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Comment by weirdstuff | Hacker News Reader

How's it sneaky? Business management and shareholders routinely try to shut down unionizing all the time throughout the last two centuries. My buddy is a manager at a national retail chain and often comments on how proactively anti-union they are, just like their competitors.

Other demographic groups like the ones you pointed out really don't have that same collective effect on the bottom line for shareholders across industries like those that unionize, whose only trait in common is that of a provider of labor.

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If it's not "sneaky", it's at least lazy. "Some believe they were targeted"... Who? Why?

If I said "Some believe we didn't land on the moon", that would be a true statement. But, it's also a way at hinting that we may have really not landed on the moon without offering any evidence or even citing specific people who believe that.

"who", the people who were distributing union related materials

"why", because they were distributing union related materials?

"without offering any evidence", which is why it says "believe"

I think they meant: who are the "some people" who "believe they were targeted"

And why did they believe that?

Without some grounds for accusation it's "sneaky".

It's sneaky because it suggests that people were targeted because they were pro-union, without going so far as to make a claim of fact (which would open them to libel claims).

If the shoe fits.

Be bold. Make the claim, or don't make the claim. Half-heartedly making the claim is shoddy journalism.

This is Reuters REPORTING on the case. Not make a claim. Take of your fanboy glasses or go home.

If you can't report on pro-union organizers being fired in retribution because the facts aren't there, don't make the suggestion.

I have no Tesla stock, products, nor am I employed by them. Not a "fanboy" in any way.

"Be bold. Make the claim, or don't make the claim. Half-heartedly making the claim is shoddy journalism."

No.

It would be impossible to verify and to say with certainty the fact that Tesla was targeting Union folks - if this were true.

Second - the journo is communicating the opinions of others, not his/her own.

There would be Musk, and a very small handful of trusted lieutenants who would have been behind it (if it happened).

But - one could look at the totality of those who are fired - and find that 'most of the vocal union bakers' were let go.

So what does this mean?

It doesn't prove anything - but it looks pretty bad, doesn't it?

So a journalist talks to some of the current or laid off workers, and they say 'off the record' - that this has happened, and 'we think they did this to kabosh the union agenda' - well, then it's reasonable.

If the journalist is just 'making it up'- that would be a deep dereliction of their duty.

But if 'some were actually saying' this, in this journalists interviews, then it's fair for them to say.

And it would be irresponsible for the journalist to say 'Musk specifically targeted Union advocates' unless they had some pretty good evidence that this were true. Which would be very hard.

> But - one could look at the totality of those who are fired - and find that 'most of the vocal union bakers' were let go.

I don't object to statements like that. Your proposal actually make some attempt to quantify proportionality. The article did no such thing: "pro-union workers were among those fired this week." It doesn't say "mostly pro-union workers were fired" or "most vocal pro-union workers were fired." It isn't reflecting someone else's opinion. It's just an attempt to fit a narrative around zero evidence. If they had interesting evidence, they would report that instead!

> It doesn't prove anything - but it looks pretty bad, doesn't it?

No! Because they didn't actually make any interesting statements of fact. Just that some pro-union employees happen to be among the 1% of fired employees, like you would expect in a population of hundreds.

> And it would be irresponsible for the journalist to say 'Musk specifically targeted Union advocates' unless they had some pretty good evidence that this were true. Which would be very hard.

But they are suggesting it anyways. I think that is similarly irresponsible.

Probably they don't want to spend the time gathering statistics before they rush to be the first to publish on this story, but in preliminary reporting like this, I think they should be hesitant to suggest a narrative they haven't made any attempt to confirm.

Journalism is hard.

They're not paid a lot, and they have to churn out stories.

They don't have the resources to hire PI's and do interviews, follow people around.

It's just a dude (or dudette) who might have time to ask a few questions, and then put out a story.

So that's it.

I wish it could be more, but what they've done is within reason, so long as it's valid and they're not making it up.

I doubt that Tesla would prevail in a libel case, under US law. Maybe in the UK, but I doubt that too. I mean, the Top Gear suit was dismissed.

It's sneaky because it's taken out of context.

Yes, pro-union people were targeted. This may or may not be statistically significant. And what is "pro-union?"

If they have 30k employees, and 3% of them are pro-union, and they laid off 1% - what are the odds that some of the folks laid off are pro-union but weren't targeted?

What what are the odds that someone that wasn't targeted assumes they were?

I have no idea what the facts are, but blind assertions like those in the article are foolish.

Imagine reading an article about you that says "Some neighbors felt he was holding more guns than needed and enough ammunition to kill dozens of people." Or they said that your Internet service provider had noticed large bandwidth which is consistent with someone watching perverted pornography.

These are baseless assertions - and therefore shallow.

Parent edited post. It said before "amongthem were pro union workers"

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