warning

Many companies/organizations out there either have for quite some time or are just instituting employee policies when it comes to personal accounts on social networking (facebook, for example) or personal blogs. They are requiring that their employees put a disclaimer (A repudiation or denial of responsibility or connection -- American Heritage Dictionary) of sorts, stating that this is the personal space of so-and-so and the thoughts, ideas, etc... are not representative of the organization.

Sometimes I think or ask, why do we need to do this? Who I am at work and who I am at home are not necessarily the same, and can't people compartmentalize? The short and easy answer is, no, people cannot...

Just the other day I was watching a re-run of Stargate SG-1 on DVD. The episode dealt with this issue - sort of... it dealt with something very similar anyway, the fact that when you are part of a group, even when you are acting alone, outside of the group, people will make the assumption that you are still acting as part of the group.

Teal'c (an alien) is part of the team SG-1, which is made up of two earthlings from the military, two aliens, and one earthling civilian. In this episode Teal'c decided to seek revenge on another alien, part of a group that has a somewhat weak alliance with earth. The people from earth, the US military to be exact who run the SG program, were worried that his actions would be mistaken as represenative of earth, and would therefore jeopardize and progress made. Teal'c, like me, thought that people should just "know" the difference. But all across the galaxy everyone made the assumption that the SG command were worried about. You see, Teal'c has been an integral member of SG-1 for about 10 years, and often has gone out alone, but on earth business. Why would this be any different, especially because the guy he was going after was a bad guy to a lot of people, and it would even be conceivable that earth would want to "do something" about this guy too.

So, their concerns were justified.

To add to the situation, and to extend the point of people's assumptions... Even when Teal'c specifically told people in the galaxy that his revenge was not an earthling plan, and that he was acting alone, people still had difficulty separating Teal'c the individual from Teal'c the team member.

So, their concerns were not only justified, but if anything, they underestimated the extent of Teal'c's affiliation with earth...

I wonder then, will a disclaimer really even help? Don't get me wrong, I am not suggesting that organizations flat out prohibit their employees from having personal blogs, etc... I don't think that is right, or fair, or even legal?? But I wonder if a disclaimer is enough...

I wonder if I have to put a disclaimer on my blog because my ideas are so radically different from the organization I work for, then is there a misalignment between me and the organization in general, should I even be working there?

I wonder why the whole warning/disclaimer issue is so one-sided... There are other aspects here, and I will summarize:

• Individuals have the right to personal thoughts and the expressions of those thoughts
• Individuals have the right to NOT read, watch or listen to things that they disagree with, or are offended by
• As Christians, we have the responsibility to pray for people who we feel are off-base with their personal facebook statuses, or their personal blog entries.

Why these things are never mentioned in conjunction with the whole disclaimer thing is (to me) something that is lacking (I do plan to blog in more detail on these three points soon)...

Ultimately... it doesn't matter what I do or do not write, read, watch, say, think, when it comes to other people's reactions to them. Really, it matters what God thinks of it. I may be out of line sometimes, but God will help straighten me out, especially if those people who tell me "you shouldn't write that" also prayed to God "please help her not to write that again, and/or help me understand and be sympathetic..." you get the idea, I think.