Tenchu's Thoughts: Mixing Business with Politics
I just got an e-mail from the CEO of an app that my company uses. It's called Expensify, and it handles filing expense reports for businesses, especially startups like my employer. It's a lengthy e-mail, and here's how it starts:
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I know you don’t want to hear this from me. And I guarantee I don’t want to say it. But we are facing an unprecedented attack on the foundations of democracy itself. If you are a US citizen, anything less than a vote for Biden is a vote against democracy.
That’s right, I’m saying a vote for Trump, a vote for a third-party candidate, or simply not voting at all -- they’re all the same, and they all mean:
“I care more about my favorite issue than democracy. I believe Trump winning is more important than democracy. I am comfortable standing aside and allowing democracy to be methodically dismantled, in plain sight.”
If the polls are accurate, there’s a roughly 50% chance that you agree Trump needs to go. You know what to do: show up on November 3rd and vote for Biden. Or even better, don’t wait until then: vote today. Go to Vote.org if you need help figuring out how.
The rest of this email is intended to address the concerns of those who disagree, and I’ll try to take the most likely questions in turn:
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The rest of the e-mail is a bunch of straw man arguments posing as a Q&A.
Here was my response to the CEO:
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This email was highly inappropriate.
First of all, let me address your view that not voting for either candidate is the same as voting for Trump. That’s just plain wrong. While I don’t support Trump, I will not be voting for Biden either, because I refuse to continue playing the game of “lesser of two evils.” The two-party duopoly is why we’ve been forced to choose between two highly unqualified candidates, both this year and in 2016.
But beyond that, you are using your business customer base as a pool of “potential voters” to reach out to. That’s crossing the line.
If I had a choice, I’d consider dropping Expensify for my needs and going with a competitor, one that doesn’t mix politics with the needs of their customer base.
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Bottom line is that this CEO, IMO, thinks he's on the "right side of history." But by politicizing his company, he has broadcast to the world that he is an arm of the Democratic Party, and that he is hedging his business' fortunes on that of his political alignment.
Now I get it. Expensify is based in San Francisco, so the CEO knows which side of the bread gets buttered. Plus, being a "woke" company can pay off handsomely. Look at Nike, who has endorsed Colin Kaepernick to the tune of several millions of dollars, and is making a boatload of money off of that hypocrite.
But as for me, I will not support a company who not takes sides in a highly polarized political climate, but also portrays people like me in terms of "If you are not with me, you are against me."
GFY, Expensify.
Tenchusatsu |
