Should Job Seekers Tell Employers To Quit Snooping?

onehitwonder writes in with a CIO opinion piece arguing that potential employees need to stand up to employers who snoop the Web for insights into their after-work activities, often disqualifying them as a result. "Employers are increasingly trolling the web for information about prospective employees that they can use in their hiring decisions. Consequently, career experts advise job seekers to not post any photos, opinions or information on blogs and social networking websites (like Slashdot) that a potential employer might find remotely off-putting. Instead of cautioning job seekers to censor their activity online, we job seekers and defenders of our civil liberties should tell employers to stop snooping and to stop judging our behavior outside of work, writes CIO.com Senior Online Editor Meridith Levinson. By basing professional hiring decisions on candidates' personal lives and beliefs, employers are effectively legislating people's behavior, and they're creating an online environment where people can't express their true beliefs, state their unvarnished opinions, be themselves, and that runs contrary to the free, communal ethos of the Web. Employers that exploit the Web to snoop into and judge people's personal lives infringe on everyone's privacy, and their actions verge on discrimination."

Comments

Re:Well

[Temujin_12]

Is it good to take a stand? Yes.

Am I going to sacrifice my own career for this cause? No.

If found this comment interesting. While I'm not commenting on you personally, the comment made me think of a Thomas Jefferson quote (of all things) that I think is especially poignant given recent events:

We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debt, as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our calling and our creeds...[we will] have no time to think, no means of calling our miss-managers to account but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers... And this is the tendency of all human governments. A departure from principle in one instance becomes a precedent for[ another]... till the bulk of society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery... And the fore-horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and in its train wretchedness and oppression.

When we live on or near the brink of destitution such that we are totally dependent on our jobs (read, debt and utter lack of savings), businesses/employers/government have all the power and the people will lack the courage to stand up for what is right.

I'm not trying to be a doom-sayer here. Just pointing out a trend that I see where people often cite something unethical they see in their company or their industry in general but then never say anything about it because the potential retribution would lead to their economic demise. That, and I think that is one of the best Thomas Jefferson quotes ever.