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Elon Musk’s ‘fund your legal bill’ tweet is a brand new level of bullshit (www.theverge.com)
submitted 3 years ago by to c/technology@beehaw.org
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Sorry, another news from this asshole, but this is too much assholery to don't be shared

Despite him being a shitty boss that fired employees that criticized him on twitter, he promised an "unlimited" legal defense fund to fight against employers that fired employees because of something they wrote on Twitter.

Under his tweet a lot of "verified" (=right wing) accounts plauded this and asked to fight employers who fired employees for having written something homophobic

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[–] 25 points 3 years ago (11 children)

It has literally nothing to do with the first amendment.

The first amendment gives you zero protections from anyone but the government. All other entities are entitled to respond to your speech however the fuck they want.

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  • [–] 6 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    @conciselyverbose
    No, they need to do so within existing law and ideally also social norms. It's not ok for Bob to go after you with a rifle just because you said you don't like his hairstyle. That he can fire you for the same is atrocious.
    @Moonrise2473 @Karlos_Cantana @prole

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  • [–] 8 points 3 years ago

    Going after you with a rifle is illegal in its own right. The first amendment is not a factor in any way.

    Firing you for it is unambiguously and unconditionally legal, unless you're in a state that has other limitations on your ability to terminate employees.

    There is no scenario you can contrive where a non-government employer firing an employee for speech can be connected to the first amendment in any way. The first amendment can only possibly be relevant to the government.

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  • [–] 4 points 3 years ago* (last edited 3 years ago) (7 children)

    Oh ok... So I guess that means the National Labor Relations Act is unconstitutional (it's not, it was upheld by SCOTUS in the 30s), because it explicitly prevents employers from firing or otherwise retaliating against employees for discussing salary.

    https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/your-rights/your-rights-to-discuss-wages

    Or do you think an employer should be allowed to fire someone for that?

    Maybe don't give this current Supreme Court any ideas given their blatant disregard for stare decisis/precedence, and Chevron deference..

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  • [–] 5 points 3 years ago (5 children)

    You should work on your reading comprehension. None of this has any relationship to the first amendment.

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  • [–] 5 points 3 years ago (4 children)

    The First Amendment protects the right to organize in addition to free speech. The NLRB (and the Wagner Act, the law that gives us the right to discuss wages, as well as unionize, without retaliation) have a storied history of being challenged on first amendment grounds.

    People have tried arguing that an employer's first amendment rights are violated by a law that prevents them from firing someone for any reason they want. The government codifying what an employer can and can't fire an employee for is directly related to the first amendment.

    Any time you're talking about protected speech, or the right to organizing, its directly related to the first amendment. If you can't see that, then I don't know what to tell you.

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  • [–] 7 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    Since it's abundantly clear that you've never actually read the 1st amendment, let me help you out:

    Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

    As you can see, employment disputes are not part of the 1st amendment. As you can also see, it restricts establishing a state religion, exercising your religion, protects you from prosecution when peacefully assembling and when you are giving the government the finger.

    I suggest reading through the Constitution and it's amendments. It's not a long read.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 years ago

    When the government tells an employer that they can't fire a person for x reason, the first amendment gets involved. Because that's the government limiting the speech of a private citizen (or in the case of a company/corporation, a group of private citizens that apparently gets all the rights of a person).

    Which is when employment law does swerve into first amendment territory

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  • [–] 6 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    The first amendment only applies to the government. Any person telling you that it can under any circumstance be applied to the relationship between an employer and employee is a piece of shit lying to you. It's not in any way ambiguous.

    The government regulating employment law is not connected to the first amendment in any way.

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