Recently I spoke at Utah Valley University about the private regulation of speech, particularly in businesses curtailing not just workplace speech but speech outside of the workplace. We have discussed such incidents where people were fired for YouTube videos or drunken scenes. This “little brother” problem falls outside of the first amendment which addresses government regulation of speech. As a result, businesses have wide latitude in punishing employees for private conduct, though some states have laws protecting some forms of speech and employment such as voting and political activities. We have a new such case involving a woman in Ontario who shot and posted a video of her berating a neighbor for flying a Mexican flag. The video caused many to be understandably angry with Tressy Capps, who didn’t seem to see how obnoxious she appeared in her own posted video. However, it has not escaped her employer, which proceeded to fire her.
The video below is incredibly insulting and intolerant in my view. Capps suggests that the family might want to move back to Mexico simply because they are flying the Mexican flag. Capps is described as a political activist and asks woman in the window
“Is that a Mexican flag in your front yard?” Capps is heard asking the homeowner, who is behind a window. You know we live in America right? This is the United States. So, why are you flying a Mexican flag in your front yard?”
The woman did not appear to understand English. Her husband Sigifredo Banuelos later told the media that he did not see what was offensive about flying the Mexican flag and that they fly both the American and Mexican flags.
Capps posted her video and not surprisingly received a harsh response. Her real estate company was not amused and fired her from an independent contactor position. For a real estate company in an area with a large Hispanic population, the decision was probably not viewed as a particularly difficult one. While the public confrontation did not involve her work, it certainly involved the clientele of her work. She made herself a liability and businesses are first to remove at-will employees who harm the bottom line.
I believe that there should be protection for private employees engaging in protected speech. However, when an employee seeks such notoriety and becomes such a liability, there is a stronger basis for the company acting to protect its business interests.
Woman Irate That Ontario Family Is Flying Mexican Flag In Their Front Yard
Elaine,
I don’t care at all what Det. Serino wants to say. He was not there, and there is no evidence to support his conclusion.
You can only follow someone as fat as their last known location. Zimmerman lost sight of Martin around the sidewalk intersection. Zimmerman followed along the sidewalk as far as the intersection. At that point he is no longer following Martin, but continuing along his own destination at the next street.
I’ll repeat. It is impossible to follow someone beyond the point of their last known location. It doesn’t matter how you want to spin it. Additional information would be required before following can resume past the point at which Zimmerman lost sight of Martin.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/george-zimmerman-trial-chris-serino-lead-detective-in-case-of-trayvon-martin-killing-takes-stand-again-tuesday/
Excerpt:
Both prosecutors and defense attorneys asked Serino about when and whether George Zimmerman was following Trayvon Martin the night of the altercation. De la Rionda replayed a portion of the Feb. 29 interview tape in court, in which Zimmerman says, “They told me not to follow him. I wasn’t following him, I was just going in the same direction.”
“That’s following,” Serino said on the tape.
O’Mara asked whether Serino had any evidence that Zimmerman continued to follow Trayvon Martin after a non-emergency dispatcher told him not to.
“I would answer I have information, yes,” Serino said. “Just based on where we located Trayvon and the fact that the altercation happened after the confrontation. That’s my interpretation. There was some following.”
Elaine – fyi GZ is NOT required to follow the directions of the dispatcher. I cannot be clearer. As far as the law goes, there is no law against following someone. And there is no law against going in the same direction.
Liberals always want to talk about how they FEEEEL on a topic. Everyone else talk about what they think.
@Olly
I second your motion about Jack’s class! (Yes, you can take that two ways!)
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Jack,
it has been my pleasure to sit through your “Fundamentals of Debating with Reason (not Emotion)” class this evening. Good stuff! 🙂
My mom called them all, “Chinamen.” As an homage to her, I’m having just “Chinamen” on the list. My PC sister used to have fits. They lived on the Choate campus w/ lots of “Chinamen.” Mom would try her best and use Asians as directed by my sister. But, invariably slide back to “Chinamen.” LOL
Elaine – if I may quote bfm
I disagree and I think a jury of his peers disagreed.
Elaine,
There is no evidence that Zimmerman continued to follow Martin after being told that they don’t need him to follow.
According to Zimmerman, he (Zimmerman) continued to walk on the sidewalk to the next street over. Then he walked along the same path back towards his truck. The physical evidence supports this.
As such, where do you come up with following Trayvon after the Dispatcher waved him off?
“I see dead people.”
The dispatcher should have a PC list. Sir, is the subject
White
Black
Hispanic
Black Hispanic
Mostly White but a little black
Mostly black but also white
Laplander
Pacific Islander
Chinaman..err Asian
Eastern European
Hoser err Canadian
Eskimo
South American
Central American
Icelandic
Greenlander
Indonesian
Pakastani
Afghani
Libyan
Saudi
Mongolian
Tibetan
Nepalese
Southern European
Nick – you need to break those Asians into separate groups. Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Mongolian, etc.
Paul,
Where did I claim that anything Zimmerman said in his 911 call was racist? That’s the second time you’ve implied that I said Zimmerman made racists comments in his call.
Elaine – my complaint is not about you, as I said before, but about bigfatmike who made the original comment and has made the charge again in the comment above this.
@NickS
I love the Home Security Systems commercials. The burglar is always white. Heck, simple odds are half of ’em are going to be black. If I owned one of those companies, I’d put some Willie Horton looking thugs with saggy pants and a gold tooth in the commercials. The PC crowd would go apepoop crazy, but I bet I would sell a gazillion systems.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
squeeky – what you could do is run the booking photos of burglars from your area over the last couple of months. That could ramp up sales. 🙂
We have a local, liberal, online newspaper in Madison, the failing Capital Times, that puts out descriptions of criminal suspects, but won’t include their race. PC insanity. You can’t make this stuff up!!
Nick – I have heard of things like the Capital Times, even PC police departments putting out descriptions without a race attached. Now that does widen the suspect pool considerably leading to more false arrests and the possibility of more officer involved shootings of innocent civilians.
The dispatcher didn’t “press” Zimmerman. He asked him a question at the beginning of the 911 call. He was trying to elicit information from Zimmerman so police who were sent out on the call would be able to more easily identify the person Zimmerman was talking about.
Zimmerman may have seemed calm during the 911 call. I have to wonder why he continued to follow Trayvon Martin after the police dispatcher told him “we don’t need you to do that”–and after he knew that police were on their way.
*****
Excerpt from the beginning of the 911 call transcript:
Dispatcher
Sanford Police Department.
Zimmerman
Hey we’ve had some break-ins in my neighborhood, and there’s a real suspicious guy, uh, it’s Retreat View Circle, um, the best address I can give you is 111 Retreat View Circle. This guy looks like he’s up to no good, or he’s on drugs or something. It’s raining and he’s just walking around, looking about.
Dispatcher
OK, and this guy is he white, black, or hispanic?
Zimmerman
He looks black.
Elaine – that is hardly racist and he was given a choice of three. Of the three he picked the one that seemed the most likely. The dispatcher did not add Native American or Asian or anything else. He reports obviously suspicious activity. Now remember that the dispatcher cannot give direct orders to anyone over the phone. They are specifically prevented from doing that. That came up at length at the trial. They have no policing powers, unlike the crossing guards from earlier today.
@PaulCS
I am not surprised. What you have operating over the Trayvon mess is a lynch mob mentality. Lynch mobs don’t work off of rational thinking. They work off suspicions and what to them is righteous anger. Accordingly, things like facts and reasonable interpretations of actions simply don’t cut it. All they need are suspicions and then they will elevate those suspicions to the level of
facts.
So here is an example of how it works. The actual FACT is, that Trayvon attacked Zimmerman. But that don’t matter to the Trayvonazis. Their SUSPICION that it was all just racism, permits them ignore that FACT, and to substitute their SUSPICION that it wasn’t a really bad attack, and thus justifying their preconceived notion that the killing was based on racism.
The issues here are not legal. They are psychological. You have already seen it at work in Ferguson. It will get worse the longer the lynch mob is denied someone to hang.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
I must agree with Paul here! 🙂
Mango – we are a leaderless society. There are some who try to claim leadership from time to time, but they are usually put down like the rabid dogs they are. 🙂
Whoa, looks like a near implosion.
@bfm
Well then, actually make fair use of what we know about Zimmerman:
<blockquote.
"He and a black friend opened up an insurance office in a Florida…"
"He'd engaged in notably un-racist behaviour such as taking a black girl to his high-school prom…"
"Not only does he have black relatives, he has reportedly donated his time to tutor black children."
"He launched a campaign to help a homeless black man who was beaten up by a white kid."
http://www.examiner.com/article/ignored-by-media-zimmerman-voted-for-obama-tutored-black-kids
Plus, he voted for Obama!
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Turley pre-school in cession.