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SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

nytimes.com

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Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#641

Post by bko »

makeitdouble wrote: post #614
bko wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The whole point of the letter seems to have been “Musk’s behavior is detrimental to the company.” This implies that they care about the company and want it to succeed, and that their loyalty lies with it, not with Musk. As well it should. Tesla, SpaceX, etc are (or should be) companies, not cults. Here's an experiment. At your place of work, circulate a document criticizing leadership and how they're all wrong. Mak…

Would you apply the same logic to your leaders drowning the company stock and killing the public image ? What should the appropriate response be ?

Your company may make decisions that you don't agree with or are objectively stupid. There is a proper channel to voice your concerns. They may be ignored in which case you can leave if you feel strongly enough about it. This is what adults do.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#642

Post by noasaservice »

toomanyrichies wrote: post #525
HillRat wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even so, they're not protected against being fired -- circulating an internal letter criticizing leadership is, in a right to work state without existing workplace union agreements and outside of a whistleblower or other protected situation, enough to get you fired, though not fired for cause. Are the optics bad? Yes. Is it indicative that "free speech absolutist" Musk believes your right to speech ends where his fee…

Except for Montana, every state in the US is an at-will employment state. Meaning the employer (and the employee) may terminate employment at any time, with or without cause or prior notice. In circumstances like this, the idea of "X is enough to get you fired" loses its meaning, since "X" could mean anything or nothing at all. Therefore, the relevant question is not "is the company within its rights to fire these em…

And in many of those states, you can be fired for simply being gay or trans.

edit: Given how fast this post hit -4, I have to assume that these people are *OK* with being able to fire gay or trans people at a whim. That ain't cool, one bit.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#644

Post by throwyawayyyy »

toomanyrichies wrote: post #434

To those arguing that this letter is tantamount to insubordination and is therefore a fireable offense: “Insubordination (noun)- refusing to obey orders from someone in authority.” [1] Unless they had received direct orders not to criticize Musk at all, internally or externally, they are not guilty of refusing to obey orders. And if they had received such orders, that only adds to Musk’s burgeoning reputation for pet…

Well, sure, it's probably legal to fire them.

But it smacks of "one rule for me, one rule for thee" from Mr "free speech absolutist" Musk, right?

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#645

Post by sergiomattei »

kenneth wrote: post #636

I am personally thrilled to see a company stand up to cancel culture and political employee activism. The ridiculous non-work related distractions from employee on various political crusades we've been seeing at many companies like Google are one of the things ruining Silicon Valley. It's nice to see Elon not allowing it at his companies, and Coinbase in being another standout against this silliness.

How is this cancel culture?

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#646

Post by Alex3917 »

HillRat wrote: post #497
toomanyrichies wrote: post #434

To those arguing that this letter is tantamount to insubordination and is therefore a fireable offense: “Insubordination (noun)- refusing to obey orders from someone in authority.” [1] Unless they had received direct orders not to criticize Musk at all, internally or externally, they are not guilty of refusing to obey orders. And if they had received such orders, that only adds to Musk’s burgeoning reputation for pet…

Even so, they're not protected against being fired -- circulating an internal letter criticizing leadership is, in a right to work state without existing workplace union agreements and outside of a whistleblower or other protected situation, enough to get you fired, though not fired for cause. Are the optics bad? Yes. Is it indicative that "free speech absolutist" Musk believes your right to speech ends where his fee…

> they're not protected against being fired

Of course they are. Concerted workplace activity to improve workplace conditions is protected under NLRB. It's literally the definition of protected activity.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#647

Post by commandlinefan »

axg11 wrote: post #110

This is a very predictable consequence of criticizing your employer via a public letter. Criticize internally all you want, and influence the changes that you want to see happen. Employment is a two-way relationship. If you don't like your employer, you are free to leave. If they don't like you, they are free to fire you (within legal bounds). Publishing an openly critical letter and signing it is a quick way to get…

> Criticize internally all you want

Tell that to James Damore.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#648

Post by puglr »

rossdavidh wrote: post #337

I'm picturing Apple employees writing an open letter criticizing Steve Jobs and saying they don't want him to be the face of the company, or Amazon employees saying they don't want Jeff Bezos to be the image of the company, or GE employees saying they don't want Jack Welch to be tarnishing the brand of the company, or...just about any other big corporation. The CEO's job involves, among other things, being the public…

> If you're not on the board of directors, the way you register displeasure with your CEO is to leave the company.

We can easily do that. Most people can't. This disdainful attitude reeks of privilege.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#649

Post by tpict »

fzeroracer wrote: post #577
iamleppert wrote: post #502

Quoted post unavailable.

I get you're trying to do a parody thing, but your comment is already almost identical with some of the flagged/dead comments here.

It’s almost identical to some of the top comments!

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#650

Post by chucksmash »

amusedcyclist wrote: post #599
memish wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SpaceX is the most ambitious company on Earth, working toward the goal of making humans a multi-planetary species. Their orders are to get to Mars. Employees that are bikeshedding, sowing internal discord, engaging in mutiny, are not working toward the goal and in fact actively hindering it. That's all the reason needed to prune them from the otherwise focused and ambitious team.

Quoted post unavailable.

Maybe, maybe not, but this level of vitriol is unmerited and makes HN worse.
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