Business Insider‘s Steven Kovach reported today on a video of an alleged Google employee shouting at protestors that they should move elsewhere if they cannot afford the city.
Protestors in San Francisco are currently demonstrating against Google, claiming the tech giant’s wealthy employees are driving up rent prices and forcing others out of the city. The video shows a man, originally described by the San Francisco Bay Guardian as a Google employee, confronting the protestors, shouting: “I can pay my rent! Can you pay your rent?… Well, then, you know what? Why don’t you go to a city where you can afford it? ‘Cause this is a city for the right people who can afford it! If you can’t afford it, it’s time for you to leave…. I’m sorry…. If you can’t pay your rent, I’m sorry — get a better job!”
As Kovach cautiously noted, though: “It’s unclear if this man is really a Google employee though. In fact, it seems like he’s a plant by the protesters or just a random sympathizer.”
Debate immediately ensued on Twitter as to whether the man was, in fact, a Google employee, and whether the confrontation was genuine, with Henry Blodget, Business Insider‘s chief, Tweeting it was “almost certainly staged.” Bloomberg‘s Brad Weiner’s chimed in: “If he’s not a plant, I’ll eat my hat.”
As it turns out, the confrontation was indeed staged. Per Kovach’s update:
Rodriguez [the reporter who uploaded the video] tweeted that the “Googler” was a plant, put there by a union organizer. It turns out the fake Googler is actually Max Bell Alper, a local activist who was born to juggler parents in Illinois, according to his biography on “Making Change Media.”
Entitlement-protest? Check! A plant used to smear the opposing view and evoke sympathy for the protestors? Check! Facilitated by Big Labor? Check!
What else is new?
(h/t to Business Insider)
Read more: https://www.businessinsider.com/googler-taunts-protesters-2013-12#ixzz2n0qNfa8E