The difference, presumably, is that people inside Google are already talking about all kinds of other political issues on internal message boards. They want to believe they're different, that they're in a new kind of enlightened environment where politics can be discussed by reasonable people without danger.
But this is ridiculous. It's easy to talk about things for which there's wide agreement. You don't even notice those things as politics. It's only politics when you disagree.
I don't suppose the human beings at Google are any better at talking about this stuff than any other human beings. If they want their workplace policies to reflect that, then fine! But there are a whole bunch of implicitly accepted leftist positions that they shouldn't be talking about, either. That's the hard part, because, again, they don't even notice those positions as politics.
Here are some Google executives saying exactly this:
Just as Uber and AirBnb are slowly revealing why we had hotel and taxi regulations in the first place, this Google case shows why our grandparents established those old-fashioned ideas about politics in the workplace.
It's easy to circumvent the legal issue, just have a vague code of conduct and claim the employee broke said code of conduct.
certainly not a slam dunk case, but he may have some reasonable basis for a case.
In most circumstances it's perfectly legal to do so. Exceptions include states with specific laws that protect political affiliation (which includes California) and federal government employees.
Really? Leave it up to the media to decide what he was fired for afterwards?
> it's never a good idea to get on a soapbox about politics at work
Many companies actively encourage this, when it comes to left-leaning politics.
I honestly don't care. Anyone who sends a company wide memo is asking for trouble. The news throws so much stuff that you are expected to get "outraged" over. It's not healthy to absorb it all.
Looks like we might go nuclear with North Korea real soon, if that happens, none of this will matter.
That being said, it's never a good idea to get on a soapbox about politics at work (or anywhere really). It doesn't make a difference in your listeners opinions and only gets people with opposing views aggravated. Best to just think about the issues and vote come election.