Employees of The Walt Disney Company (TWDC) have announced that they are planning walkouts — dubbed the “Disney Do Better Walkout” by the employees - during their breaks every day this week to protest CEO Bob Chapek’s slow response in publicly criticizing Florida;s anti-LGBTQIA+ “don’t say gay” bill. Per the Tampa Bay Times:
The act of protest will culminate next Tuesday with a general walkout by LGBTQ workers and their supporters at Disney worksites in California, Florida and elsewhere…
Statements by Disney leadership over the Florida legislation “have utterly failed to match the magnitude of the threat to LGBTQIA+ safety represented by this legislation,” the group said.
“As a community, we have been forced into an impossible and unsustainable position,” the Disney employee group stated on its protest site. “We must now take action to convince TWDC to protect employees and their families in the face of such open and unapologetic bigotry.
You can read more here about the employees’ demands regarding “the steps that TWDC needs to do in order to regain the trust of the LGBTQIA+ community and employees.” You can also read here some powerful statements from Disney employees.
This employee group has been quite impressive in making its voice heard and calling out Disney on its hypocrisy and lack of action when it comes to supporting LGBTQIA+ rights and causes. The group clearly played an important role in forcing Chapek to apologize about the company’s unwillingness to speak out against the “don’t say gay” bill and I have no doubt that they will continue to hold the company accountable.
I am cheering on their walkout and wish them all the best. The employee group notes that although Disney employees are “protected to act while on break for the daily break walkouts” this week, the full scale walkout on March 22 is not a legally protected action and thus employees need to “take your own situation into account before choosing to participate.” So Disney employees are taking some risks here.
You can follow the walkout on Twitter here.