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"Just as the worst slave-owners were those who were kind to their slaves, and so prevented the horror of the system being realised by those who suffered from it

• gruez 5y ago
  >where becoming an indentured servant for Amazon But that's literally not what's happening? >Indentured servitude is a form of labor in which a person is contracted to work without salary for a specific number of years.
  • Mizza 5y ago
    Yeah, but you'd be given room and board rather than a wage. It's indentured servitude with extra steps.
    • gruez 5y ago
      Is all employment "indentured servitude with extra step" since the wages from your employment is used to pay for "room and board"?
      • Mizza 5y ago
        Heyy, would you look at that! Now we're getting somewhere.
      • sangnoir 5y ago
        I'd argue if you don't have any money left over after paying food and board (and need food stamps), it's functionally the same as indentured servitude. So, not all employment is like this; but only those jobs that do not pay a living wage.
        • gruez 5y ago
          The difference is that you can't decide to fuck off (eg. go backpacking or live with your parents) whenever you feel like it if you're an indentured servant. Furthermore, "food and board" is an imperfect metric, because even though it may seem essential, it has a lot of discretionary components built in. For instance, buying organic or ordering takeout for "food", or getting a luxury condo or a nice school district for "housing". I'm not saying everyone working on amazon living paycheck to paycheck is because they ordered ubereats every night and live in a luxury condo, but it's something to keep in mind when we're narrowing down what exactly "indentured servitude with extra steps" means.
          • sangnoir 5y ago
            > The difference is that you can't decide to fuck off (eg. go backpacking or live with your parents) whenever you feel like it if you're an indentured servant. Do you honestly think people willingly work at McJobs that still require them to live on food stamps when they have better options available to them, like living with their parents?! Amazon's warehouse workers are not buying organic takeout or getting luxury condominiums, they are buying the cheapest (unhealthy) food and living in the cheapest parts of town. What you asking to keep in mind sounds a lot like a rehash of Reagan's incorrect "welfare queen" characterization from the 70's. Or more recently: "Why do poor people need a smartphone for?"
            • BeetleB 5y ago
              > Do you honestly think people willingly work at McJobs that still require them to live on food stamps when they have better options available to them, like living with their parents?! Just less than an hour ago I was listening to the radio and they were interviewing someone who literally fits this description: They voluntarily left their parent's house and worked at McDonalds for a bunch of years. Not going to school or anything. Living their own life. I also personally know someone who did this. Comes from an upper middle class family. Not kicked out of the house or anything. Just didn't like the small town he was in. Moved to another state and worked at McDonald's while doing some art projects when not working. People do this. All. The. Time. People here on HN (and especially in the comments for this submission) are showing how way out of touch their world view is from reality. How many of you here even know any Amazon warehouse workers? I know two, and talking to them has impacted my view of Amazon. Anti-disclaimer: I don't work for Amazon and prefer not to buy from them.
      • fwip 5y ago
        You've almost re-discovered the term "wage slavery," keep going, you're almost there!
      • deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
• plandis 5y ago
  This seems like an odd conclusion given how easy it is to get loans even if you are not the strongest academically.
• umvi 5y ago
  > Just as the worst slave-owners were those who were kind to their slaves ... the people who do most harm are the people who try to do most good Exactly, most people don't get this. This is exactly why I am vicious, cruel, and unkind to the employees of my small business - it seems counter intuitive, but I'm actually doing them the least harm this way, and so I'm actually optimizing for their long term happiness. They should be thanking me. /logic
  • Spivak 5y ago
    I mean it’s cute quip but this isn’t what that quote means and you know that. [From the perspective of someone trying to abolish slavery] kind slavers are the worst because they make the situation just tolerable enough that people aren’t motivated to change the system. [From the perspective of an individual slave] kind slavers are the best because they suffer the least. Kind slavers force a system settle on a local minimum of suffering rather than a global one.
    • umvi 5y ago
      > [From the perspective of someone trying to abolish slavery] kind slavers are the worst because they make the situation just tolerable enough that people aren’t motivated to change the system. Who says kind slavers weren't also helping to change the system? It's a pretty big assumption that all kind slavers were only being kind to keep their slaves from being uppity. Re: George Washington
      • Mizza 5y ago
        Wow.
      • ysavir 5y ago
        I think the assumption is that if kind slave owner wanted to help change the system, they would probably start by freeing their own slaves.
        • bzbarsky 5y ago
• silentsea90 5y ago
  Amazon didn't cause education to get expensive. They at least provide some respite.
• glenstein 5y ago
  A brilliant and helpful quote. Reminds me of the King quote about white moderates. It's a bit different, but what they have in common is emphasizing that when you "do good" on top of a foundation of fundamental injustice you do the most damage. Because you appeal to the most reachable minds (and therefore the most needed as supporters, the most precious resource) and implore them to support the status quo instead of helping.
  • refenestrator 5y ago
    It's do-nothing bullshit. Do good on top a foundation of fundamental injustice? I'm sorry, do you have any other foundations laying around? I surveyed 5000 years of written history and couldn't find any. The options are try to do some good or don't.
    • glenstein 5y ago
      >It's do-nothing bullshit. Thank you for your opinion on the life and work of Dr. King.
      • refenestrator 5y ago
        Wasn't a King quote I was repudiating. He never said "you shouldn't try to do good on a foundation of injustice", because he wasn't an idiot.
        • glenstein 5y ago
          You're wasting both my time and yours interpreting my comments in some of the most foaming-at-the-mouth bad faith I've ever encountered on hacker news. King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail really was critical of white moderates for reasons I described, despite your furious protestations to the contrary.
  • wallacoloo 5y ago
    Is there any path to a perfect world system within one lifetime? I’d be extremely skeptical. If you agree there isn’t, then no matter what the world looks like during our lifetime, it will be imperfect. It will be the wrong system. The problem with views like the ones being expressed in this thread is that they suggest at every moment that the thing we need is revolution. That there is no way to advance an imperfect system by doing good. And after any revolution, you’ll still be left with an imperfect foundation, so you’re still forbidden from doing good, and you need another revolution. It is insightful, pointing out where good intentions cause an imperfect status quo to perpetuate longer than it otherwise would. But the status quo will always be imperfect, so we must find ways of advancing it that don’t force everyone through a lower point in order to reach the next maxima (which is sorta what you do when you encourage all those with good intentions to stand down). Not that I’m saying all revolutions past weren’t valid. When you lose the freedom of movement that allows people to seek out higher maxima, then the only way forward actually is revolution.
• lostcolony 5y ago
  We already kinda do with the military; no other options for high paying work? Join the military for a few years, let them pay for school if you survive. But, Oscar Wilde's quote here is partially right at the societal level, and absolutely wrong on the individual level. Both can be true. Amazon isn't to be lauded as a company for something that is, ultimately, a competitive advantage, in a landscape they don't seek to change, but the change itself can be lauded as a good one in that it's something they can control
• newbamboo 5y ago
  But encouraging workers to pursue education, may potentially free them from servitude, to Amazon at least. If you want a company to reform itself you need to stand ready to praise the steps they take toward reform.
• gfodor 5y ago
  You're conflating "being kind" with "empowering" and it causes your point to collapse onto itself like a black hole. An education is a means to escape slavery or indentured servitude, so comparing it to the kindness of some plantation owners is ridiculous.
• spoonfeeder006 5y ago
  But what if every company offered free upskilling services to their employees, then that might help free people from this And so maybe one company doing it can lead to other companies doing it more? Although this is covid related...so not sure it really applies
• jdavis703 5y ago
  > becoming an indentured servant for Amazon or Starbucks takes the place of what should be a public education service. We already have a public education system, and any employee working at Amazon or Starbucks for minimum wage should qualify for Pell Grants that would make community college free anyways.
• Aunche 5y ago
  I agree that this is setting a precedent for perverse incentives to manifest, but I don't see how Amazon is to blame here. The government is failing to provide higher education to those who can benefit from it. Given this void, the free market inevitably would come with a solution of its own, even if it's suboptimal.
• elif 5y ago
  Precisely. This fukuyama dream of corporate liberalism paints exactly such a picture: that the tax evading Monopoly which has subsumed a significant portion of US capital (stripped from the common man) can be seen as beneficent for merely satisfying their own need for skilled labor in an economic context they helped foment wherein education has been made unreachable by normal means.
• belval 5y ago
  Comparing Amazon's fulfillment center's condition to actual slavery on a thread about them offering free tuition to their worker might be the most out of touch HN reply I have seen in a while. You do understand that these people, regardless of your opinion on how the government should handle education at a state and federal level, will actually benefit from this move? It's not some kind of dystopian agreement, usually the employer pays for your education and you must stay there for ~2 years or reimburse what the employer paid. That's it, you can leave, you can go work anywhere.
  • createunderrate 5y ago
    > Comparing Amazon's fulfillment center's condition to actual slavery on a thread about them offering free tuition to their worker might be the most out of touch HN reply I have seen in a while. https://imgur.com/a/BqPzT https://imgur.com/a/BqPzT
    • belval 5y ago
      I understand what you are hinting at, but it's not just the quote, the commenter I replied to wrote: > we may end up in the same situation for education, where becoming an indentured servant for Amazon or Starbucks takes the place of what should be a public education service. Where "indentured servitudes" means "a form of labor in which a person is contracted to work without salary for a specific number of years". Yes there is a difference with actual slavery, but this is still very much the parallel he was drawing. Ergo I feel very comfortable saying that this is a very out-of-touch comparison.
• hodgesrm 5y ago
  > ...we may end up in the same situation for education, where becoming an indentured servant for Amazon or Starbucks takes the place of what should be a public education service. I'm amazed at this criticism. College is and was difficult for many people to handle because it's expensive. It's not lack of will or ability to find time. I got my bachelor's degree while I was serving in the US Air Force at 40 hours plus per week. Yeah, it was a bit of a grunt. But I got the degree. I'm still grateful for their help in funding tuition as well as the flexibility to attend evening classes. I think most people in that situation would feel the same.
• arcturus17 5y ago
  I love Oscar Wilde to bits and regard him as one of the wittiest writers to live, but he was more of a satirist than political commentator, and at any rate, that quote is utter bollocks.
• raxxorrax 5y ago
  Exactly the comment I was thinking about. The price of education in the US is quite high and with programs like this you cement this circumstance while penalizing everyone not working for Amazon since universities will ensure the educational product you receive aligns with requirements of Amazon and form students in accordance to that. This is just capturing the offspring, not too different from other strategies to get control of the market.