>Turns out, in this case, the “new machine” is Tony. And Tony’s kind of a racist. He’s tanking morale, making people feel unsafe. But management keeps him around because “he works hard.”

You're talking about management. Not the law. This discussion is about legal obligations. There is no law that says people should not have to work around things they don't like. There is no law of morale.

It also has nothing to do with anyone being "kind of a racist" or causing "disruption" or "tanking morale" or "making people feel unsafe". You have added all of those yourself.

The article is about a single woman complaining about a couple of specific comments. She is heavily incentivised by the American system to overstate the effect these comments have on her. If she just says she doesn't like it (reality) she gets nothing. If she claims it has caused her emotional harm, she gets something.

>So what do you think Tesla should be responsible for - just the machines, or also when someone like ‘Tony’ starts throwing the whole system off?

It should quite obviously not be legally responsible for what its staff members say, outside of their authority. What's more there should be nothing to be legally responsible for anyway, because saying "welcome to the plantation" isn't and shouldn't be a legal wrong.

Your analogy doesn't change anything.

>If you keep someone like Tony around, knowing the damage he’s causing, you’re not neutral - you’re endorsing his behavior.

And nobody said that Tesla shouldn't be able to fire someone if it disagrees with what its employee said or did. But obviously that doesn't mean that what was said was legally actionable.

>And nobody said that Tesla shouldn't be able to fire someone if it disagrees with what its employee said or did.

You explicitly did this earlier, actually:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43747971