Yes, headline should have just been "Amazon threatens to fire employees that say things in public that does not agree with the company line". I read the article and am surprised a bit. I was expecting the employees to be at least senior or in marketing/PR roles, but nope. It is getting very weird in the US. Bezos a left leaning guy restricting peoples thoughts. Similar to Bloomberg when he told employees there will be no stories about him at Bloomberg News. So no freedom of thought, no freedom of press, an
Why, slaves must always ask permission from their masters before they are allowed to speak. I got to be honest the very second I got that from my employer I would be publicly speaking about what ever the fuck I wanted and then fight it out in court, I AM NO FUCKING SLAVE.
No, you're an EMPLOYEE. You agreed to terms of EMPLOYMENT. If you're in tech, you're highly desirable. So quit. Or just publically critique your employer, just not identified as an employee or in violation of your NDA. Now if AMAZ is violating the law, be an actual whistleblower and rat em out. Veritas would love to talk to you all pixelated n stuff.
They are not speaking out as private citizens but literally as "Employees of Amazon".
The company has the honor of setting its own public statements, and, no, as an employee you don't get to speak on behalf of the company in opposition to it.
Also, the owners of Amazon have free speech as well, and it's wrong to force them to fund their detractors.
. I got to be honest the very second I got that from my employer I would be publicly speaking about what ever the fuck I wanted and then fight it out in court
and losing.
I AM NO FUCKING SLAVE.
Indeed. You are always able to quit your job if you disagree with your employer's policies.
Per the policy, the employees are free to express their views publicly about public matters -- they just can't identify themselves as Amazon employees while doing so.
This avoids confusion between the personal views of an employee and the corporate views of Amazon. It's not unlike police and military personnel being prohibited from wearing their distinctive uniforms while espousing personal political views.
And, obviously, employees can't talk about aspects of Amazon that are covered by their NDA even if they don't identify themselves as an employee of Amazon.
You simply say that in this situation your employer does not allow you to reveal you work for them and that your views do not necessarily reflect those of your employer in the matters at hand.
Or, you ask HR or read the corporate policy to see if either gives you other guidance on how to handle this situation.
So curious, not a WaPo subscriber, but has WaPo published any negative articles about amazon in the past year? How about Walmart? Target? Google mini? Microsoft cloud? Anything on FedEx lately not that they are not part of the amazon empire? I don't have a subscription to WaPo, but if I did, I'd be cancelling. Freedom of thought does not seem to be a strong point of Bezos.
I am a subscriber and have seen articles in Washington Post that could be characterized as "negative" towards Amazon. However it's entirely possible that there are fewer such articles than there would be if Bezos didn't own WaPo -- that would require additional study which I'm not sufficiently motivated to undertake.
Prohibiting employees from publicly expressing personal opinions on their own time AND identifying their employer is not a restriction on "freedom of thought" as that policy does not prevent the
You said you read the article, but it seems you missed the salient point. It's not restricting what they can say in general, it's restricting what they can say while they identify themselves as working for the company.
This is typical in many industries and settings, because unfortunately when someone says "I work for X and think Y" many assume the company has the same position. And these employees are not (unless they receive approval) authorized to speak on behalf of the company itself.
Seriously, in today's world, or even back to the 1920's or earlier, how hard is it, was it to find out where someone worked? Did they self identify or did the reporter find out and confirm it? I think my point stands, you should be able to express your opinion when working for a company unless you are a senior exec or PR person. And when senior exec's say something bad, they usually get a golden parachute that would make any poster on/. think they hit the magamillions jackpot.
It isn't about finding out where they work, it is about when they make their statement are they directly attaching themselves to the company. Sure anyone that spends the time digging could probably find out but that isn't the point. 99.9% of people will never do that so that damage is exponentially greater and more direct when the person does that themselves.
They're not speaking on behalf of the company. They're criticizing it, and that's what Amazon is threatening to fire them for.
Really it's just Amazon curtailing their right to free speech, just because what they're saying doesn't jive with the Amazon image.
Sigh (Score:5, Informative)
So the text contradicts the headline: it is not about climate change, but about criticizing the company in public.
This is a fake news headline. Please fix it.
(I worked with Maren briefly. She was great to work with. I also worked at Slashdot for many years, and this headline is trash.)
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Why, slaves must always ask permission from their masters before they are allowed to speak. I got to be honest the very second I got that from my employer I would be publicly speaking about what ever the fuck I wanted and then fight it out in court, I AM NO FUCKING SLAVE.
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They are not speaking out as private citizens but literally as "Employees of Amazon".
The company has the honor of setting its own public statements, and, no, as an employee you don't get to speak on behalf of the company in opposition to it.
Also, the owners of Amazon have free speech as well, and it's wrong to force them to fund their detractors.
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. I got to be honest the very second I got that from my employer I would be publicly speaking about what ever the fuck I wanted and then fight it out in court
and losing.
I AM NO FUCKING SLAVE.
Indeed. You are always able to quit your job if you disagree with your employer's policies.
Re:Sigh (Score:5, Informative)
Per the policy, the employees are free to express their views publicly about public matters -- they just can't identify themselves as Amazon employees while doing so.
This avoids confusion between the personal views of an employee and the corporate views of Amazon. It's not unlike police and military personnel being prohibited from wearing their distinctive uniforms while espousing personal political views.
And, obviously, employees can't talk about aspects of Amazon that are covered by their NDA even if they don't identify themselves as an employee of Amazon.
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You simply say that in this situation your employer does not allow you to reveal you work for them and that your views do not necessarily reflect those of your employer in the matters at hand.
Or, you ask HR or read the corporate policy to see if either gives you other guidance on how to handle this situation.
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I am a subscriber and have seen articles in Washington Post that could be characterized as "negative" towards Amazon. However it's entirely possible that there are fewer such articles than there would be if Bezos didn't own WaPo -- that would require additional study which I'm not sufficiently motivated to undertake.
Prohibiting employees from publicly expressing personal opinions on their own time AND identifying their employer is not a restriction on "freedom of thought" as that policy does not prevent the
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You said you read the article, but it seems you missed the salient point. It's not restricting what they can say in general, it's restricting what they can say while they identify themselves as working for the company.
This is typical in many industries and settings, because unfortunately when someone says "I work for X and think Y" many assume the company has the same position. And these employees are not (unless they receive approval) authorized to speak on behalf of the company itself.
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Amazon has been a huge contributor to people like Bob Dornan et al.
RIGHT WING all the way down to supressing speech