For Angry Employees, Legal Cover for Rants

[alp227]

Workers fired or disciplined for bad-mouthing employers on social-networking sites are fighting back using a decades-old labor law—a new front in the murky battle over what workers can do and say online.

Since the rise of Facebook and Twitter, companies believed they had the right to fire employees who posted complaints or hostile or rude comments online about their employers.

But in recent months, workers have sought to solve their very modern employment predicament by using the law that kick-started the U.S. labor movement: the National Labor Relations Act of 1935. The law gives private-sector employees certain rights to complain about pay, safety and other working conditions. It doesn't protect simple griping.

More than 100 employers, including a saloon, a BMW dealership and Wal-Mart Stores Inc., have been accused by workers over the last 12 months of improper activity related to social-media practices or policies, according to the National Labor Relations Board, a federal agency that enforces the law and decides whether employees' complaints have merit.

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[baldguy]

1. Big Bubba is watching you.

They may not be able to tie their shoes, but they can surf the web.

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

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[Sherman A1]

2. It is always good to remember that "they" are watching

and while I certainly believe free speech trumps the employers actions here, one can choose words that get the message across without raising red flags at the air conditioned offices in the Ivory Towers of Corporate Personhood.