Tulsi Gabbard fires more than 100 intelligence officers over messages in a chat tool
The discussions went beyond work to sexual themes and political messages.
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Hmm without seeing what was said it's hard to say if this was justified or not. Certainly some of the things mentioned would warrant at least a warning about using work tools for personal discussions, but some of the other examples given don't seem particularly problematic (except that the current administration has decided to launch a jihad against specific ideas and minority groups).
The transcripts included some political discussion, including a few people criticizing Gabbard and three people celebrating the death of televangelist and former Republican presidential candidate Pat Robertson in 2023.
We can safely say this is a coup now.
I don’t trust anyone who doesn’t celebrate the death of a televangelist.
Unfortunately it was justified. The messages were extremely explicit for a government collaboration chat
Most of it seemed to be just discussions of healthcare that are only defined as "explicit" because it's talking about the healthcare trans people need. It's just part of the long-running attempt to define trans people as porn. If you are trans, you are walking pornography to these people.
Remember, this was on a chat that was specifically set up, by the agency, to serve as a resource and information sharing section for trans and LGBT people. The employer told them to use it, and they did. Now the new administration, following the model of Florida and other shithole states, has decided that trans people by their nature are pornographic, and any discussion of trans issues is explicit.
And worst, they went through years of texts and found the most explicit messages they could. They leaked these texts to fascist hate mongers to stir shit up. Then they fired anyone who had ever posted on the chat. You could have gone on the company LGBT chat once, said, "Hi," and then never used it again. And you would be fired for it.
This is the Lavender Scare all over again. They are simply using the chats as a pretext to fire every trans person from the agency.
https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/the-new-mccarthyism-lgbtq-purges
While it was likely uncovered by the anti DEI order, it still violated the rules of the chat which basically say in no way shape or form should there be anything but mission related content. No matter how you put it, they violated the rules of system which comes with harsh penalties.
Rules which only apply to people they don't like. Trumps own conduct has been gross.
So the agency set up a chat specifically for trans people to discuss trans issues, yet they were supposed to only discuss shit related to their "mission"?
Make it make sense.
The content was past trans issues and more along detailed experiences of sex and orgasms post transition. Not exactly safe for work material. The chat was likely stood up by a member of the agency, but the chat was not sponsored by the agency. Being that it is hosted on government systems, it is a huge violation.
And are they purging everyone who used such chats? Are they purging every straight person who ever mentioned a romantic partner? Are they purging every cis het guy who mentioned hooking up with someone over the weekend?
Give me a break. People talk about their personal lives all the time at work. This isn't Severance. What kind of company have you worked for that people never talked about their personal lives? Except, the administration has chosen to interpret completely normal discussions about personal lives and health matters and declare them obscene, simply because they involve queer lives and bodies, rather than straight ones.
People who appeal to "the rules" are usually doing so in bad faith. If the NSA really does have such formal and strict rules, then they would likely have to fire every person there for violating them. The employees on this chat were clearly acting in a way that was considered acceptable within the culture of the agency.
Would you freak out over a group of women discussing their health issues? What about a chat where a group of men discuss the pros/cons of a vasectomy? Everybody has issues that can sound gross and obscene if you read them in bad faith. It's obvious that at the NSA, this kind of discussion was just acceptable. But then they chose to only fire the trans people for violating the sanctity of "the rules."
You are the kind of person MLK warned us about, the kind that prefers order over justice. And you should know from history that "the rules" are often applied with blatant bigotry and double standards. And that is the problem here. Appealing to "the rules" when they are clearly being applied incredibly unevenly in the service of overt bigotry shows that you do not give a damn about justice.
If the NSA really does have such formal and strict rules
Are you serious? Such formal and strict rules that you can't talk about your genitals in a work-provided medium without fear of retribution? You're gonna be shocked when it's revealed they had to wear business casual and had to comb their hair as well.
I work in a very left leaning org and if I mentioned something as mundane as having pubic hair in our chat I'd be fired immediately.
What about a chat where a group of men discuss the pros/cons of a vasectomy?
Lol, yeah that would absolutely not be something I talked about with coworkers at work. Ever.
It’s obvious that at the NSA, this kind of discussion was just acceptable.
Why is it obvious? Why would the NSA of all places have literally the most liberal code of conduct of any office in the history of civilization? There is no office environment on the planet where talking about your genitals, your "penetration enthusiasm" or the intensity of ass-hair laser sessions will be acceptable.
Am...am I taking the bait or something? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills, and that maybe I'm just feeding a troll?
Peope fired were ones discussing the matter. The messages were not about standard trans issues but details about their sex life and orgasms post transistion, which is a huge violation. That shit is not safe for work at any job. And being that these chats are saved, the government wants no liability for holding that level of sensitive information. This was a huge violation of government systems in which they accepted the terms of use. If you think that this is a target thing, then you seriously do not understand how the world around you works. I'm completely for the rights of all people, but there are still lines that you do not cross. If I were to work there and just start rambling off about how big of a dick I have is, or any details of sensual activities the night prior I would have been fired too.
I hate the current administration as much as the next guy, but I would absolutely expect my workplace to fire me if I was using a work chat to talk about weekend gangbangs.
Are they also purging everyone in the agency that ever texted about hooking up with someone over the weekend? Please. People talk about their sex lives all the time, even at work. They just make sure to discuss it an appropriate context. And this discussion group was just that kind of appropriate context.
Again, are they firing everyone who ever texted about a weekend hookup? If not, then it's simple bigotry. Even using lurid words like "gangbang" is honestly almost a slur in this context. Do I participate in that kind of romance? Personally, no. I'm monogamous myself. But I also recognize overt, rank, and despicable bigotry when I see it.
This is how bigotry puts on a polite face. You declare certain sexual practices as obscene while consider others polite and acceptable. On cis het guy brags to another about the time they hooked up with two chicks in one weekend? That's just a player. A queer person has multiple partners and chooses a poor word to describe it? Suddenly it's worth firing every trans person in the agency.
You clearly don't hate this administration enough, as you are completely willing to accept their framing that certain sexualities are inherently deviant and shameful.
Lol, right; the NSA set up a chat for people to talk about sex. That's what they meant - not "Let's have a chat for people to ask about how to address their trans coworkers, other questions of etiquette, and generally make a spot that is welcoming and supportive". They, the NSA, wanted their workers to have a safe space to talk about sex.
I don't talk about fucking my partner with my colleagues over work-provided (let alone government-provided) chat channels; it's not a question of the number of partners or what gender those partners might be, but the fact that if you talk about having sex at work you're probably going to have repercussions.
Just to address a few pieces of your response:
I don't know, are they not? The article you linked doesn't include a lot of quotes. Is there a difference in the language used between the two?
Sure they do, but they don't type it into chat on a server they don't control. That would possibly be the dumbest thing I can imagine someone doing. Fantastic amounts of dumb.
Not anymore than my own - I'm not trying to preach about anybody's morality, I'm probably more "deviant" than most in those chats, but I sure as fuck don't talk about it at work; if I did I wouldn't be putting it in the record.
Who said they were queer? Straight people can have gangbangs. Maybe an ally who had a fantastic weekend brought everyone down. Still a stupid thing to type in.
If you don't think there are limits to what can be talked about in the workplace, regardless of the medium, well I don't know what to tell you. I don't know anyone in meatspace that would be surprised when someone who talked about sex in a public sector job got fired. In the end the current admin were going to do it anyways, but they got a solid reason gift-wrapped because folks were being dumb about a work chat.
Donald Trump probably said worse than what was in those chats - he talked about his own daughter ffs. He paid off prostitutes. He got peed on by a prostitute. Theres so much stuff out there about him and what he did and said that its shocking and overwhelming... Yet he's the president. They can fuck right off with their fake moralising and fake religious prudishness.