by Nick Fishman

A recent article featured in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Teacher Accused of Attempted Murder Wrote Self-Profile that Counters Image raises a very interesting question as it relates to the use of admissibility of personal on-line postings as a tool for pre-employment screening.  According to the story, a school teacher in Missouri is now standing trial for murder.  After some some initial digging, investigators found that the teacher had posted a personal profile on an on-line forum where he indicated that his hobbies include "pimping, prostitutes and pornography".  While freedom of speech is a tenant we hold very dearly in this country, can the language one uses be held against him or her when they are looking for a job?  It can easily be demonstrated that the language used above can be grounds not to hire someone a school would entrust to teach children, but should such language preclude an individual from getting a manufacturing job, for example. 

Another question to be raised is one based on persona.  How does one prove that role playing wasn’t taking place at the time of a posting and that these are the genuine feelings or thoughts of the individual?  I don’t have the answer to these questions, but you can be sure that significant cases are forth coming which will highlight this very issue sooner rather than later.   

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 4th, 2005 at 6:14 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.