Call it trolling to the highest levels, but it seems the brickbats aren't new. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk roasted fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos once more in a reply to the Blue Origin founder's tweet on Sunday.
Bezos showed a throwback photo of a Barron's cover article from 1999 that doubted Amazon's success. Bezos' startup had since become a $100-billion conglomerate.
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— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 11, 2021
Bezos used this tweet to defend his new aerospace company being a disruptor in the indusry, Mashable reported. It was in line with the publication of an article on The Washington Post, which Bezos also owns, on the toxic work culture at Blue Origin. Bezos was informed that the story would be published soon.
Elon Musk's Harsh Reply to Jeff Bezos' Woes
Even though Musk was not involved in any way with the situation, the South African billionaire and known Bezos rival could not help but make a hilarious yet harsh reply bearing a second-place silver medal emoji on Sunday night.
Bezos and Musk's rivalry has been long drawn, with the latter always touting SpaceX being first to space and claiming to have secured several government contracts. Musk had also labeled Bezos as a "copycat" and second-best previously. As such, these petty attacks are not new.
This time, however, Musk touched on something that was beyond the space race. It was about the Post article on internal strife within Bezos' company, with the Blue Origin chief on the defense with his tweet--even as he refused to comment on it. According to the Mashable report, over 20 current and former employees were interviewed in the Post article, and that the authors obtained an employee memo criticizing Bezos over the work culture and more.
The memo stated that "our current culture is toxic to our success."
Blue Origin Employees Claim Toxic, 'Authoritarian Bro' Work Culture
The unnamed employees interviewed claimed that Blue Origin fostered a "dysfunctional" and "demoralizing" work culture making people lose faith in the company. They also alleged that Blue Origin executives, including Bezos and CEO Bob Smith, were always warned about Blue Origin's "toxic" workplace culture.
In the 2016 memo, an employee said that the work culture had caused a loss of trust in the company leadership. It also charged that the company management failed to address the issues and chose to instead "silence" the employees.
The Business Insider said in a report that it tried but failed to seek comment about the specific charges in the article from a Blue Origin spokesperson, who only stressed that the company was taking those claims very seriously. The Post special report came after people identifying themselves as "21 current and former Blue Origin employees" released an open letter that alleged the company ignored a number of safety concerns and fostered a sexist work culture.
The article quoted a former employee as saying that the management created an "authoritarian bro culture." The workplace, several employees said, had a culture that led to condescension, humiliation and harassment of female staff.
Bezos' tweet apparently implied that such charges would not stop Blue Origin from attaining the level of success Amazon has reached. He relinquished his post as Amazon CEO in July to fully focus on Blue Origin and other initiatives, including being launched into space in a rocket.
