Some Disney artists posted support on Twitter, where the hashtag #DisneySayGay was prominent midmorning. Sixty to 70 Disney employees briefly walked in a loop around Walt Disney Studios in Burbank. Down the street at the Bette Davis Picnic Area, a smattering of Disney employees gathered in protest, although they seemed outnumbered, at least at one point, by members of the news media.
In a statement about the walkouts on Tuesday, the company said, “We respect our colleagues’ right to express their views, and we pledge our ongoing support of the L.G.B.T.Q.+ community in the fight for equal rights.”
It was impossible to gauge the ultimate level of participation; most Disney employees are still working at home. Some participation was virtual, one organizer said, with employees leaving an “away” message on Slack or other internal messaging systems to express solidarity.
The creators of the WhereIsChapek site said they were members of Disney’s L.G.B.T.Q. “community and their allies.” The site listed demands, including indefinitely ceasing — not pausing and re-evaluating, as Mr. Chapek has promised — political donations to Florida lawmakers who were involved in the passage of the bill. The New York Times verified that the anonymous organizers were Disney employees.
To get ahead of the walkout, Disney held an all-company virtual town hall on Monday that was dedicated to L.G.B.T.Q. issues. (A town hall had long been planned for Tuesday, albeit on a different diversity, equity and inclusion topic.) The roughly 100-minute session featured a panel discussion with eight Disney employees who spoke about their own L.G.B.T.Q. experience and why the company’s initial silence on the bill was hurtful. Nadine Smith, executive director of Equality Florida, a civil rights advocacy group, participated in a separate discussion.
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/22/business/media/disney-florida-employee-protests.html
Speak Your Mind
You must be logged in to post a comment.