On Monday 4 May, activists protested the Met Gala over its links to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. Reportedly among these activists was Amazon Union founder Chris Smalls, who appears to have been arrested by a small horde of police officers:
Chris Smalls, the founder and president of the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), was arrested during a protest outside the 2026 Met Gala in New York City. pic.twitter.com/SJiJt6MoNU
— Al-Jarmaq News (@Aljarmaqnetnews) May 5, 2026
Met Gala sets up people v Amazon
For those who are unfamiliar with it, the Met Gala is a lavish affair in which celebrities dress like the dystopian villains from the Hunger Games:
70% of Americans are struggling to afford groceries, housing, and healthcare, and there is a genocide in Gaza and Lebanon.
Fuck the Met Gala. pic.twitter.com/0glAGZBNJ5
— Power to the People ☭
(@ProudSocialist) May 5, 2026
This year, the gala has attracted more criticism than usual. With a sponsorship from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, the Met Gala is arguably now every bit as dystopian as its critics say. As IBT reported:
Amazon union chief Chris Smalls was arrested outside the Met Gala 2026 on Monday night during a protest against the event’s sponsorship by Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez Bezos. The activist was detained by police after attempting to breach security near the red carpet entrance, where he brandished a sign criticising Amazon’s labour practices.
Videos captured Smalls’ arrest from multiple angles:
Chris Smalls, Amazon labor union and workers activist, was tackled by NYPD at the Met Gala. https://t.co/Y61reJGWYS
— AMANI (@AmaniUniverse) May 5, 2026
Activists also used projectors:
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IBTadded:
Smalls, who rose to prominence leading the first successful union drive at an Amazon warehouse in Staten Island in 2022, has long been a thorn in the side of the retail giant’s founder and a prominent voice in the labour movement.
Amazon hired Smalls in 2015 to work at one of the company’s warehouses. The company fired him in 2020 after he organised a walk out to protest unsafe conditions relating to the Covid-19 pandemic. He would later found and lead the Amazon Labour Union, stepping down from the position in 2024.
Smalls has spoken to al Jazeera about his struggles against the mega-corporation:
Conditions
Speaking on the conditions that Amazon workers face, Trades Union Congress have said:
Reports of long, gruelling shifts with unreasonable productivity targets and unfair shift patterns are common in Amazon fulfilment centres. In the UK, pickers are expected to pick and pack around 300 items per hour, employees tend to only either do day or night shifts and working weeks average around 55 hours/ 10-hour days, especially over the peak Christmas period Staff were reported to have slept in tents near the Dunfermline site in Scotland to save money and so they are not late for work, which would risk them being penalised or fired.
The union additionally reported (emphasis added):
Workers’ productivity performance is also monitored, and they are harassed and disciplined or even sacked if they dip below targets. One undercover reporter said that while working in an Amazon fulfilment centre in Essex over the black Friday period, scores of staff who dipped below targets were sacked. It has been reported that the high level of monitoring creates a culture of fear, many workers do not take their legally entitled breaks because of the impact it has on productivity and the subsequent risk to hours and ultimately employment, particularly for the many temporary and agency workers it hires. The scale of the warehouses is so vast that many employees do not have time to go to the break room or for bathroom breaks – one report stated that employees were urinating into bottles.
And, protesters made sure to call attention to just that. A group called Everybody Hates Elon left 300 bottles of fake urine scattered throughout the venue just days before the Met Gala.
Never been clearer
As the gap between the rich and the poor widens, people will find shows like the Met Gala harder and harder to stomach. This will lead to more protests like the above.
If the rich don’t like the negative attention, they’re going to have to accept being slightly less rich than they are now. That or they can keep pushing it, and hope this ends up being the one time in history when hyper displays of wealth didn’t end badly for the wealthy.
Featured image via CNN
By Willem Moore
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