After shooting himself into space on his blue penis rocket, Amazon founder/Lex Luthor knockoff Jeff Bezos gave a press conference to discuss the flight.
During the conference, Bezos made sure “to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer cause you guys paid for all of this.”
*looks directly at camera* https://t.co/3kkamn6vti
— Saeed Jones (@theferocity) July 20, 2021
The comment appears to be a joke—or at least Bezos and others in attendance laughed. But he immediately repeated himself in a sincere tone: “So seriously, for every Amazon customer out there and every Amazon employee, thank you from the bottom of my heart, very much,” he said.
Jeff Bezos is absolutely right. Amazon customers and employees did pay for his billionaire vanity project. He was able to take his jaunt to space because of the massive wealth he’s acquired by denying employees decent wages, refusing to let them unionize, by paying basically nothing in taxes, and by implementing cruel and dangerous working conditions.
Employees have been reportedly been harassed and intimidated for trying to unionize. Warehouse workers and delivery drivers have reported being forced to fulfill quotas so strict that they’ve been forced to forego necessary bathroom breaks and have been driven to injury. The company was accused of letting COVID-19 spread through warehouses unaddressed and then fired whistleblowers and protest organizers—all of whom were women and/or people of color.
That’s how Bezos was able to send himself to space, by stepping on the backs of his employees, and I’m not sure what exactly is funny about it—though I’m also not sure why such thanks would be offered in sincerity, either. It’s terrible either way, exactly because it’s true.
Yes, Amazon workers did pay for this – with lower wages, union busting, a frenzied and inhumane workplace, and delivery drivers not having health insurance during a pandemic.
And Amazon customers are paying for it with Amazon abusing their market power to hurt small business. https://t.co/7qMgpe8u0M
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) July 20, 2021
Bezos’s exploitation of workers at Amazon was so complete that he was able hoard enough capital to blow a bunch on a stupid suborbital flight that lasted a few minutes. He thanked all the workers whose bodies he broke and souls he crushed along the way. https://t.co/CqUtOBixfF
— Edward Ongweso Jr (@bigblackjacobin) July 20, 2021
Jeff Bezos has crushed unionizing attempts for decades.
Amazon workers don’t need Bezos to thank them. They need him to stop union busting — and pay them what they deserve. https://t.co/HwHYibghHl
— Robert Reich (@RBReich) July 20, 2021
Jeff Bezos forgot to thank all the hardworking Americans who actually paid taxes to keep this country running while he and Amazon paid nothing. https://t.co/tjOeCWbUA8
— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) July 20, 2021
Jeff Bezos was in space for 5 minutes—or as its known at the Amazon warehouse, your allotted break time for a 16-hour day
— The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) July 20, 2021
(image: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
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