The Washington Post, one of the largest newspapers in the U.S., announced on Wednesday that it is laying off a third of all staff — a move that owner Jeff Bezos could prevent personally without his net worth changing in any meaningful way. As of Wednesday, Bezos’s net worth was listed as just under $249 billion by Forbes. Just last year, he spent an estimated $50 million on his wedding.
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Bend the knee to the fascist regime, still get laid off. Awkward!
Well, I doubt the reporters that are getting laid off are pro-fascist. WaPo’s staff took pretty strong stances including many resigning ahead of the 2024 election when Bezos started actively interfering for Trump.
But the ones who didn’t resign were still there prior to that and likely intended to keep alive the actual journalistic culture in the face of their new editor and Bezos’ politics. I’d guess that’s precisely why they were laid off, not that they bended the knee.
True. It’s a matter of how you spin it. I mourned for WaPo when Bezos bought it, as I saw the writing on the wall. The journalists who stayed may have intended to keep the culture of good journalism alive, but by this perspective were just providing a veneer of respectability to a propaganda outlet, which is a form of compliance.
Either way, let’s hope that they land at one of the new generation of journalism outlets that’s springing up online.