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Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

reuters.com

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Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#381

Post by rglullis »

mercer wrote: post #376
malandrew wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. It doesn't really matter what Amazon does (see this comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22871216 ), the woke crowd has already made up their mind about the company and will criticize them regardless. The only thing that is going to satisfy the woke crowd is Amazon's failure. Their best strategy is to focus on being the most customer centric company so that people like myself and millions upon millions…

For some reason I feel that I should be honest about downvoting your comment just because of the insane number of sentences mentioning 'woke' and . I just tend to zone out when commenters bore the shit out of me mentioning some kind of 'woke' adversary. It should be beneath all of us.

> It should be beneath all of us.

He said, while commenting down-thread with very rational-debate-provoking labels of "Trumpian America" and "Right-wing Brazilians who don't care about the society and the situation in their country".

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#382

Post by cperciva »

YokoZar wrote: post #373
cperciva wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, and that poster specifically talks about your working conditions. It says nothing about a protected right to talk about other people's working conditions.

The phrase "mutual aid" is right there. As is "organizing". These things imply an ability to cooperate with coworkers. These laws were made to explicitly protect collective bargaining , which absolutely implies other people .

They imply other people, yes; but mutual implies both sides. If you're only talking about other people's working conditions and never talking about your own, there's nothing mutual going on.

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#383

Post by rochester46 »

throwaway_USD wrote: post #380
rochester46 wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feel free to point out anywhere the constitution says so. The constitution and/or bill of rights have nothing to do with this situation, as no constitutional rights were broken whatsoever. >or these statements were in violation of some otherwise unknown confidential settlement agreement I really have no idea what you're talking about here. What confidential settlement agreement? >who is to say the employee statements…

You don't seem to understand 1st Amendment Law and protections; contract law; nor employment law. >This is an employment arrangement which can unilaterally be ended at any time by either party, and Amazon has chosen to do so. Yes, at will employment gives the parties the right to terminate the employment...but, Amazon can not terminate an employee for any reason. For example Amazon can't fire a employee for their rac…

edit: in the interest of being less combative I've reworded this entire comment.

The First Amendment does not apply to this situation. The First Amendment applies to restrictions to speech from the government, but provides no rights or privileges when it comes to repercussions from private entities.

>For example Amazon can't fire a employee for their race, or religion, or sexual preference. >because Amazon can not retaliate by firing an employee for reporting workplace safety concerns.

Correct, but this isn't why they were fired.

There may be some gray area where the workers could claim protection under the NLRA if they but that really depends on additional details not provided in any of the reporting so far (such as which company policies they broke), and that has nothing to do with any constitutional rights.

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#384

Post by rglullis »

NotSammyHagar wrote: post #367
malandrew wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope. I worked at a different company. This isn't even about people at the top. When everyone is on the same team and owns equity in that collective endeavor, someone that goes outside to publicly bad mouth the team is hurting everyone on their team. That's some Grade-A anti-social behavior. I'm an IC and far from the top, but I never want to work with such people who use righteous indignation to justify their anti-s…

I think your view leads to nothing mattering, and big companies should always be saved, preserved, because you'll be hurting some of the people in the company. Can a company do such terrible things that it actually matters? I believe your philosophy leads to an idea that it just doesn't matter.

The take I have on this: I will only take the critics seriously if the stand they take puts something for them to lose. Basically, Skin in the Game.

If you criticize your employer by putting other sectors of the company in a fragile position and still think you should not face any consequence, you have no SITG.

Simply put: no symmetry in the risk you are taking => no weight to your words => I just don't care at what you say.

Likewise, if you just learn about a perceived misdeed from a company and all that you can say is "This does not make me want to work there" but it does not make you say "I will not allow myself the benefit of consume something that was achieved through bad working conditions", you have no SITG. You don't work there already, you are not losing anything -> no weight to your words => I don't care at what you say.

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#385

Post by bartread »

burkaman wrote: post #305
bartread wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, hold on: do you think it's really a "Bad Thing", and by your capitalisation I'm guessing you mean universally a bad thing to experience negative consequences for publicly trash-talking about your employer? Sure, if you're whistleblowing something systemically unethical - as may well be the case here - then you should be able to do the right thing without fear of negative consequence. I.e., your employer, Amazon…

> you mean universally a bad thing to experience negative consequences for publicly trash-talking about your employer? That is not what I mean. This conversation is about the accepted "law of nature" that if you say bad things about your employer you will probably be fired. As you point out, sometimes there are good reasons to publicly say bad things about your employer. Therefore, it is bad that firing is the accept…

Cool. I think we might be in violent agreement.

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#386

Post by burrows »

8note wrote: post #358
burrows wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't know of a single employer that would be interested in hiring someone who insisted on including a list of nonfirable offenses which included making public statements which paint the company in a bad light. 1. Work for a company that you don’t feel the need to publicly criticize. 2. Start your own company. 3. Increase your market value thru hard work to improve your negotiating position. > There are many more…

For the roof though, at least in the US, the property it's on is based on men taking it with guns from the natives. Everything since then where you're keeping people off "your" property is a continuation of that coercion.

Assume the land was stolen.

The people who stole the land are dead. The people who were stolen from are dead.

The point is moot.

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#387

Post by jshevek »

burrows wrote: post #268
a1369209993 wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sort of conflation is defensible when someone actually says "First Amendment", but the parent was clearly talking about the fundumental human right to free speech that that first amendment imperfectly protects, not about a particular legal establishment of it.

Amazon isn’t threatening the men with guns, so their natural right to free speech isn’t violated.

You can disagree on who is obligated to defend what kinds of speech, but do you agree with the parent's point - that the grandparent conflated an amendment with a moral principle?

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#388

Post by jshevek »

burrows wrote: post #268
a1369209993 wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sort of conflation is defensible when someone actually says "First Amendment", but the parent was clearly talking about the fundumental human right to free speech that that first amendment imperfectly protects, not about a particular legal establishment of it.

Amazon isn’t threatening the men with guns, so their natural right to free speech isn’t violated.

Threatening a person with death is not the only way to violate a natural right. To take this view might arbitrarily limit one's ability to analyze the nature and impact of the censorship being done by social media.

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#389

Post by burrows »

jshevek wrote: post #388
burrows wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon isn’t threatening the men with guns, so their natural right to free speech isn’t violated.

Threatening a person with death is not the only way to violate a natural right. To take this view might arbitrarily limit one's ability to analyze the nature and impact of the censorship being done by social media.

> Threatening a person with death is not the only way to violate a natural right.

I agree. Discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22873029

What is your framework for analyzing natural rights violations?

Re: Amazon fires two UX designers critical of warehouse working conditions

#390

Post by burrows »

jshevek wrote: post #387
burrows wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon isn’t threatening the men with guns, so their natural right to free speech isn’t violated.

You can disagree on who is obligated to defend what kinds of speech, but do you agree with the parent's point - that the grandparent conflated an amendment with a moral principle?

Yes.

> Personally I think we should draw a clear line between these two types of actions. When we don't do that, we weaken legitimate free speech.

Refers to the free speech natural right.

> You are in confusion, there is no free speech issue; the First Amendment protects the free speech from the government, nothing else.

Refers to an amendment.

The amendment protects the natural right from state aggression. However, the right can be violated in ways not “made illegal” by the amendment.

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