5 ms·

I somewhat miss the days when the corruption was at least somewhat veiled. No-no of course we don't want to sell your data for profit, that would be ridiculous

I somewhat miss the days when the corruption was at least somewhat veiled. No-no of course we don't want to sell your data for profit, that would be ridiculous. Clearly it is just our corporate sponsors who will be doing it for us!

lanevorockz 6y ago
Yep, never heard of corruption in Italy before. The Mafia was created just a year ago right after Brexit
- user-the-name 6y ago
  Why are you talking about Italy?
  - rusk 6y ago
    They are trying to use the prevalence of organised crime in one nation to justify corruption in another. It’s called “comparing yourself downwards”. Kind of like the drunken neglectful husband who pats himself on the back for not beating his wife like some guys he sees on TV.
kzrdude 6y ago
Money has become the main objective, and it's poisoning us. Money is a means to an end, not the end itself. The nation (any country) needs to have human goals - not economical goals for their own sake - but a better life for us, for us all.
- aloisdg 6y ago
  That why we cry when countries are compared by GDP...
- Cthulhu_ 6y ago
  And I want to say that's fine, but it's the methods involved. Recently, a LOT of decisions have been made that (to me, armchair internet guy) seem to be aimed at short-term gain. Like Brexit, the people benefiting most from it are already well settled, they're working on their short- to mid-term plan to earn a lot of money before retiring to their private island or estate or whatever. They live outside of the negative consequences of their decisions. Meanwhile, the rest of the population will have to suffer through the consequences for the foreseeable. Tl;dr, policy optimizing for short term individual gain instead of long term sustainable gain. And the long term gain would be so much more better as well. All of the countries currently under a short term gain capitalist regime could be so much better for their inhabitants. Wealth, socialist policies, comfort, safety, stability, etc is all in reach. But instead the people at the top - who already live a very comfortable and privileged life so they don't see and never will see the problem - choose short term personal gain for them and their 1% friends.
- m12k 6y ago
  "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure"
carmen_sandiego 6y ago
> I somewhat miss the days when the corruption was at least somewhat veiled. Oh, nonsense. People disagree with you politically. That doesn't make it 'unveiled corruption'. What a lazy way to think.
- dbetteridge 6y ago
  I can handle political disagreement just fine. But there is a systemic and widely recognised issue in the UK with the government flagrantly handing out public money without due diligence or fair recourse. Selling citizens data for profit is just another data point. https://medium.com/shit-britain/the-bumper-uk-conservative-government-corruption-thread-26d6e0fcd673 https://medium.com/shit-britain/the-bumper-uk-conservative-g... https://thejist.co.uk/politics/a-list-of-alleged-conservative-lies-corruption-and-incompetence/ https://thejist.co.uk/politics/a-list-of-alleged-conservativ... https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/how-the-tories-normalised-corruption-report-205523/ https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/how-the-tories-no... https://sophieehill.shinyapps.io/my-little-crony/ https://sophieehill.shinyapps.io/my-little-crony/
  - carmen_sandiego 6y ago
    Believing that companies should be allowed to exploit data for profit is a political position, not corruption. Same for most of the things discussed in your links. Just because you might find something callous, or otherwise objectionable, doesn't make it corruption. It's also not inherently corruption when a (group of) companies go to a politician and say "we think X would be good" and the politician goes on to support X. Even if X is profitable for the companies. Many things that are profitable are also good for wider society.
- athrowaway3z 6y ago
  Corruption might be the wrong word. But 'disagree politically' suggests that what voters think matters, instead of what financial contributors desire. Every political decision has winners and losers. This one seems heavily biased towards the 0.01% of people directly financially incentivized, while the rest has to deal with the breach of privacy and the social effects of hyper targeted advertisement ( a case can be made that this includes things like the QAnon bubble )

lanevorockz 6y ago

Yep, never heard of corruption in Italy before. The Mafia was created just a year ago right after Brexit

user-the-name 6y ago
Why are you talking about Italy?
- rusk 6y ago
  They are trying to use the prevalence of organised crime in one nation to justify corruption in another. It’s called “comparing yourself downwards”. Kind of like the drunken neglectful husband who pats himself on the back for not beating his wife like some guys he sees on TV.

kzrdude 6y ago

Money has become the main objective, and it's poisoning us. Money is a means to an end, not the end itself. The nation (any country) needs to have human goals - not economical goals for their own sake - but a better life for us, for us all.

aloisdg 6y ago
That why we cry when countries are compared by GDP...
Cthulhu_ 6y ago
And I want to say that's fine, but it's the methods involved. Recently, a LOT of decisions have been made that (to me, armchair internet guy) seem to be aimed at short-term gain. Like Brexit, the people benefiting most from it are already well settled, they're working on their short- to mid-term plan to earn a lot of money before retiring to their private island or estate or whatever. They live outside of the negative consequences of their decisions. Meanwhile, the rest of the population will have to suffer through the consequences for the foreseeable. Tl;dr, policy optimizing for short term individual gain instead of long term sustainable gain. And the long term gain would be so much more better as well. All of the countries currently under a short term gain capitalist regime could be so much better for their inhabitants. Wealth, socialist policies, comfort, safety, stability, etc is all in reach. But instead the people at the top - who already live a very comfortable and privileged life so they don't see and never will see the problem - choose short term personal gain for them and their 1% friends.
m12k 6y ago
"When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure"

carmen_sandiego 6y ago

> I somewhat miss the days when the corruption was at least somewhat veiled. Oh, nonsense. People disagree with you politically. That doesn't make it 'unveiled corruption'. What a lazy way to think.

dbetteridge 6y ago
I can handle political disagreement just fine. But there is a systemic and widely recognised issue in the UK with the government flagrantly handing out public money without due diligence or fair recourse. Selling citizens data for profit is just another data point. https://medium.com/shit-britain/the-bumper-uk-conservative-government-corruption-thread-26d6e0fcd673 https://medium.com/shit-britain/the-bumper-uk-conservative-g... https://thejist.co.uk/politics/a-list-of-alleged-conservative-lies-corruption-and-incompetence/ https://thejist.co.uk/politics/a-list-of-alleged-conservativ... https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/how-the-tories-normalised-corruption-report-205523/ https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/how-the-tories-no... https://sophieehill.shinyapps.io/my-little-crony/ https://sophieehill.shinyapps.io/my-little-crony/
- carmen_sandiego 6y ago
  Believing that companies should be allowed to exploit data for profit is a political position, not corruption. Same for most of the things discussed in your links. Just because you might find something callous, or otherwise objectionable, doesn't make it corruption. It's also not inherently corruption when a (group of) companies go to a politician and say "we think X would be good" and the politician goes on to support X. Even if X is profitable for the companies. Many things that are profitable are also good for wider society.
athrowaway3z 6y ago
Corruption might be the wrong word. But 'disagree politically' suggests that what voters think matters, instead of what financial contributors desire. Every political decision has winners and losers. This one seems heavily biased towards the 0.01% of people directly financially incentivized, while the rest has to deal with the breach of privacy and the social effects of hyper targeted advertisement ( a case can be made that this includes things like the QAnon bubble )