opinion of amazon.com

[Mechaman]

WOW SO TOTALLY SAGE GUISE!

I expect this is the part where you turn off your Apple laptop and go to Taco Bell in your Nike shoes congratulating yourself on your moral superiority in not using products made by companies that endlessly exploit their labor!

. . . . oh wait.

[Mechaman]

WOW SO TOTALLY SAGE GUISE!

I expect this is the part where you turn off your Apple laptop and go to Taco Bell in your Nike shoes congratulating yourself on your moral superiority in not using products made by companies that endlessly exploit their labor!

. . . . oh wait.

Yawn, it's not about feeling "morally superior", it's about condemning the very worst of business - and how it brazenly f**ks us over. You acknowledge the exploitative practices they've became known for in that very post, but apparently we're not allowed to, nor condemn it, because it seems we've still not earnt the right to criticise in your eyes until we undertake the frankly impossible task in avoiding buying from nearly all businesses - and I suppose working for them, and pissing away our leisure time on researching every business as if 'consumer-activism' is anything but a sham anyway, prescribed by people like you for its ability to chill and discredit opposition to what is a plainly awful state of events.

In short, if anyone's being an insufferable prick here, it's you.

I didn't accuse anybody of being a prick here.  ANd I acknowledge that's a bad tendency of mine, especially when people are acting like reactionary butthurts.

Also, I want to comment on how incredibly lame the whole "you don't believe we have a right to dispute something!" line is that is used all too often.  If I didn't believe you had a right to dispute something, I would've called the police and had your ass arrested, not insult your self conscious need to single out a single corporation for what is common practice (sad fact) in multi-billion dollar corporations.  I do admit, I buy stuff from amazon.com.  HOwever, I refuse to believe that I am being a monster just because I buy stuff off from it.  I am no more a monster than the hipster vegan morons who buy ultra expensive Apple Laptops.  Just saying.

I believe Tik really said it best

Terrible f[inks]ing place. Stop shopping there.

That's not "terrible" unless our definition of the word is "a factory or warehouse." If you want deplorable working conditions, perhaps you should be checking out Amazon's suppliers and their factories in developing economies. Let's go through this article point by point.

1. Warehouse workers are treated like robots.

Of course they are. It's menial labour. You're at work.

Most work tends to be dehumanizing to varying degrees - especially unskilled labour. A pesky device that beeps because you've incorrectly picked a product is like basic quality control in a large warehouse that can't be actively supervised. Think about it this way - normally you have the lower rung worker and his or her supervisor or leader telling them to move faster and watching to prevent mistakes. Typically that lower skilled worker's job would get automated whereas in this instance it's the other way around. That nagging supervisor's role of increasing your efficiency has been replaced with a machine. Having worked in factories, I'd rather have a little machine beeping at me than some jerk literally behind me ordering me to speed up. Is that sort of management warranted? I've worked with enough people to believe that it absolutely does serve an important role in making sure workers keep working properly.

And that wank of a quote from the undercover reporter.. "..we might as well be plugging it into ourselves." Such melodrama. I'm sure he feels the same way about the tyranny of his smartphone.

2. Amazon doesn’t pay workers for every hour they work.

What an attention grabber that is! I was so let down when I actually read the entry. They have to pass through a security checkpoint on the way out. Sometimes it takes a while. One anecdote should not an outrage make. I have a hard time believing even most Amazon warehouse workers take up to twenty-five minutes to pass through security. But, should that security checkpoint time be paid? That's an intriguing question, sure, but it's certainly not some terrible indictment of Amazon.

3. Warehouses are so big that workers waste their lunch hour just walking to the cafeteria.

THE MADNESS! Should this particular warehouse revamp their layout to add more cafeterias? Yeah, probably. It's not worth a boycott, anyway. They should really do something about that, but it's just not that bad, really.. it sucks, but that's about it. It's not humanizing or unsafe. Boycotting for this is like cutting off your foot in response to stubbing a toe.

4. Sometimes warehouses are so hot, people pass out.

You know what else can be? Outside.

From what I've read you're allowed to wear looser clothing in the summer and are encouraged to drink plenty of water. This is hardly a problem uniquely damning of Amazon, by the way. I doubt they have done nothing about it. Employees leaving work early because of heat-related illness is bad for Amazon's bottom line, too. Still, it's just not fair to cherry-pick horror stories to lead the reader into believing Amazon warehouses are terrible.

5. Amazon lets former workers go without unemployment benefits.

Despite another case of cherry-picking, I do think this is pretty poor behavior on the part of Ama- oh, wait, this is about the temp agency that supplies Amazon its workers.. so they have no excuse for blaming this one on Amazon.

6. Amazon hates unions.

How noteworthy of Amazon, a private enterprise, to not want their workers to organize!  All businesses don't want their workers to unionize. Businesses do not like unions usually. They will attempt to subdue the sentiments that encourage workers to organize. That's bad, but also normal.

All this article tells me is that factory and warehouse work isn't pleasant. No kidding. It's not some unique problem endemic to Amazon, though. There are problems that need to be addressed, certainly. But this is a stupid article built on the foundations of faux-outrage that grabs your attention, clearly written by and for people who would hate working in any factory or warehouse.

As somebody who has worked at a Kohls backroom, Amazon doesn't sound so horrible.  We got fifteen minute breaks for dinner, which was very little time to go next door to get a Subway sandwich and be able to eat it.  If we were still in the breakroom after the fifteen minutes (which included us walking from the back of the store, out the front, and into the Subway or Dollar Store next door) the fascist managers would come out and throw a total bitchfit about it.  Even if it was a minute over.  Oh yes, there was also no climate control except for some sh*tty fans that were probably made in the 1980s.  The overnight supervisor's job was to pretty much walk around the store harassing you into being able to unload 50 boxes worth of merchandise per hour and being able to religiously tell where to place each item, even though they changed who went into what department each night.  Like Tik said, a robot would be nicer.  I don't remember getting offered to join any union.  Kohls loved firing people for being five minutes late (not kidding) and probably would actually deny somebody who was laid off unemployment benefits.
You call this "the worst of business", the sad fact is jack this is far from "worst".

So sorry that I am not sobbing sad about this one case with Amazon, it's an unfortunate reality.  Seriously, I wouldn't be surprise if among the big corporations Amazon actually has more favorable conditions in it's warehouses.  Which is really saying something about the status of working conditions in this country.  "Boycotting" is the ultimate in "feel good" demonstration in that it does little but to soothe the few socially conscious bourgeois who loudly promote their right to free speech, but really does little to actually force action.  Especially with a company like Amazon, which at the end of the day, would still be one of the cheapest places you could go to find things.  Demonstrations and marches for widespread government action on such disreputable practices would have more of an effect.  Sure, that's failed too, but which is more likely to actually benefit society as a whole?  One company reforming it's work environments because of a boycott, or HUNDREDS OF COMPANIES being forced into reform due to government laws that make their practices illegal?

[/steps off soap box]

[Mechaman]

WOW SO TOTALLY SAGE GUISE!

I expect this is the part where you turn off your Apple laptop and go to Taco Bell in your Nike shoes congratulating yourself on your moral superiority in not using products made by companies that endlessly exploit their labor!

. . . . oh wait.

Yawn, it's not about feeling "morally superior", it's about condemning the very worst of business - and how it brazenly f**ks us over. You acknowledge the exploitative practices they've became known for in that very post, but apparently we're not allowed to, nor condemn it, because it seems we've still not earnt the right to criticise in your eyes until we undertake the frankly impossible task in avoiding buying from nearly all businesses - and I suppose working for them, and pissing away our leisure time on researching every business as if 'consumer-activism' is anything but a sham anyway, prescribed by people like you for its ability to chill and discredit opposition to what is a plainly awful state of events.

In short, if anyone's being an insufferable prick here, it's you.

I didn't accuse anybody of being a prick here.  ANd I acknowledge that's a bad tendency of mine, especially when people are acting like reactionary butthurts.

Also, I want to comment on how incredibly lame the whole "you don't believe we have a right to dispute something!" line is that is used all too often.  If I didn't believe you had a right to dispute something, I would've called the police and had your ass arrested, not insult your self conscious need to single out a single corporation for what is common practice (sad fact) in multi-billion dollar corporations.  I do admit, I buy stuff from amazon.com.  HOwever, I refuse to believe that I am being a monster just because I buy stuff off from it.  I am no more a monster than the hipster vegan morons who buy ultra expensive Apple Laptops.  Just saying.

I believe Tik really said it best[...]

As somebody who has worked at a Kohls backroom, Amazon doesn't sound so horrible.  We got fifteen minute breaks for dinner, which was very little time to go next door to get a Subway sandwich and be able to eat it.  If we were still in the breakroom after the fifteen minutes (which included us walking from the back of the store, out the front, and into the Subway or Dollar Store next door) the fascist managers would come out and throw a total bitchfit about it.  Even if it was a minute over.  Oh yes, there was also no climate control except for some sh*tty fans that were probably made in the 1980s.  The overnight supervisor's job was to pretty much walk around the store harassing you into being able to unload 50 boxes worth of merchandise per hour and being able to religiously tell where to place each item, even though they changed who went into what department each night.  Like Tik said, a robot would be nicer.  I don't remember getting offered to join any union.  Kohls loved firing people for being five minutes late (not kidding) and probably would actually deny somebody who was laid off unemployment benefits.
You call this "the worst of business", the sad fact is jack this is far from "worst".

So sorry that I am not sobbing sad about this one case with Amazon, it's an unfortunate reality.  Seriously, I wouldn't be surprise if among the big corporations Amazon actually has more favorable conditions in it's warehouses.  Which is really saying something about the status of working conditions in this country.  "Boycotting" is the ultimate in "feel good" demonstration in that it does little but to soothe the few socially conscious bourgeois who loudly promote their right to free speech, but really does little to actually force action.  Especially with a company like Amazon, which at the end of the day, would still be one of the cheapest places you could go to find things.  Demonstrations and marches for widespread government action on such disreputable practices would have more of an effect.  Sure, that's failed too, but which is more likely to actually benefit society as a whole?  One company reforming it's work environments because of a boycott, or HUNDREDS OF COMPANIES being forced into reform due to government laws that make their practices illegal?

[/steps off soap box]

Ironically, the only person here calling for boycotts is you, in your demand for us to quit all awful businesses before our criticism becomes legitimate. Oh and what was your point in that, then, if not to question our right to criticise? I thought I made it pretty clear in my post I believe consumer activism to be a joke usually recommended by right-wingers for its self-defeating qualities - so I don't know where you got the view/persecution-complex that I was calling people who shopped there monsters. I was merely calling a HC a HC and amazed that you and others are falling all over yourselves to refute, and defend it.

I haven't got a "self-conscious need" to single out one company - if there were documentaries, articles, and more crucially polls on here I'd recommend firebombing others too (I'm sceptical of business as a rule), and I'm all too aware it's the standard (although their tax avoidance isn't) - but funny how it's a-ok to acknowledge that on here but then if you make an anti-business statement you're mocked, with the usual remarks of 'SAGE'. It's very much of the cake and eating it sort.

Kohls sound more or less exactly what I've heard of Amazon, and I'd be quite happy to call that a HC and calling for action, but it strikes me I'd probably be in a minority in that too - because your defence has long since became, effectively, approval: witness the overwhelming 'great' vote (you probably voted for it yourself).

So how do you think - in this air of approval, apologism and apathy - this will help meaningful efforts to effectively pressurise action to tackle it? It won't, everyone's shrugging their shoulders and voting "fantastic". F**k the workers, essentially.

You know, I tried to explain this to you logically.  Instead, you've decided to stay in your precious little phonebooth glass of emotion and rage in your mad rush to twist and distort the vast majority of my post.  Which, from the rageorgasm tone of this post, probably feels good.

Note for instance, how this Great Orator has completely ignored the last part about putting the real focus where it belongs: on the governments that empower such companies to behave like this.  But of course, it's much easier for some of us to protest companies instead of countries and governments, and this is what we get.

When you feel like settling down and talking like a calm individual who read the last part about pressuring society to make drastic changes instead of assigning blatantly dishonest strawmen to my actual argument, I will engage in conversation with you.

Engage in boycotts if you want, be mad if you want.  Just know that there are better ways to do it.  Which really is the ultimate jerk point I was trying to make.