“May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one.”


"This report is maybe 12-years-old. Parliament buried it, and it stayed buried till River dug it up. This is what they feared she knew. And they were right to fear because there's a whole universe of folk who are gonna know it, too. They're gonna see it. Somebody has to speak for these people. You all got on this boat for different reasons, but you all come to the same place. So now I'm asking more of you than I have before. Maybe all. Sure as I know anything I know this, they will try again. Maybe on another world, maybe on this very ground swept clean. A year from now, 10, they'll swing back to the belief that they can make people . . . better. And I do not hold to that. So no more running. I aim to misbehave." ~ Captain Malcom Reynolds

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Stifling speech

First off, go read this article at Laginappe's Lair:

The censorship nazis are at it again. This time, a 27 year veteran of the Iowa State Patrol has just been suspended for 30 days over an e-mail that he sent while off-duty and at home. According to KTEV:
Then, please take a moment to drop a line with your thoughts to the Iowa State Patrol.

Folks, I really do try to avoid most of the political crap around here - there are lots who write it better than I do anyway. And there are a lot of stories I don't share, or details I change, out of respect for privacy and keeping my job details somewhat low-key.

But I will be damned if I live in a country where I am not ALLOWED to share my opinion, particularly off-duty. Particularly when it is in no way illegal, immoral or unethical.

They are just plain wrong on this one - I hope you agree.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

WOW....we are in America right?

Kelsey said...

Wow. Just...wow.

Christa M. Miller said...

Shameless self-promotion (well... for my blog; I didn't write this): http://cops2point0.com/2009/02/13/social-media-vs-employer-2/ It's an EXCELLENT in-depth look at policies and best practices around public employee blogging.

Not entirely on topic here - cannot believe off-duty private email resulted in such a long suspension, much less made it to the media - but it's certainly an overreaction based on 'Net fear. Perhaps administration thought they had to "act" before the email was leaked to the media?

BTW whatever happened to police unions? They find this acceptable? They've been whipped? What?

Berserk said...

Disgusting.

Front Porch Society said...

I work for the state of IA, as well. The entire situation has most of us pissed off!!!