Worker Protections against Cancel Mobs
A simple legislative solution to "cancel culture"?
Mobs like to get people fired for saying things they don’t like. Politicians from the opposite party like to use this to fundraise and drum up outrage against “cancel culture”. I don’t know of any direct fix to the cultural problem of people being vindictive, censorious jerks. But the worst symptoms—e.g. random people getting fired for social media posts—seem like they could be addressed via legislation. And in this context, I think such legislation could plausibly be spun as both pro-worker and pro-business, and more generally pro-freedom.
The proposal: Politicians should pass a “Protect Citizens From Cancel Mobs” Act, which makes it illegal in most cases to fire an employee for their off-the-clock political activities or extramural speech.1
Why it’s pro-worker: Who doesn’t want better protections against arbitrary dismissal?
Why it’s pro-business: Sometimes, having the option to do X makes you vulnerable to outside pressure to do X. In such cases, if you don’t really want to do X, it can increase your freedom to remove the option to do X. Now no-one can bully you into it. Just as you wouldn’t want bankruptcy courts to be able to force you to sell yourself into slavery or indentured servitude, so businesses shouldn’t want politicized mobs to have a say over their internal hiring/firing decisions. (It’s no longer bad PR to have an employee with disreputable opinions if you can’t do anything about it so it really doesn’t reflect on the company’s “values” in any way.)
Why it’s pro-freedom: all laws restrict our freedoms in some ways. The good ones thereby enhance our overall freedom by protecting us against worse impositions. I’m not allowed to swing my fist into the space your body currently occupies. And that’s well worth it, to be protected against the threat of others’ assaults. In a similar fashion, it seems well worth giving up the “freedom” to fire people for their political opinions, in order to be free of the threat of being on the receiving end of such mistreatment. It would surely be a no-brainer to agree to this from behind the veil of ignorance.
Am I missing something? Let me know in the comments if there’s some reason this wouldn’t actually be a good idea. Otherwise, I’m curious why there isn’t more pressure on anti-cancel-culture politicians to “walk the walk” by actually passing legislation along these lines. Seems like it ought to be popular!
It could make sense to have exceptions, e.g. for “brand ambassador” / spokesperson-type roles, where the employee’s popularity and vibes are essential to the role.
I don't think it is obviously correct. Insofar as the US benefits from less restrictive labor laws (eg lower unemployment rate, higher productivity, etc), we should be cautious of any proposal to increase the regulatory burden in firing (and thus also hiring). For instance, this rule would seem to create an incentive for employers to pre-cancel--put in more due diligence before hiring to make sure the job applicant doesn't have any opinions or behavior that are too controversial, as they won't be able to later fire them if they turn into negative PR.
My God! Political extremism provides you with job protection! You get a job, become a Nazi or Communist, attract attention for your activities and underperform but your boss becomes afraid of litigation if she dismisses you!