Annual Microsoft Ignite conference entices criticism over 'woke' introductions
WASHINGTON (TND) -- This week's annual Microsoft Ignite conference drew criticism in response to its corporate introduction, which pointed out people's race, hairstyles, genders, and acknowledged the indigenous land on which the company was built in Washington State.
WASHINGTON (TND) -- This week's annual Microsoft Ignite conference drew criticism in response to its corporate introduction, which pointed out people's race, hairstyles, genders, and acknowledged the indigenous land on which the company was built in Washington State.
During the introduction, the hosts first acknowledge that the "land where the Microsoft campus is situated" was traditionally occupied by The Sammamish, The Duwamish, The Snowqualmie, the Muckleshoot, the Snohomish, the Tulalip, and other "Coast- Salish peoples since time immemorial."
"A people that are still here, continuing to honor and bring to light their ancient heritage," says Senior Program Manager and On-Air Host Allison Weins, who works in the Developer Tools Division. "I'm an Asian and White female with dark brown hair," she continues, "wearing a red sleeveless top."
The second host, Program Manager of the "AI Platform Group" Seth Juarez, also vocally acknowledged his race and gender before continuing with the usual conference.
"I'm a tall Hispanic male wearing a blue shirt and khaki pants," Juarez said before moving on to talk about the "latest solutions" for connecting with "peers around the world."
Many Microsoft employees, such as Nic Fillingham and Natalia Godyla, also followed this pattern of "woke" introductions throughout the conference, as did other employees before speaking on the air.
"Woke" ideology, or "Woke-ism," are terms used at the center of many of the fiercest political and cultural debates in the past few years, according to Metro.
In recent years, the term "woke" has been used to criticize people in arguments surrounding identity politics. In a pejorative sense, "woke-ism" means "following an intolerant and moralizing ideology" and is used to mock "over-righteous liberalism," according to Wikipedia.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary deems the term "U.S. slang" and describes it as being "aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues (especially issues of racial and social justice)," according to National World.
The term has recently been associated with political and social causes like LGBTQ+ advocacy, the Black Lives Matter movement, and "left-wing ideas involving social justice or identity politics," as described by Wiki's encyclopedia.
Microsoft did not respond to a request for comment from The National Desk.
@Drain Todger's Commentary:
What planet are these mysterious humanoid creatures from? No, wait, don't tell us, or we'll be here all day.
The three-hour-long conference is completely downvote-bombed on YouTube, as it should be.
Microsoft doesn't give a flying fuck about Coast Salish people. Imagine the sheer conceit of these mincing cunts with their $200 hairstylist visits and $10,000 smiles, blubbering some conciliatory shit about how their campus is "on Indian land" while they're surrounded in luxury and hawking sweatshop-made gadgetry and bullshit cloud spyware.
This is what the average Indian Reservation looks like:
Reservations are dens of rape and alcohol abuse.
Native American women still have the highest rates of rape and assault
A flawed tribal court structure, little local law enforcement and a lack of funding fail to protect women from violence.
Microsoft's Market Cap is $2.5 trillion. That's greater than the GDP of fucking Italy. They could literally give a billion dollars to the poor widdle Indians and it wouldn't impact their bottom line at all.
What are they actually spending their money on?
They lumped together some donations with some other companies for Colorado River tribes that amounted to $8 million in total, to improve their access to fresh water:
Google, Microsoft Donations Advance Arizona, Tribal Water Plan
Companies and charities on Tuesday committed $8 million to pay Colorado River Indian tribes to conserve water as part of a deal to address water shortages.
Most of that money will go straight into the hands of private contractors to build infrastructure projects. In other words, companies like fucking Bechtel or Turner Construction.
Microsoft are currently spending hundreds of millions of dollars on upgrading their corporate campus:
Microsoft Plans Nine-Figure Redevelopment Project at Redmond Campus
The company is planning a massive investment at its headquarters in a project that will begin next fall and last up to seven years.
They don't give a flying fuck. They don't give a rat's ass about Native Americans. Not only do they not give a shit, they don't give the tiniest turdlet dangling from Bill Gates' ass.
Now, by all this, I don't mean to say that Microsoft should or should not do anything to help Indians. I honestly don't give a fuck. However, their political correctness is repulsive because of the sheer smug hypocrisy of it.
