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Mastodon, circa 1934…
Me: Don’t support IBM, they’re selling mainframes and maintaining them for the Third Reich, don’t support Hugo Boss, they’re making uniforms for the Nazi, don’t support VW…
Folks: We know lots of great people who work at IBM, Hugo Boss, and VW that don’t agree with Hitler. What do you want them to do, quit? You need to pipe down and appreciate how they’re changing the system from within.
@aral "Great people" would either quit working for oppressive organizations when made aware that they are that, or be so actually intent at working to "change them from the inside" that they WANT people to oppose those organizations from the outside while they covertly subvert them from the inside.
Neither of those could lead to "so we must accept those oppressive organizations".
@b9AcE @aral
Nobody on earth lives in a country which
* respects immigrants the way they should
* deals with climate change the way they should
* respects and supports online freedom, data protection sufficiently
* values its citizens from surveillance capitalism
* hasn't got at least some innocent blood on its hands
... does that make all of us evil/complacent if we don't leave immediately? Where should we go?
Would you be willing to start a new nation somewhere on a rock?
...that is not to say that we should accept all those things!
But how far somebody is willing to go to oppose bad things in their own company/neighbourhood/city/state depends not only on how bad they themselves think it is*, but also on what the cost to themselves would be**.
*your opinion is just an opinion, and most people see their own wrongdoing less easily as that of others, whodathunk?
**leave your children/grandparents behind? Your income? Can you get a new one?
So while I *am* unhappy that most Google employees just go along, it's not really them I'm angry at. There was some internal fallout over Google's plans in China, albeit far too little, imho.
But the monster is Google itself, and the higher in its hierarchy somebody is the less am I willing to excuse them.
I don't think Aral wouldn't do what he does if he didn't believe people could change their minds. So go and hate on Google, but be careful with people. Most people, anyway ...
@Mr_Teatime @aral Well, right above me on the picture that is my current avatar, there is the text "Here ends Sweden" on the door to one of the squats I was involved with,
which is a classic thing to write at the entrances to squats to indicate hem as autonomous zones, unilaterally declaring starting over without the State's authority,
so I'm sorry, but you ask your rhetorical question to the wrong person, as I would say "yes" and so would overwhelming majority of my friends.
I also have refused working for companies due to them choosing to do business with some of the worst States out there.
None may be good, but that is not a reason to accept the worst.
I never said people can't change, but I do think incentive helps, in both directions.
Okay, I had not been aware ...
See, I'm not trying to temper your enthusiasm for something that's extremely important to you. I argue that you can't demand the same enthusiasm from everybody else.
People have different priorities and perspectives. E.g.: I'm struggling to get friends to understand that trusting Facebook is a bad idea. But they care deeply about social issues.
Calling them "part of the problem" to their face prbly wouldn't help...
@Mr_Teatime @aral The post you were originally replying to is intended as a philosophical reinforcement of the exact standpoint expressed in Aral's post, neither stronger nor weaker.
I am very well aware that people have different priorities and to even be heard one must adapt phrasing and degree of criticism to where the one addressed is able to hear what is being said.
That's how for example we got the squat in the avatar to get headlines in countryside major media such as "The neat squat", journalists declare personal support, schools bringing classes to show examples of political activism, etc, etc.
Just because the goal is far from where we are, doesn't mean one must or even CAN be constantly harsh in order to reach that goal. Sometimes, that may actually lead backwards.
Hookay, I think may have I stayed up too late last night -- there's a behaviour I should change but find really hard to...
I was reading a subtext of "anyone who hasn't quit Google already is a lost cause" between the lines, and that rubbed me the wrong way.
So I think we're actually mostly in agreement here ...
@Mr_Teatime I thought so the whole time, but didn't want to impose that opinion on you. ;-)
Still good we talked about it :)
@Mr_Teatime Oh, sure. A healthy exchange of ideas is... always healthy. ;-)
@aral They're not changing the system from within, they're just making a living. Either you are a Blade Runner or you are "little people". They chose not to change the system
@aral
An organisation and its members are not the same thing. There were of course some genuinely good people in Germany between 1933 and 1945, but that doesn't mean that Germany wasn't a force for evil during that time.
The same holds today: Not everybody decides at the same moment that Google has become evil, not everyone has the perspective/means/courage/willpower (herd instinct, man!) to do what I wish they would do, and I still need to be nice to them.
But not to Google itself.
NGL, at first I read that as "circa 1994" and I was VERY confused for a split second