Last Wednesday, ESPN Analyst and Former MLB Pitcher Curt Shilling, was fired from ESPN after a post he made on Facebook on his opinion on transgender sexuality. The post he made included a meme of a transgender man along with his own comment on how transgender people should go about going to the bathroom in public places. It seemed like he was responding to the new law in North Carolina that keeps transgender people from using bathrooms and locker rooms that don’t correspond to their birth gender. The post drew immediate criticism given the fact it is a sensitive topic throughout the country. His comment was that, “A man is a man no matter what they call themselves. I don’t care what they are, who they sleep with, men’s room was designed for the p****, women’s not so much. Now you need laws telling us differently? Pathetic.”
ESPN has made it known that this type of behavior from their employee’s will not be tolerated and that his employment was terminated immediately. Curt Shilling has been on thin ice a lot due to his constant presence on social media and his controversial opinions he posts about, including recently posting how he compares Muslims to Nazis and how Hillary Clinton should be “buried in a jail somewhere.” He has been a notoriously outspoken person who sees no reason to hide his true feelings about topics in the world, but this time it came back to bite him back.
- Do you feel that he should have been terminated because of his social media posts?
- Should work places, such as high end places like ESPN, make an emphasis on conduct outside the work place (including social media) and how their social media accounts should be managed?
- Is the fact of having people (with such strong opinions about sensitive topics) post their opinions on topics like this a good idea for social media? Does this cause more problems for society?
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/21/sports/baseball/curt-schilling-is-fired-by-espn.html?_r=0
