4 ms·

Of course they do! Private mercenaries, prisons, banks, repo companies, landlords, insurance providers, all kinds... of course they do. Corporations were initia

Of course they do! Private mercenaries, prisons, banks, repo companies, landlords, insurance providers, all kinds... of course they do. Corporations were initially an arm of the state to do state functions. They still do that today. What corporations don't have is any obligation to cede to the public demand or be held accountable for their actions. There's no democratic control, no way they can be fired by the voter nor do they have any responsibility of transparency. Voting systems, red light cameras, municipal water, nearly every aspect is controlled by private corporations shirking responsibility oftentimes for decades. Polluting a town's water supply and walking away pretending they didn't - there's even many well known movies about things like this with academy awards. Often the criminals get away with it having hid under the legal fiction of the corporation. If a secretive unaccountable private corporation determining the outcome of an election and claiming the audit trail is a trade secret doesn't ruffle your libertarian feathers then there's something seriously wrong. What you claimed is yet another silly thing I've been hearing my whole life. It's totally wrong. Any inspection would immediately reveal this

scarface74 6y ago
What corporations don't have is any obligation to cede to the public demand or be held accountable for their actions. There's no democratic control, no way they can be fired by the voter nor do they have any responsibility of •transparency. How well has that whole accountability thing worked out for the police department and the American military? The justice system? There's no democratic control, no way they can be fired by the voter nor do they have any responsibility of transparency. Nor can judges with lifetime appointments. Voting systems, Where conservative states consistently disenfranchise minority voters by closing polling places, passing voter id laws but then make it harder for minorities to get an ID and they count gun registrations as valid Id but not college IDs... Polluting a town's water supply and walking away pretending they didn't See the government run water supply in Flint Michigan.
- kristopolous 6y ago
  Absolutely! Humans can be real bastards and governments aren't magical solutions just as corporations aren't magically evil. The question is about who can be held more accountable, who can be more feasibly removed from power and what kind of institution can be more promptly remedied. We as moral actors could potentially change the laws of governance probably far easier than we could form a corporation to defeat ExxonMobil in the marketplace. Both should be easier, but that's another discussion. Both governance and private capital are imperfect and both deserve criticism. Being a fan of either is a mistake.
  - scarface74 6y ago
    The US has a long history of not being “moral actors” when it comes to the rights and freedoms of racial and religious minorities and non straight people. Having a government that caters to the majority is fine if you are in the majority. We just saw the government stripping rights of transexuals with regards to health care. What would they do if they had more access to data? If you were a Muslim America would you trust the government in its current state to have more access to your data?
    - kristopolous 6y ago
      I'm sure that will be addressed far faster than the 60 years it took to hold tobacco companies accountable, only possible through government.
      - scarface74 6y ago
        You mean the same government that still hands out farm subsidies to tobacco farmers? https://www.ewg.org/agmag/2018/05/thank-you-subsidizing-smoking https://www.ewg.org/agmag/2018/05/thank-you-subsidizing-smok... How many decades did it take the government to rule that it was discrimination not to allow gay people to adopt kids? Get pregnant by in vitro insemination? If you aren’t in the affected group it’s easy to tell those who are to be patient.
        6y ago
- yesenadam 6y ago
  The US government has treated people outside the US a lot worse than it's treated its own citizens, in the last 100 years, yet anti-US government people in the US don't seem to talk about that. You don't get invaded, saturation bombed, napalmed, droned etc. Or your democracy replaced with military dictators given a load of weapons and torture training. Still, why corporations are internally so much better by nature than governments, in that world-view, I don't see.
  - scarface74 6y ago
    I’m the first to call out the hypocrisy of people tsk tsking and saying destroying property doesn’t bring about change in the case of police misconduct but being the biggest supporter of the military that bombs other countries and kills civilians to “bring Democracy”.
  - kristopolous 6y ago
    The banana republics were done for the banana company The oil wars were done for the oil companies There isn't this mysterious firewall between government and business. They're different departments of the same thing. Nor is there any mutual exclusivity. The absolute dictatorship of Pinochets Chile is also where the most radical forms of Milton Friedman's free market capitalism was tried. They're two interacting institutions of power that can exist in many forms. Free business doesn't guarantee free societies. There is no silver bullet

scarface74 6y ago

What corporations don't have is any obligation to cede to the public demand or be held accountable for their actions. There's no democratic control, no way they can be fired by the voter nor do they have any responsibility of •transparency. How well has that whole accountability thing worked out for the police department and the American military? The justice system? There's no democratic control, no way they can be fired by the voter nor do they have any responsibility of transparency. Nor can judges with lifetime appointments. Voting systems, Where conservative states consistently disenfranchise minority voters by closing polling places, passing voter id laws but then make it harder for minorities to get an ID and they count gun registrations as valid Id but not college IDs... Polluting a town's water supply and walking away pretending they didn't See the government run water supply in Flint Michigan.

kristopolous 6y ago
Absolutely! Humans can be real bastards and governments aren't magical solutions just as corporations aren't magically evil. The question is about who can be held more accountable, who can be more feasibly removed from power and what kind of institution can be more promptly remedied. We as moral actors could potentially change the laws of governance probably far easier than we could form a corporation to defeat ExxonMobil in the marketplace. Both should be easier, but that's another discussion. Both governance and private capital are imperfect and both deserve criticism. Being a fan of either is a mistake.
- scarface74 6y ago
  The US has a long history of not being “moral actors” when it comes to the rights and freedoms of racial and religious minorities and non straight people. Having a government that caters to the majority is fine if you are in the majority. We just saw the government stripping rights of transexuals with regards to health care. What would they do if they had more access to data? If you were a Muslim America would you trust the government in its current state to have more access to your data?
  - kristopolous 6y ago
    I'm sure that will be addressed far faster than the 60 years it took to hold tobacco companies accountable, only possible through government.
    - scarface74 6y ago
      You mean the same government that still hands out farm subsidies to tobacco farmers? https://www.ewg.org/agmag/2018/05/thank-you-subsidizing-smoking https://www.ewg.org/agmag/2018/05/thank-you-subsidizing-smok... How many decades did it take the government to rule that it was discrimination not to allow gay people to adopt kids? Get pregnant by in vitro insemination? If you aren’t in the affected group it’s easy to tell those who are to be patient.
      - 6y ago
yesenadam 6y ago
The US government has treated people outside the US a lot worse than it's treated its own citizens, in the last 100 years, yet anti-US government people in the US don't seem to talk about that. You don't get invaded, saturation bombed, napalmed, droned etc. Or your democracy replaced with military dictators given a load of weapons and torture training. Still, why corporations are internally so much better by nature than governments, in that world-view, I don't see.
- scarface74 6y ago
  I’m the first to call out the hypocrisy of people tsk tsking and saying destroying property doesn’t bring about change in the case of police misconduct but being the biggest supporter of the military that bombs other countries and kills civilians to “bring Democracy”.
- kristopolous 6y ago
  The banana republics were done for the banana company The oil wars were done for the oil companies There isn't this mysterious firewall between government and business. They're different departments of the same thing. Nor is there any mutual exclusivity. The absolute dictatorship of Pinochets Chile is also where the most radical forms of Milton Friedman's free market capitalism was tried. They're two interacting institutions of power that can exist in many forms. Free business doesn't guarantee free societies. There is no silver bullet