As someone who was raised on the concept of free speech, this is really disturbing. It illustrates what a horrible situation we are in when a few technical companies become dictators as to what can and cannot be said. No matter which side of an argument one may be on, it is important to insist that all sides be allowed to express their opinions and ideas. Unfortunately, we are proving right now that the government would likely be a worse guardian, given how Obama/Biden have managed to weaponize the IRS, DOJ, FBI, etc., and how those corrupted organizations conspired with the speech dictators.
I really do not follow sports much, so I was surprised to see all of the "news" in U.S. conservative news feeds and columns regarding the loss of the U.S. Womens Soccer team against Sweden in the World Cup a day or two ago. All of the commentary was absolutely gleeful that the Americans and, in particular, Rapinoe had lost (Rapinoe was especially roasted as she missed the penalty kick that gave the game to Sweden.) This soccer team has obviously alienated half the country with their political messaging when you find that conservatives stop rooting for anything American, no less a sports team. Conservatives tend to love America and anything American. Up until now. Why the team's owners/management has allowed this to continue to this extreme, is beyond me.
They have political messaging? I live 200 metres from one of the stadiums, my community is awash with the tournament but I haven't heard anything political about that team....
The U.S. team would have had to play there for you to see anything. Apparently, their descent into politics began years ago when they kneeled during the national anthem and did other things to insult the U.S. while wearing jerseys with USA on them. Megan Rapinoe seems to have done the most damage, in that regard. While the NFL, NBA, etc., had the same disrespect problems for a while, they are successful and supported widely so they could get past those tantrums without much problem. Not the same for the relatively unknown womens' soccer team here in the U.S. Not that there was much momentum to getting soccer to be a popular sport here, but they have certainly set back such efforts with these naïve moves.
Here's one that I had not heard of before: Apparently, Victoria's Secret in 2021 decided to re-brand as a "woke" company. The named Megan Rapinoe (anti-US soccer player) and a transgender model, Valentina Sampaio, as its new brand ambassadors. They also began using overweight models and plus-sized mannequins in their advertising and stores. They had dropped their famous fashion show in 2018 because it was "harmful" to women. Result: Revenues dropped from $7.5B in 2020 to a projected $6.2B in 2023 and the CEO, Amy Hauk, was forced to resign earlier this year. Keep in mind that women are their primary customers, by far, so this market rejection is even more telling. They have announced a return to their previously successful marketing methods, including reviving their fashion show. The hits just keep coming and coming...
Perhaps, but given the inflation that has been inflicted on us over the past 3 years, the drop in revenues is stunning. I know nothing about the ladies lingerie business, but given their history of successful manufacturing and sales for decades, it would be surprising if their product quality deteriorated so quickly. The big change likely was going woke as has happened to all of the other examples above.
I last bought from them in about 2018 and the quality was markedly lower than previous purchases. I'd only buy in-shop now, and since the only shops of theirs that I see are in airports and they sell a limited line they've been getting none of my money. There's one sports bra that I thought was good but I can live without it.
LOL, Google's parent company, Alphabet, lost $70 billion in market value in a single day (Monday) over its "woke" Gemini chatbot that made historically inaccurate images (e.g., black Vikings, Asian George Washington, etc.). Investors became worried about its apparent hallucinations and obvious political bias. Meanwhile, Annheuser Busch's CEO in December announced layoffs and admitted that it will be a long road back for them to recover their customer base from the Dylan Mulvaney fiasco. He went on to say that it is obvious that customers do not want corporations to tell them how to think. Only took gazillions in revenue losses for him to figure out that they should be making beer and not political statements!
Here's a new one that we can keep an eye on to see how well it works out for them. The founder and CEO of telehealth and online pharmacy Hims took to social media on Wednesday to encourage anti-Israel/pro-Hamas protesters on U.S. college campuses to continue in those efforts because companies like his will be "eager" to hire them. Stay tuned for more developments.
Just saw a news article on the Budlight/Dylan Mulvaney saga. The former Anheuser-Busch President of Operations recently told a reporter that the company continues to suffer the consequences of embracing woke-ism two years later. He said that they lost 30% of their customer base and are trying to win them back, but are not making any headway in that effort. Business and politics do not mix.
Your tinfoil hat company is far too closely linked with Trump as far as many are concerned. This would explain 'squash parties' where liberals line up your tinfoil hats on the pavement and squash them with their leftist feet. Also China, the E.U., Canada, Mexico, Japan, and others have levied a 25% tariff on all tinfoil hats going into their countries. Even the penguins on Heard Island in the Antartica are refusing to wear them. You are now paying the price for your business getting involved with politics. You took a s**t kicking on the stock market the last 2 days.
In less than a week, it is going to be Tinfoil Hat Liberation Day. Can't go into details just yet, but it has been in the works for months. Everyone will be able to proudly wear as many of their tinfoil hats as they want in public. The old government cosmic brain wave mind controller and egg timer will no longer be effective.
There are a couple of business brands that I have not yet mentioned in this thread. The first is MyPillow whose CEO is Mike Lindell. He is a close friend of Trump and actually was one of the primary people digging up evidence of voting machine fraud in the 2020 election. His outspoken support and total loyalty to Trump cost his business many large accounts, including Walmart, Kohls, etc. American Express cut his credit line by 90% for no reason. I am surprised that the company is still in business, but he continues to run ads and actually has added a lot of different products to his offerings (way beyond just the pillows he started with.) But there is no doubt that his outspoken support of Trump hurt his business. At its peak, it was doing $100 million per year. In 2023, it was down to $17 million. And then there's Tesla and Elon Musk. Elon did much more than endorse a political view, he joined the campaign of Donald Trump and agreed to run DOGE. Right now, his car company's sales are down 13% and I believe that it will go lower before this is over. Of course, historically, it has been a mistake to bet against Elon, but it's ugly right now. Anyway, a couple more examples of why business and politics don't mix. This time from the conservative side of the spectrum.
Fair enough but if one is adept at deciphering geopolitics one can benifit business wise. Case in point, on Friday the stock market was down 2,250 points on the Dow 30. I found out from my agent that the president of Vietnam phoned Trump and told him that he was going to remove all tariffs against the U.S. I knew that Nike and Lulu Lemon get all of their shoes and clothing from Vietnam. I bought thousands of dollars in recently lowered shares, and within 4 hours I made an 11% profit.
Elon brought this on himself, not by being a loyal Trump supporter, but because of this. What made him salute like that, no one will ever know. Asperger's?
Unless that's a nod to the idea that Asperger was, himself, a nazi then no the Aspergers doesn't explain anything he's doing. Trying to give Musk a pass because he's neurodivergent doesn't work. He's fully aware of what he's doing and any miss-steps are all his own.