6 ms·

I find it ironic that the same people protesting the contract would also protest a bakery that refuses to sell a product for say a same sex couple (or if you we

by slykat 7y ago

I find it ironic that the same people protesting the contract would also protest a bakery that refuses to sell a product for say a same sex couple (or if you were in the 60s, restaurants that refused to serve blacks). You either have a viewpoint that: 1) a business shouldn't make a moral judgement on its customers and be accessible to all 2) A business can make moral judgements on its customers and choose not to do business with customers considered immoral If you are ok with #2 you are running into a slippery slope in my view. And if you are ok with #2 and you are one of the largest companies in the world, it is a very huge slippery slope.

marmada 7y ago
The difference is not serving black or queer people isn't a moral judgement -- it's just discrimination (there isn't anything inherently wrong with being Black the same way there isn't anything wrong with being queer or Asian or Indian, those things aren't a choice unlike being a Nazi). At best, not serving minorities is a shitty moral judgement. Not serving ICE is a more legitimate moral judgement because ICE has the option to change their behavior and ICE is genuinely bad. Slippery slope is one of those silly things I see from free speech advocates. I tend not to see the bad impacts in real life because if the government isgoing to restrict free speech, they will do it regardless of what anti-hate speech laws currently exist.
- chillwaves 7y ago
  If racists had self awareness, they wouldn't be racists.
- slykat 7y ago
  Do you not see the negative repercussions for businesses serving the public to be allowed to make a moral judgement on who they do business with?
  - drjesusphd 7y ago
    If that's the case then there's no room whatsoever for capitalism to be anything other than an amoral system we should be ashamed of. Vote with your dollar. You're allowed to make your own moral choices and refuse to contribute to evil.
    - manigandham 7y ago
      Capitalism is nothing but an economic system where you own the means to production. There is no inherent morality. Nobody has an issue with you making choices and voting with your dollars. The issue is forcing those choices on everyone else (as in a business, especially as a non-owner) through your own interpretation of morality.
      - chipotle_coyote 7y ago
        I'm not an economist, but I'm pretty sure the system where workers own the means of production isn't capitalism.
        manigandham 7y ago
        It refers to "you" vs the state. You create a factory or a business or a new patent and you're responsible. You gain the profits or suffer the losses and nobody else can take it from you. Workers are obviously not business owners, but they do own their own labor and are free to take whatever job they want, not be assigned to it from some central authority.
      - drjesusphd 7y ago
        > There is no inherent morality. Not inherent; we have to make it so. Capitalism dominates, what, 80% of our waking lives? The idea that morality should only be relegated to the other 20% is madness.
        manigandham 7y ago
        Dominates? I don’t even know what means. It’s an economic system. What is the other 20% exactly?
- cscurmudgeon 7y ago
  So can a business refuse to serve democrats?
  - root_axis 7y ago
    Yes, they can, and should have that right.
  - claudiulodro 7y ago
    They absolutely can; political affiliation is not a protected class. Probably not good for their bottom line, though.
- ljm 7y ago
  There is nothing inherently wrong with serving ICE. You might not like it, but many of your compatriots do. I don't like what they do at all, I think it's reprehensible, backwards, and purely uncivilised. But people you utterly hate have friends too, and they see something different than you do, and we do not have a singular moral world-view. This situation with ICE should totally change, but that change is a function of your vote, not a function of protesting against Gitlab. I very strongly argue that there should never be a single perspective on morality, in the way that these posts suggest there should.
  - sjg007 7y ago
    queue IBM and the holocaust.. I mean... wtf ???
  - drjesusphd 7y ago
    > But people you utterly hate have friends too, and they see something different than you do, and we do not have a singular moral world-view. So because shitty people have friends, we should throw in the towel and refrain from enforcing moral codes in our own lives, behavior, and economic decisions? That's pretty weak stuff.
    - refurb 7y ago
      People who have different views than you are “shitty”?
      - drjesusphd 7y ago
        Some views, yes. We're talking about concentration camps for children, not monetary policy.
  - rtpg 7y ago
    Lots of people support ICE, maybe, but that doesn’t prevent a lot of people from thinking it’s inherently wrong. The more clear cute example is weapons research. Loads of researchers and institutions outright rule out weapons research, because they find it wrong. Besides, “inherently wrong” is a subjective thing anyways, if only by the fact some people agree to your statement and some people don’t, despite everyone having the same set of facts
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
rtpg 7y ago
This is a false dicothomy The actual (IMO correct) position most of these people share is the following two points at once: - businesses should have a moral position, since businesses are just a set of people - that moral position should be right! This isn’t rocket science! Stuff like “don’t support a business doing bad stuff” and “support businesses doing good stuff” is just really basic consumer activism. There’s no need to go deep in metaphysics. It’s literally just “support good things, don’t support bad things”
- malvosenior 7y ago
  Many, many people feel that enforcing existing immigration laws is morally right and a "good thing". I think defining what is morally right is harder than rocket science and literally impossible in some cases.
  - rtpg 7y ago
    others think the laws are fundamentally unjust. Even others (a plurality I think) don't have strong feelings on the laws, but know one of the following: - the executive has selective enforcement rights - (at the time) congress + the WH could change laws! - the laws were written with an understanding of selective enforcement and so rightly recognized that this was a bad thing that could be made right. There is an n-sided die about how people see this problem, and people acted in accordance to it. And yeah, it means that some sides don't believe in the legitimacy of other sides. They're incompatible after all. Besides, it's not the point. The point of the game isn't to make a set of meta-rules for defining what is morally right. It's for, on a case-by-case basis, to say "this thing is good/bad" and then act on that. I don't need to be able to answer every moral hypothetical to be able to say that _this one specific thing is bad_. To bring it back to HN, it's a P=/=NP problem. I can say one thing is good/bad without providing the full strategy for determining every thing. And then we work from there.
    - malvosenior 7y ago
      I think your entire argument would make a lot more sense if you replaced “right” with “what I think is right”. Your position is just one side of the dice (as you say).
aeturnum 7y ago
I do not think the dichotomy you outlined accurately describes how things work I mean, this is why we have developed the idea of a "protected class." Because you're correct that, at the end of the day, judgement is judgement and sentiment is sentiment and everyone is the hero of their own story. But to place the limits of proper action at sentiment is solipsism. So there is a set of protected classes which we, as a society, have decided are inappropriate reasons to discriminate against people. The quick reasons it is wrong to discriminate: sex, race, age, religion[1]. There are many reasons we allow people to discriminate: lack of money, being violent to employees, being unacceptably rude, setting off explosives, etc. These are all discriminatory practices that often involve moral judgement. We are always in the process of trying to decide if we should have a new protected class and how that class should be defined. I also suspect we will, at some point, talk about removing protected classes. Businesses should (and in fact always do) make moral judgements about their clients. The people at Github who chose to work with ICE decided it was morally right for them to do so. You can tell because they did it. They might say they were sad about it and had "moral qualms" but at some point it does seem like it comes down to yes or no. So do you think we should have a government agency class? Or perhaps a law enforcement class? I personally do not. [1] Some exceptions here, of course, a mosque does not have to hire a catholic priest who applies to be an imam.
- icelancer 7y ago
  >> race Unless you're Asian/Asian-American, of course. Then it is fine to negatively discriminate against you. https://www.stanforddaily.com/2019/10/03/judge-rules-in-favor-of-harvard-in-divisive-affirmative-action-lawsuit/ https://www.stanforddaily.com/2019/10/03/judge-rules-in-favo...
  - dragonwriter 7y ago
    That's not at all what that decision says. Finding that it did not happen is not the same as finding that it is legal for it to happen.
    - icelancer 7y ago

by slykat 7y ago

marmada 7y ago

The difference is not serving black or queer people isn't a moral judgement -- it's just discrimination (there isn't anything inherently wrong with being Black the same way there isn't anything wrong with being queer or Asian or Indian, those things aren't a choice unlike being a Nazi). At best, not serving minorities is a shitty moral judgement. Not serving ICE is a more legitimate moral judgement because ICE has the option to change their behavior and ICE is genuinely bad. Slippery slope is one of those silly things I see from free speech advocates. I tend not to see the bad impacts in real life because if the government isgoing to restrict free speech, they will do it regardless of what anti-hate speech laws currently exist.

chillwaves 7y ago
If racists had self awareness, they wouldn't be racists.
slykat 7y ago
Do you not see the negative repercussions for businesses serving the public to be allowed to make a moral judgement on who they do business with?
- drjesusphd 7y ago
  If that's the case then there's no room whatsoever for capitalism to be anything other than an amoral system we should be ashamed of. Vote with your dollar. You're allowed to make your own moral choices and refuse to contribute to evil.
  - manigandham 7y ago
    Capitalism is nothing but an economic system where you own the means to production. There is no inherent morality. Nobody has an issue with you making choices and voting with your dollars. The issue is forcing those choices on everyone else (as in a business, especially as a non-owner) through your own interpretation of morality.
    - chipotle_coyote 7y ago
      I'm not an economist, but I'm pretty sure the system where workers own the means of production isn't capitalism.
      - manigandham 7y ago
        It refers to "you" vs the state. You create a factory or a business or a new patent and you're responsible. You gain the profits or suffer the losses and nobody else can take it from you. Workers are obviously not business owners, but they do own their own labor and are free to take whatever job they want, not be assigned to it from some central authority.
    - drjesusphd 7y ago
      > There is no inherent morality. Not inherent; we have to make it so. Capitalism dominates, what, 80% of our waking lives? The idea that morality should only be relegated to the other 20% is madness.
      - manigandham 7y ago
        Dominates? I don’t even know what means. It’s an economic system. What is the other 20% exactly?
cscurmudgeon 7y ago
So can a business refuse to serve democrats?
- root_axis 7y ago
  Yes, they can, and should have that right.
- claudiulodro 7y ago
  They absolutely can; political affiliation is not a protected class. Probably not good for their bottom line, though.
ljm 7y ago
There is nothing inherently wrong with serving ICE. You might not like it, but many of your compatriots do. I don't like what they do at all, I think it's reprehensible, backwards, and purely uncivilised. But people you utterly hate have friends too, and they see something different than you do, and we do not have a singular moral world-view. This situation with ICE should totally change, but that change is a function of your vote, not a function of protesting against Gitlab. I very strongly argue that there should never be a single perspective on morality, in the way that these posts suggest there should.
- sjg007 7y ago
  queue IBM and the holocaust.. I mean... wtf ???
- drjesusphd 7y ago
  > But people you utterly hate have friends too, and they see something different than you do, and we do not have a singular moral world-view. So because shitty people have friends, we should throw in the towel and refrain from enforcing moral codes in our own lives, behavior, and economic decisions? That's pretty weak stuff.
  - refurb 7y ago
    People who have different views than you are “shitty”?
    - drjesusphd 7y ago
      Some views, yes. We're talking about concentration camps for children, not monetary policy.
- rtpg 7y ago
  Lots of people support ICE, maybe, but that doesn’t prevent a lot of people from thinking it’s inherently wrong. The more clear cute example is weapons research. Loads of researchers and institutions outright rule out weapons research, because they find it wrong. Besides, “inherently wrong” is a subjective thing anyways, if only by the fact some people agree to your statement and some people don’t, despite everyone having the same set of facts

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

rtpg 7y ago

This is a false dicothomy The actual (IMO correct) position most of these people share is the following two points at once: - businesses should have a moral position, since businesses are just a set of people - that moral position should be right! This isn’t rocket science! Stuff like “don’t support a business doing bad stuff” and “support businesses doing good stuff” is just really basic consumer activism. There’s no need to go deep in metaphysics. It’s literally just “support good things, don’t support bad things”

malvosenior 7y ago
Many, many people feel that enforcing existing immigration laws is morally right and a "good thing". I think defining what is morally right is harder than rocket science and literally impossible in some cases.
- rtpg 7y ago
  others think the laws are fundamentally unjust. Even others (a plurality I think) don't have strong feelings on the laws, but know one of the following: - the executive has selective enforcement rights - (at the time) congress + the WH could change laws! - the laws were written with an understanding of selective enforcement and so rightly recognized that this was a bad thing that could be made right. There is an n-sided die about how people see this problem, and people acted in accordance to it. And yeah, it means that some sides don't believe in the legitimacy of other sides. They're incompatible after all. Besides, it's not the point. The point of the game isn't to make a set of meta-rules for defining what is morally right. It's for, on a case-by-case basis, to say "this thing is good/bad" and then act on that. I don't need to be able to answer every moral hypothetical to be able to say that _this one specific thing is bad_. To bring it back to HN, it's a P=/=NP problem. I can say one thing is good/bad without providing the full strategy for determining every thing. And then we work from there.
  - malvosenior 7y ago
    I think your entire argument would make a lot more sense if you replaced “right” with “what I think is right”. Your position is just one side of the dice (as you say).

aeturnum 7y ago

I do not think the dichotomy you outlined accurately describes how things work I mean, this is why we have developed the idea of a "protected class." Because you're correct that, at the end of the day, judgement is judgement and sentiment is sentiment and everyone is the hero of their own story. But to place the limits of proper action at sentiment is solipsism. So there is a set of protected classes which we, as a society, have decided are inappropriate reasons to discriminate against people. The quick reasons it is wrong to discriminate: sex, race, age, religion[1]. There are many reasons we allow people to discriminate: lack of money, being violent to employees, being unacceptably rude, setting off explosives, etc. These are all discriminatory practices that often involve moral judgement. We are always in the process of trying to decide if we should have a new protected class and how that class should be defined. I also suspect we will, at some point, talk about removing protected classes. Businesses should (and in fact always do) make moral judgements about their clients. The people at Github who chose to work with ICE decided it was morally right for them to do so. You can tell because they did it. They might say they were sad about it and had "moral qualms" but at some point it does seem like it comes down to yes or no. So do you think we should have a government agency class? Or perhaps a law enforcement class? I personally do not. [1] Some exceptions here, of course, a mosque does not have to hire a catholic priest who applies to be an imam.

icelancer 7y ago
>> race Unless you're Asian/Asian-American, of course. Then it is fine to negatively discriminate against you. https://www.stanforddaily.com/2019/10/03/judge-rules-in-favor-of-harvard-in-divisive-affirmative-action-lawsuit/ https://www.stanforddaily.com/2019/10/03/judge-rules-in-favo...
- dragonwriter 7y ago
  That's not at all what that decision says. Finding that it did not happen is not the same as finding that it is legal for it to happen.
  - icelancer 7y ago