Red Bull is right: Standing up to racism doesn’t mean you have to pander to the woke mob

The CEOs who leaked a “racist” map used at an internal Red Bull presentation have been fired. Quite right, too. While the map was wrong, people don’t want woke politics forced down their throat.

Back in February, a “racist” slide at a Red Bull company presentation was leaked to the public. There was a long silence over the matter, until recently when it was revealed that the executive responsible had been fired.  

However, in an interesting twist, it looks like Red Bull has fired a pair of senior woke employees. As in two of its CEOs. Aside from being the ones who leaked the image to the press, they’ve been pushing for more diversity in the company. Austrian leadership showed little interest.

Let’s be honest about something: this may be one of the smartest business moves that a company has made in years. It’s not exactly a massive revelation that racism is an evil thing that everyone hates. Well, except people who are actually racist, but I wouldn’t describe them as rational members of society. But the biggest detriment to business in the modern day isn’t “racist” maps. It’s woke politics that no one is interested in.

When Gillette released its ‘The Best Men Can Be’ ad, there was massive backlash and the company lost billions of dollars. It later said it’s “worth it.” I have a feeling any employees who lost money over that bungle don’t share the same sentiment.  

Marvel Comics has continuously pandered to the woke, and lost massive sales. Captain America, written by America-hating Ta-Nehisi Coates, can’t even ship 30,000 comics. For the uninitiated, those are abysmal numbers for such a popular character. EA Games’ Battlefield series suffered substantial losses because of similar pushing of woke politics. 

The fact of the matter is that people don’t want politics injected into every facet of their lives. They don’t want their comics and movies to come across as DNC advertisements. They don’t want to talk about race when they’re trying to get a cup of coffee. They don’t want to hear about Bell Hooks and feminist ideas while drinking energy drinks. 

That’s not why people buy these things. They buy them to drink something tasty or have fun. Politics are not fun. Politics are a miserable slog that few people want to engage with. Like visiting a proctologist, it’s only something you want to deal with if you absolutely have to.

Fact is, you don’t need a “diversity” division in your company. You just need to hire the best person for the job no matter what their race, creed, or sexuality is. Not a tough concept. You don’t need to make statements about social goings-on, because it has nothing to do with what you’re doing. Your customers don’t want it. They don’t think they need it either. So why try and shove it down their throats? 

Every company should keep this in mind. Any employee or CEO that is not interested in growing your business needs to hit the bricks. Let them go. You won’t lose anything by firing them. They’re like boils on the butt of life. 

Focus on making money, and let people make up their own minds.

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The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.