Eli Hernández of TheEyeWorks Makes Jokes About Dead Two-Year-Olds
I had an exchange this afternoon on Twitter with a local Dallas businessman by the name of Eli Hernández. Eli is the “EVP, Marketing and Public Relations” of TheEyeWorks, an ostensibly web-savvy PR and Marketing firm.
Eli had discovered, several days after the story was hot news incidentally, the topic of the young woman out in Florida who very unfortunately lost her son due to an accidental drowning. I won’t rehash my take on that, as it’s plainly available over at SiliconANGLE (“Social Media Gone Awry: When Mommybloggers Attack”).
I thought I’d just share our conversation here, and then ask a few pertinent questions afterward.
He kicked it off by tweeting out the headline, linking to a CNN source.
I remarked that I felt that the headline was inaccurate.
He responded as I’d expect someone would who only read the headline (as opposed to reading the full story.
I gave him the benefit of the doubt and encouraged him to read the full story.
He, inexplicably, mis-quoted Voltaire. The actual quote is “Common sense is rare.”
At this points, our tweets were crossing each other, and it’s hard to see which thread I was responding to. I responded:
He responded with continuing displays of ignorance to what the details of the story were:
I replied:
He ignored that reply and instead tried to pass me off as the ignorant one.
I called him on it:
He resorted to making jokes.
I blocked him.
He confirmed that he did, indeed, enjoy making jokes about women who just lost their two-year-old children to accidental drownings.
Later comments from Eli indicated that he thought this was some sort of fun little “food fight.” I’m sorry, but I don’t consider what happened in this story at all funny or amusing. The thought of losing my son, which is the nightmare
this story conjured up for me, struck me as a real possibility, since no one knows when tragedy could strike.
After my conversation with Eli here, though, I was struck by another thought.
I wondered what his clients at Christ for the Nations (a bible school here in Dallas) might think about his cavalier attitude about life and death. I wondered what Watermark Community Church in Dallas might think about his sangfroid in this? I wondered about the International Convention of Faith Ministries, and if this was the type of PR person that they’d want to employ to represent their organization.
It’s important, particularly if you’re in PR for organizations with moral positions, that you not act immorally online. More specifically, if you’re going to market and publicly represent churches and Christian organizations, it’s probably not a good idea to make fun of women who just lost their two year olds to tragic accidents earlier that week.
If you do, some jerk like me will call you out on it.
You are assuming Eli has direct involvement with the clients you handpicked, which is completely inaccurate. These are clients TheEyeWorks has provided services for not related to PR and none are accounts Eli has had direct interaction with. So they are not his clients, as you put it. So technically yes, what you wrote is inaccurate and misleading.
Doesn't matter. He's an EVP at the company. At that level of management, he represents the company, particularly when he's engaging on topics of social media, which is a purported expertise of your organization.
Incidentally, here's the link, since we're threatening legal action at each other and all, that shows the connection between the Twitter account and your job, Eli.
<img src="http://content.screencast.com/users/rizzn/folders/Jing/media/ce230982-82a0-462e-bb27-5b6a31cfa1db/2009-12-21_1904.png">
Mark,
I am completely in shock that you decided to turn a personal discussion between two individuals into a slander campaign against TheEyeWorks. Eli was tweeting under his personal account and in no moment did he mention TheEyeWorks. For you to turn around and drag TheEyeWorks and our clients into this is completely unprofessional and uncalled for. I am requesting as CEO of TheEyeWorks that you retract your blog post immediately. Furthermore, we are prepared to bring legal action against you, should any relationship with our clients be compromised due to your tirade.
I hope you seriously reconsider this and make things right by keeping a personal discussion, personal as it should have remained from the beginning.
Ramir Camu
Look up the definition of slander and libel. I won't waste time on it, but what I did isn't either of those things. This is something you should know in your line of work.
Eli's personal account linked to his company, and he tweeted work related links. How do you think I found out where he worked?
I have a right to free speech. All I've done is document Eli's work, which was plainly linked to his account and what he said. I'm within my legal rights.
I'm not the one that has to worry about the definition.
You definitely have the right to free speech, everyone does, it doesn't mean there are no consequences. It is truly unfortunate that you decided to exercise your right to free speech in this manner, by turning a discussion between 2 individuals into a cheap shot against an organization and its clients.
MARK:
It is unfortunate that what was a "food fight" between you and I on Twitter, YOU have now escalated the matter.
There are many people on Twitter that have disagreements and debates - ours was not the last. Thus, this was a debate between you and I!
For clarification sake: The point I attempted to make is that a sane person would not dive into Twitter upon the death of their child.
Additionally, you do not have the common sense to understand sarcastic humor. Obviously, I would mourn the death of a child - it was the reaction of the mother that I was responding to.
What you have done however is to drag our agency name into this discussion.
My views are my personal views. At no time during our debate did I mention our agency name, nor was I on offical agency business.
You can accuse me of anything (within reason) and say almost anything about ME! BUT, you have brought in the good name of an entire organization and legitimate business into this discussion.
If you continue in this vein, you will be held liable and responsible for any negative ramifications or consequences to our business.
Not only are you childish in your behaviour, YOU are unethical and unprofessional in your actions!
Remove this post from your blog immediately!
What you said was offensive. I blogged this on my *personal* blog, not my *professional* blog.
Humor, no matter what variety, was not in good taste. You don't make jokes about the dead - that's just common courtesy. This woman, and her child, were real people, not characters in a movie.
Have some decency.
Should you apologize for anything you said, I'll update the post with that information. Short of that, don't expect any apologies for my documentation of your actions.
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You will hafta worry if you don't want to be stuck with my legal fees when the case gets thrown out.
It isn't slander if it's true.
I didn't say anything that wasn't true.
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