Eagles Fire Employee for Calling Team 'Retarted' on Facebook

Everyone is on Facebook (even FanHouse -- become a fan, holmes!) My older family members, old high-school teachers, everyone. It's just a fact of life.

Here's another fact of life: if you write something on your Facebook page, it's possible for everyone to see it. Texas lineman Buck Burnette learned this the hard way. And now, so has Dan Leone, a former employee of the Philadelphia Eagles, who was recently fired for referring to the team as "retarted" (though he presumably meant "retarded") in his Facebook status.

Specifically, Leone wrote the following after Brian Dawkins was signed by the Broncos:

"Dan is [expletive] devastated about Dawkins signing with Denver. . .Dam Eagles R Retarted!!"

Philadelphia Inquirer columnist John Gonzalez defends the former Eagles' employee, primarily because he suffered from transverse myelitis as a child, which continues to impair his ability to walk quickly around a stadium, a significant part of his job as the west gate chief for the last six years.

Additionally, Leone is a die-hard Eagles fan who has worshiped the team since he was a young man. There are many reasons to be upset that the team decided to fire him for his public sentiment against the team.

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But as sad as the story is, and as much as Gonzalez wants to portray the Eagles as a cold, uncaring organization, I'm going to have to go ahead and agree with the team here: if you are employed by a company, in any capacity, and they give you a paycheck, you should, under no circumstances, ever write something derogatory about the company in a public forum.

And yeah, I'm sure that Leone isn't the only Eagles fan who is upset about Dawkins leaving, but (just as Dan Levy told FanHouse recently) football is a business. And teams are required to make business decisions. If you're an employee of that team, you're probably best served remembering that Facebook updates have a way of making it out into the world at large.