A group of Apple employees organized a Christmas Eve walkout, demanding better working conditions and calling on customers to not shop in the tech giant’s retail or online stores.
“We are Apple,” Apple Together, the group organizing the walkout, tweeted Thursday. “We deserve a respectful workplace. We deserve paid sick time. We deserve protection on the frontlines. We deserve proper mental healthcare.”
The workers are also asking for protective measures against Covid-19, including N-95 masks, sanitizer stations, a ban on loitering in stores, and appointment-only shopping.
“Demand that Apple upholds its image with your wallet,” the walkout organizers said. “Don’t shop in stores, don’t shop online.”
This #Strikemás season, we are proud to stand with all @Apple workers today & always.
The workers behind this +$65 Billion corporation deserve their fair share.
Solidarity with the #AppleWalkout 🖤✊ https://t.co/D8PQLraoMH
— Alphabet Workers Union (AWU-CWA) (@AlphabetWorkers) December 24, 2021
Apple Together — a group of company employees that formerly used the #AppleToo hashtag to draw attention to sexual harassment, sexism, and other workplace issues at the tech giant — said that in addition to Apple Store employees, workers at corporate offices and AppleCare are participating in the action.
The group is best known for blowing the whistle on sexism at the California-based company. Last month, group member and former company product manager Janneke Parrish filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) claiming she was fired for helping coworkers share their experiences of sexism and other discrimination at Apple.
Parrish followed Ashley Gjøvik — a former Apple product manager terminated after attempting to organize workers and sharing stories of sexual harassment — in filing an NLRB complaint against the company.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy