Three of Britain's biggest newspapers - The Times, The Guardian and The Scotsman - have reported the recent firing by Waterstone's (the UK's biggest highstreet bookshop) of an employee, Joe Gordon, with an eleven year tenure at the Edinburgh branch of the company. The reason for termination was cited as the content of his blog, specifically several "defamatory" comments about Waterstone's. In brief Waterstone's has always been keen to present itself as a bastion of freedom and self expression in the promotion of literature in all it's forms, a sentiment that by this recent action now seems irrelevant. This case is important for the reason that it is the first time that someone in Britain has lost their job because of comments made on their blog.
First, I am angry over the hypocritical way that Waterstone's proffers freedom of expression, yet will not extend that same courtesy to it's employees. And for that I feel that it is only fair that the company provides an eloquent explanation to their actions.
However, for example, a company would be unlikely to tolerate an employee appearing on national television to negatively comment on their employer, however satirical those comments might be. And if I were an employer I would feel duty bound to protect my company (and possibly my own job) by dealing with that errant staff member in an appropriate way. That said, termination of employment in this instance does seem to be the adoption of a very hard line (and daft when Waterstone's apparently didn't want it's name dragged through the mud!) I am sure that an official warning would have been more effective.
More and more, blogs are becoming a legitimate conduit for communication in all it's forms. I am not a fan of censorship and would not discourage anyone to write about whatever it is that they feel compelled to write about, but we should all acknowledge that there can be consequences to what we say and most will have an opinion - including our employers.
I just called Waterstone's head office in London to get the name of the person that I can write a letter of complaint to. You can voice your opinion to Kathryn Dobson who heads up the Customer Services department. Kathryn's email address is:
kathryn.dobson@waterstones.co.uk
You can also write a letter (what's that?) to Kathryn at the following address:
Waterstone's
Capital Court
Capital Interchange Way
Brentford
TW8 0EX
1 comment:
Frankly, I'm surprised it took that long. Remember the big brouhaha when employer's began terminating employees for slagging off (Do I sound British when I say slagging off?) their boss/company? I certainly do not believe in censorship, but I do believe in common sense. You would think that Waterstone's would have discussed the incident with the employee and given him a written warning so I'm wondering what was said. Furthermore, I think the level of sarcasm that has become acceptable is much more acerbic than it used to be and I sometimes think people don't realize how mean-spirited they sound at times.
This story appears at a timely moment. Last night I actually told one of my best friends of 15 years that it would be best if we were no longer kept in contact with one another. This resulted from something that I said that was misinterpreted by someone else and has brought about a great amount of tension between us. Therefore, the most loving thing to do seemed to be to just let go.
Though we often forget, words have power.
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