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> “We support every employee’s right to criticize their employer’s working conditions,” a spokesperson said, “but that does not come with blanket immunity again

by cirno 6y ago

> “We support every employee’s right to criticize their employer’s working conditions,” a spokesperson said, “but that does not come with blanket immunity against any and all internal policies.” What a strange statement. "We support their right to criticize their working conditions, only actually we don't at all"

AQuantized 6y ago
Standard corporate Newspeak. Make knowing exactly what you "can" say such a landmine ridden pursuit you stay silent, while avoiding contradiction of federal law.
mandelbrotwurst 6y ago
Strange is standard these days.
TAForObvReasons 6y ago
https://www.whistleblowers.gov/ https://www.whistleblowers.gov/ > You have the right to report if your workplace is unsafe during the COVID-19 pandemic. Amazon has to create the appearance that they aren't violating federal law
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
ozim 6y ago
I don't see anything wrong about that... Because that is if you don't agree with company policy or whatever company is doing, you should not work there. They should lose all employees and go bust. In practice I understand one would like to disagree and things should change to better. But life is not that simple, so if you can afford quitting please do so (if you are wealthy enough even in their face saying what they should do better), if you somehow cannot afford that, for the sake of your close ones really put your head down and work your way through... there is nothing bad I could say about such person, those are just circumstances. That said - for all those assholes that should say something because they have their comfortable position in a company ... fuck them really bad! That is why I highly regard Snowden, he had comfortable position, yet he went against all of that. If he would be someone oppressed and making barely living wage that would be just a normal thing that someone would like to fight for a better life ....
- jeromegv 6y ago
  We can always count on someone on Hackernews to defend billion dollar companies in the face of workers abuse "they could always quit!". They clearly don't care if you criticize internally, there is a need to expose those bad practices in the press.
  - ozim 6y ago
    Good luck reading the first part only mate! After you cool down read 4th and 5th paragraph, if you would make it to 3rd maybe you would notice something more...
    - wolco 6y ago
      I didn't keep reading. I found your paragraph structure difficult to want to follow. You give one line. This draws you in.. 3 then 4 sentences which explains your point and I decide to stop reading. Your third paragraph was bigger than all of the others combined. Your fourth is small followed by a bigger last paragraph. Beef up 2 that is where you make your key point. Keep the last line short.
- shawnz 6y ago
  What if you actually believe in the company and what they do? Does that mean you must support each and every policy that the company instates?
  - ozim 6y ago
    That is a good counter question... I don't have to name people who believed their company was doing the right thing but was in reality setting death camps. But in reality they (bad guys) were using line workers who could not really make right or wrong because they were not educated on the front line doing atrocities. Fuck you is about people who are educated enough that they could spot slimy stuff (though they were enough removed from bad stuff to not "spot" the bad stuff) but still stick to their comfortable life.
  - wolco 6y ago
jasode 6y ago
>What a strange statement. "We support their right to criticize their working conditions, only actually we don't at all" Without seeing the actual policy, my guess is that "criticizing" is something employees can do internally within the company. However, you can't post public tweets about it. In other words, "don't air dirty laundry". This type of distinction is very common in typical employee policies. Likewise, it's common for a CEO for VP to say to the employees "I have an open door policy so if you see something wrong, tell me." -- but common sense should tell you that the CEO does not mean for the employee to post an "open letter to the CEO" on Twitter or NYTimes for the public read as well. I know of no well-known company that encourages employees to publicly criticize their workplace.
- alexandercrohde 6y ago
  Uh great... yeah just walk right into the CEO's office and tell them what's wrong... 0% chance of that coming back to affect your career....
  - bavell 6y ago
    With a good CEO, your career might actually get a bump if you give them honest and helpful feedback.
    - __abc 6y ago
      In my experience those CEO's are extremely rare ... don't know how common my experience has been.
      - mtnGoat 6y ago
        I feel like its a myth... no one i know works in a place where anyone can walk into the CEOs office, be brutally honest and not have some time of blowback in one way or another(or really any level). All those who tried have not faired well.
        6y ago
folkhack 6y ago
"You're welcome to voice your concerns, but we're probably gonna fire you if you do." If anyone is looking a corporate-speak translation here ya go. It's direct signaling to potential dissidents that their employment is not guaranteed if they decide to speak-up, no other way to read this.
- lanstein 6y ago
  You can do whatever you want on your last day at Amazon.
  - krapp 6y ago
    Every day is Day One at Amazon, even your last day.
totalZero 6y ago
It doesn't seem politically smart to me for Amazon to so blatantly open itself up to state and federal investigation, at a time when the president of the United States hates their leadership's guts and the Democratic Party is on a massive pro-workers kick. Amazon has spent billions trying to replace the human component of its distribution. It would utterly fall apart if warehouse workers stop working. What's wrong with letting them share in the wealth, giving them masks and gloves, and reducing the throughput a little bit so that people don't have to work in close proximity to each other? This doublespeak bullshit from Amazon is a pretty glaring symptom of a larger problem, perhaps (if I may editorialize) Bezos's resentment that he has to employ warehouse workers at all. When all of this is said and done, I think Amazon is going to make ungodly sums of money and everyone will hate Jeff Bezos for how he treats the little guys.
- madamelic 6y ago
  >reducing the throughput a little bit so that people don't have to work in close proximity to each other? The funny part is they already are, for non-essential items.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- dnissley 6y ago
  What's wrong with letting them share in the wealth, giving them masks and gloves, and reducing the throughput a little bit so that people don't have to work in close proximity to each other? They're addressing all of your points, aren't they? - $2 raise during this time - masks and temp checking - prioritizing essential items for fulfillment and delaying non-essential shipments
vkou 6y ago
The statement is deliberately vague, so that anyone who wants to speak up will think twice about it. Other major tech firms have done the exact same thing when employees have raised concerns. They make it clear that they won't retaliate against you if you don't do the wrong things, but they won't actually enumerate what those wrong things are. It's like an extended round of the Chairman's Game. [1] [2] [1] The game forbids its players from explaining the rules, and new players are often informed that "the only rule you may be told is this one". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(card_game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(card_game) [2] The game is named in honor of a famous politician who was very well known for coming up with a lot of rules for his subjects to follow, without bothering to explain to them what the rules were.
jhayward 6y ago
"Sovereign is he who decides the exception"[1]. It's a classic authoritarian/totalitarian posture. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Schmitt#Political_Theology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Schmitt#Political_Theolog...
- acephal 6y ago
  All sovereign governments are exceptional in Schmitt's view. Our constitution grants that power to Congress specifically.
prox 6y ago
Doublespeak.
mcguire 6y ago
Not at all. They'll support your right to say what you want. They'll fire you anyway, but ... Go, you!
fmajid 6y ago
The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 protects employees rights, and Google had to settle with the NLRB on precisely this issue. There is one little difference, I am not a lawyer so I don't know if it is crucial for Amazon or not: in this case the fired employees were protesting other employees' working conditions, not their own.
- YokoZar 6y ago
  The NLRA protects workers seeking "mutual aid and protection". This is very clearly covered. https://www.dol.gov/olms/regs/compliance/EO_Posters/EmployeeRightsPoster11x17_2019Final.pdf https://www.dol.gov/olms/regs/compliance/EO_Posters/Employee...
NotSammyHagar 6y ago
Why is amazon so clueless. These firings seems like bad policy, seem to be very likely illegal (they have so much money it won't matter though to pay fines). And it's terrible PR. And for people that pay attention (including hacker news people) it makes them look terrible. Four bad outcomes. All they do is "remove a troublemaker" from their standpoint. Why not just address the issues? They look like they want to bring back the days of company towns and central control. This doesn't make me want to work there, it's a strong dis-incentive for that.
- rglullis 6y ago
  Forget about working there. Does it stop you from buying their products?
  - malandrew 6y ago
    This. It doesn't really matter what Amazon does (see this comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22871216 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 of others keep buying from them. I worked at another company the woke crowd loved to hate on and no matter how much more actual woke stuff our company did, the woke crowd still promoted the less woke company with the more woke brand because we were Goliath and they were David. We should have stopped wasting our effort to appease the unappeasable and just focused on being customer-centric like Amazon does. The loudest critics aren't trying to build a better world. They are trying to signal to others about how woke they want others to think they are. This doesn't mean that Amazon and my previous employer shouldn't do good things. They should and do. What it means is that they should do it because those things are the right thing and they should pay no mind to the haters because haters are gonna hate. You can't be Goliath and not get hated on.
    - wolco 6y ago
      Let me guess you worked at Uber and Lyft was the darling? Not sure treating employees badly makes for a better world. Perhaps more profit at the top makes for a better world for some.

by cirno 6y ago

AQuantized 6y ago

Standard corporate Newspeak. Make knowing exactly what you "can" say such a landmine ridden pursuit you stay silent, while avoiding contradiction of federal law.

mandelbrotwurst 6y ago

Strange is standard these days.

TAForObvReasons 6y ago

https://www.whistleblowers.gov/ https://www.whistleblowers.gov/ > You have the right to report if your workplace is unsafe during the COVID-19 pandemic. Amazon has to create the appearance that they aren't violating federal law

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

ozim 6y ago

I don't see anything wrong about that... Because that is if you don't agree with company policy or whatever company is doing, you should not work there. They should lose all employees and go bust. In practice I understand one would like to disagree and things should change to better. But life is not that simple, so if you can afford quitting please do so (if you are wealthy enough even in their face saying what they should do better), if you somehow cannot afford that, for the sake of your close ones really put your head down and work your way through... there is nothing bad I could say about such person, those are just circumstances. That said - for all those assholes that should say something because they have their comfortable position in a company ... fuck them really bad! That is why I highly regard Snowden, he had comfortable position, yet he went against all of that. If he would be someone oppressed and making barely living wage that would be just a normal thing that someone would like to fight for a better life ....

jeromegv 6y ago
We can always count on someone on Hackernews to defend billion dollar companies in the face of workers abuse "they could always quit!". They clearly don't care if you criticize internally, there is a need to expose those bad practices in the press.
- ozim 6y ago
  Good luck reading the first part only mate! After you cool down read 4th and 5th paragraph, if you would make it to 3rd maybe you would notice something more...
  - wolco 6y ago
    I didn't keep reading. I found your paragraph structure difficult to want to follow. You give one line. This draws you in.. 3 then 4 sentences which explains your point and I decide to stop reading. Your third paragraph was bigger than all of the others combined. Your fourth is small followed by a bigger last paragraph. Beef up 2 that is where you make your key point. Keep the last line short.
shawnz 6y ago
What if you actually believe in the company and what they do? Does that mean you must support each and every policy that the company instates?
- ozim 6y ago
  That is a good counter question... I don't have to name people who believed their company was doing the right thing but was in reality setting death camps. But in reality they (bad guys) were using line workers who could not really make right or wrong because they were not educated on the front line doing atrocities. Fuck you is about people who are educated enough that they could spot slimy stuff (though they were enough removed from bad stuff to not "spot" the bad stuff) but still stick to their comfortable life.
- wolco 6y ago

jasode 6y ago

>What a strange statement. "We support their right to criticize their working conditions, only actually we don't at all" Without seeing the actual policy, my guess is that "criticizing" is something employees can do internally within the company. However, you can't post public tweets about it. In other words, "don't air dirty laundry". This type of distinction is very common in typical employee policies. Likewise, it's common for a CEO for VP to say to the employees "I have an open door policy so if you see something wrong, tell me." -- but common sense should tell you that the CEO does not mean for the employee to post an "open letter to the CEO" on Twitter or NYTimes for the public read as well. I know of no well-known company that encourages employees to publicly criticize their workplace.

alexandercrohde 6y ago
Uh great... yeah just walk right into the CEO's office and tell them what's wrong... 0% chance of that coming back to affect your career....
- bavell 6y ago
  With a good CEO, your career might actually get a bump if you give them honest and helpful feedback.
  - __abc 6y ago
    In my experience those CEO's are extremely rare ... don't know how common my experience has been.
    - mtnGoat 6y ago
      I feel like its a myth... no one i know works in a place where anyone can walk into the CEOs office, be brutally honest and not have some time of blowback in one way or another(or really any level). All those who tried have not faired well.
      - 6y ago

folkhack 6y ago

"You're welcome to voice your concerns, but we're probably gonna fire you if you do." If anyone is looking a corporate-speak translation here ya go. It's direct signaling to potential dissidents that their employment is not guaranteed if they decide to speak-up, no other way to read this.

lanstein 6y ago
You can do whatever you want on your last day at Amazon.
- krapp 6y ago
  Every day is Day One at Amazon, even your last day.

totalZero 6y ago

It doesn't seem politically smart to me for Amazon to so blatantly open itself up to state and federal investigation, at a time when the president of the United States hates their leadership's guts and the Democratic Party is on a massive pro-workers kick. Amazon has spent billions trying to replace the human component of its distribution. It would utterly fall apart if warehouse workers stop working. What's wrong with letting them share in the wealth, giving them masks and gloves, and reducing the throughput a little bit so that people don't have to work in close proximity to each other? This doublespeak bullshit from Amazon is a pretty glaring symptom of a larger problem, perhaps (if I may editorialize) Bezos's resentment that he has to employ warehouse workers at all. When all of this is said and done, I think Amazon is going to make ungodly sums of money and everyone will hate Jeff Bezos for how he treats the little guys.

madamelic 6y ago
>reducing the throughput a little bit so that people don't have to work in close proximity to each other? The funny part is they already are, for non-essential items.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
dnissley 6y ago
What's wrong with letting them share in the wealth, giving them masks and gloves, and reducing the throughput a little bit so that people don't have to work in close proximity to each other? They're addressing all of your points, aren't they? - $2 raise during this time - masks and temp checking - prioritizing essential items for fulfillment and delaying non-essential shipments

vkou 6y ago

The statement is deliberately vague, so that anyone who wants to speak up will think twice about it. Other major tech firms have done the exact same thing when employees have raised concerns. They make it clear that they won't retaliate against you if you don't do the wrong things, but they won't actually enumerate what those wrong things are. It's like an extended round of the Chairman's Game. [1] [2] [1] The game forbids its players from explaining the rules, and new players are often informed that "the only rule you may be told is this one". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(card_game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(card_game) [2] The game is named in honor of a famous politician who was very well known for coming up with a lot of rules for his subjects to follow, without bothering to explain to them what the rules were.

jhayward 6y ago

"Sovereign is he who decides the exception"[1]. It's a classic authoritarian/totalitarian posture. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Schmitt#Political_Theology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Schmitt#Political_Theolog...

acephal 6y ago
All sovereign governments are exceptional in Schmitt's view. Our constitution grants that power to Congress specifically.

prox 6y ago

Doublespeak.

mcguire 6y ago

Not at all. They'll support your right to say what you want. They'll fire you anyway, but ... Go, you!

fmajid 6y ago

The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 protects employees rights, and Google had to settle with the NLRB on precisely this issue. There is one little difference, I am not a lawyer so I don't know if it is crucial for Amazon or not: in this case the fired employees were protesting other employees' working conditions, not their own.

YokoZar 6y ago
The NLRA protects workers seeking "mutual aid and protection". This is very clearly covered. https://www.dol.gov/olms/regs/compliance/EO_Posters/EmployeeRightsPoster11x17_2019Final.pdf https://www.dol.gov/olms/regs/compliance/EO_Posters/Employee...

NotSammyHagar 6y ago

Why is amazon so clueless. These firings seems like bad policy, seem to be very likely illegal (they have so much money it won't matter though to pay fines). And it's terrible PR. And for people that pay attention (including hacker news people) it makes them look terrible. Four bad outcomes. All they do is "remove a troublemaker" from their standpoint. Why not just address the issues? They look like they want to bring back the days of company towns and central control. This doesn't make me want to work there, it's a strong dis-incentive for that.

rglullis 6y ago
Forget about working there. Does it stop you from buying their products?
- malandrew 6y ago
  This. It doesn't really matter what Amazon does (see this comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22871216 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 of others keep buying from them. I worked at another company the woke crowd loved to hate on and no matter how much more actual woke stuff our company did, the woke crowd still promoted the less woke company with the more woke brand because we were Goliath and they were David. We should have stopped wasting our effort to appease the unappeasable and just focused on being customer-centric like Amazon does. The loudest critics aren't trying to build a better world. They are trying to signal to others about how woke they want others to think they are. This doesn't mean that Amazon and my previous employer shouldn't do good things. They should and do. What it means is that they should do it because those things are the right thing and they should pay no mind to the haters because haters are gonna hate. You can't be Goliath and not get hated on.
  - wolco 6y ago
    Let me guess you worked at Uber and Lyft was the darling? Not sure treating employees badly makes for a better world. Perhaps more profit at the top makes for a better world for some.