Nintendo of America President: “Everyone Has the Right To Form a Union”
Nintendo of America President: “Everyone Has the Right To Form a Union”
Inverse sat down with Doug Bowser to talk about the release of 'Super Mario Bros. Wonder,' the future of the Nintendo Switch, and the state of the industry.
This is the best thing nintendo have ever said
"Said" being the operative word. Talk is just talk. I predict that if any union-forming attempt is made, Bowser's opinion will change with frame perfect accuracy and this statement will be memory holed. (Although unionization of Nintendo employees is unlikely to happen in Japan anyway. If it does, it will more probably be within their American or European subsidiaries.)
We should remember that Nintendo is a privately held, for-profit company run by Japanese people. They have their own ethic, the company belongs to them, and profit comes first. They might make video games and franchises we like, but they are not good guys. There is tons of well documented past behavior on their part that illustrates this in many ways.
Why? It's obligatory, it's literally the law. It's also against the law to say the opposite. The best thing they've ever said is a bunch of nothing?
Well, no, it's not obligatory to freely state it in an interview. That being said, I understand what you mean.
I meant that this is something that not many other companies would say. And it doesn't matter if it's the law, big companies still prevent it from happening.
It's literally against the law to state otherwise.
Beat me to it. Here's the quote in context:
I think we're on the right path in terms of ensuring we've got a work environment and culture that allows people to be productive, to have balance in their lives, and to grow within the company. Everyone has the right to form a union, and certainly in the future, wherever it takes us, we'll respect that. But we're very much focused right now on how to create the best work culture and environment we possibly can.
We're always listening to our workers and we want to make sure we have both formal and informal ways of getting worker feedback and understanding the needs of our employees and where we can improve. And we always act on that feedback. And, as I said earlier, there is always a right to form unions and we respect that.
Well, yeah, congrats, he basically just stated the law: yes, everyone (in the US and many other countries) has the right to form unions. To "respect that" is to acknowledge that right.
I know the bar is damn low for good corporate behaviour, but man, it's apparently way lower than I realized...
Hell yeah
Everyone has a right to form a union, but if you do you're fired.
The large Mario thumbnail prevents me from reading the quote in anything but his voice
Bowsers not such a bad guy after all!
I swear they picked that guy because of his name.
Is this from the Nintendo part or from the Of America part? (As in, is this Nintendo philosophy or just because it's supposed to be that way in the US?)
Nintendo of America. It's unclear what Nintendo Japan think of unions.
This is kind of a nothing burger. Unfortunately companies say this all the time.
As history has shown, actions speak louder than words. You should only believe these companies statements if they actually allow a union to form without any interference on their part.