Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2021/01/12/github-fired-a-jewish-employee-who-said-stay-safe-homies-nazis-are-about-on-internal-slack-during-capitol-riot-200-staff-sign-letter-questioning-firing-report.html
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GitHub CEO Nat Friedman told workers that “the company is actively looking into the circumstances surrounding the separation of an employee last week and will take any and all appropriate action following a thorough investigation.”
GitHub report pending a deep cost benefit analysis vis-à-vis external backlash and imminent Dem administration.
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I don’t understand what the reason they gave for the firing could even have been. That was an entirely accurate statement. There were Nazis about. Literal self-professed national socialists.
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Yes, they were nazist. There’s an Italian la, the Scelba Law, that was a right-wing politician actually. thar translated is like this.
… there is a reorganization of the dissolved fascist pary when an association or a movement pursues anti-democratic behaviour proper to the fascist party, exalting, threatening either by using violence as a method of political struggle or by advocating suppression of freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution or by denigrating democracy, its institutions and the values of the Resistance o carrying out racist propaganda, that is, it directs its activity to exaltation of exponents, principles, facts and methods of the said party or carries out external manifestations of fascist tract…
And there’s a similar killswitch law in Germany.
People attacking the congress while wearing nazi t-shirts because the election weren’t the result they liked, seems me fitting this article.
Happened sometime that people were jailed for this. One could write that Mussolini was a cool guy and whatever, but if from the words there’s some action or possibility of action, like having hand grenades in the attic, this law enters in action.
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“separation”. Right. NaziHub. Time to start moving projects, people!
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Yeah, ya think!?! Those aren’t just “tribal” tattoos he’s proudly displaying.
Although, the arm tattoos that appear to be some sort of take on turtle island are just gross in a completely different appropriative “white boy who thinks they’re indigenous” way.
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Winnable Lawsuit calling…
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My reading of it was that they mistook it as a threat. That’s the only thing that makes sense. If it had been a Maga Bro saying it, I could see how they might have reacted that way.
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One would imagine such a misunderstanding would have come up at the meeting I am sure they must have held with HR before firing them?
(I’m being only half-facetious here. I’ve never worked at an American tech company but surely they meet with you before firing you?)
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So GitHub was trying to, what, protect the feelings of Trump supporters who worked there? Or republicans? Or conservatives?
How close must a person be to become a fascist by association?
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One would imagine. But I can also imagine an HR department seeing the events on Wednesday and being afraid that one of their employees were there and then jumping the gun way too quickly when there was even the slightest evidence of support for the putschisten.
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And also the amount of money they’ll have to pay in a settlement to the fired employee.
ETA: jinx @Melizmatic!
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with one colleague criticizing him for using divisive language.
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roughly 200 of GitHub’s 1,700 employees have signed a letter asking executives to take a stronger stance against anti-Semitism and white supremacy.
This is the same company that has repeatedly defended its contracts with ICE, so…
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I am utterly tired of this shit.
I don’t use GitHub but if I don’t hear about those of you that DO, leaving in droves over this, I’ll be very disappointed. This TechBro gladhanding, tolerance, and often enough obvious approval of the absolute worst impulses in society must stop.
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I’m with you that it was an accurate assessment of the situation, and an appropriate use of the word. The reason HR gave was vague:
See! Vague. I imagine if a wrongful termination suit is filed, and gets to court they will use the vagueness to say something entirely different, like “this has nothing to do with saying Nazi, there were Nazis around!; this is because he keeps taking naps in the afternoons, completes assignments 3% slower then others in his cohort, and produces 13% fewer lines of code”, or any other numbers they can come up with after the fact to support firing.
Then the actual lawsuit turns on weather a jury believes them, or if his/her lawyer managed to turn up any email or logged chats amongst HR talking about any illegal reasons to terminate employment. Or even what other employees said when they complained (if 3 coworkers tell HR they want you gone for illegal reasons, and HR comes up with a legal reason, a jury is way more likely to believe the original complaints were the real reason, not “we looked into the complaints and decided they were unfounded, but in an unrelated investigation…”)
Yeah. Dammit. I do, but unless they rehire I’m going to need to migrate off before my next billing date. Maybe even if they do.
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Two days later, GitHub allegedly fired him,
The stupid! It burns!
Seriously, two days later it was painfully clear this was an insurrection carried out in part by actual, proud, tattoo and swag encrusted nazis!
Also, isn’t “Git” derogatory English slang for an immature and vulgar, person? Yeah, it fits.
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The joke is that Linus Torvalds always names his software projects after himself.
(Yes, it’s derogatory, but not particularly offensive.)
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He totally ruffled some conservative feathers.
“They aren’t Nazi’s they’re peaceful protesters trying to stop the steal! All of the talk of White Supremacy is just leftists Godwinning themselves like they always do. There’s only a small number of extremists that give us a bad name, not every gathering of conservatives is a KKK rally! You are the real racist here! We don’t tolerate racists.”
If I were the employee I’m not sure I’d want my job back at this point. Not after your bosses have shown their true colors.
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