I’ve blogged before about not saying anything on the Internet you’d be ashamed to say in front of your mother. In an age when the concept of privacy is dead it’s inadvisable to have mouth diarrhea. Just ask “Cisco Fatty.” He got fired for an inadvisable comment on twitter. Now he lives on as an Internet meme whose half-life will probably follow him to the grave.
Unfortunately, it’s also a lesson even people apparently smart enough to get offered a “fatty paycheck” are incapable of learning. So let’s review: The Internet is not your BFF. Everyone has a “My boss sucks” moment. But the prudent know to express this sentiment away from the keyboard because they also have the “My boss knows how to use the Internet” sense they were born with.
“Cisco Fatty” and all those who came before, and those who will inevitably come after, are breaking the cardinal rule of the Internet: Never post anything you wouldn’t say to your mom, boss and significant other. Alas, if that message hasn’t sunk in by now, it never will. And thanks to Twitter further eroding the wall between your big mouth and a moment required to download some good sense, the Internet is now empowered to get you fired faster than ever.
I have a different take on Cisco Fatty and his fired brothers and sisters of the Church of the Running Mouth. In a century of inevitable social upheaval due to technologically driven changes to social mores we’re probably all going to be fired at one time or another. This should be no big deal. We have to remember that many Americans in the 1950s had the expectation of taking a job and keeping it for three or four decades after which they would receive a gold watch and a pension. If they hadn’t already been sucked into a machine cog or dropped dead of a heart attack they might look forward to as much as two to five years of blissful retirement before dying of high cholesterol or some other medical condition that wasn’t well understood back then. And that was only 60 years ago.
These days, a job is mostly just a job. You’ll work on projects. You’ll even finish some of them. And then you will be downsized and find another job. The important thing is – are you learning to be discreet when the situation calls for discretion? Are you learning to speak at the opportune moment? Are you learning to pontificate in a manner that will market your ideas and yourself effectively? If not, you may find yourself in Cisco Fatty’s shoes; fired before you even show up. At least someone will make a parody video to amuse millions of others at your expense.
Hitler rants about Twitter and Cisco
How’s your progress on that PMP certification you’ve been saying you were going to get for a few years now? Maybe you should be working on that instead of watching the Hitler/Cisco Fatty video. On the other hand civilization might be collapsing. Go ahead and be yourself while you still can. Honesty is the best policy and maybe you’ll learn something about the world by being truthful. The memes they keep a changin’.