This was quite unusual for the young company known for its high success rate in finding higher paying jobs for highly qualified individuals. Investigations into the source of the matter pointed to a local blogger who had accompanied her husband on his second interview at the Nashville, Tennessee office of J.L. Kirk. This local online reporter, who makes her journalistic mark by looking for controversy in everything from her local library’s lack of parking spots to The Weigh Down Workshop, began denigrating the J.L. Kirk organization, especially their Christian atmosphere and Christian music on the lobby sound system.

The misleading information along with completely false statements began a small blog storm pointing to Christians who participate in unethical business practice. Kirk Leipzig, believing truth to be more powerful than the internet, consulted his company’s legal representation who found the blog entries to be so libelous and untrue; they sent a “cease and desist” letter to the blogger simply asking for the statements to be removed from her site. There was no suit filed or any intention of a lawsuit, if the untrue damaging material was removed from the site. This letter precipitated an onslaught of blog attacks and online smear campaigns against Kirk Leipzig that included filth, horrible phone calls, and even death threats to him and his staff, all because of a ‘threat to sue a blogger’.

A torrent of bloggers ensued to seek and destroy a man who dared to hold a blogger to truth, and dared to be unapologetic about his faith in his place of business. The affect on Kirk Leipzig’s business has been devastating, but not nearly as devastating as the problem with blog-attacks on the American economy. Companies now must employ entire teams to help protect their online reputations with costs skyrocketing into the millions. These costs will ultimately be passed to consumers, giving the bloggers even more to write about.

This surge in online ‘popularity’ has also brought Kirk Leipzig waves of support from corporate heads and business people the world over. As it turns out, blog attacks on corporations are commonplace. Blog attacks are often followed by complaints to The Better Business Bureau and listings on an extortion-based site called, The Rip Off Report. Businesses and corporations are now daily targets by anyone who has a negative agenda and a free blog. These bloggers are protected by the large search engines who are motivated solely by money, and never by truth of material. Business people pay organizations huge sums of money to try to clear their names and reputations by what begins as an ‘innocent teasing of the First Amendment’. Business is afraid of bloggers, and while wanting to fight for truth and justice, they spend exorbitant sums to the internet blackmailers and remain silent, afraid, hoping the storm will pass. One man stands for truth, and trusts God to fight his battles. Armed with a ‘heart after God’ and a desire to clear lies from his name, Kirk Leipzig stands as a Christian in business, believing that means something.

Susan Walker-Ford is a free-lance journalist on a variety of subjects including pets, women's issues, and faith.

Article Source: http://www.todays-woman.net