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Our intelligence agencies have long recognized that individuals burdened by debt are vulnerable to coercion and manipulation. It's time we acknowledge that the

Our intelligence agencies have long recognized that individuals burdened by debt are vulnerable to coercion and manipulation. It's time we acknowledge that the H1-B visa program creates a similar dynamic. The program’s restrictive rules effectively hang over visa holders like the sword of Damocles, leaving them perpetually at risk and easily controlled. We’ve already seen how Twitter, under Musk’s leadership, has exploited this system to erode user protections in favor of appeasing his ego. When such moral compromises are normalized at the top, their effects inevitably cascade downward, influencing broader organizational norms and behaviors.

ralfd 2y ago
What „user protections“ were eroded at Twitter/X? Or do you just mean it became less woke?
- rrix2 2y ago
  just yesterday the owner of twitter was getting his employees to delete the accounts of posts he disagreed with
  - lazyeye 2y ago
    What do you mean?
    - DonHopkins 2y ago
      Pretending to be ignorant doesn't change the facts, reinforce your point, or bolster your ridiculous argument that Musk supports free speech. You couldn't possibly be more wrong, and pretending to be ignorant doesn't make you right. You have access to the same internet everyone else does. Look it up yourself instead of trying to argue with people who are paying attention and put in the time to be informed. https://www.axios.com/2024/12/27/musk-x-loomer-h1b-maga-verification https://www.axios.com/2024/12/27/musk-x-loomer-h1b-maga-veri... MAGA vs. Musk: Right-wing critics allege censorship, loss of X badges. A handful of conservative critics of Elon Musk are alleging censorship and claiming they were stripped of their verification badges on X after challenging his views on H-1B visas for highly skilled foreign workers.
      - WillPostForFood 2y ago
        You want to go on the record support Laura Loomer as a credible source? Nothing in the article about account deletions, and nothing but one notorior crank claiming, without evidence, they are being censored.
        DonHopkins 2y ago
        Laura Loomer's credibility isn't the issue. It's already quite well established and non-debatable that despite hypocritically gaslighting and declaring himself a "Free Speech Absolutist", that he is so thin-skinned and anti-free-speech that he shadowbans, demonetizes, and kicks off many many people he doesn't agree with, and promotes and amplifies the White Supremacists and Nazis and racists he does agree with, and he doesn't support anyone's free speech except his own. The thing about him censoring Laura Loomer only illustrates what a ridiculous point it's gotten to. It's not his censorship and anti-free-speech she's complaining about, it's that it's now to a point that it finally applies to her. She's not against leopards eating people's faces, she's just against leopards eating HER face. If you still believe Elon Musk supports free speech because you're skeptical of Laura Loomer, you're just as gullible and ignorant and dishonest and unethical as she is. Of course, just like Musk and Loomer, you're not even arguing in good faith, since your own words prove you obviously didn't read the article. You said "Nothing in the article about account deletions, and nothing but one notorior crank claiming, without evidence, they are being censored.", but right up at the top the article clearly states that THREE people were complaining, and he's deleted or threatened to delete the accounts of several other people and organizations: >Driving the news: Trump's conspiracy-minded ally Laura Loomer, New York Young Republican Club president Gavin Wax and InfoWars host Owen Shroyer all said their verification badges disappeared after they criticized Musk's support for H-1B visas, railed against Indian culture and attacked Ramaswamy, Musk's DOGE co-chair. And also: >He threatened to reassign NPR's account handle last year and marked some links to the site as "unsafe" when users click through. >Musk also removed the verification badge of The New York Times in 2023. >X also suspended independent journalist Ken Klippenstein's account after he shared Sen. JD Vance's vetting document from the alleged Iranian hack of Trump's campaign. And as someone who's not arguing in good faith, you know very well it's absolutely true Elon Musk doesn't support free speech, and the list of people and organizations he's banned or demonetized because he doesn't approve of THEIR free speech goes on and on, and there's nowhere near enough room in a typical article or attention span in a typical reader to list them all. You have a lot of nerve to be that blatantly dishonest in a discussion about ethics. But you're so intellectually lazy, you didn't even read the article you're facetiously pretending to have read, so don't demand other people write and read exhaustive 50 page well researched detailed articles enumerating every fact and scrap of evidence for you, if you're too lazy to read a one page article yourself. Because you risk embarrassing yourself again by having your own words and the article's words quoted back to you in juxtaposition.
  - warkdarrior 2y ago
    How is that unethical? X is Musk's toy to do with as he pleases. You as a user of X need to understand that he has absolutely no responsibility to you as a user.
    - kelseyfrog 2y ago
      Any time there are consequences to actions, the matter of ethics arises. The very act of making decisions that have consequences demands responsibility. This is the reality of being human. Whether you or anyone else organize consequences as meaningful or not is a moral abdication. The first thing an immoral person does is justifying the consequences of their actions as inconsequential. This happens to such a degree that doing so is a signal of immorality. Immorality doesn't look like choosing evil, it looks like choosing inconsequentialism.
    - Uehreka 2y ago
      (Regina George voice) So you agree? There are no “user protections” on X?
    - WarOnPrivacy 2y ago
      > How is that unethical? X is Musk's toy to do with as he pleases. I offer that that rights aren't ethics. Musk has a reasonable right to censor speech on his platform that he doesn't agree with. However, when someone establishes themselves as a free speech absolutist, it is arguably unethical for them to remove, suppress and continually work to eliminate speech they disagree with.
    - metabagel 2y ago
      Your statement is basically “might makes right”, which is antithetical to ethics.
  - StanislavPetrov 2y ago
    I'm no fan of Musk but this is has been standard practice at Twitter since it was founded. They are just using slightly different "standards" to decide who to delete/suppress/shadowban.
    - bdangubic 2y ago
      you can’t be that naive… he bought it apparently for “free speech reasons” which he repeats every chance he gets (even on the same day he is silencing his critics). Xi Jinping is more for free speech than Elon is :)
    - metabagel 2y ago
      Moderation isn’t censorship. The previous site was pretty well moderated. The current site is pretty awful, and the site owner is capricious about meting out punishment to those who offend him. It’s all personal, whereas before it was based on moderation policy.
      - tbrownaw 2y ago
        > Moderation isn’t censorship. Yes it is, it's just censorship that (most of) the people who would have heard whatever's being censored want.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
  - fsckboy 2y ago
    what hypocrisy! it's like my alcoholic doctor telling me I need to cut my drinking: his advice may be sound, but it's rich coming from him. I'm referring to the people who denied or did not decry the previous twitter administration deleting huge volumes of tweets they didn't like, the people who now populate bluesky and the fediverse they themselves are quite open about saying, because it's a cozy little echo chamber world where the people who disagree are erased from their view
    - wrs 2y ago
      The previous Twitter administration was quite open about the censorship they were doing and the reasons they did it. You may not like the result, but at least they tried to deal with their inherent conflict of interest (commerce vs. societal good) in a thoughtful way. The current one, on the other hand, constantly trumpets its free-speech absolutism while Elon tells the staff to delete whatever he wants whenever he wakes up in a bad mood, and artificially boost his own trolling.
      - fsckboy 2y ago
        >The previous Twitter administration was quite open about the censorship they were doing and the reasons they did it that is completely false. you should work on developing respect for the opposing views of people of honest intent.
        wrs 2y ago
        I doubt it's completely false. So...same to you, I guess.
    - metabagel 2y ago
      Moderation isn’t censorship. Many comments are “killed” on this very website. You can see them with the “show dead” option.
      - fsckboy 2y ago
        censoring evidence of covid gain of function research and subsequent lab leak is not moderation shadowbanning which stops people from seeing content is also censorship, you're wrong (and don't confuse mix this site with twitter either)
Swizec 2y ago
> It's time we acknowledge that the H1-B visa program creates a similar dynamic. The program’s restrictive rules effectively hang over visa holders like the sword of Damocles, leaving them perpetually at risk and easily controlled. This is why I went through the pain and cost of sponsoring my own O1 and later EB instead of relying on an employer or spousal visa. You just cannot be a full participant with someone who can get you kicked out of the country on 10 day notice.
Simon_O_Rourke 2y ago
> leaving them perpetually at risk and easily controlled. I'd use a stronger term here, for some more nefarious companies can both exploit and abuse employees on a H1b visa limitation. Now go work 60 hour weeks for less than your peers!!
- kelseyfrog 2y ago
  I worked it back from stronger language originally in the hope that it would be more easily palatable. I completely agree with your point
abduhl 2y ago
What is the relationship between this blog post and the H1-B visa program? And are you saying that Twitter has exploited the H-1B program to erode user protections? It seems like you're just trying to shoehorn some kind of unrelated anti-Musk sentiment into a discussion that has nothing to do with H-1B visas or Elon Musk?
- swiftcoder 2y ago
  No, they (and every other BigTech) exploit it to erode worker protections. Which in turn contributes to eroding user protections, since unprotected workers aren't really in a position to put up a fight when management tells them to do something unethical.
  - umeshunni 2y ago
    That's some serious leaps of logic there.
chaps 2y ago
Around the time I was born, my dad was in the army and was taught in an intelligence class that "financial problems" is one of the most exploitable facets of a person by nation states. I don't really know much about his work, but it sounded like his role was particularly at-risk from nation states trying to pull information from him. What's interesting though is that around that time we basically had no money and support from the military! We lived in a roach-infested home and barely had money for groceries! It absolutely blows me away that my family could barely support itself considering the known-and-taught risks of such a situation. When he told me about that I asked him why they didn't pay the family more, considering the risks. He hadn't considered it even once before that conversation.
lazyeye 2y ago
Couldn't disagree more about Elon. I'm just glad there was someone able to open up free speech again on a social media platform and reveal for all to see the level of censorship (by surrogacy) by the govt.I think we might be in a very dark place indeed if this level of govt corruption was allowed to persist for even a few more years.
- DonHopkins 2y ago
  What a terribly unfortunate time for you to foolishly choose to die on that particular of hill trying to defend Elon Musk's dedication to free speech. It says as much about your lack of situational awareness and tenuous grasp of reality and current events, as it does about Elon Musk's thin skinned hypocrisy and contempt for the free speech of anyone but himself. https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/elon-musk-accused-censoring-laura-loomer-maga-republicans-x-rcna185569 https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/elon-musk-accused-... >Elon Musk accused of censoring conservatives on X who disagree with him about immigration. The claims came after Elon Musk was involved in a public feud with some Republicans over immigration.
- trallnag 2y ago
  Image boards like 4chan are quite free, even without Elon
- webdoodle 2y ago
  > I'm just glad there was someone able to open up free speech again on a social media platform It ain't free if someone can buy it.
  - sieabahlpark 2y ago
    [dead]
- bilbo0s 2y ago
  Huh? There is still censorship by surrogacy. It’s just that now they censor things you don’t like being said, so you don’t mind as much. For you it’s not a problem as long as the people being censored have a world view or narrative contrary to your own. But that’s not the same as being a free speech supporter. That’s being a supporter of free speech for you. Not for anyone else.
eh_why_not 2y ago
> It's time we acknowledge that the H1-B visa program creates a similar dynamic....leaving them perpetually at risk and easily controlled. By associating this to the subject of the post, are you implying that the perpetrators of unethical tech in the U.S. are mainly foreign workers, and not "homegrown" citizens?
- kelseyfrog 2y ago
  No, to interpret it in a way that suggests that's it's mainly foreign workers would be extrapolating beyond what I said. I believe the worker-employee dynamic is fundamentally unbalanced[1] in favor of employer leverage over employees. I simply believe that this same dynamic is exaggerated when it comes to H1-B workers. It's simply easier to examine a social relation when it's more apparent. 1. Workers' choice of employment does not come close to ameliorating the disadvantage. Every argument against this is a coping mechanism.
  - eh_why_not 2y ago
    Thanks for clarifying.
janalsncm 2y ago
> perpetually at risk and easily controlled I would like to see two changes. One, better oversight of the job categories and their prevailing wage (no more creating new categories with low wages). Two, more freedom for the immigrant to switch jobs at will so long as their job family doesn’t change. These changes are pro-worker (both resident and immigrant) because they remove the main benefits of hiring foreign labor and prevent undercutting wages. They are changes that I believe SWEs as a class should be in favor of.

ralfd 2y ago

What „user protections“ were eroded at Twitter/X? Or do you just mean it became less woke?

rrix2 2y ago
just yesterday the owner of twitter was getting his employees to delete the accounts of posts he disagreed with
- lazyeye 2y ago
  What do you mean?
  - DonHopkins 2y ago
    Pretending to be ignorant doesn't change the facts, reinforce your point, or bolster your ridiculous argument that Musk supports free speech. You couldn't possibly be more wrong, and pretending to be ignorant doesn't make you right. You have access to the same internet everyone else does. Look it up yourself instead of trying to argue with people who are paying attention and put in the time to be informed. https://www.axios.com/2024/12/27/musk-x-loomer-h1b-maga-verification https://www.axios.com/2024/12/27/musk-x-loomer-h1b-maga-veri... MAGA vs. Musk: Right-wing critics allege censorship, loss of X badges. A handful of conservative critics of Elon Musk are alleging censorship and claiming they were stripped of their verification badges on X after challenging his views on H-1B visas for highly skilled foreign workers.
    - WillPostForFood 2y ago
      You want to go on the record support Laura Loomer as a credible source? Nothing in the article about account deletions, and nothing but one notorior crank claiming, without evidence, they are being censored.
      - DonHopkins 2y ago
        Laura Loomer's credibility isn't the issue. It's already quite well established and non-debatable that despite hypocritically gaslighting and declaring himself a "Free Speech Absolutist", that he is so thin-skinned and anti-free-speech that he shadowbans, demonetizes, and kicks off many many people he doesn't agree with, and promotes and amplifies the White Supremacists and Nazis and racists he does agree with, and he doesn't support anyone's free speech except his own. The thing about him censoring Laura Loomer only illustrates what a ridiculous point it's gotten to. It's not his censorship and anti-free-speech she's complaining about, it's that it's now to a point that it finally applies to her. She's not against leopards eating people's faces, she's just against leopards eating HER face. If you still believe Elon Musk supports free speech because you're skeptical of Laura Loomer, you're just as gullible and ignorant and dishonest and unethical as she is. Of course, just like Musk and Loomer, you're not even arguing in good faith, since your own words prove you obviously didn't read the article. You said "Nothing in the article about account deletions, and nothing but one notorior crank claiming, without evidence, they are being censored.", but right up at the top the article clearly states that THREE people were complaining, and he's deleted or threatened to delete the accounts of several other people and organizations: >Driving the news: Trump's conspiracy-minded ally Laura Loomer, New York Young Republican Club president Gavin Wax and InfoWars host Owen Shroyer all said their verification badges disappeared after they criticized Musk's support for H-1B visas, railed against Indian culture and attacked Ramaswamy, Musk's DOGE co-chair. And also: >He threatened to reassign NPR's account handle last year and marked some links to the site as "unsafe" when users click through. >Musk also removed the verification badge of The New York Times in 2023. >X also suspended independent journalist Ken Klippenstein's account after he shared Sen. JD Vance's vetting document from the alleged Iranian hack of Trump's campaign. And as someone who's not arguing in good faith, you know very well it's absolutely true Elon Musk doesn't support free speech, and the list of people and organizations he's banned or demonetized because he doesn't approve of THEIR free speech goes on and on, and there's nowhere near enough room in a typical article or attention span in a typical reader to list them all. You have a lot of nerve to be that blatantly dishonest in a discussion about ethics. But you're so intellectually lazy, you didn't even read the article you're facetiously pretending to have read, so don't demand other people write and read exhaustive 50 page well researched detailed articles enumerating every fact and scrap of evidence for you, if you're too lazy to read a one page article yourself. Because you risk embarrassing yourself again by having your own words and the article's words quoted back to you in juxtaposition.
- warkdarrior 2y ago
  How is that unethical? X is Musk's toy to do with as he pleases. You as a user of X need to understand that he has absolutely no responsibility to you as a user.
  - kelseyfrog 2y ago
    Any time there are consequences to actions, the matter of ethics arises. The very act of making decisions that have consequences demands responsibility. This is the reality of being human. Whether you or anyone else organize consequences as meaningful or not is a moral abdication. The first thing an immoral person does is justifying the consequences of their actions as inconsequential. This happens to such a degree that doing so is a signal of immorality. Immorality doesn't look like choosing evil, it looks like choosing inconsequentialism.
  - Uehreka 2y ago
    (Regina George voice) So you agree? There are no “user protections” on X?
  - WarOnPrivacy 2y ago
    > How is that unethical? X is Musk's toy to do with as he pleases. I offer that that rights aren't ethics. Musk has a reasonable right to censor speech on his platform that he doesn't agree with. However, when someone establishes themselves as a free speech absolutist, it is arguably unethical for them to remove, suppress and continually work to eliminate speech they disagree with.
  - metabagel 2y ago
    Your statement is basically “might makes right”, which is antithetical to ethics.
- StanislavPetrov 2y ago
  I'm no fan of Musk but this is has been standard practice at Twitter since it was founded. They are just using slightly different "standards" to decide who to delete/suppress/shadowban.
  - bdangubic 2y ago
    you can’t be that naive… he bought it apparently for “free speech reasons” which he repeats every chance he gets (even on the same day he is silencing his critics). Xi Jinping is more for free speech than Elon is :)
  - metabagel 2y ago
    Moderation isn’t censorship. The previous site was pretty well moderated. The current site is pretty awful, and the site owner is capricious about meting out punishment to those who offend him. It’s all personal, whereas before it was based on moderation policy.
    - tbrownaw 2y ago
      > Moderation isn’t censorship. Yes it is, it's just censorship that (most of) the people who would have heard whatever's being censored want.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
- fsckboy 2y ago
  what hypocrisy! it's like my alcoholic doctor telling me I need to cut my drinking: his advice may be sound, but it's rich coming from him. I'm referring to the people who denied or did not decry the previous twitter administration deleting huge volumes of tweets they didn't like, the people who now populate bluesky and the fediverse they themselves are quite open about saying, because it's a cozy little echo chamber world where the people who disagree are erased from their view
  - wrs 2y ago
    The previous Twitter administration was quite open about the censorship they were doing and the reasons they did it. You may not like the result, but at least they tried to deal with their inherent conflict of interest (commerce vs. societal good) in a thoughtful way. The current one, on the other hand, constantly trumpets its free-speech absolutism while Elon tells the staff to delete whatever he wants whenever he wakes up in a bad mood, and artificially boost his own trolling.
    - fsckboy 2y ago
      >The previous Twitter administration was quite open about the censorship they were doing and the reasons they did it that is completely false. you should work on developing respect for the opposing views of people of honest intent.
      - wrs 2y ago
        I doubt it's completely false. So...same to you, I guess.
  - metabagel 2y ago
    Moderation isn’t censorship. Many comments are “killed” on this very website. You can see them with the “show dead” option.
    - fsckboy 2y ago
      censoring evidence of covid gain of function research and subsequent lab leak is not moderation shadowbanning which stops people from seeing content is also censorship, you're wrong (and don't confuse mix this site with twitter either)

Swizec 2y ago

> It's time we acknowledge that the H1-B visa program creates a similar dynamic. The program’s restrictive rules effectively hang over visa holders like the sword of Damocles, leaving them perpetually at risk and easily controlled. This is why I went through the pain and cost of sponsoring my own O1 and later EB instead of relying on an employer or spousal visa. You just cannot be a full participant with someone who can get you kicked out of the country on 10 day notice.

Simon_O_Rourke 2y ago

> leaving them perpetually at risk and easily controlled. I'd use a stronger term here, for some more nefarious companies can both exploit and abuse employees on a H1b visa limitation. Now go work 60 hour weeks for less than your peers!!

kelseyfrog 2y ago
I worked it back from stronger language originally in the hope that it would be more easily palatable. I completely agree with your point

abduhl 2y ago

What is the relationship between this blog post and the H1-B visa program? And are you saying that Twitter has exploited the H-1B program to erode user protections? It seems like you're just trying to shoehorn some kind of unrelated anti-Musk sentiment into a discussion that has nothing to do with H-1B visas or Elon Musk?

swiftcoder 2y ago
No, they (and every other BigTech) exploit it to erode worker protections. Which in turn contributes to eroding user protections, since unprotected workers aren't really in a position to put up a fight when management tells them to do something unethical.
- umeshunni 2y ago
  That's some serious leaps of logic there.

chaps 2y ago

Around the time I was born, my dad was in the army and was taught in an intelligence class that "financial problems" is one of the most exploitable facets of a person by nation states. I don't really know much about his work, but it sounded like his role was particularly at-risk from nation states trying to pull information from him. What's interesting though is that around that time we basically had no money and support from the military! We lived in a roach-infested home and barely had money for groceries! It absolutely blows me away that my family could barely support itself considering the known-and-taught risks of such a situation. When he told me about that I asked him why they didn't pay the family more, considering the risks. He hadn't considered it even once before that conversation.

lazyeye 2y ago

Couldn't disagree more about Elon. I'm just glad there was someone able to open up free speech again on a social media platform and reveal for all to see the level of censorship (by surrogacy) by the govt.I think we might be in a very dark place indeed if this level of govt corruption was allowed to persist for even a few more years.

DonHopkins 2y ago
What a terribly unfortunate time for you to foolishly choose to die on that particular of hill trying to defend Elon Musk's dedication to free speech. It says as much about your lack of situational awareness and tenuous grasp of reality and current events, as it does about Elon Musk's thin skinned hypocrisy and contempt for the free speech of anyone but himself. https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/elon-musk-accused-censoring-laura-loomer-maga-republicans-x-rcna185569 https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/elon-musk-accused-... >Elon Musk accused of censoring conservatives on X who disagree with him about immigration. The claims came after Elon Musk was involved in a public feud with some Republicans over immigration.
trallnag 2y ago
Image boards like 4chan are quite free, even without Elon
webdoodle 2y ago
> I'm just glad there was someone able to open up free speech again on a social media platform It ain't free if someone can buy it.
- sieabahlpark 2y ago
  [dead]
bilbo0s 2y ago
Huh? There is still censorship by surrogacy. It’s just that now they censor things you don’t like being said, so you don’t mind as much. For you it’s not a problem as long as the people being censored have a world view or narrative contrary to your own. But that’s not the same as being a free speech supporter. That’s being a supporter of free speech for you. Not for anyone else.

eh_why_not 2y ago

> It's time we acknowledge that the H1-B visa program creates a similar dynamic....leaving them perpetually at risk and easily controlled. By associating this to the subject of the post, are you implying that the perpetrators of unethical tech in the U.S. are mainly foreign workers, and not "homegrown" citizens?

kelseyfrog 2y ago
No, to interpret it in a way that suggests that's it's mainly foreign workers would be extrapolating beyond what I said. I believe the worker-employee dynamic is fundamentally unbalanced[1] in favor of employer leverage over employees. I simply believe that this same dynamic is exaggerated when it comes to H1-B workers. It's simply easier to examine a social relation when it's more apparent. 1. Workers' choice of employment does not come close to ameliorating the disadvantage. Every argument against this is a coping mechanism.
- eh_why_not 2y ago
  Thanks for clarifying.

janalsncm 2y ago

> perpetually at risk and easily controlled I would like to see two changes. One, better oversight of the job categories and their prevailing wage (no more creating new categories with low wages). Two, more freedom for the immigrant to switch jobs at will so long as their job family doesn’t change. These changes are pro-worker (both resident and immigrant) because they remove the main benefits of hiring foreign labor and prevent undercutting wages. They are changes that I believe SWEs as a class should be in favor of.