Am I the only one who doesn't give a shit? I generally don't post about anything like guns, murder, rape, drugs or any of that stuff. A spelling mistake isn't exactly a huge deal but I don't usually post any of those either.

I don't like this whole "lie about who you are, to impress other people" age that we live in. I don't want to work for the kind of person who would be offended by what I post, to the point that it'd sway their decision. Maybe it's me being childish, but I'm sticking by it lol.

Future girlfriends may Google you, too. Might as well control what comes up.

Just want to throw this out there... As many of the users here are young and have not yet entered their careers.

Having a 'fuck the world' attitude with your social media is fine if you're heading into a field like construction, manual labor, plumbing, and probably 50 other things I can't even think of...

But as soon as you try to get a job in the IT world, clean up your act.

I am one of the older members here (I'm nearly 37) - I hire and fire people regularly and run a very large department for a very large company here in Toronto.

I can tell you social media is the very first thing we check on potential candidates for interviews. If we get a whiff of something we don't like - sorry, you won't be getting an interview.

Something as simple as toggling your privacy settings so the entire world can't see your drunken photos can help prevent people like me from skimming your profile or twitter feed and seeing stuff I shouldn't be seeing.

Just flagging it for people with a cavalier attitude towards the seriousness of this stuff (which appears to be how this thread started), who may not have considered that it's now a regular part of recruiting (at least in the digital/IT world) and at media companies.

Is it though?

Social media can honestly tell you a shitload about who a person is and can give you a general perspective on their values.

Most employers won't deny you a job because you have a few pics of you drunk on your wall. They will deny you a job however, if you share and support anti-semitism, xenophobia, racism or whatever other fucked up extremist ideologies.

I don't think people understand what's being meant by "checking social media".

Is it though?

Social media can honestly tell you a shitload about who a person is and can give you a general perspective on their values.

Most employers won't deny you a job because you have a few pics of you drunk on your wall. They will deny you a job however, if you share and support anti-semitism, xenophobia, racism or whatever other fucked up extremist ideologies.

I don't think people understand what's being meant by "checking social media".

Correct. Can't really blame them....Companies have hundreds of applicant going after a position. It costs money to recruit, hire, train and fire and repeat the process if something goes wrong. Why shouldnt they check all avenues to make sure you should work there? If you have anti religious views that could possibly be an issue in the workplace, why should they give you a chance, when there are 100 other applicants with your qualifications without those views? If you had 1000 girls trying to be your gf and there was only 1 spot, you'd screen them hard as well and disqualify just the same.