#AppleToo starts posting toxic employee stories in the workplace

A group of current and former Apple employees recently came together and called on their colleagues to share stories of discrimination, harassment and retaliation they had experienced within the company. As of August 27, the group called #AppleToo said it has collected 500 such stories – now it has started posting them on its official Medium page. Dear Scarlett, Apple’s security engineer and face of the movement, wrote on Medium that she will share five stories at a time “because the emotional toll of reading them is heavy.”

Two of the first five relate to sexual harassment, one of which involved a male boss using his position of power over an employee. This employee was later kicked out of an interview after the hiring team realized who she was. Another story comes from a black retail worker in the UK who tried unsuccessfully to get his bosses to do something about racism and micro-aggression in the workplace. An employee explained that she had been targeted by someone on her team and that management had done nothing about it. And the last one concerns an employee who was assaulted in her store by a customer and who did not obtain the support of the management.

If Scarlett posts all the submissions she’s received, these are just five of the many we’ll get to read. However, the #AppleToo movement said on Twitter that 75% share a common theme: they involve some form of discrimination. Almost half of them involve sexism, retaliation and HR reports that were ultimately dismissed. A quarter of these were about racism and ableism, and most stories of harassment and assault were sexual in nature.

In an interview with ProtocolScarlett said she felt “the company should be held accountable for not being held accountable. People want to feel heard. And they don’t feel heard by Apple.” She added that some employees who have worked for the tech giant for decades felt executives were listening to them, but they are no longer.

When news of the #AppleToo movement first broke, Apple said in a statement, “We take all concerns seriously and thoroughly investigate whenever a concern is raised, and out of respect for life. deprived of everyone involved, we do not discuss employee affairs. “