Consequently, I express no personal non-work related opinions not only at work but in fact not even with “friendlies,” as loose lips sink ships.
It is a shitty way to live, given how much time one spends at work.
We created a hard rule at our company in 2016: No politics / No religion. Most humans are incapable of discussing these topics rationally, and it only serves to increase division at work.
One person could not handle the idea of not being politically active at work, and we discovered after she quit that almost everyone was happier no having her toxic commentary omnipresent.
In the best case scenario, folks like this are a big distraction - at worst they are a source for litigation, security issues, and horrible employee productivity.
People who want to be politically active at work are absolute poison to creating a healthy cooperative team environment.
You're doing the right thing, and if everyone else's constant hammering of politics at work is creating a bad environment for you, it's probably doing the same for others. You may want to anonymously suggest to the higher-ups that a similar rule should be implemented. Everyone will be happier.
However what’s new(?), and tragic, is (a) omnipresent social media and/or digital footprint and (b) that discourse outside work with coworker friends — at least for me but I suspect for many of those of us working 80+ hours, our social circle is largely coworkers or industry colleagues — could massively negatively affect career.
The current environment likely leads to a sense of isolation , ironically likely shared by the /majority/ of people.
What about a request to get time off to vote?
What if someone came to HR and said they felt they were being treated differently by their boss because they posted a news article that mentioned politics and religion in the team's Slack channel, and they think their boss considered that a sneaky attempt to circumvent your strict "no politics / no religion" rule?
Politics are inextricable from most plausible modern workplaces. I'm all for asking employees to try to avoid bringing it up if they can help it, but a "no politics / no religion" rule doesn't guarantee a reduction in "litigation, security issues, and horrible employee productivity."
If people are focusing on work, these little things go unnoticed.
What's great about it is that it's engendered a culture of eye-rolling to people who try to interject their religion or politics, and this has become somewhat self-perpetuating.
If someone spammed a political article into a common venue (we don't use slack because it's such a waste of time), then I doubt it would get reported - just ignored.
> Politics are inextricable from most plausible modern workplaces.
I don't see how you could logically make this argument. Our business plan and financial goals have zero to do with the current political landscape.
> How would your company have dealt with a "Trump/Pence 2016" laptop sticker?
Presumably this would fall under the no politics rule. Remove it. It's a work laptop anyway.
>What about a request to get time off to vote?
Non-issue. Leaving to vote is not bringing your politics to work.
> What if someone came to HR and said they felt they were being treated differently by their boss because they posted a news article that mentioned politics and religion in the team's Slack channel, and they think their boss considered that a sneaky attempt to circumvent your strict "no politics / no religion" rule?
Nothing sneaky about it, posting in the teams Slack work be a clear violation of the rule. It's a work Slack channel.
But I also don't live in California or work at a venture capital funded startup
But yes, the second portion of my comment was intended to capture that even outside of work with co-worker friends I am reluctant to express opinions. Even if I am mainstream today, or on a particular issue, the winds can shift quickly.
That is a dangerous and toxic milieu.
So in essence, feels like a textbook example of what the article was talking about, with leftists having consider able freedom to talk about politics and everyone else marginalized.