Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/01/11/deadspin-rip.html
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6 Likes
Gita is wonderful. I’ve enjoyed her writing immensely.
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I know the writers are choked at what’s happening with their workplace, but is it ever a good idea to publicly diss your former employer?
I can only think of a couple examples:
- you worked for an African warlord
- you worked for a greedy hedgefund
- you worked for the Trump organization
- you were a career criminal now on the straight and narrow
More?
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The former employer is a Venture Capital dickweed of the highest order. So yeah that counts.
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I to flip through Kotauku about once a day, and have read many things by Gita and watched a few of her videos. She always seemed like a good writer to me. I confess Tim Rodgers is the only person I have a real affinity towards in videos because of his delivery. But yeah, Kotaku will be less for this.
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The entire collection of sites has become a bloated mess of slow loading ads, autoplay videos, and pages that jump around constantly. Seriously takes minutes to load a page. Makes it easier to stay away.
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It’s not exactly dissing their former employer though. That is, they’re not criticising the organisation (of which they were a part); they’re criticising an outside force that came in and fucked it up. It wouldn’t mean much to take pride in something you were part of, if that pride were unconditionally up for sale to literally anyone with the cash to buy the company. Some prospective employers might think that’s what integrity does mean, but those would be employers to avoid if you care about such things.
It’s a bit like the question of whether “patriotism” means you have to be proud of (for example) Donald Turmp because he’s the president. It can’t mean that and also be a virtue.
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Let me assist you in exercising your sociological imagination…
- Boss engaged in or condoned sexual, racial, gender, religious, etc. harassment?
- Boss engaged in condoned bigotry in hiring, promotion, and workplace culture?
- Boss was hostile to labor rights?
- Boss was simply dehumanizing or abusive, or condoned same?
- Boss wanted workplace to treat planet as his own personal urinal?
- Boss (and Board or owners) wanted to take business model in direction of increasing social harm?
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The specific reasons, horrible though they may be, don’t really matter too much. Dishing on your previous boss is never a good thing for a hiring boss to find on your C.V., because he or she will be mentally tabulating all the shady stuff they keep hidden, trying to figure out if you might rat them out in the future, too.
No matter how good you are, it’s much safer for them to hire someone who has never done that.
1 Like
You’re not wrong. But AVC was the only social media I’ve done more than lurked on until the relatively recent, slow decline began. It was a delightful collection of weirdos that is now 25% that, 25% horrible trolls that nobody moderates, and 50% bots and ads. I still keep hanging out there out of inertia and that first 25%.
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Yep - and, importantly, everyone acknowledges that fact. (Except, presumably, the venture capitalists themselves, and even they have to realize what they’ve done to some degree.) It’s obvious after the destruction of Deadspin. So it doesn’t really have the same negative impact on them, as anyone hiring them in the future would be in agreement.
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That’s right! True happiness in life is to be found in craven compliance with everything the boss does and says-- that way you will get a name as a good puppy and your future career prospects will be enhanced! And you will be happy and fulfilled!
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In case the article gets pulled:
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So, the solution is to just roll over more and more, instead of ever pushing back and maybe doing something about employer’s power to react in that way? Nice way to look at things on one’s way to concluding that you might as well just curl up into a ball and try to will your body to die.
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Your former employer is publicy known as a moron.
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You might even say he’s a herb.
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Many, in fact, do so.
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Preventing yourself from being hired by people with shady stuff they’re trying to hide sounds like a benefit, not a liability.
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Gita is a treasure and one of the few journalists whose writing on games I will actually read. At least I can still follow her on Twitter.
And yes Surprise_Puma, I miss the old AV Club, both the site design and the fun people you’d find in the comments.
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VC/hedge fund operators do what they from a sense of impunity… They can so they do and there there is no perceived consequence.
By extension these employees are doing the same thing, except there WILL most certainly be consequences for them… Lack of work going forward (he did it so I can too). Not a very informed way of looking at the world.
There used to be a PSA about driving rules. The tag line was: You can be right. Dead right.
The same thing holds true just in general. We may live in civilization, but that’s not an absolute. There are still lions to eat you, they just wear business suits.
