The Irish Yank is officially out at peloton

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Hope he wins. There’s two sides to every story of course, but the complaint puts Jen Cotter in a very bad light.

On FB there are people who know her who say this doesn't sound like her, and FWIW (since this is all speculation) she has an LGBT kid, and Daniel has been liking a lot of anti trans anti vax stuff on social media.

I have to admit I agree with others that Peloton must have had a very good reason to let him go with a fairly paltry severance package. They know their press has been bad, and they know he's a popular instructor and it would have benefitted them to pay him off. They chose not to. And I have learned a lot of less than flattering things about him lately. I mean liking Candace Owens on twitter is enough all by itself almost. Which is a real bummer because he was my favorite strength instructor. I'm not going to say I know for sure who is right or wrong, but I know there are always three sides to every story and we're only hearing the first one, which in the world of PR gets a big advantage. And when there is money at play, the stories are always biased.

As for overpaying instructors you guys are nuts. Cody would be close to irreplaceable for them. The instructor salaries, even in the 6/7 figures, are drops in the bucket for the overall overhead and people fall in love with them. The fact that they don't have a rotating door of instructors honestly says a lot and it keeps butts on the bikes. People get attached, they get followings, people feel personally connected to their favorite instructors. Cody, with his 2-3 classes a week, is probably viewed by at minimum hundreds of thousands of users a week. And if he quit, I bet they would see a not insignificant of app users cancel. He's worth the million bucks or whatever he's getting. When you think about what the 'instructor salary' line item is at say, soul cycle? Its likely FAR more than peloton because they pay hundreds of instructors all over the country, instead of 50 like peloton is doing.

100%. I was actually never a fan of Daniel- not that I disliked him but just prefer other instructors. That said, his liking of Candace Owens is enough for me on its own to never take a class of his again- it’s just totally antithetical to my personal values and I can’t stomach it. I don’t have an opinion on this lawsuit bc I want more info, such as Peloton’s response.. BUT my feeling was always that his firing had something to do with his social media behavior and that stuff being in direct conflict with their brand, their general vibe, and the values shared by their instructors who are a very diverse and inclusive bunch.

What’s nuts is that he would feel so strongly about keeping up his Twitter stuff that he must have refused to take them down when asked.

I can see where he's coming from, though -- other instructors openly talk about politics in class and on social media. You may disagree with his views, as I do, but it doesn't help Peloton's cause if he's given disparate treatment over old likes on Twitter (the ones I saw were from March) when others who talk politics more openly in class aren't.

Maybe I missed it, but who talks about politics? (Sadly) I follow a bunch of instructors on IG and most of them don’t go anywhere near any controversial topics and stick with self promotion/kids/dog/house/fitness. Maybe closest might be LGBT issues if you consider them “political.”

I don't take him, but I heard Matty talks about politics a lot. I feel like Cody mentioned he's voting for Biden on IG? Robin has mentioned it a few times, too.

Interesting. I only do strength and tread and take a lot of Matty and Robyn and neither has gone anywhere close to politics that I can remember!

Agree. I have heard zero political talk, which would completely trigger me since I was working for Congress during the insurrection.

I take a lot of Cody, Robin, and Matty classes and have never heard any of them talk politics. And I’ve been taking Cody classes for years. He mostly talks about food, TV, and dating stuff.

I’ve taken maybe a hundred Cody classes and never heard him talk politics beyond encouraging ppl to have a plan to vote. He’s also specifically said if you know me you can probably guess who I vote for, but never heard him go beyond that in a class

I don’t think anyone said that the Irish Yank fellow said anything in classes either though. People have said he liked things on social media that they disagree with so they wouldn’t want to take his classes because of that.

Exactly. He never said anything about politics in his classes but apparently is not allowed to have an opinion outside of that either. Plenty of instructors support things that others may not - BLM, LGBTQ+ rights, etc. - but this is considered a separate category I suppose.

What were those opinions? Sorry but not all opinions are created equal.

As I understand it, anti-vax and anti-trans.

One is anti science and the one is discriminatory, so these are not ok opinions. Anti vaxxers suck. So do people who are anti-trans.

The transphobia is even worse in the UK, if you can imagine. Unfortunately, in the UK it’s also the progressive media outlets driving this bizarre moral panic. I will be happy when our societies stop with the unproductive culture wars and focus on boring things like governing and policy.

You know the “Irish Yank” isn’t from the UK, right? Not sure the point of your post, except to show your ignorance of geography.

DP, while true, Ireland is also home to a lot of transphobia. Certainly as bad as the UK if not worse.

What is this based on? Data? Vibes?

Ireland has been moving away from the Church and in a more progressive direction at the same time that the UK has been moving right and in a more reactionary direction.

There have been great strides legislatively but Ireland is a very religious country and is struggling to deal with homophobia and transphobia.

https://beinglgbtqi.ie/?page_id=35

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/02610183211063402

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjXp7Xzy-f6AhUMD1kFHfZ1DQ8QFnoECBkQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinknews.co.uk%2F2022%2F04%2F20%2Ftrans-ireland-dublin-callum-kenney-transphobia%2F&usg=AOvVaw1mxXWsnGrS2tYwp18bnGLs

[Anonymous]

I really liked Daniel as an instructor and he never mentioned politics or any social issues in his classes. I don't follow any instructors on social media so I can't comment on what any of them may have said or done there. The facts will play out in the course of the lawsuit and the public will likely never know the details, but at first glance it appears to be yet another example of cancel culture. The instructors are expected to maintain a presence on social media to heighten their brand (and in turn Peloton's) but their online presence has to align with Peloton's--and now it seems he got sacked because he "liked" some pages or posts that are aligned with "conservative" values. I don't know what percentage of Peloton's membership might share those views or feel like cancel culture has gotten extreme, so we'll see whether this has any impact on the membership.

But honestly, I'm really sick of politics and social issues permeating every aspect of our lives. With a few exceptions, I don't really care what beliefs the instructors personally have as long I don't have to hear about it when I'm working out. I agree there are certain beliefs that should never be tolerated in general (white supremacy, anti-semitism come to mind) but there are a lot of issues where people should be able to disagree within reason. I personally am not anti-gay or anti-trans but there are lots of people who are based on religious views or whatnot. Same with anti-vaxxing. Same with abortion rights. We as a country have gotten to a point where we cannot tolerate any difference of opinion.

Of course, we don't really know what happened leading up to Daniel getting fired, so maybe it's more than this. Maybe his legal team is just trying to couch the dispute in these terms to drum up public support.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Any lawyers read the suit (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23130609-peloton-suite)? I am not a lawyer but I feel like this isn't very well-written. Also seems bogus to call out discrimination when he's liking anti-trans aka discriminatory posts, sheesh.

Lawsuits from plaintiff's firms tend to not be well written because they don't have a team of attorneys billing out at between $400 and $1500 and hour pouring over them. If his attorneys show that he had a documented medical issue that he presented to his employers, it seems like they've met their burden

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Any lawyers read the suit (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23130609-peloton-suite)? I am not a lawyer but I feel like this isn't very well-written. Also seems bogus to call out discrimination when he's liking anti-trans aka discriminatory posts, sheesh.

Lawsuits from plaintiff's firms tend to not be well written because they don't have a team of attorneys billing out at between $400 and $1500 and hour pouring over them. If his attorneys show that he had a documented medical issue that he presented to his employers, it seems like they've met their burden

Badly written, typos galore, no exhibits, affidavits from doctors, even the contract isn’t attached! I disagree that this bare minimum is all plaintiff’s lawyers need to do to meet their burden. Many cases are dismissed at the early stages for failure to state claims properly or demonstrating a legally cognizable cause of action. Putting something out there that defendants attorneys (who do bill by the hour!) can pick apart so easily is a pretty lazy move. I quit my firm job 5 years ago and I could still draft a pretty good Motion to Dismiss for that complaint.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Any lawyers read the suit (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23130609-peloton-suite)? I am not a lawyer but I feel like this isn't very well-written. Also seems bogus to call out discrimination when he's liking anti-trans aka discriminatory posts, sheesh.

Lawsuits from plaintiff's firms tend to not be well written because they don't have a team of attorneys billing out at between $400 and $1500 and hour pouring over them. If his attorneys show that he had a documented medical issue that he presented to his employers, it seems like they've met their burden

Badly written, typos galore, no exhibits, affidavits from doctors, even the contract isn’t attached! I disagree that this bare minimum is all plaintiff’s lawyers need to do to meet their burden. Many cases are dismissed at the early stages for failure to state claims properly or demonstrating a legally cognizable cause of action. Putting something out there that defendants attorneys (who do bill by the hour!) can pick apart so easily is a pretty lazy move. I quit my firm job 5 years ago and I could still draft a pretty good Motion to Dismiss for that complaint.

Also not a lawyer but this was horribly written. The firm Daniel hired doesn't even do employment law; it's a 2-person shop focused on commercial litigation. I'm surprised no one proofread the document and that Daniel approved it (assuming he read it beforehand).