Apple Delays Return to Office After Woke Employee Mob Calls Its Plans Racist

Apple has reversed course on its plans to return to normal operations and has suspended requirements that employees return to the office this month for at least three days a week. The U-turn comes after woke employees called the mandate to return to the office a racist move designed to make the company "younger, whiter, and male-dominated."

The New York Times reports that Apple has reversed its plans to require workers to return to its offices for at least three days a week. The company has said this is due to a resurgence in coronavirus cases, but many employees have been openly protesting Apple's plans to return to the offices for some time, placing heavy pressure on the tech giant.

(AFP)

(Justin Sullivan/Getty)

Thousands of employees have been pushing back against the company's demands, with the employee group Apple Together publishing a letter earlier this month calling on the firm to allow for a hybrid and flexible work schedule. The open letter claimed that Tim Cook's push for in-person working is an attempt to make the company "younger, whiter, and male-dominated."

Apple's latest Inclusion and Diversity report stated that the company's employees are roughly 65 percent male and 35 percent female, with 43 percent being white and nine percent identifying as black. The Apple Together employee group stated that the return to in-person work increased the disparities at the firm and will "lead to privileges deciding who can work for Apple" instead of who'd be the most suitable for the job.

The open letter stated:

Apple will likely always find people willing to work here, but our current policies requiring everyone to relocate to the office their team happens to be based in, and being in the office at least 3 fixed days of the week, will change the makeup of our workforce. It will make Apple younger, whiter, more male-dominated, more neuro-normative, more able-bodied, in short, it will lead to privileges deciding who can work for Apple, not who'd be the best fit.

Privileges like "being born in the the right place so you don't have to relocate", or "being young enough to start a new life in a new city/country" or "having a stay-at-home spouse who will move with you". And privileges like being born into a gender that society doesn't expect the majority of care-work from, so it's easy to disappear into an office all day, without doing your fair share of unpaid work in society. Or being rich enough to pay others to do your care-work for you.

In early May, Apple's leading artificial intelligence engineer, Ian Goodfellow, resigned after being told he must return to the office. In a note to employees on Tuesday, Apple said that it would proceed with a pilot program to bring some workers back to the office twice a week and that anyone in the program who felt "uncomfortable coming into the office" would have the "option to work remotely."

The company also asked that employees that return to the offices wear masks in common areas and elevators and noted that it would continue to monitor coronavirus cases and update employees before any major changes to office policies.