Amazon isn’t just an evil company. It’s THE evil company.
Today is International Workers’ Day 2020, also known as May Day, and there’s a massive boycott that’s been organized against companies like Amazon, Target, Instacart, Whole Foods and more.
I’m always down for workers’ rights, and yet this boycott gave me a moment’s pause. With the emergence of COVID-19, delivery services have made it possible to continue to survive without going out to buy supplies.
But then I quickly remembered exactly who and what we’re really talking about when we consider Jeff Bezos’ e-commerce machine.
Many people are singing the praises of Amazon during this crisis, and that’s understandable. But I can’t join in, because that would mean ignoring the ways that Amazon exploits its workers and pulls the strings of society to oppress vulnerable people.
As the coronavirus pandemic has deepened, Amazon has continuously denied workers demands for safe conditions in warehouses, personal protective equipment (PPE), hazard pay and other basics. And when they protest, they’ve been fired. And attacked.
But that’s not shocking, because this is the same company that has spent the last few years peddling facial recognition tech to police departments despite widely documented issues with their product mistakenly identifying the faces of people of color, Black people in particular. They don’t care that their product will get innocent human beings killed or thrown into cages. For Amazon, profit is more important.
And that’s unsurprising, because Amazon is also the company that is the backbone of the Department of Homeland Security and ICE’s system of concentration camps and deportation — a system that cages kids, blocks asylum-seekers, and targets Black and Brown people for indefinite incarceration.
You know how our healthcare system is struggling under the weight of the COVID-19 pandemic? Not enough ventilators. Nurses without PPE. Black folks dying at horrifying rates. A president that refuses to take responsibility and says “it’s up to the states.”
The federal government could build 10,000 hospitals with what Amazon DOESN’T pay in taxes, despite being a $793 billion company.
In 2020, Amazon isn’t just an evil company. It is THE evil company. Amazon is a genocidal war machine that typifies this era’s obsession with excess materialism, capitalist exploitation and racial subjugation-for-profit.
Recently my therapist asked me how I was coping with this pandemic, and I shared with her that I’ve suddenly discovered a love of hiking and outdoors. She said, “Well that makes sense. So much is in flux right now, but nature remains the same.”
I found this moving on many levels. And I also thought about the shock waves of pain and exploitation this pandemic is laying bare and I realized something:
Oppression is not immutable.
Oppressors are not mountains. They can be moved, boycotted against and defeated. I’m reminded today on May Day that power remains with the people, and that we can change our world no matter how entrenched it seems.
Amazon seems inevitable, but it is not. It is just a company made of people and numbers. This company’s reign will end.
I’m hopeful that this day is sooner than we think, because the resistance is coming from within: Amazon’s workers are rising up, and they are damn courageous.
Today is a major day for their efforts. So join the May Day 2020 boycott today in solidarity and keep your foot on Amazon’s neck any way you can.
You can also throw your support behind the many activists and organizations working in solidarity with Amazon workers, and also resisting this company at every turn:
- Mijente
- Color Of Change
- Athena Coalition
- Many, many others
Amazon won’t go down without a fight. But it will go down. I believe in our power to make it so.
