Washington Post fires reporter Felicia Somnez who objected to misogynistic tweets

[Anonymous]

Seems harsh, given that this was sparked by her objection to a misogynistic tweet made by another Washington Post employee Dave Weigel, who was not fired, despite tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar", which is hardly "collegial" behavior.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/09/business/media/felicia-sonmez-washington-post.html
Reporter Felicia Sonmez Is Fired by The Washington Post
Ms. Sonmez, a national political reporter, has been at the center of a debate over The Post’s social media policies.

Felicia Sonmez, a reporter for The Washington Post who in recent days has been at the center of a debate over the organization’s social media policies and the culture of the newsroom, was fired on Thursday, according to three people with knowledge of the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters.

Ms. Sonmez was fired over email on Thursday afternoon, according to one of the people. In an emailed termination letter, which was viewed by The New York Times, Ms. Sonmez was told that The Post was ending her employment, effective immediately, “for misconduct that includes insubordination, maligning your co-workers online and violating The Post’s standards on workplace collegiality and inclusivity.”

In the past week, she has been at the center of a public firestorm over the newsroom’s culture. On Friday, Dave Weigel, a political reporter at the paper, retweeted a sexist joke that implied women were either bisexual or bipolar. Ms. Sonmez then tweeted, “Fantastic to work at a news outlet where retweets like this are allowed!”
Mr. Weigel apologized for the tweet. On Monday, he was suspended by The Post for a month without pay, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.

Ms. Sonmez then got into a Twitter disagreement with Jose A. Del Real, a reporter who acknowledged Mr. Weigel’s tweet was “unacceptable” but admonished Ms. Sonmez for “rallying the internet to attack” Mr. Weigel. Mr. Real later sent several tweets regarding an “unrelenting series of attacks” against him, and Ms. Sonmez questioned why The Post had not done anything to reprimand him for his tweets about her, including one that said she had engaged in “repeated and targeted public harassment of a colleague.”

[Anonymous]

LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Seems harsh, given that this was sparked by her objection to a misogynistic tweet made by another Washington Post employee Dave Weigel, who was not fired, despite tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar", which is hardly "collegial" behavior.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/09/business/media/felicia-sonmez-washington-post.html
Reporter Felicia Sonmez Is Fired by The Washington Post
Ms. Sonmez, a national political reporter, has been at the center of a debate over The Post’s social media policies.

Felicia Sonmez, a reporter for The Washington Post who in recent days has been at the center of a debate over the organization’s social media policies and the culture of the newsroom, was fired on Thursday, according to three people with knowledge of the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters.

Ms. Sonmez was fired over email on Thursday afternoon, according to one of the people. In an emailed termination letter, which was viewed by The New York Times, Ms. Sonmez was told that The Post was ending her employment, effective immediately, “for misconduct that includes insubordination, maligning your co-workers online and violating The Post’s standards on workplace collegiality and inclusivity.”

In the past week, she has been at the center of a public firestorm over the newsroom’s culture. On Friday, Dave Weigel, a political reporter at the paper, retweeted a sexist joke that implied women were either bisexual or bipolar. Ms. Sonmez then tweeted, “Fantastic to work at a news outlet where retweets like this are allowed!”
Mr. Weigel apologized for the tweet. On Monday, he was suspended by The Post for a month without pay, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.

Ms. Sonmez then got into a Twitter disagreement with Jose A. Del Real, a reporter who acknowledged Mr. Weigel’s tweet was “unacceptable” but admonished Ms. Sonmez for “rallying the internet to attack” Mr. Weigel. Mr. Real later sent several tweets regarding an “unrelenting series of attacks” against him, and Ms. Sonmez questioned why The Post had not done anything to reprimand him for his tweets about her, including one that said she had engaged in “repeated and targeted public harassment of a colleague.”

She went too far, got completely berserk. She made it difficult to be sympathize with her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

LOL. Counting days/hours for a brand new substack.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

I don't know. Tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar" seems pretty hostile to me. I would be pissed to work with someone like that too, and think it's good she called him out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

I don't know. Tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar" seems pretty hostile to me. I would be pissed to work with someone like that too, and think it's good she called him out.

My understanding is that he deleted it and apologized after she called him out on it. Had she dropped it at that point it would have been fine, but I believe she continued on a Twitter rampage. I think people forget they don’t have to put every thought of theirs on line.

[Anonymous]

Good. She is toxic. All this over a weird and bad retweeted joke. She’s looking to get paid and that’s it. I didn’t care for her after her shitty tweet 10 mins after Kobe died.

[Anonymous]

When I read about her first lawsuit, I thought she was committing career suicide.
She's more known for her legal challenges than any actual journalism.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

I don't know. Tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar" seems pretty hostile to me. I would be pissed to work with someone like that too, and think it's good she called him out.

Agree. I think this looks pretty bad of the Post.

That having been said, the Post has been misogynist for years so this is in-line.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

I don't know. Tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar" seems pretty hostile to me. I would be pissed to work with someone like that too, and think it's good she called him out.

My understanding is that he deleted it and apologized after she called him out on it. Had she dropped it at that point it would have been fine, but I believe she continued on a Twitter rampage. I think people forget they don’t have to put every thought of theirs on line.

I’m not that PP, but a reporter who feels free to retweet something that misogynist probably has a very long appalling history behind him. An apology probably doesn’t come close to covering what’s really going on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

I don't know. Tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar" seems pretty hostile to me. I would be pissed to work with someone like that too, and think it's good she called him out.

My understanding is that he deleted it and apologized after she called him out on it. Had she dropped it at that point it would have been fine, but I believe she continued on a Twitter rampage. I think people forget they don’t have to put every thought of theirs on line.

I’m not that PP, but a reporter who feels free to retweet something that misogynist probably has a very long appalling history behind him. An apology probably doesn’t come close to covering what’s really going on.

Yeah, it's not that he tweeted some dopey slightly sexist meme. This was a pretty nasty tweet. Whether the fired reporter is a good reporter or what, isn't the question. It is bad that the sexist tweeter still has a job and the person who called him out does not.

[Anonymous]

I know nothing about this fired reporter, but from where I'm standing the Washington Post looks bad, because they seem to be supporting the first reporter who made an unacceptably misogynist remark. Like PP said, that kind of comment does not exist in a vacuum - for someone to actually type and send this, it means he often thinks like that, and feels secure enough in his employment and colleagues to publish those remarks. It means the Post is a shitty place for a woman to work. He should have been fired first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

I don't know. Tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar" seems pretty hostile to me. I would be pissed to work with someone like that too, and think it's good she called him out.

My understanding is that he deleted it and apologized after she called him out on it. Had she dropped it at that point it would have been fine, but I believe she continued on a Twitter rampage. I think people forget they don’t have to put every thought of theirs on line.

I’m not that PP, but a reporter who feels free to retweet something that misogynist probably has a very long appalling history behind him. An apology probably doesn’t come close to covering what’s really going on.

Yeah, it's not that he tweeted some dopey slightly sexist meme. This was a pretty nasty tweet. Whether the fired reporter is a good reporter or what, isn't the question. It is bad that the sexist tweeter still has a job and the person who called him out does not.

Totally agree. If this was a mild off color joke, that would be one thing. But that was a really awful tweet. Rephrase it as directed to any vulnerable group other than women, and he would be out of a job already.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LOL. Anyone watching this unfold knew she was aiming to get fired so she could bring another lawsuit against the post. And she’d directly made far more insulting remarks about men than the other reporter who got suspended for merely re-Tweeting a joke that wasn’t nearly as malicious.

I don't know. Tweeting about all women being either "bisexual or bipolar" seems pretty hostile to me. I would be pissed to work with someone like that too, and think it's good she called him out.

My understanding is that he deleted it and apologized after she called him out on it. Had she dropped it at that point it would have been fine, but I believe she continued on a Twitter rampage. I think people forget they don’t have to put every thought of theirs on line.

I’m not that PP, but a reporter who feels free to retweet something that misogynist probably has a very long appalling history behind him. An apology probably doesn’t come close to covering what’s really going on.

Yeah, it's not that he tweeted some dopey slightly sexist meme. This was a pretty nasty tweet. Whether the fired reporter is a good reporter or what, isn't the question. It is bad that the sexist tweeter still has a job and the person who called him out does not.

Disagree. The joke wasn't nasty. It wasn't funny because it's so close to being true.

It's not true-it's misogynist. And it's sad that a WaPo reporter would believe that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I know nothing about this fired reporter, but from where I'm standing the Washington Post looks bad, because they seem to be supporting the first reporter who made an unacceptably misogynist remark. Like PP said, that kind of comment does not exist in a vacuum - for someone to actually type and send this, it means he often thinks like that, and feels secure enough in his employment and colleagues to publish those remarks. It means the Post is a shitty place for a woman to work. He should have been fired first.

+1

I was just in the process of getting a Post subscription and I’ve decided against it after this.