In anticipation of Amazon Prime Day, John Oliver dedicated Sunday night’s Last Week Tonight to e-commerce—specifically conditions in warehouses operated by online retailers.
According to Oliver, working in such facilities can be, well, dangerous. “I didn’t know there were jobs more dangerous than those, except rodeo clown, Oompa Loompa, or shark dentist,” he said.
As Oliver tells it, some warehouses are too hot and operate “at a breakneck pace”, especially at companies that offer same-day or next-day shipping.
“Amazon is not the worst actor, but being not the worst is a low, low bar,” said Oliver. He said online retailers were “the Michael Jackson of shipping. They are the best at what they do, everyone tries to imitate them, and no one who learns a third thing about them is happy that they did.”
He went on to discuss the reported conditions in Amazon’s warehouses and the complaints about them posted by former employees on YouTube, and lawsuits against the giant.
All that is just so customers can get “rubber horse masks” that they forget all about until they arrive in two days or less. With that in mind, before Prime Day mania hits, Oliver suggested a new slogan for the company: “Amazon, try not to think about it.”
See the full video of John Oliver on Last Week Tonight on Amazon video below.
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