'Liking' Facebook pages of your boss' rival can get you sacked!

Washington, Aug. 9 (ANI): An American employee was sacked after he clicked on social networking site Facebook's 'thumbs up' icon to 'like' a campaign page of a fellow colleague, who was running against their boss during an election.

The move has brought up a debate on the 'First Amendment' right in the United States Constitution, posing a question, whether 'liking' something on Facebook protected free speech.

According to The Washington Post, Daniel Ray Carter Jr. said the simple mouse click, caused a sheriff to fire him from his job as a deputy, as he had liked the page of Sheriff's Office official, Jim Adams, who was running against him in an election.

Following his expulsion, Carter filed a lawsuit claiming that his First Amendment rights had been violated, and his case has reached the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit.

Carter's troubles began in the summer of 2009, when longtime Hampton Sheriff B.J. Roberts was running for reelection, according to the lawsuit, filed in federal court in Newport News in March 2011, during which Roberts learned that some of his employees, including Carter, were actively supporting Adams, in the election, subsequently after which he fired him.

The debate arose after a lower court ruled that "liking" a page does not warrant protection because it does not involve "actual statements", the paper said.

However, if the ruling is upheld, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and others worry, a host of Web-based, mouse-click actions, such as re-tweeting (hitting a button to post someone else's tweet on your Twitter account), won't be protected as free speech.

Facebook's like button appears next to many different types of content on the site, which when clicked by someone results in the announcement to be posted on his or her profile saying that the user likes that piece of content, and over 3 billion likes and comments are registered the same way on the website, the paper said. (ANI)