Freedom of Speech with Private Companies.

Something that used to always confuse me was how and why someone could be fired from their place of work for something that they said. I thought the first amendment (more specifically, free speech) applied to everyone, anywhere and at any time. Clearly, I was very naïve. It wasn’t until I started taking this class and heard about this particular incident that I learned about the power of private companies. More specifically, the power they have over their employees’ actions and words.

A few weeks ago, comedian Shane Gillis was fired from Saturday Night Live before even appearing on the show. According to this NPR article, Gillis was fired for using racist, homophobic, and offensive language on his podcast that was posted around a year ago. SNL released an apology explaining “We want ‘SNL’ to have a variety of voices and points of view within the show, and we hired Shane on the strength of his talent as comedian and his impressive audition for ‘SNL’.”

I was still a tad confused as to how SNL could do this. I didn’t by any means disagree with their decision, but I wanted to know why wasn’t Gillis protected? After doing some research, I found this website which explained the freedom of speech policy in the workplace extremely well. It states that employees in the public sector, or employees who work for the government, have first amendment rights in their workplace but are subject to certain restrictions. On the contrary, employees who work in the private-sector do not have that right for their speech in the workplace. Although Gillis has the constitutional right to say the things that he said- since SNL is a private company, they had the right to fire him.

Gillis released what some would call an apology after the news broke that he would no longer be a new cast member on the show. He went on to explain that he was grateful for opportunity and respected the decision SNL had made. No apologetic words were used in the tweet which caused some backlash from his followers and fans of the show. He made sure to end the ‘apology’ saying he “was always a mad tv guy anyway.”

Overall, private companies can monitor and decide what their employees can and cannot say. Employees can be fired for their actions and words and they technically are not protected by the first amendment in cases like these.