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Is this somehow supposed to be inconsistent? One normally doesn't hate Amazon because they are successful, but because they are too successful. This is like cla
by saurik 5y ago
Is this somehow supposed to be inconsistent? One normally doesn't hate Amazon because they are successful, but because they are too successful. This is like claiming making fun of someone who says they hate cigarettes or alcohol because they are "covertly" still using both all the time, or someone who says they hate the food at their school cafeteria despite "covertly" eating it... this "you don't get to say you hate something if you use it" take is ridiculous.
- coolso 5y agoDidn’t you hear? Losing your US-manufacturing job so everyone can buy cheap throwaway Chinese goods with loads of fake reviews is actually good for the economy, or something. You should be made fun of for thinking otherwise.
- caslon 5y agoActually, yeah. I'm the one who made the first anti-Amazon comment in this thread; Amazon encourages anti-global market practices with their political donations. This is a pretty good reason to hate them. They aren't pro-market, they're pro-Amazon. They support protectionism stateside. A bigger market is a good thing, and something to encourage. By supporting broken/longer IP laws, software patents, and local-favoring of distributors, Amazon encourages a smaller, more centralized, more broken market.
- WalterBright 5y agoMy meaning is a bit subtler than your interpretation. I was commenting on the practice of virtue signalling. For example, Seattle rebuilt and renamed the old Key Arena into Climate Pledge Arena. While I am a more ardent environmentalist than most (my virtue signalling duly noted) this name is a local pinnacle of vacuous virtue signalling nonsense.
- bduerst 5y agoJust FYI, Virtue Signalling is a pejorative that implicitly marginalizes and accuses someone of abnormal behavior. The GP here is calling that out even if you didn't specifically use the term "virtue signalling" in your original comment - the behavior here is entirely normal. The phrase's roots come from the alt-right looking for a replacement for SJW accusations not being taken seriously: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Social_justice_warrior#.22Virtue_signalling.22 https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Social_justice_warrior#.22Virt...
- UnFleshedOne 5y agoI don't think there is anything implicit in this phrase anymore -- it quite explicitly accuses someone of posturing instead of paying the honest price for signaling. For example, a peacock's tail is a honest fitness signal -- it does take a lot of effort to maintain (in food and vulnerability) so it serves as a good signal for fitness. Naming an existing place after a virtue you want to pretend to hold is an empty virtue signal. Rezoning the city to reduce car traffic would be a honest virtue signal for the same virtue. "Empty" is usually dropped from "empty virtue signaling", because why bother. Alt-right association or origin don't make the phrase automatically invalid. You could even say pretending that it does is itself a virtue signaling in the derogatory sense.
- tshaddox 5y ago> it quite explicitly accuses someone of posturing instead of paying the honest price for signaling. Not really. I see the accusation used almost exclusively to refer to any time someone deliberately associates themselves publicly with any view that is opposed by the viewer. It's literally just a meaningless accusation thrown at someone who disagrees with you about something.
- WalterBright 5y agoVirtue signalling is not at all abnormal behavior. People have done that since talking evolved. Everybody does it to some extent. And since I pointed out my own virtue signal, have I marginalized myself with abnormal behavior?
- wanderer2323 5y agoFist someone presents their leftist point of view as truth on something called 'rational wiki', then someone posts it on HN with 'Just FYI'. I'm missing an 'explanatory reporting' by a 'neutral news outlet' for my culture war bullshit bingo.
- henrikschroder 5y agoI think we need to slap a "dangerous misinformation" label on your post now! /s, obviously.
- tshaddox 5y agoAll names of professional sports stadiums are arbitrary and vacuous. It's not like there was some "real name" the building had that got surreptitiously erased or covered up by "virtue signalers."
- WalterBright 5y ago> arbitrary and vacuous Not really. It was called Key Arena before because Key Bank funded it. It was good advertising for them. The buildings on college campuses are also named after their donors. It acknowledges who paid for it. Names can also just be for fun, like the Seattle Space Needle. The Emerald City is also the official nickname for Seattle. Climate Pledge Arena is about as fun as "eat your broccoli, it's good for you."
- tshaddox 5y agoKey Bank bought the naming rights and named it "Key Arena." Amazon bought the naming rights and called it "Climate Pledge Arena." The only sense in which one of those arbitrary names is "virtue signaling" and the other isn't it that some people just don't like it when anyone mentions climate change in public.
- WalterBright 5y agoAmazon doing it doesn't make it any less virtue signalling. I'd be much more impressed if Amazon had used the money instead to buy some forest land and turned it into a nature conservancy. I wouldn't be critical of calling that "Climate Pledge Park".
- tshaddox 5y agoCouldn’t Key Bank have used the money for conservation as well? But is simply naming a stadium after the name of your bank somehow better?
- WalterBright 5y ago