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> European countries literally have no legal concept of at-will employment. They have strong social nets that make quitting your job much easier, and more preva

> European countries literally have no legal concept of at-will employment. They have strong social nets that make quitting your job much easier, and more prevalent unions that fight to improve working conditions (all of these things are, gasp, political! incidentally) This isn't what is debated here. What is debated is whether Coinbase should display a Black Lives Matter flag on its website and whether employees should be debating about Black Live matters, "Free Palestine", ICE and immigration policies or other wedge issues on the clock. In Europe the very premise of that question would be completely absurd, and thanks to that both right wingers and left wingers can coexist in the same workplace by behaving professional. This is almost impossible today in the tech sector in USA.

bradlys 5y ago
The reason it’s absurd in Europe is because Europe is a very “left” leaning region (its more that America is just so wildly conservative and in the pockets of capitalists). Many European countries do not have a political party that is even as right leaning as the Democratic Party within the USA. A lot of the stuff in Europe is just a given whereas in the US, almost nothing is a given. Even the leftists in the US are quite modest with their essential demands in comparison to most of Europe!
- throw_m239339 5y ago
  > The reason it’s absurd in Europe is because Europe is a very “left” leaning region (its more that America is just so wildly conservative and in the pockets of capitalists). Many European countries do not have a political party that is even as right leaning as the Democratic Party within the USA. Europe isn't "left" leaning at all. Most of Europe is culturally conservative. It's just like unlike the USA, Europeans believe in strong central governments and even the right usually don't question welfare state. But it says nothing about Europe and wedge issues like homosexuality, immigration, ... The fact the far right in countries like France for instance have high voting scores should dispel any sense of Europe being "left leaning". > Many European countries do not have a political party that is even as right leaning as the Democratic Party within the USA. This is completely false. Every European country has a far right party, that holds "traditional" view on wedge issues and is opposed to the US made idea of "diversity". I don't know why americans think Europe is somehow "left leaning", this has never been the case. The divide is more along the lines of "globalists" which are classical liberals and pro EU, and nationalists/isolationists, which are anti-EU, anti-globalism. Both camps have their socially liberal and culturally conservative parties.
  - bradlys 5y ago
    Kinda misses the whole point about how America has almost no social safety nets and this is why these critiques come up so much in the workplace... If everyone was not so worried about their wellbeing - these critiques wouldn't be as charged. Socially - there might be some conservative people in Europe but end of the day - people aren't dying in the streets the same way. In the USA - people die all the time due to the lack of safety net and it's a targeted attack against people of certain backgrounds. So... you're kinda missing the point. Here in the USA - people are like, "ya, they can die for all I care. I ain't paying for their healthcare, they can die!" But over in Europe? Ain't happenin' - people aren't trying to take away those rights as much as they are in the USA. Again - in the USA - race and the privileges you take for granted in the EU end up being intertwined within the USA because they're correlated and feed off one another. You don't get the nice privileges in the USA because you're not the right race, sex, religion, background, etc. (cause those privileges are associated with your employer! And employers like to discriminate!) So maybe you can see why people get upset when the only places that might give them those privileges start acting poorly towards them - and everyone is like, "you oughta just be thankful we took you off the streets! We can send ya back and you can go die and rot!" It's a different ball game here. The social impacts have very tangible real world results for survival & well being in this country.
    - throw_m239339 5y ago
      No I'm not missing any point. You are making up a point that has absolutely nothing to do with the actual situation at Coinbase. The political debate at Coinbase was never about "safety net" at all. It's about petty identity politics. You are trying to make the discussion about "safety net" when that discussion has nothing to do about "safety net" at first place. What do employees demanding a company makes a statement about "Black Live Matters" or "Free Palestine" has to do with "safety net"? Absolutely nothing. We're talking about US Tech workers here, which are already well compensated by their employer.
      - BigRedDog1669 5y ago
        Black Lives Matters is important because companies discriminate against black people and there is police discrimination and brutality against black people and whoever the police deem undesirable in the US, not just in one or two regions, but in every sizeable city in the US. So it's hard to see your friends discriminated against and employers (the only entity with enough political power to effect change in the us) making the problems worse. And amazon and other tech companies fund city council seats and fuel tons of money to defeat referendums that hurt their profit. Yes, ideally politics would be fought over outside the corporate sphere but due to politicians mostly only listening to corporations in the US at the federal and city level, that isn't possible.
- inglor_cz 5y ago
  This is a lazy stereotype. European nations generally spend more on welfare, but the social justice stuff, which is now a defining part of the current "left", seems to be overwhelmingly produced in and exported from the U.S. and plenty of locals resent it as an inorganic cultural import. The entire obsession with "whiteness" looks extra weird on a continent where the population has been mostly white since the Stone Age, but yes, some of our less than stellar intellectuals still try to transpose (and impose it) here. Also, compared to the U.S., Europe is decidedly more tribal. There is a sense of national identity forged by foreign occupations and attacks, especially among the smaller or weaker nations, that produces a lot of entrenched, insecure nationalism. Americans, being the top dogs of the world's pack for generations, generally do not understand how nationalism can arise from conditions of humiliation and victimhood, or only limit this understanding to their own black population, thus misunderstanding the European political currents a lot. If a quarter of your population was forcibly deported to Siberia (which happened in the Baltics recently enough that witnesses are still alive), you will be a lot more jaded and distrustful than if you have no concept of such threats.
- FormerBandmate 5y ago
  That’s true for economic issues, but Coinbase wasn’t facing tension from those. This whole thing is on the social side, and there are definitely hot-button social issues Europe faces that aren’t brought up at work (e.g. migrants)

bradlys 5y ago

The reason it’s absurd in Europe is because Europe is a very “left” leaning region (its more that America is just so wildly conservative and in the pockets of capitalists). Many European countries do not have a political party that is even as right leaning as the Democratic Party within the USA. A lot of the stuff in Europe is just a given whereas in the US, almost nothing is a given. Even the leftists in the US are quite modest with their essential demands in comparison to most of Europe!

throw_m239339 5y ago
> The reason it’s absurd in Europe is because Europe is a very “left” leaning region (its more that America is just so wildly conservative and in the pockets of capitalists). Many European countries do not have a political party that is even as right leaning as the Democratic Party within the USA. Europe isn't "left" leaning at all. Most of Europe is culturally conservative. It's just like unlike the USA, Europeans believe in strong central governments and even the right usually don't question welfare state. But it says nothing about Europe and wedge issues like homosexuality, immigration, ... The fact the far right in countries like France for instance have high voting scores should dispel any sense of Europe being "left leaning". > Many European countries do not have a political party that is even as right leaning as the Democratic Party within the USA. This is completely false. Every European country has a far right party, that holds "traditional" view on wedge issues and is opposed to the US made idea of "diversity". I don't know why americans think Europe is somehow "left leaning", this has never been the case. The divide is more along the lines of "globalists" which are classical liberals and pro EU, and nationalists/isolationists, which are anti-EU, anti-globalism. Both camps have their socially liberal and culturally conservative parties.
- bradlys 5y ago
  Kinda misses the whole point about how America has almost no social safety nets and this is why these critiques come up so much in the workplace... If everyone was not so worried about their wellbeing - these critiques wouldn't be as charged. Socially - there might be some conservative people in Europe but end of the day - people aren't dying in the streets the same way. In the USA - people die all the time due to the lack of safety net and it's a targeted attack against people of certain backgrounds. So... you're kinda missing the point. Here in the USA - people are like, "ya, they can die for all I care. I ain't paying for their healthcare, they can die!" But over in Europe? Ain't happenin' - people aren't trying to take away those rights as much as they are in the USA. Again - in the USA - race and the privileges you take for granted in the EU end up being intertwined within the USA because they're correlated and feed off one another. You don't get the nice privileges in the USA because you're not the right race, sex, religion, background, etc. (cause those privileges are associated with your employer! And employers like to discriminate!) So maybe you can see why people get upset when the only places that might give them those privileges start acting poorly towards them - and everyone is like, "you oughta just be thankful we took you off the streets! We can send ya back and you can go die and rot!" It's a different ball game here. The social impacts have very tangible real world results for survival & well being in this country.
  - throw_m239339 5y ago
    No I'm not missing any point. You are making up a point that has absolutely nothing to do with the actual situation at Coinbase. The political debate at Coinbase was never about "safety net" at all. It's about petty identity politics. You are trying to make the discussion about "safety net" when that discussion has nothing to do about "safety net" at first place. What do employees demanding a company makes a statement about "Black Live Matters" or "Free Palestine" has to do with "safety net"? Absolutely nothing. We're talking about US Tech workers here, which are already well compensated by their employer.
    - BigRedDog1669 5y ago
      Black Lives Matters is important because companies discriminate against black people and there is police discrimination and brutality against black people and whoever the police deem undesirable in the US, not just in one or two regions, but in every sizeable city in the US. So it's hard to see your friends discriminated against and employers (the only entity with enough political power to effect change in the us) making the problems worse. And amazon and other tech companies fund city council seats and fuel tons of money to defeat referendums that hurt their profit. Yes, ideally politics would be fought over outside the corporate sphere but due to politicians mostly only listening to corporations in the US at the federal and city level, that isn't possible.
inglor_cz 5y ago
This is a lazy stereotype. European nations generally spend more on welfare, but the social justice stuff, which is now a defining part of the current "left", seems to be overwhelmingly produced in and exported from the U.S. and plenty of locals resent it as an inorganic cultural import. The entire obsession with "whiteness" looks extra weird on a continent where the population has been mostly white since the Stone Age, but yes, some of our less than stellar intellectuals still try to transpose (and impose it) here. Also, compared to the U.S., Europe is decidedly more tribal. There is a sense of national identity forged by foreign occupations and attacks, especially among the smaller or weaker nations, that produces a lot of entrenched, insecure nationalism. Americans, being the top dogs of the world's pack for generations, generally do not understand how nationalism can arise from conditions of humiliation and victimhood, or only limit this understanding to their own black population, thus misunderstanding the European political currents a lot. If a quarter of your population was forcibly deported to Siberia (which happened in the Baltics recently enough that witnesses are still alive), you will be a lot more jaded and distrustful than if you have no concept of such threats.
FormerBandmate 5y ago
That’s true for economic issues, but Coinbase wasn’t facing tension from those. This whole thing is on the social side, and there are definitely hot-button social issues Europe faces that aren’t brought up at work (e.g. migrants)