Amazon Fires Two Tech Workers Who Criticized Warehouse Conditions (cnet.com) 189
phalse phace writes: Following the termination of Chris Smalls for leading a warehouse strike over poor coronavirus safety conditions, Amazon has fired two more employees who were outspoken critics of the company's climate policies and who had denounced worker conditions at its warehouses as unsafe during the coronavirus pandemic. From a report: User experience designers Emily Cunningham and Maren Costa, both active members of the advocacy group Amazon Employees for Climate Justice, had reportedly offered match donations up to $500 for warehouse workers, citing insufficient protections. The company confirmed the firings in a statement emailed to CNET. "We support every employee's right to criticize their employer's working conditions, but that does not come with blanket immunity against any and all internal policies," an Amazon spokesperson said. "We terminated these employees for repeatedly violating internal policies."
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More victims of moronium ingestion (Score:2)
This was intimidation, plain and simple (Score:5, Informative)
They wanted to fire him as a warning to other employees to not complain about their safety or working conditions. Amazon wanted to make him the leader because they did not feel he was "smart and articulate".
https://arstechnica.com/tech-p... [arstechnica.com]
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They wanted to fire him as a warning to other employees to not complain about their safety or working conditions. Amazon wanted to make him the leader because they did not feel he was "smart and articulate".
https://arstechnica.com/tech-p... [arstechnica.com]
They fired the first guy because he defied a management order to stay home (with pay) because he was exposed to COVID-19 and showed up at work anyway. (Which endangered his co-workers.)
I agree with the memo in part, he was stupid, but I wouldn't have written such a memo to start with (that was more than stupid) But that doesn't change the fact that All he had to do was stay home and hold down his couch and he'd still be cashing their paychecks.
What company policies? (Score:2)
Fired for continually violating company policies? What policies were being violated. This sounds like a blanket reason that's supposed to shut down criticism. "Oh they violated company policies? Well, OK then. I guess they deserved it." If they're not going to state which policies were the reason for the firing, I'd say that creates a pretty chilling effect in the workplace. "I'd better not complain about anything lest I get fired. In fact, I better not even ask about why those other people were fired. Just
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I don't know of any employee anywhere I ever worked that was fired for vague violations of internal company policy. I do know of people fired for theft, which is against company policy, but the company don't announce that as "we had to lay him off for continual violations of company policy." I do know people being fired after being put on an improvement plan. I've known people whose managers wanted them fired and yet it was still a lengthy process to do so.
Being fired for violating company policy is clearl
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Fired for continually violating company policies? What policies were being violated.
“As a general rule, external communication by employees about Amazon’s business, products, services, technology, or customers must be approved in advance by public relations.” https://www.geekwire.com/2020/... [geekwire.com]
They both signed the open letter to Jeff Bezoz and the Amazon board of directors, along with 8703 others: https://medium.com/@amazonempl... [medium.com]
Emily Cunningham spoke at Amazons annual shareholder meeting (as a shareholder) https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/2... [cnbc.com] in support of her proposition (o
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If Amazon says why they were fired they can get sued, and there are lawyers lined up around the block waiting for the opportunity. Try calling a former employer for a reference, pretty much all they can say is "He worked here from Y-date to X-date." Most won't even confirm if they left of their own volition.
I work there, it took six months to fire an employee who was half an hour to an hour late at least once a week in our Security Operations Center. If these two got fired there is a big pile of document
So let's see what France's courts say (Score:2)
Union laws say they can't do that they should sue (Score:2)
Union laws say they can't do that they should sue
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This holds true of both Amazon warehouses and aircraft carriers.
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This holds true of both Amazon warehouses and aircraft carriers.
It does. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but the two are very different cases. In the aircraft carrier case, the fired individual skipped a step of the chain of command, which is very different from going public. Maybe try referencing Snowden instead.
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Actually the carrier captain and Snowden are rather similar cases in that they both exhausted every legitimate option before going for less-legitimate options. The carrier captain went through the proper chain of command before skipping his immediate commander and notifying multiple people higher up, one of whom leaked to the public, while Snowden went straight to leaking to the public after getting no action from the proper internal channels.
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Do you have any evidence "Cheetoh Brain" gave any orders explicit or otherwise or is that just you projecting.
According to Modly (who was only acting SecNav):
he acted to prevent repetition of a 2019 incident in which "the Navy Department got crossways with the president" after Trump's intervention in the case of Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher. "I put myself in the president's shoes," Modly stated. "I considered how the president felt like he needed to get involved in Navy decisions. I didn't want that to happen again."
So he was admittedly trying to get in front of potential criticism or retaliation by Trump.
Then, besides these words from his own mouth, he decided to do the removal against the recommendation of the Chief of Naval Ops (CNO) because those kinds of actions are usually only done after an investigation.
He then decided to double down on his stupidity by blowing a quarter mil flying all the way out to Guam on a Navy executive jet to personally criticize and insult
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The captain followed the chain of command by notifying his superiors
Supposedly, he did not use the proper communications protocols to inform his superiors. He wrote a letter or a memo which was leaked (by whom?) to the press. Who he sent it to or how hasn't been fully explained. But any communications between command and active duty forces need to comply with security protocols so as not to cause readiness status to fall into enemy hands.
Now here's the interesting thing: Amazon is whining that they unfairly lost out on the Pentagon's JEDI [wikipedia.org] contract. I would imagine that one
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
And the right way is?
Organized labor movements and public airing of dirty laundry are pretty much the only things that have *ever* resulted in substantial change. Companies don't treat employees like shit because it's fun (well, mostly), they do it because it's *profitable* - and the only way it ever stops is when employees make it unprofitable.
If you're in a highly specialized field and are hard to replace you may be able to leverage your skills for a better deal. Unskilled labor though? They're interchangeable - the only real negotiating leverage they have is the blunt weapons of strikes and PR attacks.
Companies have been working on skilled labor too (Score:2)
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What has typically resulted in actual change is employees walking off the job and starting their own company to compete with the inefficiencies of their previous employer.
At no point in recent history did labor unions actually benefit anyone in the long run, they just made companies more unprofitable so that other startups could take over without the labor unions. Henry Ford was one of those examples, he simply offered double the wage and a 48 hour work week and people came flocking to him.
Labor unions in p
Re:Good (Score:5, Informative)
he simply offered double the wage and a 48 hour work week and people came flocking to him.
**Sigh** The company propaganda again. Ford offered more than his competition (not double, by the way) out of desperation. He had a factory with no skilled workers to man it and loans coming due. If he couldn't get the factory running the banks would have foreclosed. People didn't change jobs more than once or twice in a lifetime in the early 20th century, in order to get skilled workers he had to offer them so much that people couldn't resist.
The reality is that Ford was more concerned about the machinery of the assembly lines than he was about the people who worked on it, there were jobs that would leave a worker crippled from repetitive stress injury after a year or less, the only reason why the jobs were changed was because the union forced them to. My dad was a union organizer in Michigan, he knew some of the old guys who risked their lives to unionize the auto factories. One of the reasons why Ford funded Nazi newspapers in the US is because they were virulently anti-union, and he repeatedly sent armed thugs into union meetings to break them up.
There are reasons why unions controlled the factories of the nation, at the iron foundry where my dad organized his coworkers the guys were pouring molten iron in tennis shoes and sunglasses because management wouldn't cough up for safety equipment. OSHA, workers compensation, PPE rules, unemployment insurance, etc. exist because unions forced them through the legislative process, not because of the largess of business owners.
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Right now (in my region), people working production lines start out around $11/hr and with enough tenure can top out around $18/hr. Could I live on a salary of $37k? Yes. Is my quality of life going to be that great. Nope.
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Clearly you don't know any teachers.
- Necron69
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Today's political climate is such that a large chunk of the populace hates unions (probably sees them as a gateway drug to full on marxist communism). Companies don't care if the dirty laundry is aired anymore as long as that dirty laundry pertains to treatment of the serfs. The dirty laundry only matters if it is about cheating the investors.
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Yeah we hate unions, but there are reasons other than socialism.
https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab... [duckduckgo.com]
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The right way is to first try to fix things internally, using proper procedures. You make sure you document those steps, and keep records of it yourself. If and only if those efforts fail, you can then resort to steps outside the internal chain of command. We do have laws in place to protect whistleblowers, and there is always the option to sue for unlawful termination damages. If you want a chance at that, though, your odds will likely improve if you demonstrate that you couldn't have effected change a
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And the right way is?
Speak out, but make sure you are getting your job done, otherwise they will have an excuse to fire you.
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Well let's focus on the actual case at hand.
These employees were not even part of the warehouse workers. They're UX designers, so realistically they're chirping about things that anyone can chirp about; even outsiders to Amazon. Given that this didn't come from the rank and file in the warehouse, you do have question what is going on.
There was a warehouse worker fired, but the supposed reason why violating policies that seem related to Covid-19. If he was organizing protests... at this time, it's iffy, but
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The right way is, if you want to be an activist against Amazon, stop working for Amazon and go be an activist. But taking the high-paying Amazon UX salary that's paid with the sweat equity of that unskilled labor is downright hypocritical.
That bullshit right there is why the guys at the top are winning. They want the slightly-less-exploited to be looking down their noses at manual laborers instead of acting in solidarity with them. The "middle class" is a myth designed to keep us divided and working against our own best interests. If you sell your labor and someone else takes the profit, then you are working class, full stop.
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No, what OP said is that those people are hypocrites. They are complaining about slave labor by the company while taking wages that the company supposedly earns by exploiting those below them. If you are concerned about it, quit and stop taking slave money, if everybody does it, the company has to adjust.
This is similar to those athletes and movie stars complaining about Nike sweat shops and then signing a promotional contract with Nike. If you don't like them, boycott them.
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Getting fired for protesting gets way more media attention than quitting and creating a ragtag protest group that would be lucky to ever get any exposure on a slow news day. Example: This discussion.
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That may be true, but that also means there is nothing worthy fighting for. If you were truly convinced that you could improve the situation, anyone with some moral backbone would do so. The problem is that everyone complaining in the Western world has no clue on how to improve anything and most likely will make things worse because they've got no idea how well off they are. Boo-hoo, Amazon is paying me $15-25/hour, that's a month's wage for the average worker across the world.
Bootlicker. (Score:4, Insightful)
So Snowden should have told his spook bosses that he thought domestic warrantless wiretaps on U.S. citizens might be at odds with the 4th amendment and surely they would have realized the errors of their ways and started operating within the bounds of the law?
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He did tell them, repeatedly.
The trouble for the majority is wage labor (Score:2)
As long as there still is a majority that is even needed to generate the profits for the companies.
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Exactly. You want to be paid thousands of dollars to bite the the hand that feeds you? Go do it somewhere else.
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Back when we had Unions they could (Score:2)
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It's part of a lot of the new socialist movement, where a significant minority believe that companies exist for the benefits of the workers, not the owners - so an employee should be able to trash management and corporate goals as desired without any fear of being laid off.
Without a contract, workers can be fired for no reason at all, but only as long as no legal protections have been breached. The first guy was trying to organize a strike, which is a protected action, even if the strike-related activities happen to criticize or offend managers or owners. There are other protections, such as protections based on protected classes. It would be tragic if owners were allowed carte blanche to fire workers for any reason unless those workers had practical alternatives to find w
Re:Who needs trouble? (Score:4, Insightful)
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And the summary makes a tie to environmental concerns/activism, which would not be protected as that is not related to the products or services of Amazon.
The policy that the were warned that they were in breach of (and by leap of faith as a result fired) was “As a general rule, external communication by employees about Amazon’s business, products, services, technology, or customers must be approved in advance by public relations.” https://www.geekwire.com/2020/... [geekwire.com] so I think your particular defense would be an uphill battle.
Re: I'm sure we can trust Amazon to tell the truth (Score:2)
I know I do. FUCK labour organizations. These motherfuckers should go start their own business and run it however the hell they want and leave everyone else alone.
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You gotta toe the line. The law is all about following rules.
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It's part of that now rather old concept known as Protected Concerted Activity [nlrb.gov] that's been a feature of the National Labor Relations Act since the last Depression:
"You have the right to act with co-workers to...talk directly to your emplo
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No, this is basically about the warehouse workers, not at amazon but everywhere, being the modern day serfs. The lords want obedience and a willingness to accept low pay and hazardous working conditions. And it's always been this way. I think there are people taking these jobs who don't understand what it's like to be an unskilled laborer without a union at an cutthroat company. Doesn't mean this is right and shouldn't change, but expectations should be set. It's a job you only take when you're desparate
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It's a job you only take when you're desparate and the other warehouses rejected you.
What? If they wanted to go work for Distribution Centers for Walmart or Krogers or Target, etc. they would be hired on the spot, but they stay at the Amazon Fulfillment Centers because the pay is better, the working conditions are better, they get benefits, and are eligible for company-paid training that will take them out of the dead-end warehouse work. There are quite a lot of people who come back to work the Christmas
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In a lot of ways this kind of thing is like civil disobedience.
As a *political* strategy, civil disobedience actually relies upon the government reacting in a way that will discredit itself. Rosa Parks *expected* to get arrested. She was specifically chosen by Dr. King, in part because as a popular dress maker she was well known and liked by a lot of prominent white ladies. Her act of civil disobedience was a poison pill.
If you criticize employer like Amazon, you have to expect retaliation. That doesn't
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But hey, if you want to keep people in those kinds of conditions and are upset, or even vaguely surprised that they might not like it, try living in those conditions yourself for a while.
Of course we all know what happens when those types of conditions are maintained for long terms. Or at least those of us who paid attention in history class do. For the rest of you, it's often called revolution, or revolt,
Re: Who needs trouble? (Score:2)
Revolution? Thatâ(TM)s a laugh. Most of that crowd is opposed to guns and does not have guns and is too busy figuring out who they should be fucking and what bathroom they should be using to prepare for a revolution. Their opponents on the other hand, stuck up on guns, ammo and time at the practice range.
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If you are that threatened by criticism of your workplace environment perhaps you should just eat a lead bullet.
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Re:Who needs trouble? (Score:4, Insightful)
They weren't fired for criticizing their workplace environment. They were fired for repeatedly violating company policies.
No. That's what the company said they were, which means it is very probably not what they were.
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Re:Who needs trouble? (Score:5, Insightful)
They were fired just because management wanted them gone, and then the press was told that they violated company policies. Any company out there will fire any employee for any reason at all, and then justify it for the books in case the person decides to sue. Amazon isn't the first or only company to lie about this sort of thing.
If someone wants to complain about working conditions, then they need to stop being naive about it. Know that you WILL be fired if you complain, so document things carefully and secretly. If you try to organize or unionize in today's political environment, you WILL be fired. You won't be able to change any of this by going in with armed only with youthful idealism.
Re:Who needs trouble? (Score:4, Interesting)
Amazon is the most data-driven company that I have ever worked at, if they were fired for repeated violations of company policy I'll guarantee that there is voluminous documentation. It's actually not an easy place to get fired from, I've seen it take six months or more. The reason is that Amazon is quite wealthy and there are herds of lawyers slavering at the mouth looking for a viable case to sue them for enough money to buy their new yacht. Unless you hear about these two getting a huge payout you can safely assume that they're full of crap. More likely than not they were about to get fired and started barking at the moon to try to embarrass the company into taking them back.
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BRB firing a flamboyant homosexual at my workplace for violating company policies such as "No sharp objects in the building", he was fired for his earrings.
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I don't think he gets much work done.
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Well I can't prove he doesn't LITERALLY spend all day posting on Slashdot but it seems reasonable he spends at least some time eating and going potty through the day.
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Branch needs some funny mod points, but mostly it's just derivative humor from FP abuse.
Hey, here's a simple suggestion that might be within the extremely limited capabilities of the latest owners of Slashdot. Simply ban AC from FP.
I'm not saying it would cure the FP problem, but most of the worst FPs do seem to come from AC. The real solution is far beyond Slashdot, which has become more like a morality tale with an unhappy ending.
I sort of hope archive.org has a backup copy of Slashdot, Unfortunately the
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Amazon protects health with contact tracing! (Score:2)
Probably the most thoughtful contribution on this AC-FP-triggered waste-of-keystrokes thread. Sorry, I don't have a mod point for you.
What I was actually looking for in the discussion of the story is some mention of contact tracing of Amazon employees. No trace of tracing to be found. No trace of surprise given the state of Slashdot these days...
It has been repeatedly reported that Amazon traces the movement of every warehouse and delivery employee. That's done in great detail. Now I'm speculating, but I be
Re:Don't let the door hit you on the way out.. (Score:5, Interesting)
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I won't argue with you on that. However, in these cases I would go to HR and let them know. IF they are really doing their jobs, then illegal and unsafe conditions would be in their wheelhouse, given that's the basic reason they exist in the first place. Should they not act within a reasonable time, THEN you head to the proper authorities. (And reasonable depends on the situation...)
So, like in this Amazon case... You'd complain to HR about the safety issues and if they didn't respond within a reasonabl
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However, in these cases I would go to HR and let them know.
I have no idea about Amazon's structure, but in most companies I've worked with the Health and Safety department was a different entity than Human Resources. HR was responsible for hiring, firing, payroll, insurance, taxes, that sort of thing. H&S was responsible for, well, employee's health and safety. Concerns over working conditions (improper PPE, sanitary concerns and such) would go to H&S, "My boss is an asshole" still goes to HR.
What you DON'T do is get up into management's grill, stage a walk out, or talk to a reporter about how unhappy you are about the situation.
Not if you want to keep your job. Insubordination is still in
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They have "free speech" all right.. The problem though, is having the right to say something, is not the same as being free of the consequences of saying it. Many people confuse the right to say something, with not having consequences for saying it. You can freely call your boss names, insult his mother, whatever, but being able to freely say something, won't except you from getting fired (or worse).
This misconception about "free speech" seems to be pervasive these days.. I've not been in school for decade
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Health and Safety department was a different entity than Human Resources
They're separate, but interlaced. I work there and see that Health & Safety are actually considerably more powerful than HR, they can shut an entire building or even a campus down with almost no executive approval. HR on the other hand has a long and drawn out process to actually fire a problematic employee because there are lawyers waiting in line to sue the company for any damn thing. If these two were let go I'll guarantee tha
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Health & Safety are actually considerably more powerful than HR, they can shut an entire building or even a campus down with almost no executive approval.
My experience in this area comes from the construction arena. This is 100% accurate for my experience as well. If the safety guy says "stop" the work stops. (And then he and the superintendent scream at each other for a while, I guess that's kind of like HR.)
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Normally I'd agree with you...except with the current alleged administration, DoL/OSHA/ etc have been neutered, so it won't do you any good.
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That term "unsafe" leaves a lot of wiggle room. Are packages stored on a high shelf "unsafe"? How about working around a moving forklift? How does that compare to working a coal mine? Electric power lines? Driving a truck? Anything in construction?
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As with anything where the government is involved, the answer is always "it depends". Your questions are no exception. And it all depends on the controls put in place to protect the workers. And whether those controls are sufficient are dependent on the judgment of the inspector.
Is it safe to work around a moving forklift? It depends if the operator is properly licensed, and if there are defined "barriers", and if training was provided as to who gets to go on what side of the barrier, and, and, and.
Where I am the department of labor only exists (Score:2)
OSHA exists but is basically worthless. They come in after the fact and wag a finger. A fine might get levied if somebody dies but in a few weeks the business can appeal it and they won't have to pay.
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I actually had a horrible boss back in '92. I did some research and signed him up with a money order for the NAMBLA newsletter to be delivered to work.
He was gone about a week after the first one showed up. They put a change of address in to his apartment. I have no idea what knock-on effect that had with his wife.
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"Dammit, they forwarded me Jeffrey Epstein's mail. Again."
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The North American Man/Boy Love Association is a pedophilia and pederasty advocacy organization in the United States.
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I honestly don't see how you can be fired for that.
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Give in to the dark side. Join me and we shall rule the galaxy together.
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You really think anyone working in Amazon warehouses has a lot of more appealing options? It's all well and good to say walk out the door when you've got valuable skills in high demand. The millions of people doing the unskilled manual labor that keeps this country running don't have that option.
So what's your suggestion for all the millions of unskilled laborers that *YOU NEED* to keep working in order to support the society that supports your lifestyle? Bend over and take it, the little people were mad
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That's a terrible idea (Score:2)
It's even more important in 2020. What are you going to do when the 1% control nearly all the jobs? You can start a business, but with what capital? How will you get the money when you make $8/hr if you're lucky. You can go work for another company.... at the same wages and lack of benefits. You can go get a college degree... with $1200/mo in student loan payments and a starting salary of $2800/mo in a city where a 1 bedroo
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It may not seem fair to you, but if you don't like your working conditions, walk out the door and don't come back. Sure, go to HR and complain if you want too, but don't expect change if you do that and figure that it may cost you.
What would it cost you? If you're going to leave anyway, and the no companies write references anyway, then I think it's strictly better to at least raise your voice about the injustice you see around you.
The only harm I can see is if word gets around in your industry that you're a trouble-maker and you don't get future job offers because of it. That might be true, but I don't see it happening with a factory worker. The flip side is that there'll also be opportunities for which "standing up against injustic
Re:Any common sense these days? (Score:5, Insightful)
And how are things supposed to get better if no one speaks out?
There are always casualties in war, but without war, the powerful win unopposed.
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Oh, you can speak out if you feel you have to.
But you should've seen the employer's reaction coming — that's what cayenne8 is talking about.
Given the other bullshit Amazon suffered from them — like the criticism of "climate policies" — I'm astounded by Amazon's patience.
Moreover, both of these asses are Bernie-sympathizers [cnbc.com] — which makes them adherents of the deadliest school of thought [reason.com] known to humanity. If it is consider
So what were they supposed to do? (Score:2, Insightful)
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As wrong as I think these folks are, I have serious reservations about large corporations firing people for speaking their mind. It does little good to restrict government suppression of free speech if the same suppression is allowed by big companies. The reason freedom of speech is such an essential right is that he who controls speech controls the population. The suppression of speech is how corporations effectively rule the population without holding government titles.
There's a deeper problem here,
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You have a right to say what you want. You don't have a right to a job.
If the working conditions were so bad, the workers should take their package movement skills to a higher bidder.
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Well, decide right off to bat, how important this 'cause' is vs your livelihood.
if the cause is more important, then become a casualty, but quit bitching about the inevitable.
I mean, in the real world, people don't just hand you trophies for showing up....and there are real repercussions for actions.
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Idealism
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Here's a pinned tweet [twitter.com] from one of them.
We are in the disruptive process of several paradigm deaths: Patriarchy, Colonialism, White Supremacy, Neo-Liberalism, and the Carbon Economy. Thread
Yup, social justice nutters. I'm sure that they got lots of likes or whatever on Twitter so it's all good.
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Even if I accept your argument that these folks are social justice nutters, do they deserve to be fired for simply being wrong?
Because I can see some folks firing people for being homosexuals, Jews, Christians, atheists, Muslims, etc... for precisely the same reason: because the boss believes they are wrong.
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Even if I accept your argument that these folks are social justice nutters, do they deserve to be fired for simply being wrong?
No, but they do deserve to be fired for being disruptive. Being loud about being wrong is bad for productivity, and the only thing Amazon is paying for is productivity.
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Have you heard of Constructive Dismissal. That is, a company can construct a policy so vague and universal that it could be interpreted to prohibit almost anything, e.g. "An employee who repeatedly engages in inappropriate behavior can be terminated."
A particular egregious employer could consider engaging in independent thought inappropriate. (Yes, taken from actual experience.) Such policies allow a facial defense for firing employees for otherwise protected activities - for example, political activis
Re:Any common sense these days? (Score:4, Insightful)
Failed?
You mean keeping your job...putting away savings, maybe raising a family, prepare (early) for retirement?
That kind of success that most people aspire to have at minimum?
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destroying warehouses and infrastructure may be a bit extreme in this case, however
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If you went to a mechanic and he started talking shit about you, would you keep coming for more or would you find a different mechanic with a better attitude?
We keep telling you that your religion doesn't work in reality, and yet you keep coming back here to preach...
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What if my mechanic told me that my car is polluting too much and needs a tune-up but I keep ignoring my mechanic? I decide that its cheaper for me to just let my car pollute.
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Amazon fires 2 idiots and hires 100,000 people. Clearly Amazon should be punished because they didn't keep the 2 that were taking shit about the company.
Yes.