made a burner blog for this to share because i don’t use tumblr that often and forgot my main account’s password, but still wanted to respond. i tried to keep this as unbiased as possible, while also disproving any issues here.
Based on what we’ve seen, it’s hard to tell who is wrong: The higher-ups, the other volunteers, or OP who got fired.
Based on what we know, OP got fired for using the phrase “from the river to the sea, palestine will be free” a lot. That would be a clear sign of zionism, if not for the message also pointing out that both the higher-ups and other employees had asked le-bjorn (the post’s OP) to use a different phrase. The insistence on using it despite others seemingly asking both politely and rudely, however, implies that le-bjorn had in fact been, by pure definition of the word, harassing other employees with it.
Sure it could be perceived as zionism here, but it’s also important to take note that the other screenshots also show the higher-ups specifically did not want to remove the support for Palestine (a country that is, if i might add, absolutely the victim in this war), but instead just the part of the phrase that upset other employees (“from the river to the sea”). Because of that, the simple option is to simply fire the person who is, in all instances thus far, harassing other employees with statements making them uncomfortable.
Along with that, it’s not stated that every employee that was uncomfortable with it was saying it because of behavior/beliefs in support of Israel.
Also, le-bjorn never went into detail with other topics mentioned, so I’d like to bring those up as well.
Secondary Topic 1: Banning mentions of colonialism
“people are also currently asking board to ban saying that the founding of israel was colonialism—equating this to saying racial slurs—and were complaining about my status back when it was "palestine will be free", too” that statement shows a problem with the other employees, not necessarily the code of conduct or other issues at the organization. We never got any mention or indication that the higher-ups even considered banning the phrase. From what we know, they could have also taken action against the other employees as well, but that requires more information than what we know.
Secondary Topic 2: le-bjorn (OP) quit.
It was a second official warning, but the higher-ups never state anything about termination or firing le-bjorn. The organization itself never held any ill-will towards le-bjorn over this, and in fact wanted both sides to peacefully reach an agreement (as shown by them proving multiple alternatives in the messages that would not constitute harassment while also allowing le-bjorn to express their political views). However, from what we’ve seen on op’s tumblr and twitter accounts, they have ceased working there, despite not being stated to have been fired.
Conclusion
No side was right here. SOME of the other employees were in blatant support of Israel, some were made uncomfortable from the arguments and phrases used, and OP aka le-bjorn was trying to show support for Palestine but would not use a phrase that didn’t upset other people involved.
Yes there is a problem with some employees at that company, but OP was also unwilling to change in order to accommodate some other employees who may have genuinely been made uncomfortable about the situation.
(Also let’s be real twitter tries to cancel the OTW and AO3 every single year, this is genuinely just giving them an excuse there because a lot of the conversations about it this year isn’t even mentioning the actual post from le-bjorn)
