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Wix employee sacked over criticism of Israel files unfair dismissal claim
- donohoe 3y agoFull content: https://archive.is/1426Q https://archive.is/1426Q
- sgt 3y agoMaking your company look bad is probably fair grounds for immediate dismissal. She's probably not very sentimental of her position at Wix anyway.
- lapcat 3y ago> Making your company look bad Criticizing a government is not criticizing a company. Imagine getting fired from an American company for criticizing the American government. That would be absurd.
- squarefoot 3y agoTrue in case of a US (but see :1) or EU company, but try not being fired from a Chinese company if you criticize the CP, or from a Russian one if you do the same with Putin. Not all countries respect freedom of expression to the same extent, including seemingly democratic ones, and Israel does not condone any deviation from the established dogma that they're the good guys also when they slaughter thousands of Palestinians, including civilians, and any critic must be dismissed as an apology of terrorism if not straight antisemitism. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-BDS_laws https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-BDS_laws
- locallost 3y agoI am not sure a comparison of Israel to Russia and China is in their favor.
- jbstack 3y agoBut the claim being discussed here from the GP is whether something is "probably fair grounds for immediate dismissal". Being fired from a Chinese company operating in China will be dealt with under Chinese law, where criticizing the government may well be valid grounds for dismissal (I don't know if it is or not). Here, we are talking about a company operating in Ireland and therefore subject to Irish law, not Israeli law. In this case, your assertion that "Israel does not condone any deviation from the established dogma" isn't relevant.
- lucubratory 3y ago>I don't know if it is or not I am not Chinese but have several friends in China. It depends on the context and the criticism - if the criticism is generally correct or popular and is something the CCP could feasibly fix, it's fine even if harsh, and firing you is probably a lot more trouble than it's worth. Targeting an individual Party official who is high ranking enough could get you a corrupt reprisal from them, but that is obviously rare, and over time as corruption has gone down the Party official has to be higher and higher up to be able to pull it off. If the criticism is something like "The Chinese government is committing genocide", that would definitely be illegal as subversion of the state, and "We need democracy in China, the CCP is a dictatorship" would get you done for subversion of the socialist system (their terminology, not mine). In general, if you're saying things like that you might lose your job (particularly if Chinese netizens see it and mob up to demand you be fired, put in prison, thrown into the sun, etc). A more common consequence is that the authorities will look into your life and find some law you're breaking, often tax evasion - it is rare they actually charge dissidents with the whole subversion of the state and the socialist system schtick, they prefer to reserve that for more serious cases if they can. Even if they do charge dissidents for it, what the prosecution generally wants is not maximum sentence, death penalty etc - what they want most is for you to write an apology letter/video and renounce your statements calling for overthrow of the CCP or whatever. In practice that can lead to funny outcomes with dedicated dissidents, where the prosecution is trying to argue they're just a kid and this isn't that bad and time served + monitoring will be fine with an apology, and the dissident is insisting that they're a very capable revolutionary dedicated to the defeat of their local government or the CCP as a whole or whatever - sort of a special case inversion of the West, where we generally have prosecutors pushing for heavier sentences and defendants understandably trying to minimise them. What is actually dangerous and will get the book thrown at you is any attempt to get (or even enough appearance of having) foreign support. China takes the threat of Western IC associated "subversive activity" extremely seriously, they do not mess around with anything like that. It's why a lot of Chinese political groups that actually stick around and get accommodations (e.g. some queer rights groups) take great pains to separate themselves from Western organisations and causes, even if it's the same cause in a different country. In China it is a massive political handicap (and a target on your back) to have foreign support for your criticisms of the government. To make an analogy that might help understand the frame of mind, imagine a politician running for election somewhere in the US who was regularly talking about how much better China does this or that and how we should be more like them, is in communication with in-country Chinese groups or people, and was anti-US to some significant degree. Voters/the public would not like them very much, and the US government would probably pay very close attention to them and what they were doing.
- bell-cot 3y ago[flagged]
- lapcat 3y ago> Um...how old were you on 11 Sept 2001? Older than you, I suspect. How old were you during the Vietnam War? > Getting fired from an American company, after loudly voicing anti-American and pro-Al-Qaeda sentiments comparable to this Wix employee's statements, would be the "d'oh, and warm water is wet" outcome. Do you have any examples whatsoever of this happening?
- geniusdetector 3y ago[dead]
- John23832 3y agoThe company, Wix, is the same thing as the Israeli state? If anything, I have to give it to the state of Israel. It really has mastered the art of (purposefully) muddying the waters between the Jewish religion, the Israeli State, and any company that is created or housed by either of the former. All of which should be able to be criticized (or celebrated) independently. I (or anyone) should be able to criticism the actions of a state without the assumption that that critique applies to all people who live in that state, or worse assuming it applies to a distinct religion. You especially should be able to do so when working outside of that state, and not be fired.
- sgt 3y agoI don't think you understand the optics of this. She claims Israel is a terrorist state and essentially signing off that statement as someone working for Wix. See tweet: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F9EGs1JWkAAt6Yg?format=jpg&name=900x900 https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F9EGs1JWkAAt6Yg?format=jpg&name=...
- locallost 3y agoAgain, Wix is not the state of Israel. She did not get paid to align her political views with Wix, she got paid to deliver specific work for Wix. She has a very basic right to express her opinion.
- zaktoo2 3y agoShe also happens to be entirely correct.
- ericfrazier 3y ago[flagged]
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- John23832 3y ago
- pxeger1 3y agoRelated: https://www.leefang.com/p/inside-the-pro-israel-information https://www.leefang.com/p/inside-the-pro-israel-information
- throwaway55479 3y agoDiscussed here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38572675 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38572675
- Qem 3y agoHope she wins. People shouldn't be fired for criticizing an apartheid regime.
- themaninthedark 3y ago[flagged]
- hef19898 3y agoWell, there is a difference between criticising government policies and people or groups of people. Or harrassing someone.
- bre1010 3y agoSo you disagreed when other people were saying freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences, except now when it's consequences you like you are relishing it. So how are you different from the people you're sarcastically making fun of?
- robertlagrant 3y agoNo relish observed.
- themaninthedark 3y agoNo relish, I would like people in general to be more thoughtful of the consequences of the positions they put forward. Perhaps next time this happens, perhaps we should not sit around talking about free speech absolutists like they are people to be despised. I still see other people in this conversation saying she should have expected to be fired. I don't agree with that, unless her statements had her Company name in the tagline. Personally I disagree with some of her message, agree with some of her sentiments.
- js8 3y ago>Freedom of speak doesn't mean freedom of consequences. Actually, freedom from consequences (of speech, which doesn't include every utterance, but certainly does include constructive criticism) is exactly what freedom of speech means. I was born in communist Czechoslovakia. Many westerners don't understand how the system worked. In the 70s and 80s, if you were critical of the government, you would often simply lose your job. Which usually meant only menial or other low level jobs would be available for you. I think the communist party would love that slogan. Nominally, CSSR had a freedom of speech (it accepted Declaration of Human Rights). But, yeah, consequences.. like losing a job.
- bell-cot 3y ago> An Irish employee of Israeli tech company Wix... Reaction: Not that I'm any sort of expert - but "Israel routinely treats the Palestinians horribly" has been a widely-asserted and widely-believed meme for the past 3/4 century. If the employee in question wasn't okay-ish with that...why was she working at Wix?
- Freak_NL 3y agoIn what sense is that a meme?
- padjo 3y agoThey probably felt there’s a difference between treating them poorly and killing them
- bell-cot 3y agoNot an expert...but hasn't "Palestinian kid throws rock at Israeli soldier, soldier responds by shooting the kid dead" been a fairly-regular thing since the 1950's?
- SauciestGNU 3y agoI dont know what to say besides what's happening right now has a different feeling than shooting a kid for throwing stones. As wrong as that is (I believe), the Israelis can point to the concrete action of the stone throwing as a proximate cause for execution. The current conflict is killing tens of thousands of noncombatants who had nothing to do with the October incursion. They may have supported it politically, or celebrated the violence against their oppressors, but that doesn't make them combatants deserving of death. I think the difference now is the clarity of the mass disproportionate response. It's impossible to stretch the definition of "self-defense" to include the actions Israel is currently taking. I think that's why people are motivated to respond differently and with a different degree.
- bell-cot 3y ago
- junon 3y agoTIL Wix is Israeli. I mean I hope she wins, she probably won't, and she should have known this was going to happen. Everyone is on Israel's side right now for diplomatic and financial reasons, companies especially.
- hef19898 3y agoTwo things: Israeli or not, Wix still has to adhere to local labour laws. And support for Israel is less than early on, I've seen an article by WaPo the other day calling the plan some Israeli ministers have for Gaza ethnic cleansing (an apt description). I won't hold my breath, after all Saudi is still a partner of the West.
- that_guy_iain 3y agoAnd support in Ireland has never been that high. They see a similarity between Britain and Israel
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- mschuster91 3y ago> And support for Israel is less than early on, I've seen an article by WaPo the other day calling the plan some Israeli ministers have for Gaza ethnic cleansing (an apt description). Indeed, but there is no chance these nutjobs will get the chance to follow through. In fact, it is more likely that they will be out of their seats by the end of this quarter.
- padjo 3y agoNot in Ireland, public sentiment is quite different to the rest of the west here due a strong sense of solidarity with Palestinians
- Ecstatify 3y agoShe definitely will win. https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/employment/unemployment-and-redundancy/dismissal/unfair-dismissal/ https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/employment/unemploymen... Can't dismiss people for: Religious or political opinions https://jackpoulson.substack.com/p/inside-the-pro-israel-information https://jackpoulson.substack.com/p/inside-the-pro-israel-inf... There's literally screenshots of WhatsApp messages from Wix’s General Manager for Israel, Batsheve Moshe saying "being taken care of" https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F0bae5b38-375f-49b6-a8c7-7aca00be6db4_1959x1332.png https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_pr...
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- braza 3y agoI think and I hope she wins; but a question for the non-American persons here: Do you still feel free to post any kind of criticism online nowadays? (e.g. Twitter, forums, etc.) At least from 2014, I feel less compelling to write anything marginally controversial online 'cause calculating the payoff between feel good to post something online versus the risk of being fired/doxxed/others is so asymmetrical that sometimes is better to go on the streets and/or talk with a representative in private than post it online.
- mschuster91 3y ago> Do you still feel free to post any kind of criticism online nowadays? (e.g. Twitter, forums, etc.) I do, but I have accepted that I will never ever visit the US for this reason, not for tourism, not for work - as long as CBP can refuse me entry for not disclosing my social media profiles (all of which are highly critical of the US government, particularly during the Trump era), I will not go and spend tens of thousands of dollars for flights, hotels and stuff when some random CBP agent can deny me on a whim. Up next on my "country shitlist" is China and Russia, I'd likely be imprisoned upon entry for the same reason. But it's easy to avoid these two countries - it's harder to evade the US as most flights towards Central and Southern America connect via the US, and you need a visa even for transit unlike in European airports.
- flandish 3y agoWonder what would happen if you simply say “i have no profiles” and when presented with one with your image simply say “bot, not me.” Probably denied entry just the same.
- mschuster91 3y agoOr, worse, they let you in, someone does a random check against NSA or whatever databases, finds out you lied and now you get deported and a permanent ban on reentry.
- flandish 3y ago
- ChrisArchitect 3y agoArticles on same site from October: Internal Wix chat encouraged staff to support Israel’s ‘narrative’ in Hamas conflict https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38005816 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38005816 Dublin woman fired by Israeli company over anti-Israel social media posts https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2023/10/23/dublin-woman-fired-by-israeli-company-over-anti-israel-social-media-posts/ https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2023/10/23/dublin-woman-f...
- ericfrazier 3y ago[flagged]
- hd4 3y agoThis was unfairly flagged.