i work for a big local company and its the same there , you dont put anything about work on and if you do you gotta say "these represent my views and opinions and not those of *companyname*" its much easier to not talk about work all together on facebook!

If Mr Little has lost his job as claimed, we will look into that. If Mr Little wants to speak us, we would welcome that too.
We will also investigate other company's stances on Facebook/social networking usage - what would your boss think and what action would they take if you called your customers "retarded morons" on a public forum that thousands of people can see, like Mr Little's comments which were posted on the Times & Star page, not his own feed and on which he clearly stated he worked for the supermarket?
In answer to the last comment, we have no gripe with Morrisons, it's where Mr Little said he worked.

First, no strike had been called. Plus there would be a minimum 7 days warning if a strike was to occur. Francis Maude was a retarded moron for causing the panic, and those who listened to his advice were equally moronic. They ended up creating unnecessary shortages and blocked access roads. God knows what would have happened if there had been an emergency which required an ambulance or fire engine.

Would you have ran this exact same story if it had just said we worked at morrisons? I doubt it! Yeah you need to make money etc but this is the lowest of the low! This is the second time you gave ran an article regarding morrisons! What's the personal issues here??? Refused you drink in the past or something or didn't order your right chocolate! Pathetic the whole thing

So right, this part of the page is called "have your say" well are u goin 2 make a new story now on how u caused a good lad to lose a job?? Well personally times and star ur bull! So write a story about how rubbish i think ur views are i couldnt give a toss! Tony had his say and many of us thought the same thing, many of morrisons workers couldnt get to work for u pathetic morons buying petrol save the bloody planet and bloody walk u fat gits! So yea times and star write about that!

Times and Star eh!
We may write tomorrow that we are the MD's of Coca Cola on our Facebook, then post a comment that Coca Cola tastes terrible, but this may or may not be true, it is an opinion. Everyone else that likes the taste of Coca Cola are probably retarded morons but this is also an opinion, but an opinion of someone that weighs in empty cans of Coca Cola at the scrap yard for pocket money **NOT MD'S**, does this make the paper?? and do we deserve the sack??, or is this a free nation with freedom of speech?

Wow and I wonder to myself why I don't like our local media, having useless stories yet again. Congrats to having someone properly sacked in this economic downturn. Well done! You can't say anything these days without offending someone, so much for freedom of speech. Oh by the way I'm agreeing with what was posted. But please don't look at my recent jobs I'm just a humble Jedi knight...

At no point did tony call anyone a retarded moron, he said the customers ae morons, for which I'm sure 90percent are. He said their actions were retarded which is also true. He is a shelf stacker not a MD. All you buisy bodies / stiff journalists/ spineless managers have nothing better to do than pick on someone for making a flippend nothing comment. Frow up much worse is said every second with no consequence. Tony deserves a slap on the wrist at best not a manhunt!

Does anyone else find it ironic that the "have your say" thread is underneath this story?

If anything the article proves that you can't "have your say" without fear of your views being misrepresented by local media hounds in a newspaper struggling for stories. I worked with Tony and he was a great lad who is now going to struggle to find future work. I understand that Tony might have been rather foolish to post something like that in a public domain but the fact is that it was his opinion and publishing this article has exacerbated the whole situation. Talk about mountain out of a molehill, one guy loses his job so Times and Star can have a (and I use the term loosely) "controversial issue" on the front page

The fact that you have drawn on the fact he was listed as a "manager" on his facebook page to make it sound as though he was being fraudulent is ridiculous. ITS HIS FACEBOOK PAGE not his CV, if I list myself as an astronaut it doesn't mean I'm going into space does it.

So once again well done Times and Star, your scoop of the week has proved exactly what is wrong with our scoiety today. Police state, just saying

What this seems to boil down to is a lack of sense. Plain and simple, I think Tony's been a bit daft. Freedom of speech is an idea, which unfortunately doesn't work that well in the real world. You're always going to upset somebody, somewhere and as such, we all need to be careful what we say as anything is open to interpretation. Tony could have expressed the same opinion without the use of insult, something which has been damaging both to him and the company he works for. Additionally, claiming to be the manager AND saying such things wasn't the brightest idea as this may have caused greater backlash against the actual manager. This isn't a sacking offence in my opinion, but the company is right to begin an investigation and appropiate disciplinary action should be taken.

For those attacking the newspaper, come on. The reputation of the media sniffing for a story is one of popular culture, so them "supposedly being mean" is nothing new, and folk should know better.

My final say is that we all like to have a venting online rant now and again, but keep it within your close circle of friends, not on a public access news page.