Tripp Mickle, reporting for The New York Times on serious allegations against Jay Blahnik (gift link):

But along the way, Mr. Blahnik created a toxic work environment, said nine current and former employees who worked with or for Mr. Blahnik and spoke about personnel issues on the condition of anonymity. They said Mr. Blahnik, 57, who leads a roughly 100-person division as vice president for fitness technologies, could be verbally abusive, manipulative and inappropriate. His behavior contributed to decisions by more than 10 workers to seek extended mental health or medical leaves of absence since 2022, about 10 percent of the team, these people said.

Blahnik hasn’t commented, and Apple says it never happened:

In a legal filing, Apple denied that there had been “harassment, discrimination, retaliation or any other harm.”

The accusations against Blahnik include sexually inappropriate behavior—toward both male and female employees—including this peculiar account:

On another occasion, Mr. Blahnik said in front of several employees that the wife of a Fitness+ manager must have had an affair with another man because the manager’s son had a different hair color, Ms. Mofidi and three other former employees said. Mr. Blahnik used a vulgar word in making the remark, they said.

Some people think they’re being chummy when they’re actually being indecorous. Assuming he used the reported language, I’d wager Blahnik thinks it was locker-room talk. At the very least, he appears to have a seriously misplaced sense of propriety.

Also, does Blahnik not know how hair color works?