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Comment by paulmd | Hacker News Reader

It's pretty well-established that you can be fired or suffer repercussions by your employer, for things that you do on your own personal time. There's plenty of people who did something shocking or offensive, a video went viral, and they found they'd lost their mcjob, so let's not pretend this is unusual at all.

If anything stricter standards should be applied to upper management than to the rank-and-file, because part of the job is absolutely to be publically representing facebook, so it's really unsurprising that people are perceiving it as such. Keeping your nose clean is part of why they pay you the big bucks.

Kaplan is free to go to this as a private citizen, people are free to be shocked by it, and Facebook is free to do something about it if the negative attention becomes a liability. That's how things work.

Unlike the McJob worker, if they do want to get rid of him, he'll have a nice golden parachute, I'm sure.

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While all those statements are technically true, the band of what has become acceptable in Silicon Valley has apparently swung so far to the left that supporting a respected US Circuit Judge in his nomination to the Supreme Court is enough to cause “shock.” In my view, that is the problem - some in our generation believe there is a right to be shielded from dissenting viewpoints to the extent that it has become acceptable in SV to potentially fire someone for what is considered a perfectly reasonable position in most parts of the country.

> some in our generation believe there is a right to be shielded from dissenting viewpoints

I don't think that is the problem at all. Its not that people want to be shielded from dissenting viewpoints, its that the vast majority of people on the right and the left are basically entirely politically disenfranchised, while people like Zuckerberg or Kaplan hold a vastly inordinate amount of power through their connections and their money. What we are seeing here isn't "lefty people crushing dissent", it is "people organizing around and exercising one of the only viable channels of political influence that they have (challenging the means of production of their billionaire boss) in order to exert a tiny amount of political power".

Except in this case Zuckerberg likely agrees with their cause. You don’t see calls from conservative employees at Facebook to fire Sheryl Sandburg for her support of Barack Obama because the predominant political orientation in SV is liberal.

Respected by who? The ACLU, a number of bar associations, several law schools, countless other judges, and even his own roommates have publically denounced Kavanaugh. Don’t pretend this is a matter of ideology.

Interesting that you bring up the ACLU here, several lawyers I know have expressed a bit of surprise at the ACLU denouncing Kavanaugh-as they have a long and established track record of NOT speaking out one way or another on SCOTUS nominations-to say nothing of this move being outside of their very on policy on the affair.

Oh please... Kavanaugh is obviously on the conservative end of the spectrum, but to say he isn’t a respected judge is ridiculous. This is a guy who went to Yale law, clerked for a Supreme Court justice, was a partner at a top law firm and worked his way up to being a US circuit judge. In other words, prior to July, he had probably the most impressive resume you could possibly have for a Supreme Court nomination.

> you can be fired or suffer repercussions by your employer, for things that you do on your own personal time

Yes this happens, but should it be the case? Is this something you morally support? Should people be fired for smoking weed in their personal time? Posting on social media? Making a joke to a friend? Donating a political campaign?

People have been fired for these things but I don't think it should be lauded. I don't think its healthy for companies to monitor their employee's personal life, so they can punish them at work.

The people in charge of these firings are executives like Zuckerberg and Kaplan. It's completely disengenous to phrase the argument as "should this happen at all?" when it's really "should executives be allowed to punish workers for their personal life choices, while not holding themselves to the same standards?"

Are you saying that it is a bad thing. But since it is happening it should happen to everyone? If so, it just seems like you're propagating more of bad thing.

Why not just advocate for the the corporate world to be more accepting of personal life choices? Firing Kaplan doesn't get you any closer to that.

Because they are not going to be more accepting. The leadership is only trying to pull this argument out because it bothers them.

I agree that when all else is equal, we shouldn't do bad things to one person just because they happened to someone else. All else is not equal here. Given the power Facebook has over their employees lives and in politics in general, they are like a feudal lord. When they stop enforcing the rules on just them and their friends, that's a breakdown of the rule of law which leads to a breakdown of social harmony and leads to people starting to rebel against leadership like you see here with Facebook's employees

If the realistic thing is that the higher ups are going to oppress the workers, it's also the realistic thing that they aren't going to oppress themselves.

I would love to be a fly on the wall in whatever court room is utilized for the inevitable lawsuit that comes from someone getting fired for attending a government function that is arguably in the interest of public policy like a SCOTUS confirmation hearing.

Especially when that person has the job title of "VP of Global Public Policy", at-will or right-to-work laws be damned.

Edit: And no. This isn't me saying that's what should happen or even trying to publicly litigate whether or not such a person would win or should win. Just that that behavior sounds like something that would immediately get an employee sued and I'd really be interested to hear the legal arguments from both sides and the opinion of the court.

So we pivot from "he's just a private citizen supporting his friend on his own time, nothing to do with Facebook!" back to "he's representing Facebook in his professional capacity as a senior management figure"? You can't have it both ways.

Being honest here, there is no direct connection to Facebook's interests. This is not a court case in which Facebook has some stake, at best they would just be there to "show the colors".

Either way you take it, someone is supporting Kav here. It's either Kaplan personally, or Facebook professionally.

(and again, I am also not commenting here about whether he should be confirmed or not, but let's not pretend that everybody just showed up for a free 8oz bottle of water. Whether Kaplan's interest is personal or official, there is an interest.)

I'm not trying to have it both ways, I'm remarking that there may be a very simple and good reason for Kaplan to appear while recognizing there could be very interesting outcomes if-as you put it-he or anyone else were to lose their job for it.

This isn't a remarkably difficult exercise of mental plurality. Nor is it one of partisan critique.

If someone attends a government function as a private citizen and is fired for it, I think that would make for an interesting set of legal questions with regards to employment law.

If someone were fired for doing the same even in an official capacity, that-to me-would be even more interesting. Since you brought up strict standards for certain levels of employees, I responded to that. You can't very logically say my response to this is trying to have it both ways if all I've done is respond to your talking points.

That's all there is to that, imo. Don't read between the lines here because there's really nothing there to read; I am positing that one really doesn't need to connect many dots for Kaplan's attendance at these hearings, but I can entertain the idea you presented: that being fired for attending a government function would make for interesting legal theater as an impartial and dispassionate onlooker.

> It's pretty well-established that you can be fired or suffer repercussions by your employer, for things that you do on your own personal time.

In California, you cannot he fired for political activity. Not saying that his act was political activity, but if he is fired for it, it would be because it’s being viewed as a political activity.

Tell that to Brendan Eich.

Brendan Eich wasn't fired. He stepped down voluntarily.

https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2014/04/03/brendan-eich-steps-...

You know, forced resignation is a legally recognized construct. I don't pretend to have any idea what actually happened behind the scenes here, but given the circumstances I can't blindly take his resignation at face value.

I wouldn't blame you for it, either. Just stating the facts as we have them

Speaking purely hypothetically, there are three possibilities:

1. I resigned without negotiating a constructive separation.

2. I resigned but with a constructive separation leveraged by legal and other (e.g., public relations) risks inherent in (1) and (3), but about which I cannot talk.

3. I was fired under color of resignation, but I for some reason did not pursue legal action under CA Labor Law (1101,1102).

Hope this helps! Probably not, but it should put a stake through any false dilemma (binary exclusive/exhaustive choice).

I'm well aware this is a completely public forum, yet I can't help but feel a bit as though the boss showed up to the water cooler while we were talking about him. I'd like to clarify that my comment wasn't intended to draw things off topic and towards your case specifically, but rather to express my general frustration with what I felt was being implied. I find the idea of presenting something as a counterexample without any consideration of the context to be rather objectionable, particularly when it comes to political topics.

To respond to the content of your post, while your list does cover the legal aspect, it doesn't address the broader topic of whether or not someone can be effectively fired for political activity (though I do appreciate that you in particular might not be legally permitted to address that topic given the current context). Unfortunately, when it comes to contentious topics the appearance at least is that people can often be forced out in one way or another regardless of what the law might say.

Regarding your item 3, and in relation to the broader topic of this thread, in the general case (not you specifically) it would not surprise me at all if someone failed to pursue legal action after being fired (or effectively fired) for political activity. Reasons that immediately come to mind include:

1. Legal action is generally quite expensive in this country.

2. Cases involving intent (hiring, firing, racism, sexism, etc) are notoriously difficult.

3. If the political view is even remotely unpopular, the risk of being run through the media may be unacceptable. Consider not just the general aversion most people have to public exposure, but also the impact on future job searches and other similar things.

As a practical example of your average person not wanting to deal with public exposure and controversy, consider the proportion of people who post to this very website under pseudonyms (myself included). Even if you only tally those who keep their posts professional 100% of the time, it's still most of them.

Good comment, just a few quick points referring to your numbered items (note: not mine).

1. Contingency fee basis is common.

2. CA 1101&1102 protect employees from political firing and coercion. Many are unaware of state law variation here. Check them out: https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio... https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio...

Good point on pseudonyms. The Federalist Papers are a famous example of practical pseudonymity. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Federalist_Papers#Author...

Ok, wow, those really don't seem to leave any room for "creative" interpretations. Thanks for the links! I'm impressed - all too often protections get watered down when being passed into law. I particularly like the inclusion of "or tending to control or direct" in CA 1101.

That being said, my point 2 was that regardless of the strength of protections provided you still have to demonstrate intent (or for CA 1101 "tendency" I suppose) in court. No idea how high that bar is in CA, but regardless, depending on circumstances that really could be very challenging.

I do have to wonder how employers are going to reconcile this with our increasingly connected, reactionary, and polarized culture going forward. Use of social media alone presumably qualifies as "engaging or participating in politics" at this point, so what happens if, for example, a CA employee starts publicly shitposting about a political topic, someone figures out where they work, and things escalate? Your case and Mr. Kaplan's would seem to be only the tip of the iceberg...

Kaplan won't be fired, I'm sure: connected friend of Zuck, at FB pre-IPO, VP of global policy. James Damore is a better case, and CA 1101 & 1102 are in fact cited in that amended lawsuit: https://www.dhillonlaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/201804....

Contingency fee plus colorable claim often means settlement way before hearing or trial, with non-disclosure clause to keep secrets after. Hard to know how often this happens. Businesses generally strive to de-escalate whenever possible.

Quick note to agree that CA 1101 and 1102 are impressive. They date from 1937. They protect everyone, and were used in a well-known case "Gay Law Students v. Pacific Telephone & Telegraph" (https://web.archive.org/web/20171110205448/https://www.washi...). They are exceptional as you note, in being relatively clearly written. Bring back the 1930s era legal standards!

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