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I feel like im talking to the borg

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211–220 of 387 posts

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#211

I doubt these are bots. One of them says: > I don't get compensated per tweet. I get paid $15/hr whether I am answering tweets or out on the floor stowing. I do this 2 days a week and 2 days a week I stow. While I think it's weird that Amazon is doing this, I also doubt that the warehouse jobs are bad jobs. I've done manual labor for less than $15/hr and I'd much rather have a job like that than, say, a job in a rest…

I wouldn’t take the term “Bot” literally - here it’s meant in the same vein as a “Russian troll” or more clearly an astroturfer.

I think many of the people who find fault with rulesobeyer don’t use Twitter. The ambassadors are comoletely robotic in the way they use Twitter - they don’t come across as people, they come across as corporate accounts. Even developer advocates aren’t this robotic.

I feel like I’m looking at stepford wives here and everyone in the comments here are apart of the farce

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#212

Oh, wow, "FC" means "fulfillment centre". Doesn't that sound a lot like... an enrichment centre? Certainly sounds nicer than "warehouse".

It's a fairly standard dress up name for shipping warehouse. Sounds better the same way personal/executive assistant has replaced secretary.

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoting one of the ambassadors: > Sure some dont like it here, but they may just dont like to work. Ignoring the grammar.. How stupid or naive do you have to be to a) believe that and b) repeat it. A not so subtle attempt at saying anyone who has a problem here is actually themselves the problem.

This sentiment is quite common in blue collar sectors. Calling them stupid and naive is, at best , out of touch with at least half the voting block of the United States.

> Calling them stupid and naive is, at best, out of touch with at least half the voting block of the United States.

Out of touch does not imply it's an inaccurate statement, though. In 2015 55 % of the US voting block thought there was a need for the same or more emphasis on coal in power generation.

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#214
post #125

I feel like this is twitter in a nutshell, and that goes for everyone involved. The very first response is "eally like? cause your workers are liars?" There we go, now the entire conversation is everything or nothing, you're either with them or against them. Then it's off into personal attacks and arguments about followers and etc. Nobody is talking to each other in any of that. They're just posting for everyone else…

I had to delete Twitter from my phone - I found it would make me angry for no discernible reason, and I'm generally a pretty even-tempered person. Not healthy.

Once you detach, you realize quickly that much of Twitter represents a tiny minority of loud, self-righteous people. When "Twitter explodes" in righteous indignation, I feel like the best move would simply be to ignore it and wait for everyone to move on.

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#215
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This may also stem from some union-busting messaging. One of the talking points that you see on anti-union posters and in videos is "unions get in the way of you talking to your manager, when you can talk to your manager directly you can address concerns straightaway with them." This reminds me of that.

Yes...and is that not factual? My experience being in a union tells me it is.

Because the amount of force use by employers against unions in very anti social countries such as corporate US is extreme, then you might get that feeling. But countries where business and unions understand that they're partners and not enemies , both sides usually are not on a war path.

The problem is not big business, or socialism, the problem is of mentality.

Sadly the US business mentality is centered around bullying and zero sum perception of the world. violence begets violence.

Too bad this brain virus is catching on at other cultures. It'll end up with either a big blowout, or suppression of the masses.

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#216

I see people saying they are 'chat bots'; any evidence of this other than people's general feeling? To me the FCA's came off like normal human beings who actually like their job a bit more than average (these people do exist). The people replying to them come off as infantile.

> To me the FCA's came off like normal human beings

Oh come on, this is contrarianism for the sake of contrarianism. The overwhelming consensus is that their behavior is bizarre.

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the conditions are so bad, why are there more complaints? I'm very distrustful of the media in general and feel like they're pushing an agenda more than anything. I know people personally that work in distribution centres and they find it a perfectly fine job. It'd hard work, yes, but you see complaints like "boiling hot in summer and freezing in winter", and it's like.. yeah.. Which loading bay isn't like that?

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…

I seem to remember that "Last Week Tonight" said that Amazon wasn't as bad, it was the outsourcing companies that were far worse.

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#218
I used to work a hard labor job. People got injured. I got injured more than once. Some people died. It was part of the job and we knew what we were getting into in exchange for money. It was the best way we had to make a living.

I don't know if conditions were as hard as working in an Amazon FC, but it was definitely hard work. We needed the money and appreciated the opportunity to earn a living.

If the media had decided that we were some kind of downtrodden worker class cause and had descended upon us to ask these kinds of antagonizing questions our answers would have been very much the same. I'm sure we would have answered back with our employers talking points when ridiculed for the type of work we were doing. People in tech do this all the time when they explain why they work at some tech company "changing the world".

This whole thing is in very poor taste. This public Amazon FC bashing feels very much like virtue signaling and I find it disgusting.

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#219

I doubt these are bots. One of them says: > I don't get compensated per tweet. I get paid $15/hr whether I am answering tweets or out on the floor stowing. I do this 2 days a week and 2 days a week I stow. While I think it's weird that Amazon is doing this, I also doubt that the warehouse jobs are bad jobs. I've done manual labor for less than $15/hr and I'd much rather have a job like that than, say, a job in a rest…

> I also doubt that the warehouse jobs are bad jobs I agree that these folks are probably real people, but you must have missed the last several month's worth of very public information about the conditions in their warehouses. https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-employees-describe-pe... https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/3/11/18260472/amazon-ware... https://www.newsweek.com/amazon-drivers-warehouse-conditions...…

I'm friends with a couple people who work (or have worked) in these FC centers. They don't complain about these things. They work their ass off and happily collect their paycheck.

In my younger days, I used to work unloading boxes at FedEx for minimum wage. It was hard, back breaking work, and you better believe at holiday time it was crazy hectic and no time off. So I can imagine what it's like at one of these facilities, it's got to be hard as hell.

I'm sure all of us want these people to have the best conditions possible. The concerning thing to me is the tone of conversations like this in the 'Age of outrage'. It's a lot of virtue signaling, and then attacking of anyone who says anything to the contrary. "Oh you're not outraged about this like I am? Well you're an Amazon shill & hate the workers!"

Isn't the bigger issue, why is it these folks don't have better opportunities available to them? They are working these hard, back breaking jobs likely because it is better than anything else they can find in their area.

Re: I feel like im talking to the borg

#220
post #125

I feel like this is twitter in a nutshell, and that goes for everyone involved. The very first response is "eally like? cause your workers are liars?" There we go, now the entire conversation is everything or nothing, you're either with them or against them. Then it's off into personal attacks and arguments about followers and etc. Nobody is talking to each other in any of that. They're just posting for everyone else…

Reddit politics is the same.
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