There’s the start of rumblings about Unionisation from folks, last I heard.
While Blizzard gifs might not be the most appropriate thing right now, one does still ring true; “Hell, it’s about damn time.”
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Until the big law firm smashes this Union before it’s even born.
Sargeras would be proud.
Pretty sure the Balrog took one look puked up some lava and left.
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One of the most koalemic things I’ve seen since the lawsuit controversy started. Thanks.
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Something fairly similar is going on with GW right now (they also abuse their employees, though not this extremely, and they also are up to other bad things) and I saw some very relevant things from that debate.
In the UK there have been lots of calls to boycott the Wetherspoon chain of pubs because it’s a crappy business with a crappy owner that treats its employees like crap. The problem is the staff were asking customers not to boycott their pubs because they knew they would be the first casualties if any loss in profits were recorded. Boycotting a popular, national chain of pubs is never going to actually effect meaningful change, but it could be enough to get one poor member of bar staff fired.
Basically, boycotts feel good, but it’s very hard to change a company of this size from the consumer side. The system is built from the ground up to prevent that, and we don’t have the organisation and pull to put real any pressure on the company. Moreover, if profits crash, the innocent employees will be the ones hurt the most - the up tops will not lose anything until everyone else has, and then they will just sail off on their golden parachutes, while the common workers lose their livelihood.
The key to change is where the company is vulnerable - from within. Blizzard needs unions.
If anyone here personally knows a Blizzard employee or otherwise have access to communicate with them (beyond saturated channels like twitter), please tell them to do it, and inform them about it any way you can. Which no one probably does, but… it’s something.
Akamito, these jokes have all led to this, now is your time . . .
In seriousness though, I wonder how the employees in Blizzard feel about unions, since as far as I’ve seen, the general consensus is that most US people have been brainwashed to think unions are bad cuz idk, socialism or something. So would even telling them it works have an effect, when they believe otherwise?
And if they don’t (which I’m hoping is the case for majority), how easy is it to get unions considering the execs are very actively anti-unions as we’ve seen recently.
True, but any effort toward unionization is a positive as opposed to rolling over to corporate feudalism. Normalizing the struggle in american society after decades of propaganda against it is important. They may fail a hundred times but the panicked, objectively evil attempts to crush it shows people the righteousness of the effort and the dire necessity to stop the exploitation.
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Got to keep in mind, Americans have a totally different perception of unions, where they’re just grinning salesmen trying to con them out of their money while pretending to represent them. While they’re not universally correct, there’s a reason why that dim view exists - and it isn’t just propaganda.
Even if they get a union together, there’s no guarantee that it would draw a lot of membership, nor is it certain that it would be a force for good.
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Unions can exist purely to protect unions as well, which is super important to remember. Although in this case the immediate effect of one would be very beneficial.
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Not to mention corporate approved unions that only serve management, much like the failed HR only existing to shut down complaints, but the effort has to be made to get the ball rolling or everyone will think that any talk of worker’s rights equal slavery.
Like the police unions that aren’t unions and only protect the police from accountability.
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Saw a post bringing up past culture/events at Valve.
Starting to think the entire Industry needs to be put on hiatus while someone takes a bug/pest spray to the entire thing…
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Case in point:
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Wowzer that thread is a dumpster fire. I looked for about ten seconds, and that was one entire Yike from me.
Collective bargaining isn’t freeeedooom!
By the time people figure out they sold their freedoms for their employer’s freedom to exploit them mercilessly, all they can do is pee in a bottle mid-shift.
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While I can’t really comment on domestic American stuff I.e state of unions or their history with them (only really know pop Internet history tbqh).
Some of the absolute state of comments in there, “y don’t u people care for people in other jobs?”
I mean, really?
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The USA is built on whataboutism, cultural appropriation, arrogance and the blood of innocents.
And I wish I was being facetious.
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To be fair… I can’t think of a single country that hasn’t done messed up stuff at some point.
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To be fair, there’s also a difference between messed up stuff done in the name of survival and done in the name of sadistic control.
That doesn’t change the numbers that much.
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yeah people just kind of forget about a certain hobby the sweetheart of western europe, belgium, got up to in congo
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