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No, please stop with this false equivalence. People get rights and benefit of the doubt. Corporations do not.

by kibwen 2y ago

normalaccess 2y ago
As much as I dislike corporations I dislike a tyranny even more. A cooperation is not magic, they are just collections of people. Each person in a cooperation should be afforded the same rights as each person outside a cooperation. Are your personal phone records, emails, text messages stored /just in case/ you commit a crime? Once you define a class as having less rights (for better or worse) you've created a breach. The 4th and 5th Amendment: 4th: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. 5th: No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
mattmaroon 2y ago
It's not false equivalence, we were talking about communications between people. Corporations don't write emails, people do. A corporation, big or small, is just a legal way of definining the property of people, and the people who work for it (who may or may not also own some of it) are people. Communications between them are communications between people. What they're saying is that people deserve privacy, unless what they're doing has some relationship to making money, in which case they do not.
- to11mtm 2y ago
  I mean yes and no... But it's a vague nebula. Stuff like whistleblower protections, retention laws, 'piercing the corporate veil'....
  - mattmaroon 2y ago
    There are lots of vague things, the idea that if something you said could be used against you in court you must have done something wrong (the only thing to which I was responding) is not one. Prosecutors are just as overzealous in civil cases as legal. Innocent things said at work can be used against someone just as well as ones said at home and in all the same ways and for all the same reasons. What’s the famous Cardinal Richeleu quote? I responded only because “corporations bad” is a mind virus deeply inculcated in a lot of people here, but those same people mostly would never think that just because something you said could be used against you in court that you did something either morally wrong or illegal. I wanted people to see the effect the mind virus had on their thinking. Did anyone? No idea, probably not. But it’s not a false equivalence at all, all the same reasoning applies whether your communication was at the office or your house, and whether it was about your dog or your code. There are very many non-nefarious, completely legal reasons one might not want a work communication to be visible down the line, just as with personal. If someone can’t see that their thinking is cloudy and I bet they experience cognitive dissonance.
    - to11mtm 2y ago
      > What’s the famous Cardinal Richeleu quote? Among other things in my past, something a colleague reminded me of as we were going through special training, since the work we were doing had specific training and guidelines for communications, on top of the normal training and guidelines for communications, due to our team working on specifically 'compliance' oriented modules. Ironically, it did not impact the teams ability to raise concerns or deal with bugs/etc. It was primarily about being clear about messaging in certain contexts, and it wasn't hard to deal with. > I responded only because “corporations bad” is a mind virus deeply inculcated in a lot of people here, I'd argue more people are unhappy with the way your typical modern corporation is run, speaking of... > but those same people mostly would never think that just because something you said could be used against you in court that you did something either morally wrong or illegal It would be interesting to ask what subset of those people have had to give all their social media account info on application/hire to the job so that HR can keep tabs on them... I got ahead of myself here, just a bit. Let's go back to: > the idea that if something you said could be used against you in court you must have done something wrong (the only thing to which I was responding) is not one. Hard to say based on the muddling of the 'you' here. Is the 'you' in this statement something the company did? Something you did under (potentially ever-implicit) duress of losing employment? It's hard to respond accurately without knowing the context. > There are very many non-nefarious, completely legal reasons one might not want a work communication to be visible down the line, just as with personal. Yeah but at the same time all parties need to protect themselves, and that includes the corporation. As a realistic example, a business may need to retain Teams conversations for an extended period of time, for instance if someone decides to file some sort of EEOC or Harassment claim down the line. If the claiming employee is pulling messages out of context, the full history may aid the defense of the business. Yet, if the business retains those conversations, they cannot hide them on subpoena. And, having dealt with more than one attempt at 'character assassination' I can say I'm glad I live in a one-party consent state for recording. > If someone can’t see that their thinking is cloudy and I bet they experience cognitive dissonance. Nope I just know to stand by what I say. I've had some managers that don't appreciate the 'level of detail' I include in certain emails, but 90% of those are clowns that were looking for me to, shock, shock, not have enough context to a statement so they could fire or ostracize me by, as you say, 'six words out of context'. At least if I give the full context with the communication, I can point at that and they look like an idiot instead of getting rid of the person politely trying to steer them away from incompetence.
scripturial 2y ago
The flaw that is limiting your thinking and understanding is companies don’t do things, only people can do things. Until you start seeing companies as a group of people, you can’t understand and predict how a “company” will act and behave. When a sales person is selling a product, it is a person who is acting, they may follow some policies, but another person made those policies. You need to expand your thinking into the individual people.
- mattmaroon 2y ago
  I use this all the time. People say “the government wants…” or “Republicans did…” (you can pretty much play this like mad libs) and I say “wait, the government is an organization comprised of people, who specifically wants that?” And then they say {insert other nebulous group here} and I point out the same thing. And then either they give up out of frustration and think I’m dissembling or they start to think about the problem differently.
- dwallin 2y ago
  You could just as easily say “people don’t matter, people are just a collection of cells. You can’t predict a person without understand how their cells behave”, which clearly is a ridiculous statement. Structure really matters, at all scales, and the way a collection of entities behaves often diverges significantly from what you would get looking at individual entities in isolation.
richwater 2y ago
> People get rights and benefit of the doubt. Corporations do not. Corporations are just groups of people. Unless you're accusing a company of being ran by AGI.
- kelnos 2y ago
  Yes, corporations are groups of people, but they are also legal entities that have been given certain rights, responsibilities, and restrictions. On top of that, we usually consider the corporate entity legally liable for thinga the people do in the name of the corporation. That doesn't come from "just a group of people". That comes from a specific legal structure we've decided on as a society.
akoboldfrying 2y ago
Suppose a group of people agree amongst themselves to work together to produce and sell a good or service. Are these people entitled to the rights you're talking about? They're people, so I think you must say that they are. OTOH, to all intents and purposes these people are behaving like a corporation. How can it be that corporations are denied those rights, but groups of people that behave exactly like corporations -- that are corporations, in all but name -- are entitled to them?
- mattmaroon 2y ago
  Because corporations are bad that’s why!
- oarsinsync 2y ago
  > OTOH, to all intents and purposes these people are behaving like a corporation. How can it be that corporations are denied those rights, but groups of people that behave exactly like corporations -- that are corporations, in all but name -- are entitled to them? A collection of individuals operating in principle like they’re an LLC, but not contained within an LLC, don’t get the protections that an LLC get. They get individual personal unlimited liability. For the same reasons that me operating as an individual gets taxed as an individual, but me operating through a LLC wrapper gets taxed as an LLC. We’ve made up these arbitrary rules whereby LLCs (sometimes) get a different set of rules to real people.
  - akoboldfrying 2y ago
    True, this is an important distinction that I neglected to mention. Nevertheless I don't see liability or tax differences as fundamental: I think that, even if there was no legal concept of a corporation being a (kind of) person with special protections, functionally similar structures could and would arise. We already have liability-waiving EULAs everywhere for software, which 99% of people accept without a second thought; perhaps this concept would be much more widespread. I also think that most people who complain about "corporations" don't carefully distinguish them from other ways of clumping people together for business reasons, like partnerships or trusts -- I think the resentment is mainly around the size and wealth of these clumps. And I think that the differentially wealth-generating tendency of all these people-clumping arrangements comes primarily from the efficiencies (and additional possibilities) afforded by letting the people in them specialise their work, rather than from liability and tax differences. But admittedly that's my own speculation.

No, please stop with this false equivalence. People get rights and benefit of the doubt. Corporations do not.

by kibwen 2y ago

No, please stop with this false equivalence. People get rights and benefit of the doubt. Corporations do not.

As much as I dislike corporations I dislike a tyranny even more. A cooperation is not magic, they are just collections of people. Each person in a cooperation should be afforded the same rights as each person outside a cooperation. Are your personal phone records, emails, text messages stored /just in case/ you commit a crime? Once you define a class as having less rights (for better or worse) you've created a breach. The 4th and 5th Amendment: 4th: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. 5th: No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

mattmaroon 2y ago

It's not false equivalence, we were talking about communications between people. Corporations don't write emails, people do. A corporation, big or small, is just a legal way of definining the property of people, and the people who work for it (who may or may not also own some of it) are people. Communications between them are communications between people. What they're saying is that people deserve privacy, unless what they're doing has some relationship to making money, in which case they do not.

to11mtm 2y ago
I mean yes and no... But it's a vague nebula. Stuff like whistleblower protections, retention laws, 'piercing the corporate veil'....
- mattmaroon 2y ago
  There are lots of vague things, the idea that if something you said could be used against you in court you must have done something wrong (the only thing to which I was responding) is not one. Prosecutors are just as overzealous in civil cases as legal. Innocent things said at work can be used against someone just as well as ones said at home and in all the same ways and for all the same reasons. What’s the famous Cardinal Richeleu quote? I responded only because “corporations bad” is a mind virus deeply inculcated in a lot of people here, but those same people mostly would never think that just because something you said could be used against you in court that you did something either morally wrong or illegal. I wanted people to see the effect the mind virus had on their thinking. Did anyone? No idea, probably not. But it’s not a false equivalence at all, all the same reasoning applies whether your communication was at the office or your house, and whether it was about your dog or your code. There are very many non-nefarious, completely legal reasons one might not want a work communication to be visible down the line, just as with personal. If someone can’t see that their thinking is cloudy and I bet they experience cognitive dissonance.
  - to11mtm 2y ago
    > What’s the famous Cardinal Richeleu quote? Among other things in my past, something a colleague reminded me of as we were going through special training, since the work we were doing had specific training and guidelines for communications, on top of the normal training and guidelines for communications, due to our team working on specifically 'compliance' oriented modules. Ironically, it did not impact the teams ability to raise concerns or deal with bugs/etc. It was primarily about being clear about messaging in certain contexts, and it wasn't hard to deal with. > I responded only because “corporations bad” is a mind virus deeply inculcated in a lot of people here, I'd argue more people are unhappy with the way your typical modern corporation is run, speaking of... > but those same people mostly would never think that just because something you said could be used against you in court that you did something either morally wrong or illegal It would be interesting to ask what subset of those people have had to give all their social media account info on application/hire to the job so that HR can keep tabs on them... I got ahead of myself here, just a bit. Let's go back to: > the idea that if something you said could be used against you in court you must have done something wrong (the only thing to which I was responding) is not one. Hard to say based on the muddling of the 'you' here. Is the 'you' in this statement something the company did? Something you did under (potentially ever-implicit) duress of losing employment? It's hard to respond accurately without knowing the context. > There are very many non-nefarious, completely legal reasons one might not want a work communication to be visible down the line, just as with personal. Yeah but at the same time all parties need to protect themselves, and that includes the corporation. As a realistic example, a business may need to retain Teams conversations for an extended period of time, for instance if someone decides to file some sort of EEOC or Harassment claim down the line. If the claiming employee is pulling messages out of context, the full history may aid the defense of the business. Yet, if the business retains those conversations, they cannot hide them on subpoena. And, having dealt with more than one attempt at 'character assassination' I can say I'm glad I live in a one-party consent state for recording. > If someone can’t see that their thinking is cloudy and I bet they experience cognitive dissonance. Nope I just know to stand by what I say. I've had some managers that don't appreciate the 'level of detail' I include in certain emails, but 90% of those are clowns that were looking for me to, shock, shock, not have enough context to a statement so they could fire or ostracize me by, as you say, 'six words out of context'. At least if I give the full context with the communication, I can point at that and they look like an idiot instead of getting rid of the person politely trying to steer them away from incompetence.

scripturial 2y ago

The flaw that is limiting your thinking and understanding is companies don’t do things, only people can do things. Until you start seeing companies as a group of people, you can’t understand and predict how a “company” will act and behave. When a sales person is selling a product, it is a person who is acting, they may follow some policies, but another person made those policies. You need to expand your thinking into the individual people.

mattmaroon 2y ago
I use this all the time. People say “the government wants…” or “Republicans did…” (you can pretty much play this like mad libs) and I say “wait, the government is an organization comprised of people, who specifically wants that?” And then they say {insert other nebulous group here} and I point out the same thing. And then either they give up out of frustration and think I’m dissembling or they start to think about the problem differently.
dwallin 2y ago
You could just as easily say “people don’t matter, people are just a collection of cells. You can’t predict a person without understand how their cells behave”, which clearly is a ridiculous statement. Structure really matters, at all scales, and the way a collection of entities behaves often diverges significantly from what you would get looking at individual entities in isolation.

richwater 2y ago

> People get rights and benefit of the doubt. Corporations do not. Corporations are just groups of people. Unless you're accusing a company of being ran by AGI.

kelnos 2y ago
Yes, corporations are groups of people, but they are also legal entities that have been given certain rights, responsibilities, and restrictions. On top of that, we usually consider the corporate entity legally liable for thinga the people do in the name of the corporation. That doesn't come from "just a group of people". That comes from a specific legal structure we've decided on as a society.

akoboldfrying 2y ago

Suppose a group of people agree amongst themselves to work together to produce and sell a good or service. Are these people entitled to the rights you're talking about? They're people, so I think you must say that they are. OTOH, to all intents and purposes these people are behaving like a corporation. How can it be that corporations are denied those rights, but groups of people that behave exactly like corporations -- that are corporations, in all but name -- are entitled to them?

mattmaroon 2y ago
Because corporations are bad that’s why!
oarsinsync 2y ago
> OTOH, to all intents and purposes these people are behaving like a corporation. How can it be that corporations are denied those rights, but groups of people that behave exactly like corporations -- that are corporations, in all but name -- are entitled to them? A collection of individuals operating in principle like they’re an LLC, but not contained within an LLC, don’t get the protections that an LLC get. They get individual personal unlimited liability. For the same reasons that me operating as an individual gets taxed as an individual, but me operating through a LLC wrapper gets taxed as an LLC. We’ve made up these arbitrary rules whereby LLCs (sometimes) get a different set of rules to real people.
- akoboldfrying 2y ago
  True, this is an important distinction that I neglected to mention. Nevertheless I don't see liability or tax differences as fundamental: I think that, even if there was no legal concept of a corporation being a (kind of) person with special protections, functionally similar structures could and would arise. We already have liability-waiving EULAs everywhere for software, which 99% of people accept without a second thought; perhaps this concept would be much more widespread. I also think that most people who complain about "corporations" don't carefully distinguish them from other ways of clumping people together for business reasons, like partnerships or trusts -- I think the resentment is mainly around the size and wealth of these clumps. And I think that the differentially wealth-generating tendency of all these people-clumping arrangements comes primarily from the efficiencies (and additional possibilities) afforded by letting the people in them specialise their work, rather than from liability and tax differences. But admittedly that's my own speculation.