Supporters of Elon Musk are celebrating on Reddit over the news that the Tesla CEO intends to fire 75% of Twitter employees once he acquires the company.
The reactions, made on the r/elonmusk subreddit, came after it was revealed that Twitter employees had begun circulating a draft open letter criticizing Musk’s statements to investors last week that he would downsize the workforce from 7,500 employees to around 2,000.
“Elon Musk’s plan to lay off 75% of Twitter workers will hurt Twitter’s ability to serve the public conversation,” the draft reads. “A threat of this magnitude is reckless, undermines our users’ and customers’ trust in our platform, and is a transparent act of worker intimidation.”
Reddit users responded by arguing that all those who had signed the letter should be the first employees to go.
“I’d use the list of employees on that list as a starting point for firing,” one user wrote.
The open letter also cited concerns among employees that some may be discriminated against for their ideologies.
“We demand that leadership does not discriminate against workers on the basis of their race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, or political beliefs,” the letter continued. “We also demand safety for workers on visas, who will be forced to leave the country they work in if they are laid off.”
Numerous Redditors saw the statement as hypocrisy given their belief that Twitter has unfairly targeted conservatives.
“Irony: Twitter employees demanding that someone else not discriminate against them on the basis of their political beliefs,” a user said.
Others appeared to believe that Musk’s planned acquisition would lead to a new golden age for the social media platform.
“I love it. Elon’s gonna clean house and fix Twitter,” the user wrote. “Give us that edit button and diss the spambots. I’m all for that.”
A handful of Redditor users even felt that firing 75 percent of the company didn’t go far enough.
“FIRE THEM ALL,” another said.
Musk, who has until Friday to finalize the acquisition, has previously accused Twitter of having a “strong left-wing bias.”
Experts fear given the platform’s already significant issues, as recently outlined by a former Twitter executive turned whistleblower, such a loss of employees could endanger users’ privacy and data.
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Source: https://www.dailydot.com/debug/elon-musk-fans-celebrate-twitter-layoff-plan/