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"and can't empathize with you" - I don't really understand why such a perception of companies has been regurgitated and reinforced so much in US public, to the
by alluro2 19d ago
"and can't empathize with you" - I don't really understand why such a perception of companies has been regurgitated and reinforced so much in US public, to the point where it's a blank excuse from ever expecting such a thing from a company. It's not true that it can't. The only reason to keep repeating that kind of worldview is to absolve companies behaving in shitty, toxic or downright evil ways.
The law doesn't say companies MUST choose the most profitable choice at every turn, and even explicitly allows for good treatment of customers, community, employees etc as a viable business strategy (even if it's sad that it must be justified in that way).
- ImPostingOnHN 19d agoI think the point is that companies are purely legal entities, and as such, cannot feel, much less empathize, simply by virtue of them not being living things
- leptons 19d agoThat's nonsense. "Companies" are not something non-human, they are run by humans, who do feel, empathize, and are living beings. Without these living-being humans, there would simply be no "company". Now how those humans that run the company behave is another thing - they are free to be greedy assholes, and a lot of them are, and some of them aren't - but that's still a human thing.
- ImPostingOnHN 18d ago> "Companies" are not something non-human Yes, they are not humans. They are not even living creatures. They are mostly-legal entities mostly for the purpose of contracting with humans or other legal entities. > they are run by humans, who do feel, empathize, and are living beings This is usually true, but it is orthogonal to whether the company (a legal entity) itself is a biologically living creature, which is the only thing capable of feeling*. To put a point on it: my lawnmower is also run by humans, but it does not have empathy for any grass or people that gets in its way. It mostly just goes where it is steered. A company is like that, except with less touching grass. * — unless you want to argue semantics about what "feeling" means, even though the discussion is about "feeling" and "empathy" in the way humans experience it, and how that form of "empathy" does not exist for a nonliving legal entity which may or may not employ any actual humans
- leptons 17d agoThis pointless internet interaction is over.
- awesome_dude 19d agoI agree that this notion that companies make these decisions is bad, bad on the grounds that it's people working for those companies that make the decisions, they hide themselves away, but the company itself isn't doing anything - is always a human making the decision
- scubbo 19d ago> The only reason to keep repeating that kind of worldview is to absolve companies behaving in shitty, toxic or downright evil ways. Or...to warn people away from ever expecting compassionate or empathetic behaviour from companies, and remind people not to trust them?
- sublinear 19d agoI think the only misleading part of this situation is your naive and self-centered definition of "trust", and the assumption that so many others think similarly enough that they need to be warned. I trust a business to fulfill their obligations as stated in writing for the money paid. I do not trust them in any other way. Nobody should "trust" or depend on undefined behavior. Common sense can only ever be as common as you expect.
- scubbo 18d ago> your naive and self-centered definition of "trust" I never gave one? For what it's worth, I agree with your second paragraph, despite your first being needlessly aggressive.
- flaunf221 18d agoIt is a fact that it can't. Because company is not something tangible. It can't feel or think. As for companies being shit, that's just capitalism, but plenty of people believe that's the only way.