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Amazon Admits Workers Have To Pee In Bottles

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. . .“Paying workers $15/hr doesn’t make you a ‘progressive workplace’ when you union-bust & make workers urinate in water bottles,” [Rep. Mark Pocan] wrote on Twitter on March 24.

Amazon fired back, saying Pocan was suckered in. “You don’t really believe the peeing in bottles thing, do you? If that were true, nobody would work for us. The truth is that we have over a million incredible employees around the world who are proud of what they do, and have great wages and health care from day one,” the mega-corp responded on Twitter.

But on Friday, Amazon did a U-turn — and eventually acknowledged that workers do in fact pee in bottles in order to meet deadlines — if in a roundabout way. . .

First, the tweet was incorrect. It did not contemplate our large driver population and instead wrongly focused only on our fulfillment centers. A typical Amazon fulfillment center has dozens of restrooms, and employees are able to step away from their work station at any time. If any employee in a fulfillment center has a different experience, we encourage them to speak to their manager and we’ll work to fix it. . .

[W]we know that drivers can and do have trouble finding restrooms because of traffic or sometimes rural routes, and this has been especially the case during Covid when many public restrooms have been closed.

(Read more from “Amazon Admits Workers Have To Pee In Bottles” HERE)

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Report: Amazon Started a Social Media War With Democrats Because Jeff Bezos Got Mad

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A recent report from Recode states that e-commerce giant Amazon’s recent social media posts targeting Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) came after CEO Jeff Bezos angrily told executives that they weren’t pushing back hard enough against criticism of the company.

Recode reports in an article titled “Amazon Started a Twitter War Because Jeff Bezos Was Pissed,” that Amazon’s recent tweets harshly criticizing Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren were the result of a new mandate from company CEO Jeff Bezos to fight back harder against criticism.

Recode reports:

Recode has learned that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos expressed dissatisfaction in recent weeks that company officials weren’t more aggressive in how they pushed back against criticisms of the company that he and other leaders deem inaccurate or misleading. What followed was a series of snarky and aggressive tweets that ended up fueling their own media cycles. . .

“I welcome @SenSanders to Birmingham and appreciate his push for a progressive workplace,” Clark’s account posted on Wednesday. “I often say we are the Bernie Sanders of employers, but that’s not quite right because we actually deliver a progressive workplace.”

(Read more from “Report: Amazon Started a Social Media War With Democrats Because Jeff Bezos Got Mad” HERE)

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Woke Amazon Bans Books That Treat Gender Dysphoria as Mental Illness

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Amazon informed senators on Thursday that it instituted a new policy banning books that treat gender dysphoria as a mental illness from its platform.

The e-commerce giant explained its policy, which had previously not been public, in response to a request for clarification from senators concerned about the banning of When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment by Ryan T. Anderson. Amazon pulled the book from its shelves on February 21.

“We have chosen not to sell books that frame LGBTQ+ identity as a mental illness,” said Amazon. Author Ryan T. Anderson pushed back on Twitter, saying the ban is based on misinterpretations of his book. . .

Republican senators Marco Rubio (Fla.), Mike Lee (Utah), Mike Braun (Ind.), and Josh Hawley (Mo.) asked Amazon to clarify why the book had been removed from the platform and whether the ban marked the beginning of a new approach from the tech giant.

In its response, Amazon seemed to confirm that only the distributer had been informed of the ban, not the publisher or author: “Amazon notified the distributor via email of the removal of the book for violating our content guidelines on the day the book was removed from sale.” Anderson and his publisher Encounter Books both said they found out about the ban when they were contacted by prospective buyers who could not find the book on the platform. (Read more from “Woke Amazon Bans Books That Treat Gender Dysphoria as Mental Illness” HERE)

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Beyond Creepy: 150,000 Security Cameras Hacked

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The Electronic Privacy Information Center long has warned that security cameras in Amazon’s Ring network can be hacked.

The doorbell cameras are part of the largely “unregulated surveillance and data collection” systems that contemporary technology has made possible, EPIC noted Friday. Ring cameras often capture images to which facial recognition software can be applied, the organization has warned.

Now, EPIC is spotlighting a breach of surveillance cameras linked by Verkada, a surveillance company that has services in hospitals, schools, homes and prisons.

The hack of the system exposed video from some 150,000 security cameras, EPIC said.

The Washington Post reported Thursday that in one hacked video, “a woman in a hospital room watches over someone sleeping in an intensive-care-unit bed. In another, a man and three young children celebrate one Sunday afternoon over a completed puzzle in a carpeted playroom.” (Read more from “Beyond Creepy: 150,000 Security Cameras Hacked” HERE)

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Amazon Removes Book on Transgenderism by Conservative Author Without Explanation

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Amazon’s web store has removed a best-selling book by a conservative author on the science and politics of transgenderism without notifying the author or giving him a reason why the book was deplatformed.

Ethics & Public Policy Center President Ryan T. Anderson, Ph.D., on Sunday discovered that his book, “When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment” had been removed from Amazon’s online store.

The book, which was an Amazon and Washington Post best-seller, surveys the debate on gender dysphoria, sex reassignment surgeries, and anti-discrimination law and considers biology, psychology, and philosophy to address what the public policy response should be for individuals who struggle to accept their bodies.

Anderson told TheBlaze that Amazon did not provide him with notice or an explanation for why his book was made unavailable to purchase. He only found out after people attempting to buy the book told him the listings on Amazon were taken down. Customers cannot purchase a used copy, the Kindle edition, or even the Audible version of Anderson’s book.

(Read more from “Amazon Removes Book on Transgenderism by Conservative Author Without Explanation” HERE)

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Jeff Bezos to Step Down as Amazon CEO; Meet the Man Taking Over Jeff Bezos’ Role

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By CNBC. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos will leave his post later this year, turning the helm over to the company’s top cloud executive, Andy Jassy, according to an announcement Tuesday. Bezos will transition to executive chairman of Amazon’s board.

Bezos, 57, founded Amazon in 1994 and has since morphed the one-time online bookstore into a mega-retailer with global reach in a slew of different categories from gadgets to groceries to streaming. Amazon surpassed a $1 trillion market cap under Bezos’ leadership in January of last year — it’s now worth more than $1.6 trillion.

The company had kept its succession plans quiet, though onlookers speculated that either Jassy or Jeff Wilke, CEO of Amazon’s worldwide consumer business, would be Bezos’ eventual successor. In August Amazon announced Wilke will retire in 2021. Jassy, 53, will become CEO in the third quarter.

Jassy joined Amazon in 1997 and has led Amazon’s Web Services cloud team since its inception. AWS continues to drive much of Amazon’s profit. (Read more from “Jeff Bezos to Step Down as Amazon CEO” HERE)

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Meet the Man Taking Over Jeff Bezos’ Role

By New York Post. Andy Jassy is set to take over the reigns of Amazon after Jeff Bezos announced on Tuesday that he’d be stepping down as CEO of his e-commerce empire.

Jassy, 53, started with the company as a marketing manager in 1997 — just three years after it was founded by Bezos — and, over the next decades, helped to turn Amazon into a profitable tech firm. . .

Jassy currently leads the company’s cloud computing offshoot, Amazon Web Services, which provides a range of online services for businesses.

A graduate of Harvard Business School, Jassy founded AWS in 2003 and became its CEO in 2016.

Under Jassy’s leadership, the division grew to a cloud platform used by millions, signing major customers including Verizon, McDonald’s and Honeywell. (Read more from “Meet the Man Taking Over Jeff Bezos’ Role” HERE)

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Parler Sues Amazon Web Services

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Parler, a free speech social media platform, filed a lawsuit against Amazon Web Services on Monday alleging that the big tech company terminated the social media platform’s account due to “political animus” and violated antitrust laws in the process.

“This death blow by AWS could not come at a worse time for Parler — a time when the company is surging with the potential of even more explosive growth in the next few days,” the lawsuit states. “Worse than the timing is the result — Parler has tried to find alternative companies to host it and they have fallen through. It has no other options. Without AWS, Parler is finished as it has no way to get online.”

The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington, follows Amazon’s decision to boot the site off of its web hosting service effective Sunday over “a steady increase in violent content.” Google and Apple also decided to remove Parler from their app stores, just days after the app received an influx of users following Twitter’s ban on President Donald Trump and other conservative accounts. (Read more from “Parler Sues Amazon Web Services” HERE)

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QAnon Reigns Free on Amazon Despite Its Recent Ban of Proud Boys Merchandise

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Amazon continues to offer over 2,000 products related to the QAnon conspiracy theory on its marketplace, despite its recent bans on merchandise related to the Proud Boys and the Washington Redskins.

The QAnon conspiracy theory took off in late 2017 after an individual purporting to be a confidant of President Donald Trump began posting messages to anonymous internet message boards claiming that the commander in chief is secretly fighting Democrats and “deep state” operatives involved in a worldwide child sex trafficking ring.

The FBI specifically mentioned the QAnon movement in a May 2019 bulletin warning that fringe conspiracy theories are domestic terrorist threats that could drive “groups and individual extremists to carry out criminal or violent acts,” Yahoo News reported. . .

Among the products related to the conspiracy theory available for purchase on Amazon’s marketplace include the 2019 book, “QAnon: An Invitation to The Great Awakening.” (Read more from “Qanon Reigns Free on Amazon Despite Its Recent Ban of Proud Boys Merchandise” HERE)

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GOP Calls for Amazon to Explain Reliance on SPLC

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GOP members of the House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary sent a letter to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos concerning the Southern Poverty Law Center’s relationship with Amazon Smile, a charity program that lets customers donate money to any of the acceptable nonprofits listed on the website.

In the letter, the Reps. Jim Jordan, Matt Gaetz, Mike Johnson, Ken Buck, and others determined that Amazon’s reliance on the SPLC to decide which charities may become eligible for the Smile donation program confirms that “Big Tech is biased against conservatives and censors conservative views.”

“The exclusion of these conservative groups from Amazon’s heavily-trafficked digital platform leads to less exposure for these groups and fewer opportunities for donations,” the letter reads. “In this way, Amazon’s reliance on the SPLC as a barometer to determine the eligibility of charitable organizations on AmazonSmile serves to discriminate against conservative views.”

The letter also outlines why the SPLC is unreliable, claiming that its willingness to place some conservative groups in the same category as “actual extremist organizations” proves its untrustworthiness and unreliability. (Read more from “GOP Calls for Amazon to Explain Reliance on SPLC” HERE)

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Amazon Removes ‘Offensive’ Kamala Harris Clothing

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Amazon removed shirts referring to Kamala Harris in a derogatory term from its marketplace.

The seller, The Oxygen Bandit, was offering t-shirts, tank tops, hoodies and sweatshirts with a similar design to Joe Biden’s campaign logo saying “Joe and the h–.” The name of the gardening tool that rhymes with “Joe” is slang for the word “whore.” . . .

“All sellers must follow our selling guidelines and those who do not will be subject to action including potential removal of their account. We are working to remove these products,” an Amazon spokesperson told USA TODAY. . .

The Oxygen Bandit does not appear to have a standalone website. Among the other items it is selling on Amazon are clothing items with the words “Kamala smelled the best” alluding to the claims of inappropriate behavior by the presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden. These items are still available for purchase.

(Read more from “Amazon Removes ‘Offensive’ Kamala Harris Clothing” HERE)

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