But we aren’t there yet.

Anyway, here’s what bugs me: People who make themselves different from everyone else, then are shocked that they are treated differently. And the online world makes it bot easier to show your differences and for people to see them.

Hey, if you want to wear a tattoo, or dye your hair purple, or wear low-cut blouses, or post pictures of yourself mooning the camera, that’s fine. It’s your choice. There are lots of places where that is normal of even expected (I don’t care one way or the other).

However, if it’s different than what everyone else is doing, you must expect that people WILL treat you differently because of it. You’ll be an outsider. If you are prepared for that, and can handle it (or even enjoy it), that’s great!

But don’t complain that you aren’t accepted. Don’t whine that your straight-laced boss seems to treat you differently after he sees the online pictures of you at the strip club. Or that your very liberal coworkers don’t seem to include you in office discussions after reading your passionate post on an pro-choice webpage. Or that coworkers of the opposite genderin seem to leer at you (short of sexual harrasment) after they see a picture of you half-nude at Mardi Gras.

The problem is that SOMETHING we do is considered different to SOME group of people in our lives. We ALL present different aspects of ourselves to different groups of people. We present one face our parents, another face to our friends, and a different face to our coworkers (and sometimes a completely different face when we are alone). At work, we keep things professional. We avoid topics that can be controversial, in order to keep our workplace relationships pleasant.

But posting stuff online under your real name defeats all that. I don’t see much difference between telling a off-color joke on a web page (and signing it with your real name), and telling that same joke at work. If it’s there, someone will find it. And you can’t blame them for acting differently around you if they do.

YOU have control. Exercise it or accept the consequences.

Imagine yourself in the position of a hiring manager, what if you have a candidate that is completely qualified to do a job and the interview went fine would you check their personal website?
what if you checked it and it turns out that the person is a neo-nazi?
or gets themself arrested at antiwar protests every weekend? I doubt that you would have the same image of that person as if you didn’t see their website.

Also, an entirely true anecdote you may be interested in: My old company used to have company season tickets at the local professional baseball stadium and if none of the managers or clients wanted the tickets them would give them to staff. The seats are literally in the front row at the rail just beyond third base. One time a staff coworker went to the game and there was a disputed call. The next day the front page of a national newspaper had photograph of the play and clearly seen in the background is our worker with a beer in one hand, pointing a finger at the player and yelling. Very few people at work seemed to notice and he really wasn’t doing anything out of the ordinary that a baseball fan would do and so nothing really ever happened at work after that about.

Thanks for the good post though.

-Matt

http://www.recruitingbloggers.com/rbs/2007/06/blogging_for_jo.html