Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Political correctness, censorship and Big Brother at City Hall.

The City of Rochester suspended Deputy Director of Emergency Communications Steve Cusenz without pay for five days Wednesday after an internal investigation determined he had posted racially offensive comments on Facebook.
It was never stated what they were, or what they related to.
It was sufficient that James Smith, the mayor's director of communications, deemed them so.
Cusenz made the post on his personal account outside of work hours.
In short, it is not enough that city employees pay lip service to political correctness during business hours. Their thoughts and words are subject to City Hall's control on their own time as well.
That is frightening.
I have no idea what Cusenz said on his own time and own dime.
I do know that censorship is dangerous.
I have also ceased to give City Hall the benefit of the doubt about anything they say and do, particularly in regard to Facebook postings.
This administration's judgment has been in the shithouse since Mayor Warren took over last year.
They are hypersensitive to any criticism, real and imagined, directed against it.
Accusations of racism have been their usual rebuttal to their critics.
Forcing Cusenz to take diversity and inclusion training before returning to his job overseeing daily operations at the 911 Call Center will not brainwash him.
It will demand political correctness of him in both his public and private lives.
It will teach him to keep his mouth shut in order to keep his job, and to watch what he posts on Facebook.
At least what he posts there under his own name.
Now the Warren Administration ought to hire a lot of spies, like they do in totalitarian dictatorships, to follow its employees around, to insure that they behave properly in public.
At least until they leave its employ.
Then, all Hell can break loose when they start talking about what really went on there.
What is clear is that City Hall is making political correctness an official policy for its employees to follow in work and out.
This is why they chose to inform the media. And name names.
Cusenz will be their test case. An example.
And that's why City Hall employees post so much pablum on their Facebook pages, praising the administration..
If they post anything about City Hall at all.

1 comment:

  1. People might want to read Bob Lonsberry's blog, dated March 27, 2015: "If our speech isn't free, neither are we."

    ReplyDelete