Can you really lose your job for posting an opinion on Twitter, or even for clicking “like” on somebody else’s message? Surprising though it may be to employees who expect firms to indulge their odd working hours, their tastes in coffee and their pets, the answer is often yes. Pascal Besselink, an employment lawyer in the Netherlands, reckons that about one in ten abrupt sackings there is connected to behaviour on social media.
Controversial opinions were once expressed in bars after work, and went no further. Today Twitter and other social media broadcast employees’ thoughts; they also make it easy for anyone who is offended to put together a mob and retaliate against the poster and their employer. Jittery firms respond by sacking the offender. A firm may judge its self-interest correctly when it punishes workers who speak out. Though it is not necessarily in companies’ interests to allow the free expression of opinion, it is clearly in society’s interest.
There is also a difference between what people do at work and what they do outside. Speech is like a dress code. Just as companies can demand that their employees look the part while at work, they should be able to restrict what they say there, provided they are clear and fair about it. After people go home, though, they should be able to express their opinions freely, just as they are free to change into jeans and a t-shirt.
