Firing was over-reaction

Firing was over-reaction

Posted Mar 25, 2013 20:45 UTC (Mon) by Nelson (subscriber, #21712)
In reply to: Firing was over-reaction by dskoll
Parent article: Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost

What I find disturbing was the two firings. Maybe the people in question behaved badly, but who among us hasn't overreacted occasionally or done something stupid in public? I don't think people deserve to lose their jobs over something like this.

I'm struggling with this one.

It seems to me, when you have 12,000 twitter followers and rather than addressing the guys directly or asking the conference to do it for you if you're not comfortable with it (let's not forget, there were at least 2 non-public ways to address this) shaming them is more than an overreaction. I'm not sure where the line lies, but at 12,000 followers, that's akin to putting it on the news. Referring to it as an overreaction just seems a little disingenuous. This is clearly a person that has done tons of self-promotion, has cultivated a following and has some idea how media works and knows the value of it.

Firing a person that is supposed to represent your company and does that seems like a fairly sensible thing. Unless of course they want to go even more public and say what it was exactly that was said which was so offensive and make the case for what they did... That blows my mind too, I know I'll sound like I'm sexist or something but what exactly was this joke that was so offensive to just over hear?

Likewise, if you're at a conference with your company name on your pass and you're telling some off color jokes and your company has a policy about that, what happens happens. Seems a little extreme but that's not exactly bringing good press to your company. An overreaction? Sure but we're talking about Playhaven and I had never even heard of them before this. Again, hearing the actual offending jokes or comments might sway one's opinion one way or the other, policy is policy though. And with this much attention, I don't see how they can't enforce policy.

I'll say something else that a lot of the geeks and nerds will dislike. Why isn't twitter taking a beating for allowing all the anonymous sniping? There is something to be said for some anonymity and the ability to tweet with a pseudonym or something but rape threats?!? Seems like twitter could shut that down pretty easily or at least provide some mechanisms for tracking the offenders down.

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