Why Does Google Employ a Pro-Slavery Lunatic?
In 2011, Justine Tunney was an anti-establishment organizer within Occupy Wall Street, exhorting class warfare on the sidewalk. Today, it appears that Tunney spends her time ranting against the poor, advocating for the overthrow of American democracy, and not least notably, working at Google's New York branch.
What exactly happened between now and then is unclear. Remnants of the Occupy movement have worked to distance themselves from Tunney, whose views are increasingly of the neo-techno-fascist variety, rather than inclusionary leftism. In February, Tunney seized control of the @OccupyWallStreet Twitter account, which she claims to have created, proclaiming herself the rightful founder of the entire movement. The resulting backlash wasn't the first she's faced from people of all political alignments.
It's now difficult to tell if Justine Tunney is a real person or not. Reading her Twitter and blog, she seems like some sort robot intelligence, an artificial entity designed to offend and disgust. No person can be this awful, right? Is it an act? A long-con of hardcore trolling? At a time when anti-tech resentment is at a high, can someone possibly be this brazen?
It seems to be true. With Google buses turned into symbols of software decadence, Justine Tunney is petitioning the White House to make Eric Schmidt the "CEO of America." She is really proposing that the underfed be given a flavorless vitamin sludge instead of food.
Give poor people @soylent so they can be healthy and productive. If you're on food stamps, maybe you're unhealthy and need to eat better.
— Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) May 13, 2014
The world turns to Silicon Valley and asks, Must you act this way? Tunney replies, Fuck you, peasant.
The bottom 1/3rd of the population should be live-in servants for the top 1/3rd.
— Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) July 23, 2014
Ever since the French Revolution, the merchant caste (aka Wall Street) has ruled the West. Why not bring back the aristocracy? (aka Techies)
— Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) July 25, 2014
I propose that we invert our welfare system. Rather than give it to the worst, let's give it the best. #HereditaryPrivilege is awesome.
— Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) July 23, 2014
@afscot I'm not trolling. Minimum wage makes servants unaffordable for 99% of families. It's another way the 1% oppresses us.
— Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) July 22, 2014
Michael Fassbender in a nazi uniform. Now I know which movie I’m watching that next. http://t.co/YpZS6QRfjp
— Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) July 5, 2014
Hygiene and good posture were invented by the nobility because they were prejudiced against the lower classes. Maybe classism is good.
— Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) July 22, 2014
All this diversity nonsense makes me wonder if the only reason Google hired me is because I'm a minority. If so, I should just kill myself.
— Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) July 20, 2014
Is Justine Tunney the id of white collar tech, or just a terrible person a little more terrible than most? What happened between her stint as the social media guru of Occupy Wall Street and her poisonous persona of today? What made her switch from lefty geek and coding enthusiast to technocrat authoritarian, tweeting about the establishment of Silicon Valley overclass? Her own writing is an incoherent mix of jumbled politics and futurism. It doesn't answer much.
So, I gave her a call at her office, Google's mammoth New York headquarters. When I asked if she really believed that some Americans would be better off as slaves or servants, she asked me to forward any questions I might have to Google's press email account—which never replied—and said "please don't listen to the lies people tell about me," and then hung up.
But the problem isn't what others are saying about Tunney—typically just "Is this person for real?"—but what she's saying so loudly herself. The problem is also with her employer, which stays silent on Tunney's toxicity, and provides her a comfortable, climate-controlled perch.
Google's corporate "Code of Conduct," by which all employees must abide, demands that Googlers above all "[do] the right thing more generally–following the law, acting honorably and treating each other with respect." It's difficult to see how Tunney's 16th-century views on race, class, and equality would be considered respectful by all of Google's roughly 50,000 employees. Unless she's some sort of singular coding talent, there's little reason to keep one of the web's nastiest trolls (at best!) around.
In the meantime, Google's letting itself be represented by a hateful fascist.
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