If this is the wrong place for this, I apologize in advance and it’s okay if it gets removed.
First, it was bad enough for Elon Musk references, but now…
The real life Paul Stamets, for which the character is named, hired union busters at his business, Fungi Perfecti.
https://www.thestand.org/2024/05/fungi-perfecti-workers-joining-together-with-liuna-252/
But rather than recognizing and respecting these workers’ right to join together free from management interference, the union reports that Fungi Perfecti has responded by hiring the union-busting firms of Littler Mendelson P.C. and the American Labor Group. These firms represent clients such as Amazon, Apple, Google, and Starbucks, all of which have faced multiple Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) charges with the National Labor Relations Board for illegally interfering in their employees’ freedom to unionize.
These firms have attempted to slow the momentum of Fungi Perfecti workers’ organizing drive with typical union-busting tactics like “unrequired” meetings that are heavily encouraged.
“ALG has been distributing anti-union propaganda that, in some cases, are outright lies,” said Derek Sewell, a warehouse worker for Fungi Perfecti. “But we will not be discouraged. It’s just unfortunate that they are spending thousands of dollars on union-busting to try to discourage us rather than investing in making Fungi Perfecti and better and more sustainable place to work.”
Anyway, my opinion is firmly that if they’re going to make references, it needs to be about people who are already dead, whose negatives are known, and who can’t come back and fuck your reference up by becoming a horrible person as your life goes on.
Because these living people keep revealing how Un-Star-Trek they are, imho.
That also could potentially be justified by the fact that the US still has places named after Confederate generals though it’s harder to lock down as any sort of positive thing.