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>You're overlooking the possibility that drivers who don't want firearms in the car might prefer a policy that forbids passengers who are carrying. You're corr

by Nadya 11y ago

>You're overlooking the possibility that drivers who don't want firearms in the car might prefer a policy that forbids passengers who are carrying. You're correct, I did overlook that in my pro-gun leaning bias and my pro-logic leaning biases. Fluff policies that don't actually do anything in practice are weird to me. I don't see how this actually provides comfort to anyone who feels uncomfortable around guns. But hey, if a placebo policy works for people. It works. * shrugs * If a person is carrying a concealed weapon or a weapon in a backpack/purse, it's not like the driver is going to know. This policy only affects drivers/passengers who are known to be carrying a firearm. Drivers can still carry one in the glovebox so long as passengers don't find out about it, etc. But yes - from a business perspective. You do what's more popular. If the popular action is to have a fluff policy, you add the fluff policy. It's not like it actually changes anything and it wins you some PR brownies. Sometimes I forget to put my business glasses on when looking at things like this.

dragonwriter 11y ago
> Fluff policies that don't actually do anything in practice are weird to me. This policy does something in practice: it allows Uber to point to the violated policy and sanction the involved party (e.g., banning them from the platform) anytime an action occurs which reveals that a firearm was present; in the event that action also provides a basis for a liability claim, it is also a concrete action Uber can point to say that it took the actions within its power to prevent the event. > I don't see how this actually provides comfort to anyone who feels uncomfortable around guns. It reduces the probability of them becoming aware of the presence of a guns, since the other party will be less likely -- for fear of being reported and sanctioned for violating the policy -- to have a visible firearm; if they "feel uncomfortable around guns", this addresses their discomfort. > This policy only affects drivers/passengers who are known to be carrying a firearm. Which are exactly the firearms that cause discomfort to a person who "feels uncomfortable around guns".
anigbrowl 11y ago
Dragonwriter points out the business case for this: it lets Uber shift liability entirely to the firearm owner (and shifting liability onto other parties is arguably the core of their business model and a fundamental characteristic of platform capitalism in general). I'm not sure what the disclosure laws are for public v. private companies, but liability situations create material risk for investors and those material risks have to be budgeted for and built into a firm's financials. Uber clearly aspires to be a global company. They're going to look at the risk that a driver or passenger draws and fires their gun, and the risk that they might be sued by the victim or victim's family, as well as the PR cost of stories like 'Uber driver/passenger kills person' or 'Uber/driver passenger kills innocent person' etc. etc. The probabilities of guns being used unsafely or irresponsibly might be very low, but we know that in the aggregate there are many injuries and deaths every year from negligent use, and we can extrapolate from that to the possibility of an Uber employee or customer being either a victim or a perpetrator of an illegal or negligent act involving a firearm. To put it bluntly, the cost to Uber's bottom line of a driver or passenger becoming a victim of crime due to not having a gun is likely much lower than the cost of a driver or passenger killing someone, even if the probability of the former event is much higher. Get shot as an Uber driver, everyone feels sorrry, but it's the shooter's fault rather than Uber's you chose to work as an Uber driver and pick up a fare from right outside the OK corral, you might have been killed anyway before having time to draw your gun (like those two police in New York sitting in their patrol car a while back) - too bad, so sad. If an Uber driver were to kill someone without good reason then it would just be a legal horrorshow - years of discovery, high profile court case, reams of adverse publicity, hideously expensive settlement at best. I don't know what Uber is valued at right now, $20 billion or something? If it were a person, that would put it among the world's wealthiest individuals. The brutal reality is that your life is probably worth no more than a couple of million, and quantifiable value is the only kind that matters in capitalism.
- DrScump 11y ago
  >Get shot as an Uber driver, everyone feels sorrry (sic), but it's the shooter's fault rather than Uber's But this policy change could now expose them -- since Uber explicitly forbids the driver from carrying for self-defense, its policy guarantees a defenseless victim.
  - anigbrowl 11y ago
    Yes, but what's the incentive to hold up an Uber driver, who isn't being paid in cash? OK, this doesn't prevent drivers from being selected by psychopaths or people who are intent on stealing cars and wanting to minimize risk, but the necessity to register a phone and a credit card to sign up for Uber service acts as an effective deterrent to most criminals in the first place. And when you get down to it, a) nobody needs to drive for Uber, so if you don't like the risk calculus, don't do it; b) guaranteeing a defenceless victim is a lot less blameworthy than shooting people, notwithstanding the nutbags on fox news trying to hold a preacher responsible for being gunned down in his church the other day, and c) the legal & PR liability from leaving someone at risk is still massively lower than the liability from facilitating a (hypothetical) crime - sins of omission are always punished less severely than sins of commission. I'm not saying this policy of Uber's is fair or rational for society at large, just that it is rational from the self-serving POV of the firm itself.

by Nadya 11y ago

dragonwriter 11y ago

> Fluff policies that don't actually do anything in practice are weird to me. This policy does something in practice: it allows Uber to point to the violated policy and sanction the involved party (e.g., banning them from the platform) anytime an action occurs which reveals that a firearm was present; in the event that action also provides a basis for a liability claim, it is also a concrete action Uber can point to say that it took the actions within its power to prevent the event. > I don't see how this actually provides comfort to anyone who feels uncomfortable around guns. It reduces the probability of them becoming aware of the presence of a guns, since the other party will be less likely -- for fear of being reported and sanctioned for violating the policy -- to have a visible firearm; if they "feel uncomfortable around guns", this addresses their discomfort. > This policy only affects drivers/passengers who are known to be carrying a firearm. Which are exactly the firearms that cause discomfort to a person who "feels uncomfortable around guns".

anigbrowl 11y ago

Dragonwriter points out the business case for this: it lets Uber shift liability entirely to the firearm owner (and shifting liability onto other parties is arguably the core of their business model and a fundamental characteristic of platform capitalism in general). I'm not sure what the disclosure laws are for public v. private companies, but liability situations create material risk for investors and those material risks have to be budgeted for and built into a firm's financials. Uber clearly aspires to be a global company. They're going to look at the risk that a driver or passenger draws and fires their gun, and the risk that they might be sued by the victim or victim's family, as well as the PR cost of stories like 'Uber driver/passenger kills person' or 'Uber/driver passenger kills innocent person' etc. etc. The probabilities of guns being used unsafely or irresponsibly might be very low, but we know that in the aggregate there are many injuries and deaths every year from negligent use, and we can extrapolate from that to the possibility of an Uber employee or customer being either a victim or a perpetrator of an illegal or negligent act involving a firearm. To put it bluntly, the cost to Uber's bottom line of a driver or passenger becoming a victim of crime due to not having a gun is likely much lower than the cost of a driver or passenger killing someone, even if the probability of the former event is much higher. Get shot as an Uber driver, everyone feels sorrry, but it's the shooter's fault rather than Uber's you chose to work as an Uber driver and pick up a fare from right outside the OK corral, you might have been killed anyway before having time to draw your gun (like those two police in New York sitting in their patrol car a while back) - too bad, so sad. If an Uber driver were to kill someone without good reason then it would just be a legal horrorshow - years of discovery, high profile court case, reams of adverse publicity, hideously expensive settlement at best. I don't know what Uber is valued at right now, $20 billion or something? If it were a person, that would put it among the world's wealthiest individuals. The brutal reality is that your life is probably worth no more than a couple of million, and quantifiable value is the only kind that matters in capitalism.

DrScump 11y ago
>Get shot as an Uber driver, everyone feels sorrry (sic), but it's the shooter's fault rather than Uber's But this policy change could now expose them -- since Uber explicitly forbids the driver from carrying for self-defense, its policy guarantees a defenseless victim.
- anigbrowl 11y ago
  Yes, but what's the incentive to hold up an Uber driver, who isn't being paid in cash? OK, this doesn't prevent drivers from being selected by psychopaths or people who are intent on stealing cars and wanting to minimize risk, but the necessity to register a phone and a credit card to sign up for Uber service acts as an effective deterrent to most criminals in the first place. And when you get down to it, a) nobody needs to drive for Uber, so if you don't like the risk calculus, don't do it; b) guaranteeing a defenceless victim is a lot less blameworthy than shooting people, notwithstanding the nutbags on fox news trying to hold a preacher responsible for being gunned down in his church the other day, and c) the legal & PR liability from leaving someone at risk is still massively lower than the liability from facilitating a (hypothetical) crime - sins of omission are always punished less severely than sins of commission. I'm not saying this policy of Uber's is fair or rational for society at large, just that it is rational from the self-serving POV of the firm itself.