I was thinking they are playing it up in hopes of copycats. Basically malicious compliance

Our systems and hierarchies do often support the oligarchy, but that does not mean every single individual supports the oligarchy, or that every single thing our systems do are meant to advance the goals of the ultra rich. Sometimes individuals who participate in these systems do malicious compliance, sometimes they don't comply at all.

In this case there could be someone high-up who is empathetic(or a group of empathetic people unaware of each other, their actions adding up) whose decisions led to this happening, or this could have just been a dumb decision, who knows.

I dont think they need an excuse, they just do whatever they want now. Thats what electing trump is all about, letting them run amuck unrestrained.