Big Tech Loves Big Oil: A Bid For White Supremacy
Amazon’s Alexa has strong opinions about systemic racism.
“Black lives matter. I believe in racial equality,” she says. “I stand in solidarity with the black community in the fight against systemic racism and injustice.”
So does Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai. “Our Black community is hurting,” he wrote in a public memo. “…The events of the past few weeks reflect deep structural challenges.”
In fact, self-awareness is becoming trendy among Big Tech. “We also have a responsibility to use our platform and resources intentionally to address systemic inequities in our communities and in society broadly,” declared CEO Satya Nadella in an email to Microsoft’s employees.
As the privileged of the world come to reckon with the systemic and structural racial violence deeply entrenched in our societies, tech giants are racing to vocalize their reflections, their changes of heart, and their commitments to address the pain of communities of color. Many have paused selling facial recognition technology to police departments, made donations to non-profit organizations, and touted their diversity programs. They have begun to admit responsibility for their technology by taking steps to screen hate speech and fact check information — as usual, after a crisis has already occurred.
Conspicuously silent is how Big Tech is going to address their contributions to accelerating the climate crisis, which harms Black people, Indigenous people, and people of color massively and disproportionately even though they have contributed the least to global warming. These actions span from funding climate change deniers to spreading climate misinformation, but most egregious of all is their ongoing and expanding billion-dollar cloud and AI contracts with Big Oil (Shell, BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil, etc.) to expand oil extraction capacity, which Greenpeace dissected in gritty details in May.
Google, Microsoft and Amazon are forecast to make $15.7 billion in oil contracts in 2030, most of which are intended for expanding exploration and production capacity. This number puts into perspective the hypocrisy of Amazon’s $2 billion climate fund, Microsoft’s announcement about going carbon negative in 2030 that excludes emissions from their oil contracts, and Google’s declaration of carbon neutrality through offsets, a practice that has displaced Indigenous communities and shoved the burden to the Global South.
Given that we have only 10 years left of business-as-usual emissions before inevitable climate catastrophes, Big Tech’s pursuit of oil money is reckless if not purposely insidious. Worst of all, this destructive love affair is a bid for reinforcing white supremacy through the sacrifice of BIPOC communities in the inevitable race for climate crisis adaptation. As Hop Hopkins from The Sierra Club succinctly explained, “You can’t have climate change without sacrifice zones, and you can’t have sacrifice zones without disposable people, and you can’t have disposable people without racism.”
Why we support tech workers
One sliver of hope in holding Big Tech accountable has been the relentless opposition by their own workforce. Among Google, Amazon and Microsoft, over 10,000 tech workers have publicly condemned their employers’ courtship of the fossil fuel business. They have stood up to shareholders, mobilized to walk out, and defied corporate’s silencing orders. Across all 3 companies, they have shared similar demands* for a fundamental shift in corporate priority to incorporate climate impact and justice:
- Zero emissions by 2030.**
- Zero contracts to enable or accelerate the extraction of fossil fuels.
- Zero funding for climate-denying or -delaying think tanks, lobbyists, and politicians.
- Zero collaboration with entities enabling the incarceration, surveillance, displacement, or oppression of refugees or front-line communities.***
Inspired by the tech worker movement, on April 1, 2020, Extinction Rebellion NYC played a digital prank on Google by showing the world a vision where Google apologizes for its funding of climate change deniers and embraces the workers’ demands.
In 24 hours, we generated over 4 million Twitter impressions, 160,000 unique website visits, and coverage in many press outlets. Google workers have publicly and privately let us know how the action was a morale boost for climate activists within the company and raised awareness among coworkers who were not yet engaged with the climate fight. This is the power of digital protests: we can show a broad audience the hypocrisy of Big Tech while lending solidarity to the front-line activists who lead the resistance.
Ready to join the fight?
Beginning on July 6th, Extinction Rebellion is continuing the fight at BigTechLovesBigOil.com. Over three weekly challenges of Internet arts making, we, as users of technology and stakeholders of our future, will be standing with workers to make Big Tech tell the truth about their Big Oil profits and act with the urgency this crisis demands. In addition, we are going to condemn the internal retaliations against Amazon and Google activists who are fighting against racism and labor exploitation, struggle for racial and labor justice is integral to the climate fight.
Join us today! Go to BigTechLovesBigOil.com to sign our petition, make memes, and storm the Internet with our rebellious arts to let the world know #BigTechLovesBigOil!
Endnotes
* These are the demands included in the public statements by Google Workers For Action on Climate, Amazon Employees For Climate Justice, and Microsoft Workers 4 Good released ahead of the 2019 Climate Strike.
** We, as Extinction Rebellion, call for an even more urgent deadline of zero emission by 2025. As some of the biggest corporations in the wealthiest country in the world, Google, Amazon and Microsoft need to be leaders in terms of climate ambition.
*** The 4th demand (focused on racial justice) is only included in the worker pledge of Google, but Amazon Employees For Climate Justice has explicitly called for consideration of environmental justice in many statements.
