That Time I Posted Myself Out Of a Job

https://cohost.org/stillinbeta/post/1847579-that-time-i-posted-m

by luu • 3 years ago

207 388 3 years ago

jasmer• 3 years ago

Yeah, if you don't know why you weren't going to keep your job after that, then well, that's not good. Plenty of places you can work with opinions like that. Also be wary that others will then voice their opinions about you.

This reads 'immature borderline toxic' I can't imagine having to work with this kind of drama.

dcreater• 3 years ago

Good on you! I'd have done the same

redroyal• 3 years ago

I would’ve fired him on the spot for the blood tweet

hoffs• 3 years ago

Cringe

constantly3• 3 years ago

I would have fired this person as soon as humanly possible for basically (actually) telling customers of the company to go F themselves, and making horribly insensitive and inappropriate jokes at their expense.

imho the point of this article seems to be to tell the story where big bad VMWare or the target of VMWare’s employee’s ire stomped on poor VMWare employee, but I think it makes the employee look bad. I would absolutely not hire this person based on this post. Work isn’t the right time to be attacking people on a personal level.

WheatMillington• 3 years ago

Totally agree. The author seems so incredibly obnoxious and insufferable, I don't understand how anyone could work with them.

This should have been a lesson on the toxic and pointless nature of social media, but the author seems to have misread the situation entirely.

oefrha• 3 years ago

All the fist bumps and cheers in these social media echo chambers won’t help them reflect. Unlike the OP who casually tagged some tech guy on Twitter and said “I’d shake your hand but the blood never washes off” (what the actual fuck), reasonable people won’t engage them on social media and tell them how incredibly toxic they are.

random_kris• 3 years ago

Indeed couldn't agree more

js98• 3 years ago

Agreed. Being technically right isnt the only thing which matters in an employer/employee context. They (the employee) represent the company

wiseowise16• 3 years ago

They’re not even technically right.

Leave your edgy fursona (is that how they call it?) to your personal life.

revelio4• 3 years ago

She's not technically right. Her article is filled with "all my bosses cheerfully agreed that the social media policy was impossible to comply with", which is nonsense. She could have just stopped using Twitter. She's not a shark who will die if she doesn't tweet every few minutes, it's just social media. Yet she seems to be convinced that she found some clever gotcha here and everyone in every meeting bowed to her superior intellect, meaning she has an impressive inability to read her colleagues.

parineum11• 3 years ago

Yeah, I thought the same thing. Like, yeah, the guy was being thin-skinned and over reactive but publicly accusing your employer's client of war crimes should get you fired. If you're upset that your employer is dealing with these people, quit. Work for someone you don't hate.

morelisp9• 3 years ago

publicly accusing your employer's client of war crimes

What other factual statements should you not be allowed to make about your employer's clients?

grimgoldgo21• 3 years ago

My bad, misunderstood

znpy2• 3 years ago

If you think what your employer does is unacceptable you shouldn’t work for them (even if this happens via an acquisition).

But most people are extremely hypocritical, and will gladly ignore their “ideals” in the name of the holy fat paycheque.

rmetzler2• 3 years ago

publicly accusing your employer's client of war crimes

Where did you read this?

Shaanie3• 3 years ago

I don't think it's thin-skinned to complain about those tweets. It would bother me too if someone who attended my presentation in professional capacity personally attacked me in a public way like that. It's absolutely completely unacceptable, even in a more casual setting (I'd expect to get banned or at least a stern warning if I said something like that on HN, for example).

eusto5• 3 years ago

"I go to conferences and I say 'Fuck you!' to presenters, but I tweet a lot so I thought nothing of it".

smsm426• 3 years ago

Also when HR approaches me about it, I tell them their rules are stupid, but I am willing to educate them and show them how to write the correct rules, if they ask nicely.

nik736• 3 years ago

It's also super unnecessary to tweet like that. No one wins.

wiseowise16• 3 years ago

The company won. Good riddance.

magicalhippo• 3 years ago

Reminded me of that bar scene from Trainspotting where he throws a pint into the crowd from the balcony above, then goes down asking which idiot threw the pint...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUZyNLZZjMs

re-thc3• 3 years ago

Twitter wins. More traffic! Got to rate limit.

newaccount749• 3 years ago

If you fire someone for a few insults on Twitter then you belong in Kindergarten, not in a management position.

Boy, I'm so happy I don't work for anyone, I'd hate to have to deal with sensitive pricks that think they can dictate what their employees say on social media.

seanthemon• 3 years ago

I'm curious, as a self-employeed worker, do you find freedom in saying "fuck you" to your clients publically online?

constantly3• 3 years ago

If you maliciously and repeatedly attack people on Twitter, customers no less, while at a work conference on work’s dime then you belong in kindergarten, not having a professional job. Thankfully VMWare fixed that.

iLoveOncall4• 3 years ago

If you insult people on twitter then you belong in the kindergarten.

jossclimb3• 3 years ago

They are a business, not a social club, and so they will do whatever safeguards that business (maximises its profits). If an employee tells a customer to 'fuck off', they are going to fire them, as its not good for business.

DaSHacka2• 3 years ago

Boy, I'm so happy I don't work for anyone, I'd hate to have to deal with sensitive pricks that think they can dictate what their employees say on social media.

Here's a genius idea: keep your hot takes to an isolated Twitter account not directly associated with your employer? Have we really forgotten basic OPSEC?

lelanthran8• 3 years ago

If you fire someone for a few insults on Twitter then you belong in Kindergarten, not in a management position.

Nonsense; no company allows any employee to publicly hurl insults at a large paying customer.

matheusmoreira4• 3 years ago

You should be careful. It takes a whole lifetime to build a reputation and mere seconds to destroy it permanently. Everything depends on reputation, especially in business. Guard it with your life.

rewmie4• 3 years ago

(...) but I think it makes the employee look bad.

The fact that the author claimed brought a third party to a work-related meeting with a VP with the purpose of live tweeting it to the world already speaks volumes.

bigbacaloa2• 3 years ago

You are a typical employer unfortunately. Thin skin and no morals.

jossclimb3• 3 years ago

Engineers with unicorn / my little pony avatars is a slight red flag to me. I am as socialist as they come (I am not even American, I am Brit and a left wing), but I always try to not engage with those folks on twitter, to easy to get caught up in personal attacks if anything you say is remotely misunderstood. It can quite easily turn into a digital lynching.

npteljes2• 3 years ago

My impression is that a large number of toxic people, or outright grifters, join them. In a way that a protest has a bunch of people who don't care as much about the cause, as they just want to fuck shit up. I genuinely find value in many of such groups' original ideas, but it's impossible to separate them from what they have turned into, especially when speaking about them to other people.

ben_w5• 3 years ago

I'm not a free speech absolutist[0], but if there's one speech one ought to be free to do, it's to write mean things about a government body (or deals with one) in a country that has a constitutional right to free speech.

[0] neither is the US, despite what it says; I am however a free-speech maximalist, and the differences between these positions includes but is not limited to acknowledging that some speech chills other speech.

jossclimb3• 3 years ago

she has free speech, and they are free to fire her too.

eusto5• 3 years ago

I'm assuming the "fuck you" was the one that fired her. However you choose to understand free speech, being needlessly rude as a media representative of a company should get you fired.

lelanthran8• 3 years ago

I'm not a free speech absolutist[0], but if there's one speech one ought to be free to do, it's to write mean things about a government body (or deals with one) in a country that has a constitutional right to free speech.

Right, understood. But it is the right of every company to have the freedom of association[1] to determine what sort individuals they want to associate with, no?

Just because someone has the freedom to say something, it doesn't mean that their employer has to provide a platform to say it. It also doesn't mean that the employer has to allow its employees to disparage paying customers.

Like I kept hearing over the last few years[2], "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences".

[1] Much like your Free Speech position, I'm not being absolutist, only maximalist in this position; IOW, no dissassociation on illegal grounds, like protected class members, for example.

[2] Not that I agree, just that it seems to be acceptable.

btilly• 3 years ago

On your personal Twitter, on your personal time, absolutely.

If you're there on your company dime, and the tweets are associated with your company image, the company now gets a say.

revelio4• 3 years ago

some speech chills other speech

Is this not just a way to say "my speech is free speech and protected, your speech is hate speech and should be banned"?

smsm426• 3 years ago

If anybody would prosecute this person under the color of law for her speech, I'd be first to object. I am also very against going for people's job for something they said in their personal capacity, or for disagreeing with their politics.

But that's not what happened. What happened is that she personally cursed out a client, publicly accusing this person in war crimes, while being on a job conference. And, when confronted about that, she basically told HR "your rules are stupid, I'm not going to follow them, let me educate you about how your job should be done". This is not a free speech issue, this is "rules don't apply to me because I am a precious flower that is always right" issue. The organization could choose to tolerate and accommodate this kind of an employee if it's worth it, but nothing requires them to. She is still free to curse out the government in her free time, or when she is outside her job duties - and I would be the first, again, to support her right to do so. But maybe realizing there's a time and a place for such things may do her some good. And if she can't control herself while being on a job (and going to the conference is part of one's job, otherwise why would their employer pay for it?) and be a professional then maybe she should look for some job that does not involve doing that.

Note she wasn't even fired for the conference BS. It was when she explicitly refused to commit to social media guidelines that they pulled the plug. I say if you prioritize the ability to say shit on twitter over your job, then it's not a question of free speech, it's a question of choice. She made her choice, now she's completely free to say shit on twitter.

kome3• 3 years ago

I don't know anything about this person, but I would definitely hire them just because of this story! I like this kind of ppl and i dislike bootlickers, suckers and ppl without a spine

janejeon• 3 years ago

I don't know anything about this person, but I would definitely hire them just because of this story! I like this kind of ppl and i dislike bootlickers, suckers and ppl without a spine

There's a difference between being a "bootlicker" and being extremely unprofessional (to the nth degree).

DaSHacka2• 3 years ago

You'd hire someone you barely know because you like their political opinions? You'd be doing them more of a disservice than anything, as clearly your business will go under before the year's end and they'd be stuck finding a better job.

squeaky-clean4• 3 years ago

It makes them look so bad. Also that bit about their friend live-tweeting the private meeting with the VP??! I had to scroll up and check this wasn't fiction.

ralfd• 3 years ago

And did I understand it right, that the first “witness” who “lightly live tweeted” didn’t even work there?

scns2• 3 years ago

Well, i have to concur, but there is always two parties in a conflict. And in this case the other party looks even worse [0]. Would hire neither.

[0] https://www.oxebridge.com/emma/op-ed-usafs-chaillan-knausenb...

[edit] WAY worse! Intellectual Property Theft, Gifting Officials, Misuse of Position, Abuse, “Sabotage” of Competing Platforms, Improper Contract Award, Misappropriation of Funds

Zero excuse for the behaviour of the tweeter though.

lelanthran8• 3 years ago

I thought the other party in this case was the employer?

bsder• 3 years ago

I would have fired this person as soon as humanly possible for basically (actually) telling customers of the company to go F themselves, and making horribly insensitive and inappropriate jokes at their expense.

OP does mention that they were with VMWare only by acquisition.

Do I think that OP should have done this? No. Do I think they deserve to be fired over this? No. This is the standard chastise them for being an idiot and get back to work.

The problem here was a high-ranking Federal bureaucrat (USAF Chief Software Officer) got his knickers in a twist and rattled VMWare management who should have told him to go pound sand.

And, personally, even though I don't find the OP sympathetic, I'm glad this story came out as the bureaucrat in question should absolutely be named and shamed so other companies won't capitulate to him being a snot. Anybody with skin that thin shouldn't be allowed any amount of power, ever.

lelanthran8• 3 years ago

The problem here was a high-ranking Federal bureaucrat (USAF Chief Software Officer) got his knickers in a twist and rattled VMWare management who should have told him to go pound sand.

How do you know that? Nothing in that article suggests there is even the smallest shred of evidence that the bureaucrat in question applied any pressure.

npteljes2• 3 years ago

Do I think they deserve to be fired over this? No.

I think we're taking their account of the events at face value. Maybe this event was just the last in a chain of similar events, and management were fed up already.

Although, I also think that your kind of event description is just as likely. I'm sure it happens a lot, as I know it does in many political, business and interpersonal situations. And you know that being thin skinned won't ever lose them their power, just like that. A person has many reasons to get into power, it's not up to merit.

Osmose10• 3 years ago

basically

Unfortunately it's not basic; the ability to strip all context to make this about being mean to a customer makes for a poor argument.

The government isn't just _any_ customer, whether you think the firing was justified or not. The DoD enjoys a ton of taxpayer budget money and a sanctioned right to kill people if it deems it necessary. And it was proactively recruiting at a tech conference for software that isn't innately violent. Is that bad? Maybe not, maybe so. Is that a basic customer? Not at all.

Is this really only about criticizing the government at work? If she made the tweet off hours or wasn't even at the conference, does Nicholas Chaillan still complain to VMWare and get her fired? When is it okay for her to criticize the government without losing her job? Would it even have cost VMWare anything if they didn't fire her and just disciplined her? How about the social media policy that bans talking about incredibly generic things like "age, sex, race, religion"? Has anyone at VMWare ever gotten disciplined for tweeting out "Jesus lives"?

I think your reduction to "employees must never tell any customer ever to go fuck themselves and that's basically what happened here" isn't useful nor is it one of the more interesting questions this post raises.

Shaanie3• 3 years ago

The comments were personal attacks on the speaker, not aimed at the government or the military. There's a huge difference between those.

If the engineer had posted something criticizing the military outside of the context of the conference and without personally attacking the speaker, nothing would have happened. In fact, I bet the engineer had already done that multiple times before.

preezer• 3 years ago

Jep, I thought the same.

mock-possum• 3 years ago

Wow. What a rats nest of drama to wander into.

I feel like there is something - not necessarily something legal - about the fact that the author was attending the convention on behalf of her employer; she was tweeting ‘on the clock,’ if I understand correctly.

Otherwise, I’m not sure how that kind of policy could possibly be reasonable. People get to hold their own opinions, and they get to hold forth on those opinions if they choose. I don’t think anyone reasonable would confuse her statements with some sort of official policy position on the part of her employer…

… but also honestly fuck professionals who take blood money from the military industrial complex. VMWare should be proud to take a public, principled stance on DoD contracts. That’s the kind of free speech that everyone is entitled to, firing someone over it is shameful.

wiseowise16• 3 years ago

… but also honestly fuck professionals who take blood money from the military industrial complex. VMWare should be proud to take a public, principled stance on DoD contracts. That’s the kind of free speech that everyone is entitled to, firing someone over it is shameful.

Taking “blood” money and complaining about doesn’t make you a freedom fighter, it makes you a hypocrite.

parineum11• 3 years ago

People get to hold their own opinions

The oft-repeated "The first amendment doesn't apply to corporations!" slogan when defending the banning of people from various social media applies here. The company she works for doesn't have to employ her if they disagree with her opinions. Isn't that the goal of all these doxxing Twitter mobs when they find someone who said the n-word on video?

josephcsible5• 3 years ago

If you publicly make personal attacks against employees of your employer's biggest customer, isn't firing you a completely reasonable thing for your employer to do?

grimgoldgo21• 3 years ago

Is saying "the blood never washes off" the hands of this DoD employee really a personal attack? I mean, it certainly seems like a consistent and reasonably widely held belief that military industrial complex jobs cost lives.

There's of course the opposite opinion too. I'm not interested in trying to demonstrate that one opinion is right or wrong, just that like, is this really an attack?

SuchAnonMuchWow• 3 years ago

Considering the previous tweet said "fuck you", yes it is an attack.

medellin• 3 years ago

Incredible mental gymnastics

siliconpotato• 3 years ago

Of course it is an attack, and they tagged him in the tweet too. There were plenty of opportunities to keep the job after this point (deleting the tweets, not being a massive douchebag in every interaction with the company) but they gave the company no choice.

yuliyp4• 3 years ago

Yes. There's a difference between saying "I would like to avoid you because your industry costs lives" and "I'd shake your hand, but, y'know, the blood never washes off". They're both basically statements about the same thing, except one is an attack while the other is merely expressing disapproval.

inertiatic2• 3 years ago

It certainly reads like an attack, and that's to someone who agrees with the sentiment. And as an observation, in professional contexts you can generally be poetic and figurative when talking about good things ("Gary is such a godsent and a genius for showing us the way to restructure our department"), but it's in bad taste to do it to express negative things ("I worked with Gary and he's an absolute mouth-breather and defecated all over our infrastructure").

furyofantares• 3 years ago

The author has some captions on the screenshots of the tweets if it helps you here:

"I don’t even usually swear much"

"Anger does not really become me, but boy was I mad."

camillomiller7• 3 years ago

Tell me again how corporate capitalism is compatible with personal freedoms, then.

wiseowise16• 3 years ago

If your clown persona is incompatible with corporate culture, then you’re the one who’s in the wrong. They just corrected their original error of hiring the person.

erik_seaberg2• 3 years ago

Freedom and loyalty are not incompatible. You shouldn’t want to harm your employer’s relationships.

3np• 3 years ago

Depends.

If you do it from your private account, which doesn't contain any links to or mentions of you being part of your employer, outside of working hours? The employer shouldn't even be mentioning it.

If you do it from your fused-personal-and-work-persona while repping your employer on a conference, on working hours? You have it coming.

In one, you speak purely as a private person while in the other you are acting on behalf of your employer, like it or not. There's a vast gray area in-between. One of many good reasons to keep your identity small and your personas segregated. If you need to live-tweet no-filter-hot-takes from kubecon, you shouldn't be attending on company time.

spondylosaurus11• 3 years ago

Nice read, thanks for sharing.

It's interesting (to say the least) that they more or less used a "no talking about politics" clause to fire this woman, even though the other guy's statements about DoD weapons systems are certainly just as political. But he's an Air Force guy, she's a dissident, he's establishment, she's counterculture, so he got to push her out of a job for meeting him on his playing field, so to speak.

Always illuminating to see what gets cast as "political" and what gets cast as merely neutral.

fake-name2• 3 years ago

Anything that isn't explicitly supporting the status quo = "politics".

This is also true of a large portion of HN commenters.

comprev2• 3 years ago

The key element is the poster was essentially _representing_ their employer at a tech conference.

This would be no different than wearing the uniform of a supermarket and going on a political rant with a megaphone.

spondylosaurus11• 3 years ago

Genuine question, though (and not "asking just to make a rhetorical point because I've already decided on an answer"): is that really the case?

I know the boilerplate "tweets do not represent the views of my employer" thing is a cliche at this point, but I always assumed it was at least partly true. If you're not tweeting directly from AcmeCORP's socials, wouldn't there be some understanding that you're not a direct mouthpiece for the company?

reflexco2• 3 years ago

No, it's absolutely not about how "counterculture" her opinions are. It's about using offensive language. She probably would have avoided all trouble if instead of talking down a fellow participant of the conference, she plugged her beliefs in pacifism in a positive manner.

spondylosaurus11• 3 years ago

TBH I don't know that she would have fared much better. One, because it sounds like the Air Force guy is thin-skinned, and two, because even peaceful anti-war protestors have generally been met with disdain and/or tear gas.

But I also dislike the idea that offensive language is somehow not pacifist behavior, whereas developing weapons of war is perfectly fine so long as you're polite about it. Regardless of how you feel about weapons of war, it's hard to deny that they hold a certain non-neutral weight.

catboybotnet• 3 years ago

Boohoo, somebody said "fuck you" instead of "I strongly disagree with you, good sir! I shall shake my head disapprovingly whence upon I see you again!"

It's just respectability politics. Tone down your language so you don't hurt the poor DoD Aiw Fowce man's feewings. If she "plugged her beliefs in pacifism in a positive manner" he would've just ignored her, which is the point of Respectability(tm).

galkk12• 3 years ago

There is nothing political to say "If Kubernetes is good for DoD weapon* systems, it is definitely good enough for your business!".

I'm sure that every software engineer can think about complexities that DoD experience in their work with software. Some are highly technical in hard environments and with reliability requirements

* corrected, based on comment below

jzb7• 3 years ago

I disagree. First, you dropped the word “weapons.” “DoD systems” sounds neutral, could be benign personnel systems.

DoD weapons systems isn’t neutral, and it is political. Those systems are used to enforce U.S. policy, via combat. That’s the status quo, which may not feel “political” if you’re supportive of U.S. policy and/or don’t think about the ramifications, but it is very political. If you’re not okay with how the U.S. uses its military, its definitely political.

To some that message reads as “if it’s good enough to use to kill people, it’s good enough for your business.”

wiseowise16• 3 years ago

DoD weapons systems are certainly just as political.

It’s not. Maybe insensitive to contra-war, but not political.

spondylosaurus11• 3 years ago

War is pretty explicitly political.

irjustin3• 3 years ago

Whether you agree or disagree with how VNWare followed up the tweet, he was very prudent in handling. Lawyer up, witnesses everywhere.

spondylosaurus11• 3 years ago

*She, I believe, but absolutely. I'd have never thought to bring a witness to that sort of meeting. Keeping that one in my back pocket just in case.

re-thc3• 3 years ago

The flag was likely HR. HR is the sort of thing you never interact with unless something's up.

HDThoreaun2• 3 years ago

Bringing witnesses to all these meetings is likely what got them fired. The VP was going to just accept their apology for insulting a customer but the combativeness turned it into a bigger problem.

The_Amp_Walrus• 3 years ago

why does employer not say "dear whoever, this employee is clearly an idiot, and whatever they say on their private twitter does not represent our views"

seems easier than firing someone

wiseowise16• 3 years ago

Why would you want to keep toxic person in a company?

newaccount749• 3 years ago

Then they should be fired for being toxic, not for stepping on the wrong guys toes.

lelanthran8• 3 years ago

why does employer not say "dear whoever, this employee is clearly an idiot, and whatever they say on their private twitter does not represent our views"

Because:

1. It wasn't private, it was public and tagged the subject of the abuse directly.

2. "This employee" was on company time and actively representing the company at the time.

It doesn't matter what role you are, you are always at risk of getting fired if you embarrass your employer.

comprev2• 3 years ago

Arrogance got them fired, nothing else.

If you are at a tech conference, likely on company time, then you are in effect representing your employer. This includes the content of the constant stream of tweets.

King-Aaron7• 3 years ago

Being as I’m not an idiot

Well, I'm afraid to say after reading this, I have to disagree. Common sense would have made me consider not posting an inflammatory tweet like that, to be perfectly honest.

camillomiller7• 3 years ago

Do you realize you are all reinforcing that business must come always first before personal expression? It is factual that one person was touting instruments of war, but by most comments here that’s seen as “the right” because it’s representing “business”. What you’re all saying implicitly is that the rights of a corporate employer to make money are always above the freedom to personal expression, by contract, by law and so on. So if that is always true as many commenters seem to believe, I reiterate that you’re all confirming that contributing to corporate capitalism is incompatible with personal freedom.

King-Aaron7• 3 years ago

If you have signed an employment contract, then it's perfectly normal to be required to restrict your personal opinions when you are representing your employer.

This isn't some dystopian concept. This is how grownups behave. You are welcome to be an edgelord on your own time anonymously.

inertiatic2• 3 years ago

you’re all confirming that contributing to corporate capitalism is incompatible with personal freedom

Isn't it obvious? You're literally giving away more than a third of your life working these jobs to do things that you don't personally want or benefit from. You think the more restrictive thing that is being really imposed on you is being unable to tweet "Fuck you" instead of spending like half of your waking time away from your family and loved ones?

I'm personally not a fan of capitalism conceptually, not just the corporate kind, but it always strikes me as weird how other leftists think that's the unthinkable part, that someone would fire you for speaking out of line while still acknowledging that the other party is part of an organization that kills thousands and suppresses nations for oil for example.

yuliyp4• 3 years ago

This isn't anything particularly corporate. If you worked at a mom and pop restaurant and mouthed off with this level of vitriol about the customers you should expect to be fired.

I don't think there's any discussion about whether the OP had the right to make such comments. The employer also had a right to no longer employ them. Nobody's personal expression rights were violated, just the expression had consequences.

parineum11• 3 years ago

I reiterate that you’re all confirming that contributing to corporate capitalism is incompatible with personal freedom.

Nah, she should have quit and exercised her personal freedom to work for an employer she doesn't think is a war criminal. _That's_ how capitalism works, vote with your labor/dollar. Instead, she fought tooth and nail to keep that corporate job and the blood money that came with it.

Hamuko2• 3 years ago

Considering that this person was happily collecting a paycheck from a company that supplies DoD, I'd personally not make the "personal beliefs are more important than business" argument.

Gareth3212• 3 years ago

Do you realize you are all reinforcing that business must come always first before personal expression?

But it must. If an employer at Starbucks signs off every order with “Heil Hitler,” we should expect them to be fired. Companies don’t have to afford employees free speech when they are on company time.

bobsmooth• 3 years ago

Do you realize you are all reinforcing that business must come always first before personal expression?

Yes, businesses exist to do business not be a place where you can discuss your feelings.

easyThrowaway• 3 years ago

A full frontal attack is not always the best strategy while facing an opponent, ideological or not. Just saying.

They could've just posted asking if something as controversial and politically-biased as the DoD was the best fit for an international conference and if there had been any political interference and it would've carried the same weight.

jzb7• 3 years ago

The sticking point here for me is that this person was attending an event on the company dime. They were literally being paid to make the company look good by attending.

I’m still on the fence about this, I also think there’s probably context that we don’t have.

Tagging the speaker was also needlessly antagonistic. That IMO escalated it from snarking to picking a fight.

If they were at an event paying their own way, I’d be in agreement with you - but they were there to represent the company.

matheusmoreira4• 3 years ago

What you’re all saying implicitly is that the rights of a corporate employer to make money are always above the freedom to personal expression

Rather, it's the right to freely associate yourself with whoever you want. Not above freedom of expression but certainly not below either.

I wouldn't want to associate with certain people because of what they say and do. There are people who wouldn't want to associate with me either. This is fine. It gets a bit duplicitous when money and power are involved but that's to be expected.

TheRoque• 3 years ago

I don't see the issue with this one. If you are working for the company in the first place, you're making an agreement to give your energy, and contribute to this company. It doesn't make much sense to willingly enroll in a company to then criticize its clients and business. The fact that they now represent this company is also quite obvious... This employee of course has the freedom to express its discontent with the company, but then the company is also free to fire this employee for not fitting the culture. If both disagree, it makes sense that they part ways in the end.

nextlevelwizard4• 3 years ago

How is this any different than someone coming to your business and starting to yell at you, because they don't agree with your political views?

reflexco2• 3 years ago

So their employer pays for them to go to a conference and they don't see anything wrong with embarrassing their employer with inflammatory tweets against an arm of the government?

How would they react if it was the megacorp playing stupid by ignoring all common-sense and respect, and pointing at minutia in written guidelines to justify sociopathic actions?

cmdli2• 3 years ago

"Being as I’m not an idiot, I elect to bring a witness of my own (@lizthegrey ). She slightly livetweeted that conversation until VP VMware tells her to stop. "

This, I think, is the point that caused the firing. It's pretty clear that if you choose a witness who then posts everything publicly that you are not discussing in good faith. Like, it's your right to speak your mind, and maybe you think you are in the moral right, but if you intentionally antagonize the people you work with you won't be working with them for much longer.

grimgoldgo21• 3 years ago

You are allowed to discuss workplace conditions. That's like, protected concerted activity 101.

If the business was uncomfortable with their treatment of their employees being public, maybe that activity wasn't ethical.

cmdli2• 3 years ago

There's a difference between speaking publicly about workplace conditions and livetweeting the details of an individual conversation in a (likely) mocking tone. At that point, the only thing standing between you and being fired is whatever legal defense you can muster, because no reasonable person is going to want to work with you after that.

irjustin3• 3 years ago

It's the "live-tweeting" aspect. You're not showing a basic level of respect to the nature of the conversation.

once_inc3• 3 years ago

Bullshit. Bringing someone from outside a business to a conversation that "slightly livetweets" what is being said is totally not acceptable. I invite you to bring an outside party to your next business meeting, standup or all hands meeting and have them "slightly livetweet" it. You will find the door before the meeting ends.

Businesses have every right to some level of obscurity on what happens internally. There is a very clear difference between using a tape recorder or your smartphone to record a conversation (after clearly stating that you will do so!) and having someone without any relation to the company present and blurbing everything into the ether.

Demotolo• 3 years ago

What?

While I have an internal meeting I would NOT assume someone is life tweeting this.

IshKebab2• 3 years ago

You are allowed to do many things that will piss off your employer so they want to find a way to fire you.

pewpew20202• 3 years ago

and that was an "external" witness, not even an employee of the company. Which company would tolerate that? Social media has somehow conditioned people to think they can air all of their opinions with no filter and when there are consequences, they act surprised.

squeaky-clean4• 3 years ago

I took external to mean someone not involved in the conflict. If they actually were external to the company, that's insane and definitely cemented them being fired. Maybe even before the second round of live-tweeting.

iLoveOncall4• 3 years ago

I mean this is just baffling to me, why is VMWare even allowing her to bring a random person external to the company as a witness to a meeting related to a company's employee, and then that person decides to TWEET that meeting?

It sounds like some weird joke. What goes in those people's head?

re-thc3• 3 years ago

that you are not discussing in good faith

I'd think a VP (many levels above) coming to DM someone for a private chat isn't likely coming in good faith to begin with so it goes both ways.

colpabar• 3 years ago

If anyone is wondering who lizthegrey is, search for “consent accident” on your favorite search engine.

pengaru• 3 years ago

smh

swarnie3• 3 years ago

Flaming business partners on the internet can lose you your job?

Surely not....

This is why we use semi-anonymous services to post criticism.

berkle4455• 3 years ago

I'd have fired them too. You don't get to represent my company at a conference and be a total fucking bellend.

lynx23• 3 years ago

Really? On first meeting they brought a witness who sort of livewteeted the meeting? This is so weird, I wonder what is going on with author that they dont see by themselves what they are doing here? Feels like a case of totally missing any sort of self-reflection.

wiseowise16• 3 years ago

That’s terminal case of social media brain if I’ve ever seen one.

yungporko2• 3 years ago

this was most likely the only time they had ever had to deal with the consequences of their own actions.

basicoperation• 3 years ago

We’ve all worked with these people. Nice to see the company just get rid of one for once.

bigbacaloa2• 3 years ago

What this post really highlights is the complete lack of ethics that prevails in US business hiring practices.

All these clauses are coercive. It should be impossible to sign away what should be rights.

Rapzid• 3 years ago

Surely this is satire?

galkk12• 3 years ago

That person should've been fired, and it happened. Good riddance.

So what did I see "Fuck you" for slide where army officer praises Kubernetes and calls to join them. Then accusing him for blood on his hands. Then also connecting inability to negotiate better severance package when firing happened with Trump era...

My opinion always is: if in any shape or form your posts are related to work (e.g. that person was tweeting about conference attendance, that conference attendance was on behalf of her employer, for fucks sake), then you should have separate account and strictly separate your opinions.

The things that I read both in post and in referenced tweets, actually, did remind me about Timnit Gebru and her story with Google (opinion below is my own and in no means reflect anything else, as Google is my employer). I was curious about Gebru and read her twitter for some time after her departure. God lord, the toxicity is over the top. I even learned a bit of the anti-white racist dictionary such as "white aligned". But, of course, as I'm eastern European immigrant, I still speak from the historical position of patriarchal white privilege, so my opinion doesn't matter.

gordian-not• 3 years ago

If you’re truly curious and a Google employeee you should open moma and see how toxic she really was and how she was handled with kid gloves

IshKebab2• 3 years ago

What's moma?

techcontractor• 3 years ago

I’m an IT contractor working in gov, and I’ve worked in a huge number of autocratic governments around the world that would be considered “the bad guys”. Many of the regimes that mistreat their citizens and workers.

And you know who’s always there with big contracts and consultants?

That’s right: VMware (and oracle and others…)

If one were to start virtue signaling (which I’m clearly not prone to do given my work history) I think it’s hard to argue that the DOD is worse than VMWare.

theobeers2• 3 years ago

She was right to speak out, and her employer was within its rights to fire her. As long as she subsequently found a job at a company that comes closer to sharing her values, it sounds like a win-win.

kome3• 3 years ago

indeed! and kids remember: VMware likes to work with merchants of death.

swarnie3• 3 years ago

Speak out against what exactly?

Defence is one of the most vital sectors in a countries continued existence, coming just after food and water.

the-printer• 3 years ago

There is something of a paradox that I feel exist, at least in the US, with regards to the defense sector. I don’t agree with its ethics or morals as they exists in the country, but I’m curious how others reconcile their privileges in comparison to other regions with the fact that said privileges can be attributed to the US’s tremendous military scale domestically and globally.

One could even argue that defense even precedes food and water at this stage also.

theobeers2• 3 years ago

The screenshot of the DoD recruitment pitch from the conference set off a little "military-industrial complex alarm" in my mind. To be clear, I wouldn't have tagged the guy in a mean tweet. I would have just frowned and gone on with my day. But I think it's crucial that the voices of people like this blogger be present in tech communities.

xupybd2• 3 years ago

I'm pro free speech and hate when people get cancelled for their beliefs. I don't think firing was appropriate based on the story told in the article, but also recommend not acting like the author. Not to avoid being fired but to follow the basic life rule "don't be a dick".

josephcsible5• 3 years ago

I wouldn't call this being "cancelled". IMO, getting fired can only mean being cancelled if it was for something not work related.

xupybd2• 3 years ago

Yeah I think you might be correct. I used the wrong term but I guess what I don't like is the idea of calling someone's boss to get them fired for saying something mean online.

On the other side I'd not want people on my team to represent my work place like this. If I was a coworker I'd rather see them removed. Those tweets were gratuitously unprofessional in the setting of a work conference.

Yizahi3• 3 years ago

It wasn't work related, no? She wrote from the personal account, not from the @vmware or something.

I'm not pro insults on twitter. But I think much bigger problem than the insults is the way corporations try to claim everything as "work related". If that specific account or whole media (Twitter) had been explicitly mentioned as her job responsibilities, then I guess corporation was in the right, claiming that it was for work. But just trying to blanket control whole human lives during the employment period is bad. Bad for us, employees.

6nf• 3 years ago

Insta-fire

imjonse• 3 years ago

I agree she's obnoxious (as is anyone tweeting too much), and tweeting that is kind of rude, but would she get more positive reviews here if she were a Tencent/Yandex employee and had tweeted the equivalent of FU at a presentation of a Chinese/Russian military tech representative?

thom• 3 years ago

Shame about their financial package but it feels like the system mostly works. People should be free to be their whole selves at work and in public and they shouldn’t want to work anywhere that fires them for that. Obviously many people don’t have the privilege to live that way, and more’s the pity.

yumraj• 3 years ago

This sounds exactly like the person who first does something stupid, then instead of accepting their mistake doubles down on it and takes several steps to make it much much worse, and then when has to face the consequences blogs about it with a straight face while trying to get public sympathy.

Is there a word for this kind of behavior?

For what it’s worth, IMHO, VMWare comes across as extremely mature.

x3n0ph3n32• 3 years ago

This person came from the Pivotal acquisition, which is saturated with toxic people who don't produce much of value.

ojhughes2• 3 years ago

They were ex-Heptio I believe.

iLoveOncall4• 3 years ago

Is there a word for this kind of behavior?

Mental illness.

Pannoniae• 3 years ago

For me, as someone not an American, this level of polarisation and abrasivity is almost unimaginable for me. Like, intentionally provoking people then painting them as dicks when they get enough of it.

Like, this wasn't even about tweeting political opinions and then being fired for it (which is way less black-and-white than this and I could absolutely have sympathy if that happened), this was straight-up telling "fuck you" to someone when representing the employer at a personal event.

throwoutway2• 3 years ago

Most Americans would see this person's behavior as polarizing and abrasive, and most employers would seek to fire anyone exhibiting this behavior, and especially with the subsequent actions. This post is just doubling down and shows they have not learned anything. The community of commenters/friends are reinforcing the negative behavior

wolframhempel2• 3 years ago

I very much agree with the general sentiment here, but I want to make a separate point about tech's relationship to defense which is also portrait in these tweets. Much has been written about the DoD's funding of early Silicon Valley companies - but today, this relationship has been largely severed with giants like Google refusing to provide their tech for defense and military purposes.

I THINK THIS IS A MASSIVE MISTAKE.

War exists. It is as old as humankind. We could wish it wouldn't, but it does. And history has shown again and again that the way to avoid war is not in de-arming, appeasing or otherwise refusing to participate, but in obtaining a level of military and economic strength that makes it unattractive for others to attack you.

Silicon Valley has the potential to generate this overwhelming strength, but it declines to do so. And the few companies that do, such as Palantir or Anduril are often shunned by their peers.

I believe that Silicon Valley could play a unique role in ensuring a lasting global peace and is held back by shortsighted sentiments. Or, to put it into fancy Latin:

Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum

rmetzler2• 3 years ago

So your view is that the military power of the US brings peace to the rest of the world?

wolframhempel2• 3 years ago

That is too absolute a statement. But generally, yes, I believe that a militarily strong US that has an interest in global trade makes war much less likely.

Of course, one of the inherent problems of having a strong military is the temptation to use it - and the US has certainly done so multiple times in ill-advised fashion in Irak, Kuwait or Vietnam to name just a few.

But having a military superpower like the US that's more interested in economic and cultural expansion than in direct land grabs is certainly an important counterweight to Russian or Chinese ambition. I believe a world with a militarily weak US would have seen much less "Pax Americana" and much more aggressive, expansionary wars since 1945.

wiseowise16• 3 years ago

Absolutely, yes.

A tiny fraction of western weapons allowed Ukraine to hold against Russian war machine and even have prospects of counter offensive. I can’t imagine the hell on earth if it kicked in full force and went to war against anyone.

supriyo-biswas2• 3 years ago

This has been upvoted by many people on HN, so I guess it has some value for folks here, but can anyone enlighten me as to how this outrage porn is supposed to result in curious conversation? (For anyone wondering, I flagged it.)

newaccount749• 3 years ago

It's an interesting insight into work place politics inside a big tech company. It's certainly interesting to hear that even though you may be a well paid professional, your employment is still at the whims of a bunch of spineless execs who'd prefer to fire an employee that they paid a lot of money to hire, rather than finding a way to deal with Twitter drama in a reasonable way.

I found it especially interesting that the DoD dude apparently had a history of using his position to get people fired who insulted him on Twitter (or at least trying to do so).

tzekid2• 3 years ago

That's disingenuous of you. This article sparks conversations about workplace boundaries and corpo vs personal ethics and rights, as can be clearly seen by the other comments.

supriyo-biswas2• 3 years ago

We agree on the fact that it does spark conversation, I’m just not sure whether it’s the right kind of conversation for this place.

newaccount749• 3 years ago

Yeah, unfortunately important topics like these are typically flagged on HN and quickly disappear from the front page.

I understand why -- they tend to lead to flamewars. But I'm not sure if hiding issues like this is a good choice.

(Aside: I think it's telling that the apparent majority on HN is on Goliaths side in this case. Usually we're more on the side of the underdog. I wonder if that's just the latent misogyny showing, or if it's because OP is left leaning, or because of the pink homepage with the ponies.)

afiori• 3 years ago

I do not understand what the closign remark is meant to say

And when he publicly resigned in 2021 he worried about how in the future “China has the drastic advantage of population over the U.S.”

Given its place it feels like it has a very clear subtext, but I cannot figure out what it could be.

luispauloml• 3 years ago

Had the HR deparment said something like

We became aware that you dislike one of our clients, and that you have strong beliefs that we shouldn't do business with them. Given that, we decided that you should not work with us because you think we shouldn't do business the way we do.

what would have happened? Could this clear and direct justification still be used as basis for a lawsuit from the employee?

dustypotato• 3 years ago

. And when he publicly resigned in 2021 he worried about how in the future “China has the drastic advantage of population over the U.S.” I invite you to draw your own conclusions about this guy.

I don't know anything about this guy, but if this is an attempt to portray him as a racist, it's a pathetic one at that.

yakshaving_jgt• 3 years ago

Zero sympathy for this person. The behaviour described is unprofessional, immature, and frankly quite toxic.

Not to mention a fairly stupid opinion; some of my colleagues arguably have the US DoD to thank for not being victims of russia's genocide. I couldn't imagine my colleagues having to deal with this drama bullshit on top of sheltering from missile attacks on civilians.

How depressing.

yungporko2• 3 years ago

sounds like their employer was being more than fair. honestly the thumbnail tells you all you need to know about this person lol.

apexalpha• 3 years ago

This would even be grounds for firing in the Netherlands, which has the most rigorous employee protections on the planet.

I mean in what world do you go to a conference on company time, as a representative of that company and then type "Fuck you" to one of your biggest customers?

icu• 3 years ago

This situation is complicated and I've noticed most of the top posters saying they would fire the employee immediately. However, the behaviour expectations weren't communicated properly post acquisition and it's really the company's management who are responsible for protecting the company from these situations. Imho the situation is something like, it's the employee's fault, but not their responsibility. Management should have done a lot more to prevent this happening and communicate to all employees expectations in a clear way. Imho the VP should have taken the L, communicated a clear policy and then dealt with the angry customer personally. This whole sacrificial 'fire the employee' thing makes the company and the VP look weak and pathetic. It's much harder to meditate and communicate towards an amicable resolution.

000ooo000• 3 years ago

Is this a defense of tweeting "fuck you" at a customer based in the company not having said "don't tweet 'fuck you' at customers"? Is there some ambiguity at play here, like in some cases employees are encouraged to tweet fuck you at customers? I'm puzzled

Apocryphon17• 3 years ago

Presumably there are companies that consider your social media part of your personal life and beyond the purview of corporate scrutiny. Maybe the reason why the author felt entitled to act this way was because their company permitted them to tweet like this prior to the VMWare acquisition.

HDThoreaun2• 3 years ago

Imho the VP should have taken the L, communicated a clear policy and then dealt with the angry customer personally.

This is exactly what happened. But when communicating the policy the poster flat out refused to follow it and brought their bud to the meeting to insultingly live tweet it. Insulting the VP and refusing to follow the policy after that meeting is what got them fired.

nextlevelwizard4• 3 years ago

Not being able to comply with “Avoid topics involving age, sex, race, religion, ethnicity, politics or disabilities.” is pretty odd, but then again I guess this is your average Twitter user.

Apocryphon17• 3 years ago

Not even Hacker News can avoid those topics these days, especially politics. The world is Twitter now, partly because of Twitter.

nextlevelwizard4• 3 years ago

Pretty easy to just not engage on those topics. Just don't comment.

fennecfoxy• 3 years ago

Lmao, this is like the time the furry posted about getting a job at NASA and excitedly told someone to "suck their dick and balls" and that person turned out to be on the NASA council (https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/nasa-internship-twitte...).

It worked out in the end as he correctly surmised that she was just young, dumb and excited and tried to work to get her the position back. However the crappy side of furries (well anybody online) targeted the poor dude even though he was completely correct to call her out on her language.

As a furry myself I completely separate it from work, why someone would ever mention work or any other professional part of their lives on a "I like cartoon animals" account is beyond me. It's easy to be necessarily vicious and reactive/emotional online and I do it all the time myself, but I never involve my job.

Perhaps it's a context problem, being used to particular environments, say professional & unprofessional, when someone makes the mistake of being unprofessional in their unprofessional environment (their personal Twitter) but there are links to the professional environment (colleagues on Twitter) then trouble happens.

OP was big-headed and was posting all this conference shit from their personal Twitter account looks like. They should've been posting it from a work account and not gone off the rails. If they want to bitch about the DoD fine, I can totally understand, but do it on personal account and don't involve your work/job in any way. Explain what you don't like about the DoD rather than "fuck you".

RickJWagner• 3 years ago

There's too much insensitivity these days. People think it's perfectly fine to state their opinion as fact and be completely rude to anyone else. I believe it should stop.

So I'm sorry for this individual, but glad it happened. It needs to happen more.

BossHogg• 3 years ago

These comments are suspiciously light on anti-cancel culture rants. Wonder why.

josephcsible5• 3 years ago

Because it's not cancel culture when the reason you got fired is work-related.

BasedAnon2• 3 years ago

telling the DoD to fuck off is pretty based, but yeah losing your job is a likely outcome of that

1000bestlives3• 3 years ago

Hope her new job fires her after reading this. They clearly missed red flags in the interviews

josephcsible5• 3 years ago

I wouldn't go that far. You'd basically be stooping to the cancel mobs' level with that.

gusfoo• 3 years ago

I would have fired this person immediately. Gross misconduct -> instant dismissal.

cantsingh• 3 years ago

Yeah, I agree with the author's moral stances, but I'd fire them too.

tonnydourado• 3 years ago

Y'all are really telling on yourselves by shitting on OP. It's all about defending freedom of speech until the speech is a gay furry communist telling the army to fuck off.

Should OP have tweeted as they did, specially while attending an event *on behalf* of their employer? Yeah, it is asking for trouble. Yeah, the company does have a right to fire them.

What should be extremely grinding y'all gears though is:

1. A government employee should NEVER be the initiator of such an event. Even if it's legal, smells A LOT like the government trying to silence citizens.

2. The minute the company says "we'll accept your resignation" and tried to get out of paying what OP was owed, they become the bad guys, doesn't matter how obnoxious OP might be. If you wanna fire someone, have the balls to actually fire them and pay up whatever was agreed to in the contract.

I'll give a bit of a pass on 2, because a lot of HN commenters are Americans, and Americans are brainwashed by their shitty work laws, they lost perspective of what is fair in an employer/employee relationship.

But 1? Reverse the ideologies and this post would've been front page for 3 weeks.

irrational3• 3 years ago

I pointed out the social media guidelines were basically impossible to follow

Can someone explain why they are impossible to follow? Just… don’t tweet (or use other social media) and you are following them, right? Apparently I’ve been doing the impossible since forever.

smsm426• 3 years ago

So, we have here:

A person that publicly curses out the military, while on a job conference paid by her employer, and while the military is their client, and adds vile personal attacks to that. The justification for it - "I was mad". Sure, then of course it makes it ok, of course if you're mad the rules no longer apply to you, sorry we even asked.

Refuses to promise she wouldn't keep doing it, while having the gall to "propose to improve" the guidelines so that they suit her personally. Probably adding "all the above doesn't apply if the employee feels mad at DoD for existing".

Refuses to admit there's anything wrong about inflammatory offensive cussing (I'm not talking about serene or even heated political debate, "fuck you" is not that) - again, while being on the job, and repeatedly being suggested by hr that it's not how things are done.

Signing the NDA, because sweet sweet money.

Violating the NDA as soon as she's sure they won't ask for the money back, because agreements are for other people to follow.

Somehow making it all Trumps fault because sure, that's what Trump was doing for 4 years, personally ensuring this person could not tell her bombshell story.

Looks like a nice person to work with, yep.

iJohnDoe• 3 years ago

I wonder if they are posting themselves out of a job again.

sizzle• 3 years ago

Why do people gloss over the fact that they signed a contract stating their employment is “at will” meaning they can be let go for a multitude of reasons outside of being in a protected class.

This person’s entitlement is on another level. They aren’t guaranteed a job and insulting high ranking officials will get you sacked 99% of the time, on top of the thousands of other reasons your employer can let you go.

That Time I Posted Myself Out Of a Job

Related Stories