re: #119 ObserverArt

That is similar to what I posted a few months ago regarding anyone that is publicly associated as the face of a business and then goes out and makes all kinds of strident political statements. You are asking to chase some customers.

It doesn’t even have to be a strident statement, just an unpopular one.

A few years ago I was co-authoring a series of books. My co-author and I hung out at the same politics sub-forum at a popular writer’s hangout. Our politics were different (their’s was edging wingnut status) but it didn’t matter to me. They were a good writer and we’d been chatting on Yahoo for years. We got along.

Then I posted an opinion that made a lot of people’s heads explode at the writer’s board. My co-author then made it clear that they did not approve of me posting something that would chase customers away.

I tried to point out that a) their opinions posted on that board would also chase customers away, and, b) it’s part of the price a person pays for freedom of speech. A price I was willing to pay.

They were having none of it. My co-author made it clear I was never going to post a political opinion on-line anywhere ever again. If I felt I must they would have to read it first and if they disapproved it was not going to be posted. If I didn’t as they commanded they would kill the project and the excuse they would give is that my co-author could not work with someone so ‘unprofessional’.

In our society being labelled unprofessional is like being labelled a pedophile. For many people it’s an accusation that requires no proof and even those who do wait for evidence tend to have their perception of you warped.

So I knew the project was over. I don’t knuckle under to bullies. We finished the book we were working on and went our separate ways. They still spread the unprofessional rumour though.

It was my first inkling that those who label themselves ‘conservative’ seem to share a very different ethical framework from myself.