A Georgia-based activist was ripped on social media for accusing Elon Musk of starving Twitter employees, after it was revealed that free lunches will no longer be provided at the company.
On Friday, The New York Times released a report detailing Musk’s tumultuous takeover of Twitter, with workers telling the paper that their new boss plans to make employees pay for lunch at the company cafeteria. Lunches were free under previous management.
That same day, "super followable" Democrat activist Andrew Wortman shared a link to the article, writing, "He fired ¾ of the employees. Now he’s planning to starve the rest of them. He’s failure incarnate."
A number of prominent Twitter accounts mocked Wortman for equating paid lunches with starvation, including Musk himself.
"Is this a parody?" sideline reporter Tatjana Pasalic asked.
"I can’t tell," Musk replied.
New York law partner Ron Coleman appeared to mock Wortman by sending an Amazon link to the book "There’s no such thing a free lunch," by Milton Friedman.
"Here’s a book you might like," Coleman wrote. "If you promise to read the whole thing I’ll even send it to you. Free."
"Starve? Because well-paid employees have to buy (or bring?) their own lunch? What other industry gives employees free lunch? Surely you’re joking?," former gymnast and author Jennifer Sey chimed in.
Ruby Media Group president Kristen Ruby admitted that she pays for her own lunch, and compared Wortman’s mentality to socialism, where people expect everything for free.
"‘Starve’ is a bit much," The Federalist staff editor Sam Mangold-Lenett tweeted. "Considering the people in question make considerably more than the overwhelming majority of the country, I think they can brown-bag it."
Many other Twitter users continued to criticize Wortman for his tweet.
The following day, Wortman hit back at his critics, calling Musk a "cheap pile of garbage" in the process.
"For the ‘I bring my own lunch’ crowd, that’s a shame but not relevant. Twitter was a company that provided lunch for its employees for free for ten years and has now abruptly stopped because its CEO is a cheap pile of garbage," he said.
The New York Times on Friday devoted eight reporters and 2,598 words to investigating Elon Musk’s first few weeks after buying Twitter.
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The Times recounted how Musk's large-scale layoff plan developed: "On Oct. 28, hours after completing his $44 billion buyout of Twitter the night before, Mr. Musk gathered several human-resource executives in a ‘war room’ in the company’s offices in San Francisco. Prepare for widespread layoffs, he told them, six people with knowledge of the discussion said. Twitter’s work force needed to be slashed immediately, he said."
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