INDIANAPOLIS (WTHR) - Controversial social media posts investigated by IU Health has led to the woman who posted them losing her job with the hospital.
The hospital released a statement Sunday afternoon: "A recently hired IU Health employee tied to troubling posts on social media this weekend is no longer an employee of IU Health."
Below is a screen shot of the tweet with an offensive word blurred out:
A spokesperson for IU Health on Saturday addressed the Twitter post: IU Health is aware of several troubling posts on social media which appear to be from a recently hired IU Health employee. Our HR department continues to investigate the situation and the authenticity of the posts. During the investigation, that employee will have no access to patient care.â€
Specializes in Psychiatry, Community, Nurse Manager, hospice.
Emergent makes a good point about the internet and social media. Also, the way you can select what you see and don't see supports cognitive dissonance in a way that we haven't seen before.
I saw this on FB over the weekend. The post above was not an isolated incident. There were screen shots of at least a dozen posts which were all pretty, um, "opinionated".
More evidence as to the negative aspect of the internet and social media. It gives a platform to extremists and can be a catalyst for harm.
I believe it's fueled divisiveness in the world. So many people are engaged in negative attention seeking, and getting their endorphin fixes from clicks and likes. They will crave more and more, escalating their rhetoric and behaviors.
YES! I see it exactly this way! The original intent for the "web" was a global connectedness free from centalized power. This did not turn out exactly that way.
This person obviously seems a little warped, and so tweeting this way means she is probably a little off, and doesnt consider the consequences of her impulses. So as a hospital, you cannot just unlearn this information about an employee. If her state is a fire at will state, then they can remove someone if they are caring for patients and seems threatening.
I read the news about that tweet and some other awful tweets on her account, but I also read a story that mentioned some of her prior tweets about her travels to Iceland and Ireland.
The travel tweets were well-written, thoughtful,and showed introspection. The bigoted tweets were simple and sound like a completely different person.
That nurse has been licensed as a RN for less than a month (which I confirmed on the Indiana verification site)...so she is a new nurse with a new job and just up and shoots herself in the foot by tweeting hateful, easily tracked remarks with her real name and photo attached to them?
My instincts tell me to question the authenticity of the hateful tweets. It's posible she is a racist idiot with no concept of self-preservation, but it is also possible someone else who knew her had access to her account and posted those things to hurt her.
I haven't looked up her other tweets yet but my first thought on reading the article was that she was writing satire in the tradition of Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal".
My instincts tell me to question the authenticity of the hateful tweets. It's posible she is a racist idiot with no concept of self-preservation, but it is also possible someone else who knew her had access to her account and posted those things to hurt her.
The slew of tweets referencing white people date back at least as far as March 2017. There are multiple tweets between then and the ultimate one which broke the camels back this month. I would think you would see these remarks on your own twitter over the last 9 months... I think the whole "it wasn't me" claim is a last ditch effort to save face.
I have never been so proud of my profession. Coming off of the Alex Wubbels' fight to protect her patient and the termination of Taiyesha Baker helps to solidify that we are an ethical profession.
Some professions would have surrounded and defended Taiyesha Baker, claiming she had to right to say those things and she should understand where she is coming from. Not nursing, she made inappropriate statements which harms the public's trust in the profession so out she goes.
Law enforcement can learn a thing or two from nursing.
A lot of people have controversial opinions and exaggerate them on top of that. It's only difficult to believe that she saw fit to share her opinions and associate them with her job and photograph.
Let me just say, I'm glad she was fired. Saying too much more, might identify me, lol. She said it on her Twitter account where she identified herself as a nurse.
People tracked down her employer quickly and called the hospital.
People should realize these days social media can be your downfall.
FolksBtrippin, BSN, RN
2,317 Posts
Emergent makes a good point about the internet and social media. Also, the way you can select what you see and don't see supports cognitive dissonance in a way that we haven't seen before.