A tasteless tweet by a “proud male feminist ally” and freelance journalist following the heinous terror attack on the Ariana Grande concert demonstrated yet again how detrimental misuse of social media can be to one’s career.
Freelance writer David Leavitt’s name is quickly spreading over social media after his decision to use the terror attack at Manchester Arena that left at least 22 dead and 59 injured, among them several children, for what he apparently intended to be some good laughs. Now his articles have been pulled by two previous employers who have condemned his response to the tragedy.
“Honestly, for over a year I thought an Ariana Grande was something you ordered at Starbucks,” he wrote (a joke he’s tweeted before). Then he posted this line: “MULTIPLE CONFIRMED FATALITIES at Manchester Arena. The last time I listened to Ariana Grande I almost died too.”
Heat Street sums up the blowback from Leavitt’s tweets:
Leavitt’s tweets were quickly inundated by a torrent of anger from across the political spectrum. Clearly reveling in the attention, he doubled down with even worse tweets until his former employers at CBS Local and AXS issued statements distancing their companies from him. Both CBS and AXS deleted Leavitt’s work from their websites, although a trace of it remains in archive.
Leavitt has also written pieces for Yahoo! and Examiner. He eventually pulled the tweets and tried to float an apology, but quickly got back to testing out jokes, including this #ImpeachTrump tweet:
