Recently a Twitter contact and fellow sex blogger was fired from her job for her private life and as she puts it, “Clark Kent” identity on the web. She blogged about her open relationship and her escapades using the nom de plume: “The Beautiful Kind”.

It appears her employer, a non-profit, was running Google searches (and possibly more background checking, I think) on current employees in an attempt to dig-up any dirt on those employees that could be potentially compromising to the company. In doing so some old information from her Twitter account came-up with her real name and her Twitter nom de plume, and thus further Googling lead to her blog and a whole lot of really dirty stories I’m sure the “researcher” and the boss wanked-off to for hours.

When she arrived at work on April 27 she was immediately dismissed from her position with the company for her private life, that had someone not dug really, really deep would never have been discovered. To boot, she wasn’t in any position in the company that anyone outside the company would have been looking for her name, in short she was an office drone, not management, her name was nowhere on articles of incorporation.

Her boss wrote to her in her termination letter:

“We simply cannot risk any possible link between our mission and the sort of photos and material that you openly share with the online public. While I know you are a good worker and an intelligent person, I hope you try to understand that our employees are held to a different standard. When it comes to private matters, such as one’s sexual explorations and preferences, our employees must keep their affairs private.”

Dear Mr. Employer, what per se is that “standard” that your employees are held to that is different than other comparable companies, and wouldn’t her private life remained private had you not been digging for something with which to nail one of your employees on? Would her private life not remained private if you had not been sticking your nose into her bedroom?

Where do you draw the line of what is your life at work and what is your life away from work? As is, our employers have great control over our after-work activities, from drinking and drugs to when we actually get time off, and anyone who signs the back of the paycheck instead of the front can tell you that according to their employer there is never a “good” time to take vacation or take a sick day.

I personally recently lost a part-time job due to breaking one of my own rules and getting involved with coworker, and although she knew up-front what my relationship status was, when shit went south with her she filed a complaint with HR against me. I was honest with HR in regards to my relationship with my wife and my relationship with her. She lied about many things. She still works there and I was let go for “inappropriate behavior” (see this post for the back story).

I also think a recent job offer was retracted after the employer that had offered the job I had accepted hooked-up to me on Facebook (obviously I pretty much had to accept his “friend request”) and three days later I got an email stating the position was “on hold” and the company “wasn’t sure which direction we are going in this division”. I think my liberal politics and support of LGBT issues did me in with this Conservative-leaning employer. My Facebook has no mention that my wife and I are in an open relationship.

As many have said though, if your boss and coworkers can’t accept you as you are, if you have to pretend to be someone else at work than who you are, do you really want to work there?

In today’s economy here in the U.S. I don’t know if the answer to that is “to thine ownself be true and be happy and broke” or “be an actor and be who they want you to be but unhappy”?

Where does the line between being who you are outside of work and discrimination in the workplace blur? Lesbian, gay, and transgendered people have been fighting this fight for years.

Regardless, the Internet and social media is rapidly redefining the workplace and workers’ place in it.

Related articles by Zemanta

• A Very Personal Message from The Beautiful Kind (aagblog.com)
• How to Keep Your Privacy Safe(r) on Facebook (atomiurl.com)

I just read this article at Adult Industry News about Scott Janke, the Town Manager of Fort Meyers Beach, FL, who was fired because it was discovered by some nosy self-proclaimed do-gooder that his wife is a porn star working under an assumed name.  I personally have a few problems with this:

How did the wannabe do-gooder discover she was in porn?  Was he/she using a city-supplied computer or city-supplied bandwidth to surf porn on the Net and suddenly said to themselves “Jesus Christ, that looks like Scott’s wife!”  Obviously they knew somehow and why isn’t THAT an issue?

Second, City Council member Bob Raymond stated “In these types of jobs, trust is a very important thing. If you lose that, you’re losing a big thing.”  How is Mrs. Janke being in porn a trust issue?  Is she going to sell top secret town information to Ron Jeremy?  Oh yeah, because you have sex with a man other than your husband, and your husband allows it, both of you are now untrustworthy.  You can’t be trusted with town business, money or town secrets – like who’s fucking who, and let’s face it, statistically speaking half of those on the City Council are cheating on their spouse.

So lets say that someone else on the council like huge dildos… Do they get fired because they “deviate” from the “norm”?  What if one of the councilmen like to dress-up in woman’s clothes in private?  What if one of the men like to fuck their wife in the ass, or one of the women like it in the ass and anal sex is viewed as “deviant behavior” and offends another City Council member?  Do they get fired?

The possibilities of such judgments by others is endless.

Now I’m going out on a limb here, but I’d bet if their uncovered activities simply included some threesomes with hot chicks there wouldn’t be a problem.  But, because another man if fucking Mr. Janke’s wife, nevermind getting paid for, there is where the behavior is seen as less than acceptable.

Lucretia MacEvil and I have run into this ourselves.  We had a coworker at a company we both worked at that knew we had somewhat of an open relationship.  It was all because when she worked with this same person at another company she was coming back from lunch one day when he and another guy were also walking in and he asked her “You and Lucius have been married for 6 years, how do you and keep things interesting?” and she answered with a smirk “We throw another girl into the mix every now and then.”  Word spread fast through her office and I was viewed as a god by the other men.  I mean I got to fuck my wife AND her hot girlfriends!  Eventually we all worked together and they never knew anything additional because as one of the guys put it “I have no problem mowing my neighbor’s grass, but nobody mows mine.”  If he had known that she fucked other men also she would have been instantly labeled a “slut” and we both would have lost our jobs.  Other women = cool.  Other men = deviant and loss of job.

Amazing how the male mind works and how well men have brainwashed many women over centuries of conditioning to believe the same and label their sisters as “sluts” for being sexual beings.  As Erica Jong said “Woman is doomed to live in a double bind which is at once psychological and physical: she is damned for doing the very thing that keeps the race alive.  Man, for his part, is damned for partaking of that guilty sexuality, and doomed to wander the world turning virgins into whores, then cursing his fate in having no true mate to love.”

This whole case has little to do with “right” or “appropriateness” and all to do with narrow-mindedness and  judgment based on insecurities and fears of those afraid of their own sexuality much less their partners.

It vividly illustrates though how any couple who has a relationship outside of the monogamous male/female type can be discriminated against at work and lose their job, lifestyle and security for simply being “different” than their superiors are.  It is discrimination, just like sexual orientation or racial.  What goes on in a person’s life outside of work should not be an issue at work unless it is something like robbing banks or selling meth or molesting children.  Unfortunately though, many states are “right-to-work” states and people can be fired for no reason other than “because” without any recourse.  Until that changes there will truly not be any equality in any workplace.

Authors note: This post is a little scattered, but I was writing as this was rushing through my head and needed to be put in print.

A big issue I see in the whole “married” persons debate and same sex marriages is that you cannot give people rights entitled to married persons, such as medical, taxes, and other legal tidbits without them being “married”.  There are too many regs on the books that specify “married”, all of which would have to be changed, which would require every State’s legislature, and the Federal government in many cases, to change via vote thousands of statutes and regulations and laws.  Because of partisan politics this process will take an indefinite amount of time (i.e. it will never happen).

The point being here that it will be simpler to change the definition of “marriage” than it will be to change or add to the parameters for “married” benefits to all civil unions.

The whole marriage vs. civil union debate also brings-up an important question: Since my wife and I were married by the County Clerk and not by a religious body, do we have a “civil union” or a “marriage”.  Under the LDS Church and other’s definition of marriage the union must be recognized by them to be considered a valid “marriage”.  Therefore my wife and I are not technically married and simply have a civil union since we were married in a civil, not religious ceremony.  So, under this presumption do we really have the same legal rights as someone married in the LDS Temple or by a representative of the LDS Church or any other church?

But given the nature of civil unions as described above, why does the LDS Church and others oppose same-sex couples from being joined in legal partnership by a civil servant also.  They say they don’t, but they do oppose the same ceremony being used for these people.

The double-talk and loose definitions are a huge problem in fighting this whole issue.  I think before any progress can be made, the terms “marriage” and “civil union” and religion’s role in each is going to have to be clearly defined by all.

~ Lucius Scribbens