[gdulli]

I don't even understand which two things you're trying to distinguish. Or where duplicity comes in. The narrative of the employees understanding too late about the rights they gave up, and then protesting, is straightforward.

I doubt the employees had ever given any thought to it, or were even aware of it, until they had a reason to look into lawsuits.

Arbitration is neither objectively worthy nor unworthy of moral condemnation. It's on them and on you to try to make your cases and influence opinion.

Like many things arbitration is probably fine in principle if treated by both parties in the spirit in which it was originally conceived. To simplify legal matters. But if it gets abused and used as a license to misbehave by one party then it should be rethought.

Maybe that's what happened here and maybe not, I don't know. But the positions and intentions seem straightforward.