Movies: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3

Jan 9, 2007
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I wonder if famous people will ever just decide that Twitter isn't worth it. Keep your Insta and let everyone know when you take a trip or eat a really bangin omelette. But that thing that lets you say whatever you want at any time just may come back and bite you. Especially since the internet is hell bent on making sure anyone who ever said anything controversial never works again.
 
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MXD

Original #4
Oct 27, 2005
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I'm a bit conflicted here, honestly.
The HUGE issue I'm having, however, is Disney capitulating to Tssernotvits.
 
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johnjm22

Pseudo Intellectual
Aug 2, 2005
19,402
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I wonder if famous people will ever just decide that Twitter isn't worth it. Keep your Insta and let everyone know when you take a trip or eat a really bangin omelette. But that thing that lets you say whatever you want at any time just may come back and bite you. Especially since the internet is hell bent on making sure anyone who ever said anything controversial never works again.
If I was an agent or manager I would advise my clients to either get off social media entirely or have their accounts managed by a PR firm.
 
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LarKing

Registered User
Sep 2, 2012
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I wonder if famous people will ever just decide that Twitter isn't worth it. Keep your Insta and let everyone know when you take a trip or eat a really bangin omelette. But that thing that lets you say whatever you want at any time just may come back and bite you. Especially since the internet is hell bent on making sure anyone who ever said anything controversial never works again.

It really isn’t that hard to not make rape jokes. Most people avoid it just fine.
 
Jan 9, 2007
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It really isn’t that hard to not make rape jokes. Most people avoid it just fine.
My point was a broad one. It sounds like the last part of my post is what you seized on. I literally never saw the tweets in question. I don't know what this famous person did to end up in this position. I just think there is so much downside to social media, and not very much real upside. I know, "connecting with fans", etc. It's strange how people used to watch movies and go to concerts and enjoy them just fine.
 

LarKing

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Sep 2, 2012
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My point was a broad one. It sounds like the last part of my post is what you seized on. I literally never saw the tweets in question. I don't know what this famous person did to end up in this position. I just think there is so much downside to social media, and not very much real upside. I know, "connecting with fans", etc. It's strange how people used to watch movies and go to concerts and enjoy them just fine.

Maybe you shouldn’t make statements without reading the details first then? I do agree with most of your post though. There is a lot of downside, but it is really not that hard to avoid making rape jokes.
 

Dipsy Doodle

Rent A Barn
May 28, 2006
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Firing people now for comments made 5 years ago seems incredibly stupid. People can't predict what's going to be too far over the line in the future, for f***'s sake. Yikes.
 
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Warden of the North

Ned Stark's head
Apr 28, 2006
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Firing people now for comments made 5 years ago seems incredibly stupid. People can't predict what's going to be too far over the line in the future, for ****'s sake. Yikes.

They were over the line back then too.

Id be fired from my job if I did this, and Im not employed by a company which is known the world over for childrens entertainment.

Disneys biggest mistake was hiring him in the first place.
 
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Dipsy Doodle

Rent A Barn
May 28, 2006
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They were over the line back then too.

Id be fired from my job if I did this, and Im not employed by a company which is known the world over for childrens entertainment.

Disneys biggest mistake was hiring him in the first place.

At the time, James Gunn wasn't employed by a company known the world over for childrens entertainment either, nor was he working at a job where he could have been fired for such tweets, clearly.
 

LarKing

Registered User
Sep 2, 2012
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They were over the line back then too.

Id be fired from my job if I did this, and Im not employed by a company which is known the world over for childrens entertainment.

Disneys biggest mistake was hiring him in the first place.

Same here. It’s not that hard to avoid things like this if you put a smidge of effort into it.
 

LarKing

Registered User
Sep 2, 2012
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At the time, James Gunn wasn't employed by a company known the world over for childrens entertainment either, nor was he working at a job where he could have been fired for such tweets, clearly.

That sucks for him. Maybe he should just not post rape jokes no matter where he works. Seems like a decent rule of thumb.
 
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Dipsy Doodle

Rent A Barn
May 28, 2006
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That sucks for him. Maybe he should just not post rape jokes no matter where he works. Seems like a decent rule of thumb.

I like free speech more than I dislike rape jokes, so I have to disagree.

It's one thing to fire people for distasteful comments they make while they are working for you. It's something else to fire them for distasteful comments that were not only from 7+ years ago when the person was employed elsewhere, but that were always publicly available.
 

LarKing

Registered User
Sep 2, 2012
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I like free speech more than I dislike rape jokes, so I have to disagree.

It's one thing to fire people for distasteful comments they make while they are working for you. It's something else to fire them for distasteful comments that were not only from 7+ years ago when the person was employed elsewhere, but that were always publicly available.

I think we can live in a world where free speech exists and we punish those who make rape jokes? Why are they exclusive?
 

Shockmaster

Registered User
Sep 11, 2012
16,006
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I like free speech more than I dislike rape jokes, so I have to disagree.

It's one thing to fire people for distasteful comments they make while they are working for you. It's something else to fire them for distasteful comments that were not only from 7+ years ago when the person was employed elsewhere, but that were always publicly available.

Free speech doesn't mean his employer can't fire him. It just means he can't go to jail for it.
 
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GlassesJacketShirt

Registered User
Aug 4, 2010
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If you can be denied your livelihood based on publicly available comments from 7+ years ago and before you worked for your present employer, I'd say that's as effective a deterrent to free speech as jail time

I somewhat agree in the sense that I personally would not have fired him, but Disney is allowed to do what they want. Comes down to the same principle that allows him to be an idiot on twitter in the first place. Besides, based on James Gunn's own logic, free speech should not give him an out, so I don't feel bad for him so much as the fans who will, in all likelihood, get a sub par third film to bookend the franchise.
 

Dipsy Doodle

Rent A Barn
May 28, 2006
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I somewhat agree in the sense that I personally would not have fired him, but Disney is allowed to do what they want. Comes down to the same principle that allows him to be an idiot on twitter in the first place. Besides, based on James Gunn's own logic, free speech should not give him an out, so I don't feel bad for him so much as the fans who will, in all likelihood, get a sub par third film to bookend the franchise.

They are. Whether this is something that hurts Disney, either due to inferior product or simply narrowing the pool of available talent only to people who have never said anything remotely controversial, no matter how long ago or what their job was at the time, remains to be seen.
 

Osprey

Registered User
Feb 18, 2005
27,093
9,355
This isn't a "free speech" issue. He wasn't speaking out against the government. Even if he were, it wouldn't mean that he'd be free of public judgment. The public, including private companies, are more than welcome to judge his "jokes" and choose not to associate with him.

This is a political correctness issue. The jokes that he made were not politically correct and he's suffering the consequences for them. It's easy to say "he shouldn't be fired for them," but imagine that you're the employer and you're disgusted by them. Should you not be allowed to fire him? Imagine that he were to keep doing it, making your company look bad and hurting business, and there's nothing that you could legally do about it? Don't you have rights (to protect your business), too?

There are many reasons, but one reason why I'm very careful with what I post on sites like this is that, even 10 years down the road, someone, especially an employer, might go through my posting history. The chances of that are low, especially because I'm average person insulated by a user name, but I'm careful, regardless. In contrast, the chances of Gunn's tweets and blog comments coming back to bite him, especially because he's famous and they undeniably came from him, were very high, and, yet, he still showed no common sense. He could've deleted them after he was caught and embarrassed the first time, or at least once he changed into the "very different person" that he claims that he is today, and didn't, again showing a lack of common sense. I just don't have a whole lot of sympathy when I go to a lot of trouble to be careful with my image and someone else shows a terrific lack of judgment and gets hit by negative consequences.
 
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Osprey

Registered User
Feb 18, 2005
27,093
9,355
I wonder if Chris Pratt is involved in this at all. He's an outspoken Christian and very recently accepted some kids' choice award, giving a speech in which he shared a lot of wisdom and life tips (some funny, some serious). He seems to be embracing being a role model. It would not be hard to believe that he heard about the uncovered tweets and expressed concern to Disney that he might not be able to work with Gunn again in good conscience. Choosing between Pratt and Gunn would be a no-brainer, and it would be smart of Disney to keep that choice out of the news, taking any PR hit for it so that their star doesn't have to. That could also explain why they took action only now.
 

Dipsy Doodle

Rent A Barn
May 28, 2006
76,532
21,073
This isn't a "free speech" issue. He wasn't speaking out against the government. Even if he were, it wouldn't mean that he'd be free of public judgment. The public, including private companies, are more than welcome to judge his "jokes" and choose not to associate with him.

This is a political correctness issue. The jokes that he made were not politically correct and he's suffering the consequences for them. It's easy to say "he shouldn't be fired for them," but imagine that you're the employer and you're disgusted by them. Should you not be allowed to fire him? Imagine that he were to keep doing it, making your company look bad and hurting business, and there's nothing that you could legally do about it? Don't you have rights (to protect your business), too?

To take your reckoning to its logical conclusion, a plumbing business would be perfectly within its rights to fire a 30 year old for a Facebook post he made when he was in high school. Maybe something as innocuous as pantomiming a grope, like Al Franken did.

As far as I'm concerned, no business should have the right to fire you for something you did before you were in their employ, so long as it didn't break any laws.

There are many reasons, but one reason why I'm very careful with what I post on sites like this is that, even 10 years down the road, someone, especially an employer, might go through my posting history. The chances of that are low, especially because I'm average person insulated by a user name, but I'm careful, regardless. In contrast, the chances of Gunn's tweets and blog comments coming back to bite him, especially because he's famous and they undeniably came from him, were very high, and, yet, he still showed no common sense. He could've deleted them after he was caught and embarrassed the first time, or at least once he changed into the "very different person" that he claims that he is today, and didn't, again showing a lack of common sense. I just don't have a whole lot of sympathy when I go to a lot of trouble to be careful with my image and someone else shows a terrific lack of judgment and gets hit by negative consequences.

Gunn wasn't famous at the time. And if he had deleted the tweets, would that have made any difference? He still put it out there, so I don't see how removing the evidence remedies anything.

I wonder if Chris Pratt is involved in this at all. He's an outspoken Christian and very recently accepted some kids' choice award, giving a speech in which he shared a lot of wisdom and life tips (some funny, some serious). He seems to be embracing being a role model. It would not be hard to believe that he heard about the uncovered tweets and expressed concern to Disney that he might not be able to work with Gunn again in good conscience. Choosing between Pratt and Gunn would be a no-brainer, and it would be smart of Disney to keep that choice out of the news, taking any PR hit for it so that their star doesn't have to. That could also explain why they took action only now.

I would find that incredibly hard to believe.
 
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Super Cake

Registered User
Jun 24, 2013
30,924
6,356
I could see both sides of the argument.

On one hand, i really don't think he should be punished for comments made many years ago. Heck, there are comedians nowadays that make jokes about worse things, yet people find them funny.

On the other hand, he really shouldn't have made jokes about rape.
 

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