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Your post somehow remind me of the most proeminent excuse in the Nuremberg trials. "We were just following orders". You are right that regulation play a very

Your post somehow remind me of the most proeminent excuse in the Nuremberg trials. "We were just following orders". You are right that regulation play a very important part into this, but this should not be a excuse to releave ourselves from the burden that in the end we are responsible for everything we do, even under orders, under a chain of command or whatever. Proper regulation is a good goal, but in the meantime, making a ethical stand in what we do, is very important, because the moral corruption can spread faster than the regulation, and in the end, there will be no individual ethical behavior nor proper regulation. People should not just try to quit their jobs just because they work in a big company (maybe) doing shady stuff, because you may be in a job that actually create something good, or even if thats not the case, you can try to move to another product or team.. But if you are working in a core part that are doing unethical things, i guess trying to hide behind the company can work like a placebo for your guilty, but i bet it wont work after a short period of time.

FussyZeus 7y ago
Again, I'm not saying it's wrong. What I'm saying is in our current system, everything is tied to your job; your health insurance, your credit, obviously your income. If you don't have a job, you don't have food, you don't have housing, you don't have gas in your car. This to me is very like when people criticize capitalism and are countered with "yet you participate in capitalism, curious!" as though that's a point. Of course I participate in it. I don't have a fucking choice. If I want to take my ethical stance that capitalism is a dehumanizing and oppressive system, how am I to do that? Go live in the fucking woods? So maybe I have to stay at my job, even if I fundamentally disagree with it, because again, the other choices are horrific. As I said to another commenter, I'd love to hear one of you guys debating whether to continue working at Facebook on their news team, or whatever, if you have a child with chronic illness. Or maybe your wife is in treatment for depression. Hell, maybe YOU are. I'm not saying people shouldn't do their best to act ethically. I'm saying that painting anyone who can't make those kinds of ethical stances as a complicit bastard is the worst kind of horseshit, and putting the burden of the ethics of their employers on them is ridiculous. Just because a shitty company can find enough people who can't afford to say no to develop their unethical software doesn't mean those people are then bad, especially when, again, the alternative solution is put pen to paper and make what they're doing ILLEGAL. With no room for interpretation.
- oscargrouch 7y ago
  I agree with you that in some cases this is not even a choice to you. You will pay severely for this choice and you may not be willing to pay such a big price for acting ethically. Thats why in a part of my former comment i've addressed other options, like moving to other products that actually create something good.. But anyway the important part is to remain conscious about this, even if you cant get out of the situation. Because the uneasy feeling might help you to recognize a good oportunity to change your situation. The Nazism soldiers example shows cinism, like they knew what they were doing, they choose individually to do it, and when confronted they just blamed hierarchy. Somehow in the process they have lost their 'soul'. Its very specific, and its not very much relatable to every case, but more like a cautionary tale, that we need to be aware of this, and keep or conciousness and our individual will as part of the whole. What each one of us do matters in the whole, and we should be awake in every order we are executing when we are in a system where we need to follow orders.

FussyZeus 7y ago

Again, I'm not saying it's wrong. What I'm saying is in our current system, everything is tied to your job; your health insurance, your credit, obviously your income. If you don't have a job, you don't have food, you don't have housing, you don't have gas in your car. This to me is very like when people criticize capitalism and are countered with "yet you participate in capitalism, curious!" as though that's a point. Of course I participate in it. I don't have a fucking choice. If I want to take my ethical stance that capitalism is a dehumanizing and oppressive system, how am I to do that? Go live in the fucking woods? So maybe I have to stay at my job, even if I fundamentally disagree with it, because again, the other choices are horrific. As I said to another commenter, I'd love to hear one of you guys debating whether to continue working at Facebook on their news team, or whatever, if you have a child with chronic illness. Or maybe your wife is in treatment for depression. Hell, maybe YOU are. I'm not saying people shouldn't do their best to act ethically. I'm saying that painting anyone who can't make those kinds of ethical stances as a complicit bastard is the worst kind of horseshit, and putting the burden of the ethics of their employers on them is ridiculous. Just because a shitty company can find enough people who can't afford to say no to develop their unethical software doesn't mean those people are then bad, especially when, again, the alternative solution is put pen to paper and make what they're doing ILLEGAL. With no room for interpretation.

oscargrouch 7y ago
I agree with you that in some cases this is not even a choice to you. You will pay severely for this choice and you may not be willing to pay such a big price for acting ethically. Thats why in a part of my former comment i've addressed other options, like moving to other products that actually create something good.. But anyway the important part is to remain conscious about this, even if you cant get out of the situation. Because the uneasy feeling might help you to recognize a good oportunity to change your situation. The Nazism soldiers example shows cinism, like they knew what they were doing, they choose individually to do it, and when confronted they just blamed hierarchy. Somehow in the process they have lost their 'soul'. Its very specific, and its not very much relatable to every case, but more like a cautionary tale, that we need to be aware of this, and keep or conciousness and our individual will as part of the whole. What each one of us do matters in the whole, and we should be awake in every order we are executing when we are in a system where we need to follow orders.