What's good for the goose...
I.e. if it's only fair for someone to be canned based on the postings on some random's personal twitter account, it's only fair for it to work in reverse. Employers can people based on their personal lives all the time.
Also, as detailed elsewhere, this goes beyond a mere tweet.
She makes penis jokes on twitter, works at a company that makes jokes about photocopying genitals, and she gets offended when someone in the row behind her says 'dongle'. Sounds about right.
I think firing either party was a pretty daft idea for all types of poultry, or in this case, human beings.
> Employers can people based on their personal lives all the time.
Yeah, I think I'm saying I'm saying that in a lot of circumstances, that's pretty lame and we actively, as a community, saying that type of reaction is unwise. Instead, you have someone calling for it.
This is only getting to be a bigger problem as everyone's personal lives become more and more broadcasted.
Chalk it up to self-interest if you'd like, I got a bunch of shit on my twitter accounts that could get me in trouble with different types of views and people. Any employer who is interested in hiring me is going to have to be able to deal with that.
> this goes beyond a mere tweet
Her actions were a tweet and a blog post. What someone else did with that is their issue. Go get angry at them if you think those actions were inappropriate.
So if I get this right..
Someone says a joke that offends you, in earshot, but not to you, and you take this as your opportunity to photograph them, get them kicked out of a con, fired, pilloried in public? And then you take to your blog to defend yourself (not really) with an incessant repeating of "I'm in the right! I'm in the right!" (paraphrased)
Let me say this as clearly as I can: Anyone who would engage in the behavior described in the previous paragraph is a colossal fucking idiot of the highest caliber, who I would think very long and hard about hiring or retaining employment for any job that required any kind of public interaction.
I am having trouble mustering words for how angry this makes me. Time to get off the internet for a while.
You're generalizing too much.
If your response to your first example was to do what the person we're talking about did, then yes, you would be an idiot.
>Okay, how about if someone was threatening to harm a political figure as a joke?
Yup.
>Or what if the joke insulted people of a different race for their cultural beliefs?
Yup.
In my arrogant opinion, nothing short of lewd and obscene sexual discussion or threats of bodily harm should have led to the sequence of events we have here in front of us.
I've got one word for that: Lol.
Aside: Does anybody know the actual joke in question? More than it just referencing a "big dongle".
Unfortunately, it seems to be winning the argument here with several proposing boycotting and swearing against using SendHub in the future if they don't fire her. All the while people seem to think that the problem here is "women are sensitive and don't like dick jokes, we better watch what we say," instead of asking, "how do we fix this?"
Let's get one thing straight right now, this isn't just "behavior I don't agree with", I think this kind of crap should be a criminal matter with prison time and/or huge compensatory fines involved.
Barring that, if there is any justice in the world whatsoever, Adria will lose her job as well.
Think about it. Some jackass caused someone to lose their job for no good reason.
That's a blow that would put many of us in a very bad place.
>All the while people seem to think that the problem here is "women are sensitive and don't like dick jokes, we better watch what we say," instead of asking, "how do we fix this?"
I've seen very little of the first sentiment and a great deal of "this person overreacted". Yes, by women too. I don't think the average conventiongoer now needs to watch their back to see if any women are around before making a joke in good faith.
How we fix this? How can any person know in advance if something they're talking about is going to offend some random who might take huge and extraordinary steps to ruin your life?
I'd argue we fix this by making an example of anyone who misuses their power like this. Maybe then the people who like to call a mob to pitchforks will think twice if their target is really deserving of mob justice based on the context of a possibly insensitive fucking joke.
..In which case the decision to stop or not do business with Sendgrid would be all the more justified.
edit: this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5411071
Adria's actions unjustly caused another person to lose their employment and very possibly negatively impact their future employment opportunities.
At least in my mind, it's only fair that Sendgrid re-evaluate whether they want their "evangelist" acting in such a manner.
I guess you got your wish.