The California-based Walt Disney Company deliberately discriminates against “white males,” according to a video that has been published by US undercover journalist James O’Keefe.
Two employees of the O’Keefe Media Group (OMG) secretly filmed Disney executive Michael Giordano, a vice-president for business affairs at 20th Television, bought from Fox in 2019.
“Nobody else is going to tell you this, but they’re not considering any white males for the job,” Giordano was shown as saying in the video published late on Thursday.
“I’m guessing that there’s acceptable code words and buzzwords that are used to explain what they’re looking for,” such as people “bringing diversity,” Giordano continued, but in one or two cases he was told directly, “there’s no way we’re hiring a white male.”
BREAKING: Senior Vice President at The Walt Disney Company details discriminatory hiring practices: “Nobody else is going to tell you this, but they’re not considering any white males for the job,” says Michael Giordano, a Vice President of Business affairs, “there’s no way we’re… pic.twitter.com/IMOsFOLKro
— James O’Keefe (@JamesOKeefeIII) June 20, 2024
He shared an anecdote about his department wanting to hire someone “who was half black but didn’t, like, appear half black.” A creative executive stepped in and stopped it, according to Giordano. “They wanted somebody in meetings who would appear a certain way and he wasn’t gonna bring that to the meeting.”
“It kind of feels like at some point there’s going to be a lawsuit,” he added.
Giordano himself didn’t get a promotion on account of his immutable characteristics, he revealed at one point in the video published by OMG. Although he has been with the company for 11 years and knows people in human resources, “as far as Disney is concerned, I’m a white male, and that’s not who they’re looking to promote at the moment,” he said.
As the source of these decisions, Giordano pointed to Disney’s chief executive Bob Iger and the company’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) department.
“I think there’s certainly a belief that it’s just good for society,” he can be heard saying at one point. “But there’s also a belief that we’re gonna make more money if we appeal to a wider variety of people.”
OMG’s expose comes as Disney faces backlash over The Acolyte, the latest show in the ‘Star Wars’ franchise. Created for the Disney+, the series has drawn scathing condemnation from the Star Wars fandom. The company has just turned a small quarterly profit from its streaming platforms, which include Hulu and the sports-oriented ESPN+, which drove the Q1 numbers.
“Wow,” and “This is messed up” was how Elon Musk of SpaceX, Tesla and X (formerly Twitter) commented on the OMG video. Musk is currently funding a wrongful termination lawsuit against Disney by former Star Wars: The Mandalorian star Gina Carano.
After the video was published, Giordano wiped his LinkedIn profile.
Commenting on the undercover video, O’Keefe said there was more material that will be published next week, including the revelation that a white man can be considered for an executive position if he’s Jewish.
