[deleted]
I feel like im talking to the borg
241–250 of 387 posts
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#242Earlier quoted context omitted.
They are assuming the German sector based model here.
Is there anything preventing unions from growing huge and essentially dominating entire sectors in the US?
Yes, that's not how unions are structured by law in the US. Every union is shop-based and organized against a specific employer. They usually throw in with a larger union or an association, but not always. This is where the "Local 404" comes from -- the union itself is the local ###, aligned with the national federation. The union at Powell's Books, for example, is a retail union but they're connected to the ILWU, the longshoremen.
Portland is also undergoing an tremendous unionization battle at a local burger chain (Burgerville); one or two of the shops have successfully unionized, while the rest are still fighting for their right to organize. That's because unions here are at the shop level, and there just couldn't be one burger union that dominated all burger-making.
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#243Earlier quoted context omitted.
The media absolutely pushes an agenda, they are paid to do so. Not many would question that. The difference is, reporting on these things is their job and Amazon is treating their employees like trash. You have to be purposefully ignorant to miss this stuff. It's everywhere! Last Week Tonight broke it down pretty well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9m7d07k22A . The fact you think your anecdotal evidence means anyt…
Last Week Tonight isn't real news, it's comedy. Not to mention it's heavily biased. Also, it's not really that funny :p
So I post a video in response to someone using anecdotal evidence as a counterpoint to Amazon treating their workers poorly. Included in the video are testimonials from actual Amazon workers and your response is to dismiss the video because it's not real news, not funny and heavily biased. None of the things you listed have anything to do with the evidence presented.
And now I see in your other response in this topic you express anecdotal evidence as well. It's simply a poor way to counterpoint something. It really is.
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#244Earlier quoted context omitted.
Owning a few shares isn't really what's meant. If your way of life still depends on earning wages for the bulk of your adult life, that's usually not what people mean by the term "capitalist" (or "capitalist class"), since it'd be a pretty useless definition.
Anyone can buy shares or start a business and own their means. It's only become easier now with the internet. And yes, I agree that it's a useless definition. I've never seen it used outside of esoteric political debates.
> And yes, agree that it's a useless definition. I've never seen it used outside of esoteric political debates.
Esoteric? It's a central concept for understanding how capitalist societies are structured. The central concept, even. It's not math, it's language, exceptions or hard-to-pin-down boundary regions don't wholly invalidate or render useless an idea.
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#245Earlier quoted context omitted.
They're not real, they're Twitter chat bots. That Amazon thinks this was a good PR move is truly astonishing.
It’s astonishing people are so confident these are bots. No real evidence of that and it’s more likely they’re real. Occam’s razor.
Bots or not, it's not very authentic or honest, and certainly not good PR.
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#246Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a fallacy. If you're going to talk about profit then you must also consider that the risk and loss also goes to owners while workers get paid either way. This is something that should be rather simple to understand in the HN/Startup crowd. Considering that anyone can buy shares or start their own business, my point stands that this is the most non-exclusive club possible.
The workers also shoulder the risk. If a business goes under, they lose their jobs. Ability to buy large quantities of shares is not "non-exclusive." Not everyone has money.
That's not the same risk. That's a voluntary agreement of work in exchange for cash, and either side can stop at anytime. Legal and contractual obligations like pensions and severance can also be layered on. What assets and liabilities that employee has in their personal life doesn't factor into calculation, they could be independently wealthy for all you know.
Also why does it have to be "large quantities"? Buy 1 share and you're a part owner. Many large companies have stock plans. It's not rare and if you're an employee then by definition you "have money" from working.
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#247Earlier quoted context omitted.
>are you a robot, did they make a bunch of ai to lie for them instead of helping real workers Talking to a real human this way is not reasonable. Nor is it an argument. >how much are you compensated per tweet like this This is like the question "Have you stopped beating your wife?" When the assumption of malintent/guilt is there from the start, you're setting yourself up for a very unreasonable conversation. >so they…
>>so they’re paying you to tweet that you like your job, which is tweeting about liking your job...lol yes!! you are paid to say that you like your job. it’s your job! >This is very likely false, and she is actively ignoring people who are saying it is false. She's technically correct in the same way that it's technically correct to say that if I take a restroom break while on the clock that I'm getting paid to use t…
Some ambasssador in the thread says she tweets two days and works in the warehouse two days. So it's not really comparable to using the bathroom.
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#248Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does rather show how important it is to have good personal heuristics for "this is a real person's account speaking authentically", which is very difficult to verify for strangers.
Precisely. We're even psychologically inclined to agree with RO because "it" is "fighting the good fight" and "fighting The Man", etc. Whether she's legitimately exactly who she says she is or "it" is just a next-level PR AI whose sole purpose is harming Amazon, we have little way of knowing, especially outside this specific example.
We're inclined to agree with RO because her account looks genuine, whereas the Amazon accounts look like this: https://mobile.twitter.com/TheKenChilds/status/1161847717397...
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#249Earlier quoted context omitted.
Anyone who owns the means but does not actually do the work of production. This is in contrast to a worker-owned structure. It leads to concentration of power, since the profit from many workers goes to one or a few owners. Each owner is more powerful than any one worker, so workers have to act collectively to have leverage.
This is a fallacy. If you're going to talk about profit then you must also consider that the risk and loss also goes to owners while workers get paid either way. This is something that should be rather simple to understand in the HN/Startup crowd. Considering that anyone can buy shares or start their own business, my point stands that this is the most non-exclusive club possible.
> This is a fallacy. If you're going to talk about profit then you must also consider that the risk and loss also goes to owners while workers get paid either way.
I think you're falling into a set pattern of argument rather than looking at what's under examination and considering it on merit.
> This is something that should be rather simple to understand in the HN/Startup crowd. Considering that anyone can buy shares or start their own business, my point stands that this is the most non-exclusive club possible.
Please look back over the previous posts in the thread and consider the points that have already been raised.
Re: I feel like im talking to the borg
#250I don't get this. There's a reason why they make AstroTurf green. If you're Amazon and you're trying to generate realistic good buzz about your work conditions don't name the accounts "AmazonDrone643278" or similar.
What they're trying to do is a bit of false transparency thinking if they show the people they're paying to tweet are associated with the brand it'll look less fake because "if they were being fake we'd hide it" or something similar. If it was paired with something less artificial and hyper cheery it might have worked but the relentless positivity and the fact that no one person replies more than twice it feel real f…
No, it's not that, it's really so that Twitter won't shut them down.
Maybe being "honest" is some side-effect, but they wouldn't be doing it if Twitter didn't have a history of deleting Russian troll accounts (for example).