Left $150k software engineering job (well got fired for making video called "9 Ways to cope with having a boring 9-5 job" which somebody found and sent to HR) to make videos about stuff I think is interesting (https://www.youtube.com/c/JDiculous1https://www.facebook.com/HonestLogic), with a slant towards addressing wage slavery, basic income, student loans, capitalism, etc. Still in the early stages, but I'll be hitting this hard in 2018.
You will get the experiences you need to go where you're going; being fired for pointing out obvious is not that bad, you did nothing wrong, it's their shitty karma. Can't you see the irony in doing something like that on facebook? The solution starts with making the right choices yourself.
Yea it's pretty lame seeing as how the video was posted under a pseudonym, meaning that person did some serious digging and clearly had an agenda (I'm 95% sure who it was). It's all good though, I had been wanting to leave for a long time but had kept putting it off for the "right moment". I'm glad that that decision was made for me because now there's nothing to regret.
In the US this would be 100% legal. For almost all jobs, you can fire someone for any reason (I don't like your shirt, your jokes weren't funny, it's a Tuesday) or literally no reason at all. The exceptions are few and far between - unions provide additional protection via collective bargaining agreements; you can't fire someone for being in a protected class (i.e. because of their race or gender); and you can't fire someone in retaliation for something like a wage complaint. You could almost certainly fire someone for making a video you don't like (unless they're in a union, which is very few tech employees.)
While it is true that most employment is “at-will” (which means that both sides voluntarily choose to employ/be employed) for both sides, in a friendly employee state like California, there are numerous wage claims and employment law suits that come with doing business. It’s not as easy to fire in some states.
Yea it's legal here in the U.S. since it was at-will employment. They tried to play down the effect of the video and made up some vague performance-related reasons.
It's all good though, I was planning to leave anyways.
That’s not quite true. There are still illegal reasons for firing (discrimination, retaliation for whistleblowing, etc) though fighting back can be difficult and costly.
But if you’re okay with the current state of affairs (I was with my own previous incident - the company was awful) it can make sense to just move on.
That's true. I should've mentioned that they tried to play down the effect of the video and made up some vague performance reasons. But yea I'm fine with it and had been planning to leave for a while, so no hard feelings. The best retaliation would be me achieving success in my new endeavors.
