4 ms·

How does an employee, much less a CEO, get away with openly mocking another employee's disability?

by bmitc 4y ago

hgsgm 4y ago
When you have ~$200B you can afford to lose $40B destroying on a social chat app, and a few $B in goodwill/consumer sentiment for your other holdings.
- lokar 4y ago
  Consider he is instead gaining new fans and goodwill from the right.
- ncallaway 4y ago
  The cost of the Twitter acquisition to much will have been much more than $40B. Since he had to liquidate stock to make the purchase happen, you don’t get face value for the sells and the lowered stock price is then reflected in the rest of his net worth. I’d be surprised if the hit to his net worth from the purchase as less than $80B
  - donkeyd 4y ago
    It's all just numbers at that point though, the actual money means nothing. He gets to be in the public eye and news all the time. Gets to be defended by fanboys while making fun of disabled people and laughing at design people who work with Figma. He gets to delist anyone he dislikes. This role gives him power and attention on a global scale. Seems like a great investment of $80B if that floats his boat, which it seems to.
  - runarberg 4y ago
    80 billion USD is still a ridiculous amount wealth, which puts him in the top 20 richest persons in the world. For all intents and purposes there is no difference in 80 billion USD and 800 billion USD. You are still more rich and more powerful than many nation states. The fact that you can blunder this horrendously, and loose this much money, and still keep all your wealth and power is proof of you parent’s point.
  - jjeaff 4y ago
    There is potentially more to it than that since he also had to leverage his stock for part of the purchase price. There will be interest on that, and since the stock price has been rather volatile, there may be margin calls as well.
HarryHirsch 4y ago
By playing to the choir, how else? Elon Musk is mobilizing his followers because he would like to gut legal protection for his employees, ADA is only the start. Elon Musk talking crap like he does says a lot about us, and it's not favourable.
happytoexplain 4y ago
At a high level there are two directions you can take with the public-facing portion of leadership: 1. Appeal broadly to as many people as possible. 2. Appeal strongly to a subset of people. #1 is more principled and idealistic, and produces more stable results, but it's more difficult. #2 is easier - it also allows greater focus and frankness - but it increases conflict and instability, since to be effective it usually involves not just ignoring, but explicitly antagonizing those outside or opposed to the chosen subset. Typically option #1 is the safer bet, but the more divided your audience becomes, the greater the effectiveness of option #2. Also, #2 is just more appealing if you, personally, already have an affinity for the chosen subset. Musk is taking option #2, and his chosen subset are "trolls", for lack of a more specific word. Obviously you could reasonably call tons of people on all sides of all issues "trolls", because there's no shortage of petty people for any given disagreement. I'm referring to a specific subset of people who jump quickly to hatred and mocking others, and do so to their face, or in public, or on social media. People who don't simply act shitty when an argument breaks out, but rather who make "asshole" a part of their overall personality (take a look at the Musk-supportive Tweets for prime examples). Normally this is a small group, but the more divided people become, the more individuals fall into this group. In other words, imagine person A says to person B, "I'm so sorry you weren't notified," and then privately explains the decision to fire them. That's generic option #1 stuff. Now let's say person A laughs and antagonizes person B. There is a default social contract that basically says, "if you antagonize somebody in a way that maximizes pettiness/obnoxiousness, you will repel almost everybody, because even the people who agree abstractly with you won't want to be associated with such childish, revolting behavior." However, the more division increases in your audience, then if persons A and B are perceived to be in different "groups", the more people in the same perceived group as person A will be willing to explicitly stand with them in that pettiness/obnoxiousness. That's how option #2 becomes more viable.
- bmitc 4y ago
  That addresses sentiment, but it address the legality of the situation. Mocking a disabled employee or any person is clearly discrimination and is very much illegal.
  - 4y ago

How does an employee, much less a CEO, get away with openly mocking another employee's disability?

by bmitc 4y ago

How does an employee, much less a CEO, get away with openly mocking another employee's disability?

When you have ~$200B you can afford to lose $40B destroying on a social chat app, and a few $B in goodwill/consumer sentiment for your other holdings.

lokar 4y ago
Consider he is instead gaining new fans and goodwill from the right.
ncallaway 4y ago
The cost of the Twitter acquisition to much will have been much more than $40B. Since he had to liquidate stock to make the purchase happen, you don’t get face value for the sells and the lowered stock price is then reflected in the rest of his net worth. I’d be surprised if the hit to his net worth from the purchase as less than $80B
- donkeyd 4y ago
  It's all just numbers at that point though, the actual money means nothing. He gets to be in the public eye and news all the time. Gets to be defended by fanboys while making fun of disabled people and laughing at design people who work with Figma. He gets to delist anyone he dislikes. This role gives him power and attention on a global scale. Seems like a great investment of $80B if that floats his boat, which it seems to.
- runarberg 4y ago
  80 billion USD is still a ridiculous amount wealth, which puts him in the top 20 richest persons in the world. For all intents and purposes there is no difference in 80 billion USD and 800 billion USD. You are still more rich and more powerful than many nation states. The fact that you can blunder this horrendously, and loose this much money, and still keep all your wealth and power is proof of you parent’s point.
- jjeaff 4y ago
  There is potentially more to it than that since he also had to leverage his stock for part of the purchase price. There will be interest on that, and since the stock price has been rather volatile, there may be margin calls as well.

HarryHirsch 4y ago

By playing to the choir, how else? Elon Musk is mobilizing his followers because he would like to gut legal protection for his employees, ADA is only the start. Elon Musk talking crap like he does says a lot about us, and it's not favourable.

happytoexplain 4y ago

At a high level there are two directions you can take with the public-facing portion of leadership: 1. Appeal broadly to as many people as possible. 2. Appeal strongly to a subset of people. #1 is more principled and idealistic, and produces more stable results, but it's more difficult. #2 is easier - it also allows greater focus and frankness - but it increases conflict and instability, since to be effective it usually involves not just ignoring, but explicitly antagonizing those outside or opposed to the chosen subset. Typically option #1 is the safer bet, but the more divided your audience becomes, the greater the effectiveness of option #2. Also, #2 is just more appealing if you, personally, already have an affinity for the chosen subset. Musk is taking option #2, and his chosen subset are "trolls", for lack of a more specific word. Obviously you could reasonably call tons of people on all sides of all issues "trolls", because there's no shortage of petty people for any given disagreement. I'm referring to a specific subset of people who jump quickly to hatred and mocking others, and do so to their face, or in public, or on social media. People who don't simply act shitty when an argument breaks out, but rather who make "asshole" a part of their overall personality (take a look at the Musk-supportive Tweets for prime examples). Normally this is a small group, but the more divided people become, the more individuals fall into this group. In other words, imagine person A says to person B, "I'm so sorry you weren't notified," and then privately explains the decision to fire them. That's generic option #1 stuff. Now let's say person A laughs and antagonizes person B. There is a default social contract that basically says, "if you antagonize somebody in a way that maximizes pettiness/obnoxiousness, you will repel almost everybody, because even the people who agree abstractly with you won't want to be associated with such childish, revolting behavior." However, the more division increases in your audience, then if persons A and B are perceived to be in different "groups", the more people in the same perceived group as person A will be willing to explicitly stand with them in that pettiness/obnoxiousness. That's how option #2 becomes more viable.

bmitc 4y ago
That addresses sentiment, but it address the legality of the situation. Mocking a disabled employee or any person is clearly discrimination and is very much illegal.
- 4y ago