Best Buy Employee "Outs" Straight Guy

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

that is a very extreme case you pointed out, as that shit gets plastered everywhere when something so horribly illogical happens. I've seen this happen to people i know (derp via facebook status's) and a solid 90% of the time people know it's either a hack or a joke, if his friends/family are that gullible to believe some random status post (or let himself get so worked up about it) then they really need to wake up and take a good whiff of the 21st century.

and while i'm not saying you don't have a point, because you do, let's remember this is Denver Colorado we are talking about here, not some random hick town out in the middle of nowhere or another random country still stuck in 3rd world mode (no offense is meant by that), so the expectations are quite different and for him to honestly sue to win money over it (the guy was fired, that is more than enough justice served) is quite absurd.

While sewing is extreme, and I'm not arguing against that, doesn't mean that it isn't out of the question. He could sue the person for the written version of slander which I can't remember the term for at the moment if it actually caused some real trouble for the man. Hell, it is a felony in multiple places, so he could still very well make that guys life a living hell.

But on topic once more, just because a state is nice doesn't mean that terrible shiz doesn't happen in it. Germany is a nice place but lest we forget that is the place where a dictator decided to kill all the Jews and rose to power. He may have been friends with very highly religious people, and since this is America, most likely insane Catholic people who most likely think that Homosexuality is not only a sin, but a plague that can be vaccinated.

As I said earlier, as well as many others, Facebook profiles can be seen by everybody and certain people will want certain things from a worker. Could have lost a buisness oppurtunity if he was looking for a new job and the dude who was manager there saw his profile, saw he was gay and said no. I can't work at Mcdonalds and rant about how much Mcdonalds is a terrible place without at least raising one eyebrow in the work place. I can't be a priest and go onto my Facebook account and say how much I love to rape children without getting slapped in the face while teaching prayer to said children.

Yes, extreme it may seem, but I wouldn't be honestly surprised if he had to seriously walk people through that he is in fact not gay. Just because your circle of friends are either indifferent or don't care about homosexuality doesn't mean all of his are the same.

Coming out is, once again, a emotional thing, and I wouldn't be surprised that after telling them that he didn't post it they thought he was trying to jump back into the closet, thus they do the thoughtful thing and try to lure him out, and after much talking they get that he was in fact telling the truth about not being homosexual.

judging by how anal the guy is, i guarantee his facebook profile was private, as only friends/family could see, and while i understand your point, these are all VERY situational very TIMELY things you are talking about, not something that occurs day to day in activities, and while yes, just because my "circle of friends" (which most of the time aren't even close friends, usually it's a friend of a friend or some distant person i met once at a party) is cool with it, doesn't mean that they WON'T be cool with it, if your friends hammer down on you that hard about it, then you either have some super douchey friends or he misunderstood them doing typical immature jokes that usually ensue a status like that.

while i agree it can be an emotional thing, i have yet to see a single person come out on a facebook status actually be serious.

not saying i don't see your point, because i do, but i'm done debating about it, as my view point won't be wavered on something as effortless as this that doesn't affect anyone outside those few entities.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

I like to eat greasy cheeseburgers while watching jersey shore and ranting on how awesome america is.

sorry...was just too tempting after that first line of your post.

"sue me"

 

[Wintermoot]

is it that hard to post that it was all a prank?

 

[Rottweiler]

The irony being I do indeed like to eat greasy cheeseburgers whilst ranting about how awesome America is.

Don't like Jersey Shore.

Mind, I find it hilarious that you found:

A) eating cheeseburgers
B) talking about how awesome the country I live in is

to be grounds for slander.

Being labeled a 'Jersey Shore' watchers, sure.

 

[Mr. Grey]

Yeah it's embarrassing but he's still an idiot. Plus he says "my reputation has been tarnished", almost as if being gay were, I don't know, something to be ashamed of. I have zero sympathy for someone who thinks like that.

I just feel like that's a jump to conclusions.

Also, is it really fair to call him an "idiot" for trusting someone to be professional at their job? The average person just doesn't know all the crazy shit people do when they repair your electronics. When I was fixing computers, I used to look through so many people's personal files that it's not even funny... but that just makes me an asshole; it doesn't make them an idiot.

When someone calls me gay, I just laugh and get over it. I wouldn't involve my lawyer over something that was obviously a joke. And if he really didn't bother to log off Facebook before handing his phone over to someone else, then he's really got no one but himself to blame if his profile gets tampered with.

There's a difference between being called gay and having someone take your Facebook account - and in the process taking your identity - then convincing everyone you know that you're gay. This man has had to explain to several different people, people from his past and people he currently knows that he is not gay. He still has to explain he's not gay. That's all he's been doing, he hasn't been rallying against any group or anyone... he's just tired of having to explain to people that he's straight. I'm willing to wager he is now worried about what this means for his job. Hell, this could make - if it hasn't already - his entire work environment hostile for him. With the fact that most everyone here is already hostile towards him without even knowing him and only hearing a particular sentence most likely taken out of context, I can't blame the guy.

Could he have chosen a better way to phrase it, sure. Does he mean his reputation is actually tarnished? Yeah, that's because it is. People everywhere thought of him as straight and now they think he's gay. It's no longer as he wants it, therefore it's tarnished. He probably doesn't have anything against homosexuals, but really just wants things to be back to what they were. We have no way of even discerning his opinion of homosexuality with what's been given to us, everyone is just jumping on some kind of lynch-wagon.

In fact, Grey Carter going so far to call him a homophobe without any actual evidence to back that up is committing an offence, one that can be taken to court. This guy is already looking to sue Best Buy, this is not a smart move on Mr. Carter's part.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

The irony being I do indeed like to eat greasy cheeseburgers whilst ranting about how awesome America is.

Don't like Jersey Shore.

Mind, I find it hilarious that you found:

A) eating cheeseburgers
B) talking about how awesome the country I live in is

to be grounds for slander.

Being labeled a 'Jersey Shore' watchers, sure.

haha i honestly didn't even look at your profile, so that was just a shot in the sky on those two things (most people on here are super anti-nationalistic anything, especially involving america, if anything it's opposite, so that's why i added that in there)

and eating greasy cheeseburgers? well, that just adds to being american, and being considered american can be quite an insult on these parts (like i said, didn't look at your profile so that was a toss up)

figured the jersey shore part had to at least get ya, that's russian roulette with a full gun

 

[mysecondlife]

There are worse things than people's thinking that you're gay.

If there were gay rumor surrounding me, I'd rather just ignore the rumor rather than try to address it.

capcha: queen of hearts (there has to be a joke in there somewhere)

 

[MorganL4]

Is it just me or does anyone else see being called homophobic as a bigger insult than being called homosexual? I know that personally when I first heard the term "homo" used as an insult, I immediately assumed it meant homophobic, and when my father then explained that it meant homosexual, I was confused. Being gay isn't a bad thing, is what popped into my head. So yeah, to me his reputation was ruined by getting ticked off and claiming his reputation was ruined. ( yay irony)

That's my 2 cents.

 

[Atros81]

I think the labeling him as a homophobe is a bit over the top, and is is a bit unprofessional on the part of the reporter. As to my take on this whole thing... there some things here that I think that people in this thread are failing to take into consideration.

One is trust. When he gave the phone to Best Buy to service, he was placing a certain amount of trust in them to respect his privacy. While there is consensus that he should have logged out of Facebook... in reality, he shouldn't have HAD to. It's similar to if I have to take my own phone in to get serviced, I shouldn't have to worry about some asshole at wherever-it-is using my Google Play account to fuck with my account and screw me over financially. It's a very similar situation, except one is financial, and the other is reputational.

Another thing though, is tone, or gravitas, or whatever. Consider for a moment, that instead of him being a straight man who was fucked over by a Best Buy employee, he was instead a closeted gay man who's coming out. I could very easily see somebody in that situation doing something simple and straight to the point like a Facebook status message like this of "I am gay, I'm coming out." to break the ice and get it over with. If this was worded as something like "I love smoking cocks!" for instance, it'd be a lot easier for people to dismiss it as a prank.

 

[RyoScar]

I had a bit of sympathy for him at first since it wasn't true, but after he said his reputation was "tarnished" all sympathy went out the window.

 

[lotanerve]

You're all really missing the point.

The guy handed in the phone to Best Buy, and the Best Buy employee abused his position. The customer was wronged, and there's nothing to "get over". This is the main point.

The details of homosexuality and whatnot are just the means.

I agree. While one's sexual preference can be considered sensitive, it could have been worse. The employee could have posted a racial/ethnic hate post on the guy's facebook account. Or maybe post a false rant on how he hates the company he works for and get the guy fired. Point is, the employee intentionally posted a statement on the guy's facebook account as the account holder. The man left his phone with the repair service with the intention of it getting repaired, not to be exploited in some juvenile prank.

Seeing that Bust Buy has had issues before, (as in 5-7 years ago) Geek Squad employees accessing private files (looking for porn and copying it on to their personal drives) they had no business looking into, they don't need another issue where it's shown they employ people with irresponsible behavior.

I don't think a $50 gift card is gonna make this thing go away.

 

[nickpy]

This is hilarious.

Not because of the prank itself but the fact that Facebook has grown so huge that it can apparently affect your entire life to this extent.

Another reason why I don't bother with the damned parasite.

I was going to post something along these lines, but I see you already pipped me to the post!

I loathe Facebook; I don't think it's an inherently evil concept, but the implementation... Every single member of my family has Facebook, and in the case of two of them, even in the "Real World" they can't say more than two sentences without mentioning it or Twitter. It's scary.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

Well, in times of yore he'd just have been able to punch the Best Buy employee in the face with the rage of an angry God, call him arsehole, refute the nonsense claim and that would be the end of it since the other guy would accept he got busted and take his licks like a grown up. However, that is no longer acceptable, so the affected customer is taking legal action against the smug prick who screwed him over instead.

You can call it whiney, you can ask him to have a cup of concrete to harden up, whatever. But I'd be willing to bet 10 bucks that if he could get away with it, just punching the arsehole in the jaw would have settled the matter.

 

[shintakie10]

Calling the guy a homophobe with nothin to back that up. Real classy Grey Carter. Wait no, I mean sick.

Look, I get it. You all like to add little jokes in here and there to news articles. The last one was meh, but at least it was still easily spotted as a joke. Straight up sayin he isn't fond of homosexuals with absolutely no proof to that is disgustin and puts you at the level of those people we all despise who make shit up on all those news channels (Fox isn't the only one). Seriously. Its sick and wrong and I can't believe I read it here.

 

[Grey Day for Elcia]

Oh, so you're not gay. You're a wanker.

Good to know.

 

[370999]

Honestly I very much question how offended he is. I tend to think he smells money out of a court case and is going for it.

 

[thom_cat_]

But seriously, grow some balls.

Because it's a saying. I've had testicles the size of grapefruits and that was an uncomfortable experience.

 

[Chairman Miaow]

Wow talk about not being able to take a joke.
Who really doesn't see an "i am gay" post on facebook and not immediately think it's a frape anyway?

Adults. And if somebody I didn't know went through my personal things I would be pretty damn pissed off too.

 

[ClanCrusher]

Haha..oh man, that's a hilarious prank. Someone logging in on someone's Facebook account and posting stupid things. What a priceless gag! It's going to be even more funny if that stunt lands him two years in prison [http://www.cracked.com/article_18554_5-wacky-internet-pranks-that-can-get-you-jail-time_p2.html] after being charged with identity theft.