New Labor Lawsuit: Activision Blizzard Accused Of Attempting To Prevent Its Employees From Exercising Their Rights
Amidst their ongoing legal battle concerning the widely publicized sexual harassment complaint filed against them earlier this year, a new and separately filed lawsuit has accused Activision Blizzard of having used coercive and retaliatory tactics to prevent their employees from both unionizing and speaking out about their mistreatment.
Filed with the National Labor Relations Board in partnership with the CODE-CWA unionization campaign on behalf of the ABK Workers Alliance, an unofficial and informal union composed of Activision Blizzard employees, on September 10th, the new lawsuit claims that “Within the last six months the above named employer has repeatedly engaged in unlawful conduct by threatening employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed by Section 7 [of the National Labor Relations Act].”
According to said provision of the NLRA, workers are afforded “the right to unionize, to join together to advance their interests as employees, and to refrain from such activity.”
Listing numerous anti-union activities that Activision Blizzard supposedly engaged in, the lawsuit explains that “The employer has threatened employees that they cannot talk about or communicate about wages, hours and working conditions […] or discuss ongoing investigations of wages, hours and working conditions.”
Regarding the efforts to suppress employees’ attempts to unionize or discuss working conditions, The ABK Workers Alliance alleges that Activision Blizzard also “maintained an overly broad social media policy [and] enforced the social media policy against employees who have engaged in protected concerted activity.”
Further, the group of Activision Blizzard employees maintains that the company not only “threatened or disciplined employees” who engaged in these activities, but also went so far as to have “engaged in surveillance of employees engaged in concerted activity and engaged in interrogation of employees about protected concerted activity.”
In a September 14th tweet published in follow-up to their public announcement of the lawsuit, the ABK Workers Alliance asserted that “If the NLRB rules in our favor, the ruling will be retroactive and we will set a precedent that no worker in the US can be intimidated out of talking about forced arbitration.”
What do you make of this latest lawsuit filed against Activision Blizzard? Let us know your thoughts on social media or in the comments down below!
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