Fired over Facebook

M

moosag

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http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,,2-7-1442_2522718,00.html

A 23-year-old administration clerk at a clothing factory south of Durban lost his job after being reported by a co-worker for calling his boss a "serial masturbator" on Facebook.
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This should make for interesting comments from the public. The questions is: Should the content on social networking sites, within your own private capacity and associated private content be used against you in the real world?
 
gdiza said:
That should not be allowed!
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It depends really. I don't think the employee should have been fired as it was within a private context, however technically speaking legal action could have been taken against the employee for defamation of character.
 
A 25-year-old Johannesburg-based Facebook user was suspended for punting a competitor?s product on her profile homepage.
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I don't think this is justified.
 
xrapidx said:
I don't think this is justified.
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At least they could have asked her to remove the competitor's product. But if she persisted with that, then it was justified.

Employees of a company is expected to ensure to the wellness of the company. If they don't, then said company might just as well close its doors.
 
The_Librarian said:
At least they could have asked her to remove the competitor's product. But if she persisted with that, then it was justified.

Employees of a company is expected to ensure to the wellness of the company. If they don't, then said company might just as well close its doors.
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Hows it justified - if I worked for Honda - but Ferrari is my favourite car, I have the right to say so publicly.
 
As far as I am concerned freedom of speech is selective. It works when they want it to work and then it works against you when they want it to work against you.

Take the following e.g: Imagine if there was some sort of evidence of someone saying they stole something from me. Either they posted is a status update or posted a "hahah i stole x from moosag" on somebodies wall. What are the chances of the local judiciary allowing that in court and prosecuting that person for stealing from me? There is no precident and I dont think they would allow it for 2 reasons. 1 they too lazy to create a precident and 2 it will cost me a lot of money in legal fees to proove.

Yet when someone gets fired over what they said on facebook the whole table is turned around. Its a double edged sword.

But for the most part I agree, as individuals we need to take responsibility of our actions and words on public profile social networking sites like facebook. The law is never on the average man's side unfortunately.

I am sure if this guy took his employer to the CCMA for arbitration he would win. To be held liable for insults on facebook and get fired over it is IMO ludicrous!
 
xrapidx said:
Hows it justified - if I worked for Honda - but Ferrari is my favourite car, I have the right to say so publicly.
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Sure you can. But I think there's more to that case than meets the eye.

Would love to see the details of that case, why they fired her and what she did.
 
What people should remember is that there is a sensationalist angle involved in reporting about sackings resulting from facebook. I would not be surprised if the reporters didn’t dig down deep enough to find out other factors which mean that the facebook incident is merely the last straw.

Without the full facts of the case beforehand, I wouldn’t be so quick to jump on the employer. It reminds me a bit of the guy who claimed KFC fired him for wearing a traditional zulu wrist thingy before more facts emerged.
 
wouldn't his boss have to prove his not a serial masturbator before firing him though?
 
xrapidx said:
wouldn't his boss have to prove his not a serial masturbator before firing him though?
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milomak said:
he made the statement. he must prove it.
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If I say Mr X is, for example, a serial rapist, then I must be able to provide proof of my assertment.

If I cannot, and Mr X loses his job, family and everything, and his quality of life is negatively influenced by what I said, then yes, he can sue me.

On the other hand, if he is a serial rapist, and I can prove it, then he can do nothing.
 
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