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Google employees demand Alphabet stop compiling data on abortion seekers

August 19, 2022 | | Print Article

More than 650 Google employees have demanded that Alphabet, the big tech giant’s parent company, provide contract workers with abortion healthcare and stop collecting data on those who are searching online for abortion services.

The Alphabet Workers’ Union (AWU-CWA) delivered the signed letter to Alphabet execs, including CEO Sundar Pichai, and posted their demands on Twitter in a lengthy thread that details their reasoning.

“We, the undersigned, recognize that all Alphabet workers, of all genders, are impacted by the overturning of Roe v. Wade and are disappointed in Alphabet’s response and influence on this ruling,” the letter begins. “Alphabet has continued to make access to reproductive and gender-affirming healthcare a ‘women’s issue’ by only providing women@ Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) with listening sessions, and using gendered language in their communication with workers when this is an issue that affects all of us.”

If the company is to uphold Google’s core values, say the employees, they must “immediately do” what the workers want.

Included among the demands is the setting of a reproductive healthcare standard in the US Wages and Benefits Standards that would extend and increase travel expenses and “a minimum of 7 days of additional sick time” to all staff, including temps, vendors, and contractors (TVCs)  seeking an out-of-state abortion.

“We have a two-tiered workforce, that’s the reality w/in Alphabet,” the union tweeted. “Any benefit extended to FTEs *must* be extended to TVCs (temps, vendors, contractors) as well—otherwise we’re leaving more than half our coworkers to fend for themselves. Anything less is not a real solution.”

“And b/c it is precisely TVCs who are already paid less, enjoy fewer benefits, & more likely to reside in anti-abortion states—they’re the workers who need these benefits the most” the group argued. “So we’re demanding that all abortion access benefits be extended to the 50% of us who are TVCs.”

Additionally, “Alphabet must stop lobbying politicians and any political organizations, through NetPAC or any other means because these politicians were responsible for appointing the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe V. Wade and continue to infringe on other human rights issues related to voting access and gun control.”

According to the Alphabet workers, “this isn’t just about anti-abortion lobbying.”

“For its stances to be meaningful, Google needs to be independent of political spending altogether,” they state. “Alphabet’s political donations are significant—& too often they’re directed at anti-worker causes, funneling money to candidates actively stripping away our rights. This must end.”

And the company must address “the disinformation and misleading information as it pertains to abortion services and other reproductive healthcare services on all Alphabet platforms.”

User data privacy controls “for all health-related activity” must be instituted immediately. Searches for “reproductive justice, gender-affirming care, and abortion access information on Google must never be saved, handed over to law enforcement, or treated as a crime,” the employees proclaimed.

“We all saw the story about the Nebraska teen & her mom, charged for seeking abortion care,” the union said. “We can’t allow that at Google.”


Of course, what the AWU-CWA fails to mention is that the Nebraska mom is charged with performing an abortion on her 16-year-old daughter who was more than 20 weeks pregnant at home and the duo then allegedly attempted to burn and bury the body of the fetus.

In response to that horrific crime, the workers demand that search results “for fake abortion providers” — i.e. pregnancy crisis centers, which offer pregnant women valuable services such as sonograms, free baby clothes, and support — must be removed.

 

Alphabet must also cut ties with “publishers of disinformation related to abortion services who violate AdSense’s publishers policies related to unreliable and harmful claims about a major health crisis” and ensure “that abortion services that pay for Google ads don’t inadvertently have their ad revenue go to organizations that are actively working against them.”

“To enact all these changes & more, we’re calling on executives to create a task-force, w/50% employee representation, that would implement changes to company policies across Alphabet,” the workers stated. “We protect our rights, & we need to be at the table when making decisions that affect us all.”

 

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Melissa Fine
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