Comments on No Opinions, No Porn

Aargh, you yungins. Keep it in the bathroom stall.
The cumstench of the shitters back in our Brooklyn newsroom were infamous.

Please. I feel dirtier looking at Leona Helmsley's pic on the home page of the NYTimes than Fleshbot.

(She's dead, by the way.)

Yes, it does suck, Dan.

It is called the REAL world where you can not look at porn or anything that could be construed as porn at work. If you are dumb enough to look at it AT WORK you probably should lose your job or at the least get a write-up with a suspension.

@4: Hear hear!

but seriously, just looking at that site, it's completely NSFW, and not safe for viewing in public... you'd have to be on a brain vacation to think that would be OK in most workplaces.

This is the kind of nonsense that follows when your country was founded by religious whackos. There was a good reason the English were happy to see the Pilgrims go.

Cato - It may be the REAL world, but that doesn't mean that it it's fair or just or wise.

If an employer gives their employees internet access, and can't keep their employees busy enough with, ya know, actual work, then they've no one to blame but themselves when they go off and look at porn, or Stranger.com (almost the same thing), or something really horrible like Red State.

WELL WELL WELL

How stupid. Good union job. Bye, bye.

As they say the male brain is somewhere near his dick and balls.

There is no workplace that allows a lot of porn, other employees can object, many supporting laws, and cost mega problems - and they do - all the time.

Am - Pm - laptop at lunch off premises - take the hint all you people who think you work at uber liberal places.

guest

Trouble is not always clear (or fair) as to what is porn and what is not. Certainly there are many things on websites such as the slog that could be deemed as porn. I remember that when I pulled up yahoo at work there was an ad with a nearly naked woman in a swimsuit for Maxim Magazine would appear in one of the banner ads. Anyone PURPOSELY trying to view that ad should have been fired but how can a stop a yahoo banner ad.
This is simply an overaction to trying to be political correct and very few are actually viewing real porn but expect more witchhunts like this as people such as Cato the Younger Younger above who don't understand the real web world and how "porn" is unavoidable.

@8 LOL!!! You funny!!!! Yeah, the fired employee is absolved of any responsibility in this!!! Blame someone other than the idiot who surfed the website.

At times some liberals just really are stupid.

the very first time i ever saw internet porn was on the job. it was when i worked for .....
the stranger.
sigh
good times..

The policy may be stupid, but... the guy knew the policy and chose to break it anyways. I'm sure most everyone on here could point to a workplace policy/rule that they disagree with, but when you accept a job you agree to abide by those rules, or at least you accept the consequences of getting caught breaking the rule. I have limited sympathy for this guy...

Meh, a rule's a rule. But the guy is lucky, really. He has the blogoverse to cry to; 10 years ago he'd have had to work out his frustrations at being caught doing something he KNEW HE WASN'T SUPPOSED TO DO by sneaking back into the building with his extra key and sprinkling pubic hairs all over the ice cube trays in the freezer.

The thing is, as shocking as it may sound to the enlightened whores at The Stranger (said with love), but there are people in the working world who use porn to purposely dominate and embarrass co-workers. So... if you let the guy who was just horny stay, where do you draw the line?

what is with these people that think the "REAL"WORLD" is a place where you do not look at porn and do what you are told to do or get punished.
My job is in the so called "real world" and I do not get fired for looking at porn. In fact I have to do it and also look at anything that is good subject matter for making art. Everything is game where I work as it should be in any job that involves having an opinion about the "real world". The people that make up most of the rules about things like porn and beleive others should be punished are usually the ones with the most twisted minds and are afraid of something like porn. Many others just know how to get on with life and get their job done even when there is a little distraction now and then. Seems it would make life and a job far more bearable if rules were relaxed.
Oh that Job I have as an artist might sound flaky to some since I work in an environment that encourages looking at every image I can from all sources. The end product usually sells for $150,000- (if putting a price on something justifies it as a real job to some) and is packed with meaning and challenges most that view the work. I can walk away from it at the end of a long day and still function in the "real world" quite fine because I am not some uptight idiot that is afraid of porn.

you've been working at the stranger too long if you think that fleshbot isn't "real" porn. i see your point, but in addition to a warning that "Fleshbot links to adult sites. It is not safe for work. If you are under 18, you must leave now.", the front page has pictures of lots of naked people, some of them fucking each other.

Yet another reason I'm glad I'm self employed. That and the fact that i just woke up ten minutes ago.

People who work at the Stranger tell me it also sucks to work at a place that doesn't pay shit. I'm not talking about Dan -- naturally he lives in a million dollar house near Volunteer Park.

I have to side with the teetotlers here. I'm not a genious, nor do I have a degree in HR, but I know one shouldn't view porn at work, unless the work at a job that explicitly condones such viewing.

And it doesn't matter what kind. Swimsuit models is too racy. Just stick to The Slog and check out the T & A sites at home...

Well. Of course he got fired. I'd get fired too. In fact, I'd probably get in trouble for checking my mail or surfing to non-work related sites at work.

Dan probably does live in an expensive house. But it's no doubt thanks to the books he has written and his syndicated column and the freelancing he does for other papers and for This American Life.

Actually, in reply to myself, I'd get a warning first.
No warning?

This post is all kinds of ridiculous. (Even for you, Dan.)

Look, I'm all for people looking at porn on their own time and all that. I'm also for maintaining a semi-professional office atmosphere. That does involve limits on what you can be looking at while you're at work. Sure, you can go overboard with trying to make sure everyone's comfortable, but I really don't think that not being able to look at porn at work is a crucial issue.

Employees of The Stranger, I take it, are not disciplined for looking at pornography during work hours? They are allowed to take refreshing porn breaks during work? That would seem fair, given the commentary by Dan Savage.

Is it that hard to not look at porn at work. Personally I have managed to avoid it for many years.

The best thing is that he has now put it out there on the internet that he was fired for looking at porn at work. Good luck getting another job :)

@26, LOL!! Yeah, imagine that interview. "Why were you fired from your last position?" "Ah, well I was bored at work and wanted to look at some porn...Is that a problem?" The real issue is how do you spin that during an interview??

There is a practical issue here, which is that porn sites are often riddled with invasive trojans and the like, and are often a threat to network security. I can see why a company would be concerned about this on that level. But is that a fireable offence?

To me, a bigger issue is about feeling like the place you work doesn't trust you. If my boss thinks I'm doing a good job and I'm demonstrably productive, does it really matter what I look at in the privacy of my own office?

And shouldn't a company's IT department have better things to do than peel through server data and snoop around in people's hard drives? If they're so worried about security, can they not block off certain areas of the web from corporate access, say, anything that has a "click here if you're 18" screen? (Caveat: I'm no IT guy, so maybe this isn't possible. Just seems like it should be.)

I personally don't have any desire to look at porn while I'm at work. If I need a break, there are plenty of entertaining non-porn websites to surf. But making one's staff feel like they're working for Big Brother doesn't engender a sense of workplace community.

@7,

Although the theocrats certainly don't help matters, it's less that than the opposite extreme: anti-porn feminists. It's fear of sexual harassment lawsuits. By demonstrating a "zero tolerance" policy for this kind of behavior, they avoid almost any liability. So blame the attitude that porn = oppresion, combined with a litigous society.

So, I'm going to go out on a limb, and state that maybe Dan is being just a little bit satirical.

But, let's hear from him.

So what if the individual that got fired claims an internet porn addiction? They do exist according to pop psychologists. You'd think that employers would be a little frightened of shit canning an employee so radically like that. What if the person just couldn't help himself/herself (because @9 bitches like to look at cock just as much as dudes like to look at pussy). The only place one can really truly get away with this is working at a law firm because the partners surf porn all day while whacking it in their offices.

@29,

As noted by #14, some men use porn to embarrass their coworkers. If you want to blame someone for workplaces' anti-sexual harrassment and anti-porn policies, blame them. Porn doesn't equal oppression, but tell that to the assholes who use porn to humiliate others.

@keshmeshi:

Well technically, I said some people, not men. Apparently this person was a dude, but I'm not Judge Judy, I don't have the power to assign perp-hood to one sex and victim-hood to the other. Lots of folks in this comments thread already doing that, Judge Judy must be busy today. ;-)

I love porn, but have never considered looking at it at work. Because I like being employed. Fellow sybarites- same it for home. If you don't, the ACLU isn't going to save your ass.

I've worked at The Times for 5 years, and have received The Red Hand of Doom at least 20 times. Not for trying to look at porn, but for attempting to access PG sites like Sean Nelson's. *shrug* At least I can get to SLOG with no problem.

Oh for heaven's sake, people. Take 30 seconds to google for "sexual harassment + playboy + hostile work environment + jury award" -- this has nothing to do with puritanism or "political correctness" on the part of the Seattle Times, and everything to do with a perfectly reasonable desire to avoid paying out a multi-million settlement to anyone within shoulder-surfing range of this idiot's computer.

A couple of years ago the number one reason people were fired from their jobs was improper use of the internet (I suppose the definition of improper is up to the employer). The CEO at my job was fired for having porn on his computer.

I think part of it (the biggest part, perhaps) is fear of a sexual harassment lawsuit.

But another big part is control. I used to work as a bank teller. Sometimes it would be really slow, and there was nothing to do. We'd go on the internet, but our supervisor would constantly come around and specifically look at our computer screens to make sure we weren't on the internet at all. This never made much sense: if a customer were to come up, it woud look much more professional for us to be doing something on the computer as opposed to chatting with each other (what we did when we got kicked off the internet).

Our jobs are taking up more of our time and taking control of other parts of our lives (drug tests, anyone?). Sure, you can make the argument that we give drug tests because of insurance companies, but it's really just part of a much larger program to turn us all into robots.

A couple of years ago the number one reason people were fired from their jobs was improper use of the internet (I suppose the definition of improper is up to the employer). The CEO at my job was fired for having porn on his computer.

I think part of it (the biggest part, perhaps) is fear of a sexual harassment lawsuit.

But another big part is control. I used to work as a bank teller. Sometimes it would be really slow, and there was nothing to do. We'd go on the internet, but our supervisor would constantly come around and specifically look at our computer screens to make sure we weren't on the internet at all. This never made much sense: if a customer were to come up, it woud look much more professional for us to be doing something on the computer as opposed to chatting with each other (what we did when we got kicked off the internet).

Our jobs are taking up more of our time and taking control of other parts of our lives (drug tests, anyone?). Sure, you can make the argument that we give drug tests because of insurance companies, but it's really just part of a much larger program to turn us all into robots.

A couple of years ago the number one reason people were fired from their jobs was improper use of the internet (I suppose the definition of improper is up to the employer). The CEO at my job was fired for having porn on his computer.

I think part of it (the biggest part, perhaps) is fear of a sexual harassment lawsuit.

But another big part is control. I used to work as a bank teller. Sometimes it would be really slow, and there was nothing to do. We'd go on the internet, but our supervisor would constantly come around and specifically look at our computer screens to make sure we weren't on the internet at all. This never made much sense: if a customer were to come up, it woud look much more professional for us to be doing something on the computer as opposed to chatting with each other (what we did when we got kicked off the internet).

Our jobs are taking up more of our time and taking control of other parts of our lives (drug tests, anyone?). Sure, you can make the argument that we give drug tests because of insurance companies, but it's really just part of a much larger program to turn us all into robots.

Sorry about the double post. Sometimes with the new thingie it doesn't look like it's posting.

Sometimes I feel like I'm looking at pr0n when I browse SLOG.

Um, not with you on this one: I don't really want to walk up to a coworker to ask a question and see Sgt. Major Woody in their lap. Not while I'm on the job. That's more than I want to know about someone they have to PAY me to actually speak to. BTW: Appears the critter was a temp and not a contract employee.

Fleshbot is the tamest porn site there is. It's about a notch less tame than Slog.

Next: getting fired for looking at Slog!

Dan, I realize that your job requires yu to watch porn to be an effective sex columnist, but if we working stiffs so much as indulge ourselves in ESPN.com - off with our heads!

@42, exactly. Its work not your house.

That's ironic, Dan.

You just recently mentioned in Savage Love, Wee Weenies (July 12) in your response to IPRUDE, that as the computer was HER computer that her SON was using to look at porn, that it was okay for her to regulate his use of the internet ON that computer.

Funny that a company should have the right to do the same with its computers. I mean, not only is the employee in question looking at NSFW material on the job, but with THEIR equipment.

They provide that equipment for the purpose of the job they want done, not for the personal enjoyment of the employee. And that they are okay with the employee using the computer for SOME personal things is rather magnanimous (my boss doesn't, and I don't think it's necessary anyway). But to EXPECT to be able to look at PORN on someone ELSE'S computer, much less your BOSS' computer, is absolutely ridiculous.

Matthew @ 28: "If they're so worried about security, can they not block off certain areas of the web from corporate access"

Sure they could. My workplace has a internet filter and, for example, I can't get to The Stranger (it's considered porn, go figure?) I would think places that concerned about lawsuits would find it easier to block sites than having to fire people.

so wait, there's an opening at the Times?

so wait, there's an opening at the Times?

so wait, there's an opening at the Times?

Some of these entries are hilarious... especially Matthew @ #28 and his big brother conspiracy. Who said the guy was in his "office" and IT did a scan of his computer to find out he was viewing porn? He was probably a cubicle punk that made $8/hr and was caught with his pants down... Come on people! Have you ever thought that maybe he just sucked at his job and that was the last straw? And yes, #28, viewing porn at work is a fireable offense if it is stated as such upon hire. Quit bitchin'.... Learn from your mistakes and get on with your life

Having being one of the more unfortunate people to momentarily work with this vulgar individual I must say SAW THAT ONE COMING. Seeing as how the first words out of this man's mouth were "That guys tits are bigger than my girlfriend's", keeping in mind this was his third day in an office environment, I knew that his lack of professionalism would soon lead to his termination. May I also add that addressing his boss' "idea" of the strict rules was an absolute exploitation of said boss' kindness and overall attempt to make an already uncomfortable and possible detrimental situation progress more smoothly than it had to. In NO way would he support the actions of this former employee. I was quite surprised he actually made it three weeks.