15 Matching Annotations
  1. Oct 2023
  2. apnews.com apnews.com
    Starbucks, Workers United union sue each other in standoff over pro-Palestinian social media post
    15
    1. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      Starbucks Workers United has been operating under that name since August 2021, a few months before it unionized its first Starbucks store in Buffalo, New York. Since then, at least 366 U.S. Starbucks have voted to unionize. The campaign helped kick off a wave of labor protests by Amazon workers, Hollywood writers and actors and auto workers.But Starbucks doesn’t support unionization and hasn’t yet reached a labor agreement at any of its unionized stores. The process has been contentious, with workers organizing multiple strikes. Federal district judges and administrative judges with the National Labor Relations Board have issued 38 decisions finding unfair labor practices by Starbucks, the NLRB said, including delaying negotiations and withholding benefits from unionized workers.

      All of this context seems to suggest that Starbucks, given its history of anti-union action, is only suing Workers United as a further anti-union effort, just as Workers United President Lynne Fox stated.

    2. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      Workers United hasn’t issued its own statement. But its parent, the SEIU, said Tuesday that it has many members with family on both sides of the conflict and believes “all Israelis and Palestinians deserve safety, freedom from violence, and the opportunity to thrive.”

      Once again, providing both sides of the situation. Although the SEIU might not be the best source on this since it's the parent organization of Workers United and Workers United itself.

    4. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      Florida state Rep. Randy Fine, a Republican, tweeted on Oct. 11.

      Who are Florida state Rep. Randy Fine and Sen. Rick Scott? Might they be extremists to some extent? Certainly, Fine's tweet seems extreme. Probably, other examples of tweets or reactions from lawmakers would be useful in making this point (that there were extreme reactions to the pro-Palestine tweets). Fine and Scott are both Republican legislators from Florida, so they represent a very narrow demographic.

    5. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      Seattle-based coffee giant

      This is a useful epithet to avoid repetition of the name Starbucks, but "coffee giant" does come across as alienating, if not critical - almost definitely not an intentional decision, but seems to represent a general bias that people have against big corporations.

    6. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      Starbucks said it received more than 1,000 complaints about the union’s post. The Seattle-based coffee giant said workers had to face hostile customers and received threatening phone calls. Vandals spray-painted Stars of David and a swastika on the windows of a Rhode Island store.

      Is there any evidence to substantiate or reject these claims outside of Starbucks's statement?

    7. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      Workers United President Lynne Fox wrote in a letter to Starbucks.

      Expert witness - directly involved, but also heavily biased. We don't get to hear what Starbucks has to say about this allegation, and the inclusion of the last paragraph about Starbucks's ant-union stance, while providing context, seems to also operate toward supporting Lynne Fox's allegations.

    8. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      noting that Iowa City Starbucks Workers United was among those posting pro-Palestinian messages.

      Why did they chose Iowa City Starbucks Workers United in particular among the several "pro-Palestinian" Workers United branches - could this be important/relevant? Should this have been included in the story?

    10. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      But posts and retweets from local Starbucks Workers United branches supporting Palestinians and condemning Israel were still visible on X Wednesday.

      Primary sources

    11. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      standoff

      News values: conflict (playing off of Israel-Palestine conflict as well as Starbucks labor union conflict), prominence (Starbucks is a very big and popular brand), timeliness. This is a political and business news story. I came across it while researching the claims that Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz has been directly funding the IDF.

    12. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      said in its lawsuit that workers put up the tweet without the authorization of union leader

      The point of view from the workers who actually posted the tweet is not provided.

    13. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      On Oct. 9, two days after Hamas militants rampaged across communities in southern Israel, Starbucks Workers United posted “Solidarity with Palestine!”

      The context of Hamas militants "rampaging" Israel being provided alongside the Starbucks Workers United's support of Palestine seems to suggest the union supports Hamas by extension, or that all Palestinians are directly related to Hamas - potentially bias at work in the sentence structure choice, but very subtle.

    14. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      Workers United also said Starbucks defamed the union by implying that it supports terrorism and violence.

      Both sides presented - this is Workers United's point of view.

    15. morellot 26 Oct 2023
      saying a pro-Palestinian social media post from a union account early in the Israel-Hamas war angered hundreds of customers and damaged its reputation.

      This is Starbucks's point of view.

    Visit annotations in context

    Annotators

    URL

    apnews.com/article/starbucks-workers-united-union-lawsuit-israel-palestinian-f212a994fef67f122854a4df7e5d13f5