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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."
He's better off not working for them if:
A) They employ such tactics
B) His beliefs actually do strongly differ with the company's
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?
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
"French corporations and government are entangled in ways that Americans might find unfamiliar."
It's not so unheard of outside of France either, believe it or not.
xkcd is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
Time for the French to start sharpening the blades on all the old guillotines - the only suitable punishment for Mr Sarkozy and his cronies is a proper beheading.
Americans are so convinced of the virtue of entrepreneurship they are willing to give corporations and their corrupt ways a far wider leeway.
In America, 'individualism' means believing greed is a virtue, the same as everyone else. There are plenty of people who think that in France as well, of course, but there is considerably more cynicism regarding that worldview outside America.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
They fired him for "public statements;" but as far as I can tell, he never made any public statements, he only wrote, privately, to his MP.
This kind of incident is great for us fighting this law; it produced some more ammos for the opposition in parliament, and it made the gov't look like the assholes they are.
On top of that, it's proof positive -- if it was ever needed -- of the collusion between the gov't and the major media.
Yes, look how friendly the BBC are to the government...
Or alternatively, we could look at the "Independent Military Experts" hired by many of the "private" news channels in the US, many of whom turned out to be on the Pentagon's payroll.
The independence of the media depends on many things more than ownership. Even where there is no state media, independence can be compromised by things like access to state officials, the expense of trying to investigate without access and the complexity and difficulty of some stories where only government employees know what is going on.
Forwarding a private letter to a third party is a giant privacy violation, I hope he will sue and win against his previous employer and the ministers that forwarded his emails. A good lawyer should be able to secure him some good money and give the cause a good publicity.
French here
What's your friend describe is a "mise au placard". It's a specific way to fire somebody without really firring him.
It's extremely wrong in french for your managing staff motivations when you start to fire people without serious reasons and it's pretty hard to prove and convince every body that some body don't actually do as expected. So you don't fire him but progressively put him in a position where he don't have responsibility, interesting works, no computer, no phone, etc... and you simply wait that he resign by himself.
If he resign he isn't cover by the social protection law, so it's cheaper for you, better for you managing staff, etc...
The only problem is went you push it to far ( excessive work load, harassment, etc ) and the employ commit suicide ( Renaud technocenter serial suicide at work )
The "mise au placard" have nothing to do with this case where the employ was fired for "important fault". In this case the employer say "you committed an important fault in regard of the company, you are fired, you will not get the social protection".
Driving a truck drunk = important fault
sending a mail to his MP = ?
It's actually quite telling that a country that took a stand so strongly against invading and imposing outside will on a country's freedom is entirely failing at understanding and dealing with the more subtle corruptions of big media and government.
What about Halliburton? I'm fairly sure only offering contracts to the company the VP used to be CEO of is much worse than the standard run of the mill corruption! At least the US is still #1 in some things!
IranAir Flight 655 never forget!
Yeah, Europeans are just so cool. Find me any group of European countries that comprise 300 million people, and tell me how much better off they are now. In 5 years, when EuroSocialism breaks down even further, come back and tell me again.
Why is this insightful? European social democracies have been sitting there, giving their citizens a better quality of life than the US, for decades, and there's no reason at all to assume it won't continue. (Given how your national debt's going, the US should be more worried about where it will be in five years.)
I am trolling