"All of this is only going to have one realistic effect: it will encourage people to share such information anonymously. "
As it was done since forever. You send a letter under a fake name to several newspapers, you know, those papery blogs grandpa reads. Kids today just don't know what those are anymore, they just know FB.
Alas, it isn't anonymous.
Hence the blow-backs.
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Fair point, but I expect there's broad agreement that this is at least as invasive on a liberal site such as Slashdot.
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I made an exception a few years ago, in spite of my long-standing policy, because they were a good company and they literally could not make an exception for me because of the company was insured through an umbrella corporation. Allowing me to be exempt would have (truly) endangered insurance cove
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Taxpayer-disapproval of public-servants being high on or off the job is almost universal. I can't think of a single taxpayer that would disapprove of hearing from government employees what is going on in the government.
Let's not forget something else -- this is a city, not the CIA. With a few exceptions -- police officers, health authorities -- there are no privacy or public safety implication to a city government releasing information about his own work.
This has nothing to do with protecting the public fr
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Complete BS (Score:3)
Free speech is pretty well misunderstood (Score:3)
You are free to say anything you want, and free to feel the consequences.
Folks on the private side can get fired for not following a companies PR policies on even non-defamatory public comments (usually translated to mean that anything you say publicly about a company while employed there must be approved first). Public entities are a little different, and are covered by different laws, but the general rule stands that bad mouthing the hand that feeds you is not smart.
Whistle blowing for real grievances, safety issues, and illegal acts are a different story, and it is unlikely that laws such as this preempt whistle blowing laws.
Standard stuff (Score:3)
It's generally understood that you don't badmouth your employer, even if you work for the government.
At-will employment (Score:2)
At-will employment [wikipedia.org]:
"[A] doctrine of American law that defines an employment relationship in which either party can break the relationship with no liability, provided there was no express contract for a definite term governing the employment relationship and that the employer does not belong to a collective bargaining group (i.e., has not recognized a union). Under this legal doctrine:
“any hiring is presumed to be "at will"; that is, the employer is free to discharge individuals "for good cause, or ba
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State employment laws would in this case be trumped by the federal constitution, since the employer is a government entity and the employee therefore has expanded rights to criticize his/her employer. If this were a private employer, you'd be correct, but in this case, it's irrelevant.
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What part of "[The US] Congress shall make no law..." do you think applies to the State? Besides, an employment policy is different than a law anyway.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incorporation_of_the_Bill_of_Rights [wikipedia.org]
You don't know much about con-law do you?
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It still doesn't make a policy making an offer of employment contingent on certain behaviors the equivalent of a law that applies to all people in the State now, does it?
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It's about time!!!! (Score:3)
I think its about time city officials officially get paid to browse facebook during business hours.
Now if they could just find some reason to keep their farmville farms in top shape while monitoring other city workers crops.
Son of a bitch (Score:5, Insightful)
I have to say, I don't like this policy. One is not generally supposed to badmouth one's employer, but badmouthing one's government is patriotic and should be encouraged. That's how things get fixed.
Consequences (Score:4, Informative)
Anyone care to educate these clowns on the existence of the First Amendment?
First Amendment allows you can say whatever you like, with few exceptions. It does not, however, protect you from being responsible for the consequences of what you said. If you are badmouthing your employer on a publicly visible page with your name attached, you are committing career suicide, regardless of your employer. They can either get rid of you, or make it miserable for you to maintain your employment. If you must vent, do it offline, or privatize your page and be sure you don't have co-workers as "friends". That's being responsible, and shielding yourself from these consequences so many forget about.
Re:Consequences (Score:5, Informative)
If you are a government employee, the 1st amendment actually does [umkc.edu] protect you to some degree. Your advice is absolutely correct if you're privately employed, but government employees have more protections when it comes to issues like this.
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I work at the mayors office in Anniston (Score:2)
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and this place sucks a seriously huge bag of dicks.
Wait, they only monitor facebook right?
I live in this town too, As if we don't have enough problems with people around here going hungry an looking for work that will never come, now we have to waste our time an effort on facebook an what a employee does in his off time. I live right on one of the main streets in town an I see homeless people that are facing starvation an frostbite on a daily basis. I tried to call mayor gene robinson, but he's dodging his phone like a plague. I think everyone that feels this is the stupidest thing you've seen i
Good thing Alabama's an at-will state (Score:4, Interesting)
.. they'll never actually fire someone for badmouthing the city - they'll just terminate your employment.
I'll never understand why people thought giving companies the ability to fire for "no" reason was a good thing - all it does is let them fire you for *any* reason (legal or not)
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You are free to quit your job for any reason (or for no reason), so why shouldn't the company have an equal right to terminate your employment?
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Because the company is almost always on much stronger footing than the employee.
That's why there are labour laws. That's why not everyone agrees with the at-will doctrine, including most or all Canadian provinces.
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That would be a meaningful argument if my leaving the company would damage it to a comparable degree that being fired would damage me. Employees where that is the case are almost always under contract anyway. For the rest of the employees your point is horseshit.
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Do you have any clue what a small percentage of wage earners make over $100k? 84% of HOUSEHOLDS make less than that. The national MEDIAN HOUSEHOLD is $44.6k.
I would say for most people it hurts the company more when someone quits than it hurts a person to be let go.
I would say you need a reality check. Most people get no severance.
And that's not even the point. You're operating under the false (and frankly delusional) assumption that my losing $1 is the same as the company losing $1. It's not. If I lose $20k, I'm utterly bankrupt, and probably homeless. If the company loses $20k, they post slower growth for t
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This is why some places have labour laws that state a minimum notice for ending employment from either party. This notice period varies based on how long the relationship lasted, started with a week from day one to about six weeks after two years of employment. Of course, if the employer wishes to not keep you around for security reasons, they may require you not to come to work, but they must pay your paycheck for that time period. The same applies to the employee, they must give the same amount of time in
I'm confused (Score:3)
my advice: (Score:2)
Physician: heal thyself.
I thought it was... (Score:2)
Jennifer. But somehow it didn't match up with Alabama. Besides why is she reading my FB anyway? /tinfoil
Fine, I guess I'll have to do it for them (Score:2)
There. Now, since I'm not an Anniston, Alabama employee, all sides should be happy.
My company tried it. Hilarity ensued. (Score:4, Interesting)
It was slightly farcical. We argued that it was nothing defamatory and fair commentary. The next day, the entire department posted 'Company X's Media Policy is a joke' as their status.
Of course, if they tried to monitor Slashdot comments, the entire IT department where I work is going to be looking for a job on Monday.
Psychology anyone? (Score:2)
Note to employees of Anniston, AL (Score:2)
not unique (Score:2)
If you think government employees can't get fired for talking smack about there employer go ask someone in the armed forces what happens to them if they call their boss an ass hat. No free speech issue here it's pretty much a standard clause in any employment contract.
The real question may be legally is Facebook public or private. There's a lot of grey area there.
Someone must've said something negative and true (Score:2)
Probably something to do with someone paying someone else they're also exchanging bodily fluids with, is my guess.
All conjecture that I can engage in because I'm not talking about where I work...God help us if the companies keep merging until they're all one company and no one can talk shit about their emplo
I'm from the Anniston area (Score:4, Interesting)
I live just outside of Anniston. The local paper. the Anniston Star, runs stories on the city council several times a week. It's awesome entertainment, Believe me when I say that the Anniston city council is a complete joke. One of the council members stated that the reason they want to trample on the first amendment rights of their employees (and understand that this is just not about posting on Facebook at work) is that comments made on Facebook could embarrass the city. Which is completely ridiculous considering the City council has been the #1 source of embarrassment for the city for a couple of years now. The last couple of months they have been conducting an "inquiry" at tremendous expense, apparently on the general subject of "bad stuff" that's going on at the city, But it's really about the ego of one council member who was not happy at the results of an investigation conducted by the police department and who was also attempting to punish a police officer who criticised the council member on Facebook, as well as take revenge on a judge who ruled against him.
The mayor and the various council members fight and argue like school children continuously. One of the council members files multiple law suits based on idiotic grounds. In their "inquiry" they have issued subpoena after subpoena, many of which are quashed because they're so damn ridiculous. This latest issues regarding Facebook is just one in a long list of laughable shenanigans perpetrated by the council. Honestly, a reality show based on these people would be awesome and would be the one reality show I would watch. You wouldn't even have to edit anything, just broadcast the council meetings live on Comedy Central. The truth is far more hilarious and amusing than any group of video editors could conjure,
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Except that's a shitty, shitty idea. What good is having free speech if no one is allowed to use it to criticize their employers, for fear of winding up on the street.
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one could hope.. of course, rationality rarely comes out on top within bureaucracies.
Ah Ha! I've caught you bad mouthing our bureaucracies! Please turn in your keys.
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Why Drug free? Seems like controlling what you can ingest is big government talk.
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Assuming he means illegal drugs, regardless of your opinion on whether or not they should be legal, being a habitual user shows the same disregard for the law as failing the "free criminal record" qualifier he mentioned.
Ideally, the only thing the employer actually cares about is the individual in question hasn't gotten caught meaning they're less likely to be a headache for HR.
Not so sure... (Score:2)
I think if you were hounded by the paparazzi as much as Jennifer Aniston, you might have a different take on the issue.
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you are free to say whatever you'd like about them. but do you really expect them to keep you if they find out?
if i worked for you and was going on and on about how you are a shitty person, the company you run is terrible and i hate my co-workers, do I really expect you to keep me around?
basically, this: http://thenextweb.com/2009/08/09/note-friend-boss-fb-bitch-job/ [thenextweb.com]