6 ms·

> If they do want to put profit ahead of everything else, then whatever, but you don't get to defend them as doing the right thing for their employees. They're

> If they do want to put profit ahead of everything else, then whatever, but you don't get to defend them as doing the right thing for their employees. They're enabling the whole situation. IMHO, cooperating with an authoritarian regime in this way should be illegal, sort of like a sanctions violation. Cook and Pachai should go to jail for this. That consequence might clarify their thinking a little.

a123b456c 5y ago
Define "authoritarian regime"
- michaelt 5y ago
  Just because there are shades of grey, doesn’t mean we can’t tell black from white.
  - eldaisfish 5y ago
    it's an excellent question which your reply doesn't address. There's black and white with grey in between. Whether you report the shades of grey as black or white depends on who you ask and what is offered for comparison. Is india an authoritarian regime? You'll find plenty of evidence going both ways. What about Belarus? Hungary? Venezuela? The grey is precisely why having yes/no binaries like this leads to more confusion.
  - whimsicalism 5y ago
    I am not convinced that we can tell black from white. I also think that there ought to be a certain level of relativism when it comes to judging political systems. Is it democratic that an unelected group of 9 people can unilaterally essentially decide the law of the land in the US?
    - lovecg 5y ago
      How is the US constitutional system remotely relevant in this discussion?
      - whimsicalism 5y ago
        Because every political system has elements of "authoritarianism"/decisions being made by unelected officials. For instance, we often criticize Iran as being authoritarian, but compared to many of our allies elsewhere, Iran is actually relatively democratic, even if they have authoritarian "checks" just like we do with the Supreme Court.
        lovecg 5y ago
        I have a hard time understanding what you mean about Iran: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Leader_of_Iran https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Leader_of_Iran Seems like a dictatorship to me.
    - yanderekko 5y ago
      >Is it democratic that an unelected group of 9 people can unilaterally essentially decide the law of the land in the US? Are republican (little r) systems inherently authoritarian in your view? Do you actually fear that SCOTUS is going to start imposing some sort of autocratic control over American government? I'm not. You probably aren't either. There are institutional explanations for this.
      - whimsicalism 5y ago
        I actually consider myself a staunch (little r) republican. That said, Machiavelli's Discourses on Livy (a seminal republican text) was quite clear that republican mixed government does involve mixing a bit of democracy with a bit of authoritarianism/autocracy. I do think it is "authoritarian", but I don't think it is necessarily bad. My question is merely: why can we extend this sort of support to mixed government in our country, but seemingly consider many of the other forms of mixed government in action as pure authoritarian tyranny?
      - klyrs 5y ago
        I would describe qualified immunity as starkly autocratic, and it was written whole-cloth by the supreme court.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- blacktriangle 5y ago
  The CCP
- tablespoon 5y ago
  > Define "authoritarian regime" A simple rule of thumb definition (that could probably use some refinement) is regimes that are either explicitly anti-democratic or a sham democracy. Russia certainly falls into the latter category, as this very story demonstrates. In most cases, it's not that hard.
  - whimsicalism 5y ago
    > as this very story demonstrates. This story is sufficient to demonstrate that Russia is a "sham democracy"? Does the fact that Twitter/Facebook/et al banned the NYPost in the run-up to the 2020 election as well as preventing people from sending links to NYPost articles in their DMs "demonstrate" anything about the US?
    - tablespoon 5y ago
      > This story is sufficient to demonstrate that Russia is a "sham democracy"? It's just another example among many. Russia is a sham democracy because the government takes action to prevent opposition politicians from gaining power. > Does the fact that Twitter/Facebook/et al banned the NYPost in the run-up to the 2020 election as well as preventing people from sending links to NYPost articles in their DMs "demonstrate" anything about the US? I sense you think it shows some kind of equivalency, which is not true. Actually, if those organizations had to run the NY Post story, the US would be closer to a sham than it is.
      - whimsicalism 5y ago
        > Actually, if those organizations had to run the NY Post story, the US would be closer to a sham than it is. Hm, guess I'd like to live in a sham democracy then, as blocking me from sending certain political thoughts in my chat messages is unacceptable to me. I'd rather have this power in the hands of publicly-sanctioned, rules-based agents than arbitrary private actors who can interfere with me at any time for whatever reason they want. Philip Pettit has written quite well on this issue.
Angostura 5y ago
Hmmm. Withdraw the app and you go to jail. Don’t withdraw the app and your Russian employees go to jail
- skinkestek 5y ago
  Fire your Russian employees. Then withdraw. Hurts but if history should learn us a thing or two one of them should be not to give in to dictators. The younger ones here are allowed to take a few minutes off to use their favorite search engine to look up the quote "peace in our time" by Chamberlain. Edit: It looks so simple the way I wrote it above. Please note that doing the right thing isn't easy. Telling lots of people their job is gone. Telling investors the money invested in one of the most promising markets is gone etc etc. But I am afraid that sooner or later the alternative will be worse.
  - saiya-jin 5y ago
    > Fire your Russian employees. More like move them to a better place if they prefer this to simply terminating the contract. Benefits are numerous - retain already-hired quality personnel, have a good PR campaign about being moral and holy and doing the extra mile with bureaucracy (which would be true), grow some extra hairy balls overnight. Or something similar.
    - skinkestek 5y ago
      Good points. Russia unlike certain others probably won't torture their loved ones because of this.
      - xyzzyz 5y ago
        Of course, if they ever go back to Russia, they risk prosecution. Rather rough deal.
        ashtonkem 5y ago
        “Leave and never be able to visit your family for as long as the current regime lasts” is a tough call. People do do that, but the pain of remaining has to be very high to make the tradeoffs palatable.
madeofpalk 5y ago
The irony here is that your idea sounds pretty authoritarian!
emiliosic 5y ago
'authoritarian regime' is a slippery slope. There can be clear human violations, but at what point does a government become authoritarian? USA has plenty of violations on its shoulders, perhaps complicit in many others. I would not call it authoritarian but it has been repressive (Citing USA as a clear example, not picking on particular politics). Genocide is distinctively clear from freedom of expression, so by no means should this be constructed to justify that. A war has many battles, so perhaps in this case there would be compromises. Why these companies are working with China needs a deeper discussion.
- lotusmars 5y ago
  Why do you always bring up USA when people are talking about injustices in other countries? Every time.
  - walteweiss 5y ago
    They could be simply paid opinions.
  - Nemerie 5y ago
    If you mean discussions at HN then that may be because folks here are mostly Americans who are interested in and aware of things in their country like any other nation. As a Russian (concluded from your post history), don't you see the same thing in Russian communities?
  - Talanes 5y ago
    Assumablely in this hypothetical, it would be the USA arresting Cook and Pachai, no?
hiram112 5y ago
Agreed. There should be a lot of employees from Twitter, Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. slapped with very punishing fines and possible jail sentences for "cooperating with an authoritarian regime" the past few years. By the time of the election (e.g. the Biden laptop story), they weren't even pretending to be neutral platforms. They were corrupt crony partisans boot-stomping on the public square, and we should ensure that type of behavior is absolutely not tolerated in a free society.
2xpress 5y ago
I do not support Cook and Pachal getting arrested over submitting to Putin over their employees being held hostage, but they should definitely pull Apple and Google out of Russia and Communist China. US government should help out, at least by prohibiting US citizens from traveling to these regions without a special exception. Should be easy to do during the pandemic anyway, beats me why the government is so weak about it.
silexia 5y ago
I agree. All US companies should be required to fully withdraw from countries with active dictatorships. Unfortunately, US companies have lost all trace of ethics. Most product companies now have planned obsolence, and use regulatory capture and abusive patents to grow revenues rather than putting customers first. We are truly in the twilight of the free market.

a123b456c 5y ago

Define "authoritarian regime"

michaelt 5y ago
Just because there are shades of grey, doesn’t mean we can’t tell black from white.
- eldaisfish 5y ago
  it's an excellent question which your reply doesn't address. There's black and white with grey in between. Whether you report the shades of grey as black or white depends on who you ask and what is offered for comparison. Is india an authoritarian regime? You'll find plenty of evidence going both ways. What about Belarus? Hungary? Venezuela? The grey is precisely why having yes/no binaries like this leads to more confusion.
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  I am not convinced that we can tell black from white. I also think that there ought to be a certain level of relativism when it comes to judging political systems. Is it democratic that an unelected group of 9 people can unilaterally essentially decide the law of the land in the US?
  - lovecg 5y ago
    How is the US constitutional system remotely relevant in this discussion?
    - whimsicalism 5y ago
      Because every political system has elements of "authoritarianism"/decisions being made by unelected officials. For instance, we often criticize Iran as being authoritarian, but compared to many of our allies elsewhere, Iran is actually relatively democratic, even if they have authoritarian "checks" just like we do with the Supreme Court.
      - lovecg 5y ago
        I have a hard time understanding what you mean about Iran: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Leader_of_Iran https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Leader_of_Iran Seems like a dictatorship to me.
  - yanderekko 5y ago
    >Is it democratic that an unelected group of 9 people can unilaterally essentially decide the law of the land in the US? Are republican (little r) systems inherently authoritarian in your view? Do you actually fear that SCOTUS is going to start imposing some sort of autocratic control over American government? I'm not. You probably aren't either. There are institutional explanations for this.
    - whimsicalism 5y ago
      I actually consider myself a staunch (little r) republican. That said, Machiavelli's Discourses on Livy (a seminal republican text) was quite clear that republican mixed government does involve mixing a bit of democracy with a bit of authoritarianism/autocracy. I do think it is "authoritarian", but I don't think it is necessarily bad. My question is merely: why can we extend this sort of support to mixed government in our country, but seemingly consider many of the other forms of mixed government in action as pure authoritarian tyranny?
    - klyrs 5y ago
      I would describe qualified immunity as starkly autocratic, and it was written whole-cloth by the supreme court.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
blacktriangle 5y ago
The CCP
tablespoon 5y ago
> Define "authoritarian regime" A simple rule of thumb definition (that could probably use some refinement) is regimes that are either explicitly anti-democratic or a sham democracy. Russia certainly falls into the latter category, as this very story demonstrates. In most cases, it's not that hard.
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  > as this very story demonstrates. This story is sufficient to demonstrate that Russia is a "sham democracy"? Does the fact that Twitter/Facebook/et al banned the NYPost in the run-up to the 2020 election as well as preventing people from sending links to NYPost articles in their DMs "demonstrate" anything about the US?
  - tablespoon 5y ago
    > This story is sufficient to demonstrate that Russia is a "sham democracy"? It's just another example among many. Russia is a sham democracy because the government takes action to prevent opposition politicians from gaining power. > Does the fact that Twitter/Facebook/et al banned the NYPost in the run-up to the 2020 election as well as preventing people from sending links to NYPost articles in their DMs "demonstrate" anything about the US? I sense you think it shows some kind of equivalency, which is not true. Actually, if those organizations had to run the NY Post story, the US would be closer to a sham than it is.
    - whimsicalism 5y ago
      > Actually, if those organizations had to run the NY Post story, the US would be closer to a sham than it is. Hm, guess I'd like to live in a sham democracy then, as blocking me from sending certain political thoughts in my chat messages is unacceptable to me. I'd rather have this power in the hands of publicly-sanctioned, rules-based agents than arbitrary private actors who can interfere with me at any time for whatever reason they want. Philip Pettit has written quite well on this issue.

Angostura 5y ago

Hmmm. Withdraw the app and you go to jail. Don’t withdraw the app and your Russian employees go to jail

skinkestek 5y ago
Fire your Russian employees. Then withdraw. Hurts but if history should learn us a thing or two one of them should be not to give in to dictators. The younger ones here are allowed to take a few minutes off to use their favorite search engine to look up the quote "peace in our time" by Chamberlain. Edit: It looks so simple the way I wrote it above. Please note that doing the right thing isn't easy. Telling lots of people their job is gone. Telling investors the money invested in one of the most promising markets is gone etc etc. But I am afraid that sooner or later the alternative will be worse.
- saiya-jin 5y ago
  > Fire your Russian employees. More like move them to a better place if they prefer this to simply terminating the contract. Benefits are numerous - retain already-hired quality personnel, have a good PR campaign about being moral and holy and doing the extra mile with bureaucracy (which would be true), grow some extra hairy balls overnight. Or something similar.
  - skinkestek 5y ago
    Good points. Russia unlike certain others probably won't torture their loved ones because of this.
    - xyzzyz 5y ago
      Of course, if they ever go back to Russia, they risk prosecution. Rather rough deal.
      - ashtonkem 5y ago
        “Leave and never be able to visit your family for as long as the current regime lasts” is a tough call. People do do that, but the pain of remaining has to be very high to make the tradeoffs palatable.

madeofpalk 5y ago

The irony here is that your idea sounds pretty authoritarian!

emiliosic 5y ago

'authoritarian regime' is a slippery slope. There can be clear human violations, but at what point does a government become authoritarian? USA has plenty of violations on its shoulders, perhaps complicit in many others. I would not call it authoritarian but it has been repressive (Citing USA as a clear example, not picking on particular politics). Genocide is distinctively clear from freedom of expression, so by no means should this be constructed to justify that. A war has many battles, so perhaps in this case there would be compromises. Why these companies are working with China needs a deeper discussion.

lotusmars 5y ago
Why do you always bring up USA when people are talking about injustices in other countries? Every time.
- walteweiss 5y ago
  They could be simply paid opinions.
- Nemerie 5y ago
  If you mean discussions at HN then that may be because folks here are mostly Americans who are interested in and aware of things in their country like any other nation. As a Russian (concluded from your post history), don't you see the same thing in Russian communities?
- Talanes 5y ago
  Assumablely in this hypothetical, it would be the USA arresting Cook and Pachai, no?

hiram112 5y ago

Agreed. There should be a lot of employees from Twitter, Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. slapped with very punishing fines and possible jail sentences for "cooperating with an authoritarian regime" the past few years. By the time of the election (e.g. the Biden laptop story), they weren't even pretending to be neutral platforms. They were corrupt crony partisans boot-stomping on the public square, and we should ensure that type of behavior is absolutely not tolerated in a free society.

2xpress 5y ago

I do not support Cook and Pachal getting arrested over submitting to Putin over their employees being held hostage, but they should definitely pull Apple and Google out of Russia and Communist China. US government should help out, at least by prohibiting US citizens from traveling to these regions without a special exception. Should be easy to do during the pandemic anyway, beats me why the government is so weak about it.

silexia 5y ago

I agree. All US companies should be required to fully withdraw from countries with active dictatorships. Unfortunately, US companies have lost all trace of ethics. Most product companies now have planned obsolence, and use regulatory capture and abusive patents to grow revenues rather than putting customers first. We are truly in the twilight of the free market.