The head of Netflix has told his staff he needs to “set a better example” after sacking the company’s head of communications for twice using the N-word during work meetings.
Reed Hastings, the video streaming company’s founder, told staff in a memo he had decided to “let go” of Jonathan Friedland for using the racial slur in a “descriptive” sense.
Friedland, a former journalist who joined Netflix in 2011, first used the word several months ago during a discussion about offensive words in comedy, and again a few days later during a conversation with two black colleagues.
Hastings, who became a billionaire after starting Netflix as a mail-order DVD rental company in 1997, said in the lengthy memo, published by the Hollywood Reporter, that he heard about the second incident last week.
“I should have done more to use [the first incident] as a learning moment for everyone at Netflix about how painful and ugly that word is, and that it should not be used,” Hastings wrote. “I realise that my privilege has made me intellectualise or otherwise minimise race issues like this. I need to set a better example by learning and listening more so I can be the leader we need.”
Friedland tweeted an apology: “Leaders have to be beyond reproach in the example we set and unfortunately I fell short of that standard when I was insensitive in speaking to my team about words that offend in comedy. I feel awful about the distress this lapse caused to people at a company I love and where I want everyone to feel included and appreciated.”
Friedland spent 20 years as a foreign correspondent before joining the Walt Disney Company. During his seven years at Netflix, it has become a dominant force online, valued at £106bn, with 125 million subscribers worldwide.
The memo from Hastings said Friedland had “contributed greatly in many areas”, but showed “unacceptably low racial awareness and sensitivity”.
“Several people afterwards told him how inappropriate and hurtful his use of the N-word was, and Jonathan apologised to those that had been in the meeting. We hoped this was an awful anomaly never to be repeated.”
Of the second incident, Hastings wrote: “Jonathan said the N-word again to two of our black employees in HR who were trying to help him deal with the original offence. The second incident confirmed a deep lack of understanding, and convinced me to let Jonathan go now.”
Hastings said global debate and the word’s use in film and music had created some confusion about whether using it could ever be acceptable.
“For non-black people, the word should not be spoken as there is almost no context in which it is appropriate or constructive (even when singing a song or reading a script),” Hastings wrote.
“There is not a way to neutralise the emotion and history behind the word in any context. The use of the phrase ‘N-word’ was created as a euphemism, and the norm, with the intention of providing an acceptable replacement and moving people away from using the specific word. When a person violates this norm, it creates resentment, intense frustration, and great offence for many.”
