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In France, Fired For Writing To MP Against 3 Strikes
neurone333 sends along the cause célèbre of the moment in France: a Web executive working for TF1, Europe's largest TV network, sends an email to his Member of Parliament opposing the government's "three strikes and you're out" proposal, known as Hadopi. His MP forwards the email to the minister backing Hadopi, who forwards it to TF1. The author of the email, Jérôme Bourreau-Guggenheim, is called into his boss's office and shown an exact copy of his email. Soon he receives a letter saying he is fired for "strong differences with the [company's] strategy" — in a private email sent from a private (gmail) address. French corporations and government are entangled in ways that Americans might find unfamiliar. Hit the link below for some background on the ties between TF1 and the Sarkozy government.
The Irish times has an explanation for the incestuous relationship between his government and TF1: "TF1's owner, the construction billionaire Martin Bouygues, is godfather to Mr Sarkozy's youngest son, Louis. Mr. Bouygues suggested to Mr. Sarkozy that he ought to ban advertising on TF1's rival stations in the public sector, which was done in January. Laurent Solly, who was deputy director of Mr. Sarkozy's presidential campaign, is now number two at TF1. Last year, TF1 sacked Patrick Poivre d'Arvor, the station's star presenter for the previous 21 years. Poivre had angered Mr Sarkozy by saying he 'acted like a little boy' at a G8 summit. He was replaced by Laurence Ferrari. Mr. Sarkozy reportedly told Mr. Bouygues he wanted to see the young blond on the news."
The Irish times has an explanation for the incestuous relationship between his government and TF1: "TF1's owner, the construction billionaire Martin Bouygues, is godfather to Mr Sarkozy's youngest son, Louis. Mr. Bouygues suggested to Mr. Sarkozy that he ought to ban advertising on TF1's rival stations in the public sector, which was done in January. Laurent Solly, who was deputy director of Mr. Sarkozy's presidential campaign, is now number two at TF1. Last year, TF1 sacked Patrick Poivre d'Arvor, the station's star presenter for the previous 21 years. Poivre had angered Mr Sarkozy by saying he 'acted like a little boy' at a G8 summit. He was replaced by Laurence Ferrari. Mr. Sarkozy reportedly told Mr. Bouygues he wanted to see the young blond on the news."
Now the question is under French law can he sue? If he can, the next question is will it make him less employable suing an ex-employer?
He absolutely can sue. There's a special court for employer/employee disagreements called the Prudhommes, and he will probably sue TF1 for wrongful termination.
I don't know much about law myself, but his lawyers should have a field day with this. He would have to screw up the case royally to lose it: It was a private email address and a private communication which his employer should never have heard about, and secondly, it is forbidden by law to fire someone on political grounds in France.
In theory this shouldn't affect his future professionally, however seeing how the world works, I'm not so sure.
It is not a UN document. The human rights are enforced by the human rights court in Haag. They are pretty well enforced in all countries that have signed them. It can even override the supreme court in the signing countries.
Note, the US have not signed the human rights declaration since the US disagrees with human right number 1: The right to live, AND with the concept of a foreign court that can override the government.
Just like in any other european country, this lay-off is most certainly illegal and can be appealed by the email's author. That's what labor law is there for.
Of course people got sacked for expressing opposing opinions long before the internet existed. French roots of labor law and freedom of speech date back to the revolution in 1789, UK workers have already fought for those in the 16th century, in Germany those rights have existed before the third reich since the 1849 revolution.
This is not really a "your rights online" article, but should be tagged "your rights in capitalism" - you have them, so use them.
Except that ECHR, which ratifies the UN UDHC in 99% of areas, HAS been incorporated into all EU member states law. This does make it illegial to discriminate on basis of political expression.
They government also broke the french DPA (no doubt, it is again similar to UK law) by forwarding on the email, which was by default considered private.
Prediction: lawyers have complete field day suing the employer for large, large amounts of money.
I read an interview of the MP in question. She said that he never explicitly asked for this correspondence to be considered 'private'. Apparently by default the (e-)mails sent to MPs are considered 'public'. She also said that his letter was well constructed and contained good arguments, so she forwarded it to the Minister backing the bill to "challenge" her (more like to give her some time to come up with plausible counter-arguments). Then it found its way to TF1 HQ for some reasons.
The founding fathers were not atheists. They were nearly-all Protestant, with a few being Deist (believed in God but not church doctrine). Don't spread mythology about them being atheists.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
What he did was to make it plain that General Motors would not be considered for further TARP funding if they continued to utilize the services of the CEO who bankrupted the company in the first placed.
Perfectly acceptable here in the United States. Note that there has not been a popular revolt or backlash against this. Evidently, President Obama's action in causing GM to ditch their loser of a CEO was (apparently) neither illegal nor immoral in the opinion of the majority of United States citizens.
(Incidentally, until recently I was a Republican. I actively disapprove of many of the things our current President advocates. This particular example isn't one of them)
The important point, which I don't think the GP illustrated clearly, was this:
The founding fathers had just left a country deeply steeped in religion. They specifically wanted a country where religion didn't affect the government at all. "Congress shall make no law..." is a direct response to the (iirc) Anglican church that was essentially controlled by the king. Anyone with any sense will not claim that the US was intended to be a christian nation, as that is an absolute falsehood.
And as for your actual post, here's this:
They absolutely were not nearly-all protestant. Most of them were, at the most, Deist, with a few being what would now be called Atheists. Please learn your own history.
Just another "DOJ fascist authoritarian totalitarian bootlicker" -- Zeio
Recent foreign policy notwithstanding, the problem the US has with the "right to live" is that it eliminates the death penalty, not that the government wants to reserve the right to kill, kill, kill.
We are the 198 proof..
I'm not French but I live in France.
The e-mail author (and most comments here on Slashdot) assumed his e-mail was private correspondence (which is usually the case in French and EU law). However, the e-mail to the MPs is *not* private, since what MPs do, read, communicate is by default public (thus making bribery, unlawful conduct and other potential crimes and misdemeanors at least harder to hide).
Thus being said, it is clear the MP in cause was not guilty of anything when she redirected the e-mail message to the author of HADOPI law, i.e. the French Ministry of Culture.
The Ministry of Culture sough to find out why somebody from the TF1, on of the biggest pushers for HADOPI, would push his MP in a different direction than the company he's working for (it's a legitimate question; imagine if a GM welder *publicly* asks for the foreclosure of GM - in such situation there would be nothing wrong for the TARP guys to ask GM what's going on).
Until here I see no evil.
Now, TF1 is not selling bricks or clothes. It's selling cultural products and opinions (plus news). Therefore, having a dissenting opinion to the corporate one, in a business of selling opinions & cultural products, clearly incensed TF1 management. On this case, I say they were right.
BUT, based on their anger, TF1 decided to terminate the employment of this guy. That's something I can't agree, yet in my opinion they should be allowed to do it.
Now, before being chopped off by the liberal wing of /. (i.e., 99%), let me point it's all a non-issue. In France NOBODY can be fired (not until they do something so terrible it makes news in Afghanistan or Somalia, anyway). Therefore this guy will certainly keep his job at TF1.
One last thing: the original author mentioned in his "private" e-mail that he's working at TF1 (that's how they were able to finally trace him down). It seems to me he was ready to add his job as a weight to his e-mail, yet when the weight went against himself he was pissed. Doesn't make much sense to me.
Catalin Braescu
Ofaly.com