It's unreasonable to expect somebody to publicly denounce their spouse like this. It's inappropriate for people to make a coworker's spouse a matter of contention in the first place.
And stop pretending that this is just any ordinary coworker. This is the public face and leader of the company that publicly advertises a certain set of values. This is also a person who has been made rich by the success of the company, and then is using that money to donate to very morally questionable causes (either directly himself or via his wife).
The guy literally donated an "ordinary coworker's" years salary to an organization that explicitly discriminates against members of the LGBTQ+ community. Do tell me exactly why it is inappropriate for employees of the company to complain about such dubious donations of their CEO, who they helped make mind-numbingly rich?
Would you say the degree to which a coworker's personal relationship with their spouse is 'your business' is proportional to their salary? Or how exactly do you figure this works?
His relationship with his spouse is his business, not yours. It's really that simple.
> His relationship with his spouse is his business, not yours. It's really that simple.
If his wife yelled racial slurs and he said nothing about it, should employees just shut up about that as well?
Presumably you're arguing they should stop advertising that set of values. But then that'd be used to condemn them as well.
why it is inappropriate for employees of the company to complain about such dubious donations of their CEO
Totally appropriate, just as long as those employees don't mind the CEO telling everyone that their political donations are dubious/questionable, demanding they publicly denounce their spouse, or controlling their private political and charitable donations.
But of course those employees would explode if the CEO even hinted at doing any of those things. One rule for them and another for the boss, likely justified with vague rhetoric about power. But, you can't have it both ways. If employees can demand control over the CEO's life but not vice-versa, then it's the employees who have the power, not the CEO. Yet we all know that's not how companies actually work. Eventually even tech CEOs will realise that, so expect them to get a lot more aggressive against this kind of employee activism in future. It's simply not fair on them, currently.
The bosses have the most power and money and therefore deserve the most scrutiny.
