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Keep politics out of business. Stop caving into activist pressure (whether internal or external) and online outrage. That isn't representative of what customers
by throwawaysea 6y ago
Keep politics out of business. Stop caving into activist pressure (whether internal or external) and online outrage. That isn't representative of what customers care about or want. Companies entering cultural/ideological wars (like Verizon) are doing so based on the voices of a small vocal minority of people.
By adopting such stances, these companies are doing the silent majority of their customers a huge disservice and alienating them. As an example, I don't think Facebook is wrong to operate neutrally (unlike Twitter), and I am not supportive of this campaign to get advertisers off Facebook. However, my opinion on the matter is invisible to Verizon. Verizon doesn't have any idea that numerous customers might be okay with them advertising on Facebook, because most customers are not willing to sacrifice their life to engage in activism. My opinion still should matter to Verizon. They should poll a large and diverse sample of their customers before committing to political actions like this.
Put another way, companies like Verizon are likely being misled by sophisticated organization, campaigning, and manufactured outrage. In the absence of knowing their entire customer base intimately, they should stay out of political issues, operate neutrally, and just do what maximizes their own value. Leave the rest to the public theater of politics (meaning elections, legislation, etc.).
- thephyber 6y ago> These companies are basically being gamed by sophisticated organization, campaigning, and manufactured outrage. I'm sorry I lost the thread. Is "these companies" the boycotting companies or the boycotted? > Stop caving into activist pressure and online outrage. Is this post not "online outrage"?
- throwawaysea 6y agoI edited my post, and hopefully it reads more clearly now.
- thephyber 6y agoFYI, I only posted because the ambiguity was ironic.
- JamilD 6y ago> only do what maximizes their own financials So if a company feels like they can acquire more customers or employees, or gain positive publicity by taking certain actions and expressing their right to free speech, shouldn't they be able to? This is why businesses take political stances in the first place. A company would be doing a disservice to shareholders by _not_ taking an action which could improve financials. Before gay marriage was legal, for example, companies would stand up for gay rights and offer gay employees equal benefits, because it would help with talent acquisition and expand their pool of possible employees. This is a "political" stance with clear selfish, financial implications. You have the right to not shop or procure services at a business which does not support your ideology, but others have their own right to choose companies based on the actions they take. That's the beauty of the free market. Regulating or otherwise stifling companies' speech and actions in this way simply hinders progress and the marketplace of ideas.
- throwawaysea 6y agoYou make some great points and I mostly agree with you. I think my take is that Verizon taking this stance (on Facebook advertising) does not maximize their own financials. I think they're operating in the fog of (political) war and are giving more weight to this campaign against Facebook than they should. In doing so, they're likely alienating customers who are center-left, centrist, or conservative. Will those users switch away to a different provider? Realistically they won't do so in large numbers. But my gut tells me an even smaller number of customers would adopt Verizon specifically because they took a position on this issue, so they aren't really going to gain anything from this either. Unless of course, the play here is to weaken Facebook so that Verizon has a better shot at being a content provider themselves - in which case this is a wholly selfish move. As for the regulation of companies' speech. I think I agree with you except in the case where companies become too big. I see Facebook, Twitter, Google (particularly with YouTube), and Amazon as being too big. These companies control so much of information flow in our societies that they are the new town square. Enough of societal discourse takes place on their platform that their acts of censorship are as problematic as governmental acts of censorship. I'd be OK with a solution that retains companies' speech but with revised/enforced anti-trust laws that breaks up big tech. I also think there's a reasonable argument to treat some of these companies as utilities and hold them to a standard of neutrality we'd expect from public agencies.
- PascLeRasc 6y agoI agree, let's keep politics out of business. Let's start by not having the president announce policy decisions over social media.
- barbecue_sauce 6y agohttps://www.verizon.com/about/responsibility/political-contributions-report-archive https://www.verizon.com/about/responsibility/political-contr...