I think it is absolutely essential for tech people to realize that working for EvilCorp is, in fact, evil. And there is no redemption from that by doing a little bit of "activism" or contributing a handful of lines to an "open source" project on the weekend. Stop this form of tech greenwashing.
If you give your full working power to EvilCorp, you are *absolutely responsible* for what is going on and you deserve to be called out on that. Quit your job or nothing will ever change. Your choice.
This, besides it being a shit place, is why I quit my job as php monkey in what basically amounted to an advertising agency.
I was making the web and the world a worse place. I'll never stop regretting this and I'll never get that time back either.
FUCK the corporate web.
@resist_berlin In capitalism we are compelled to work under threat of starvation. Thanks though.
@rotatingskull the tech folks I'm referring to are usually not the ones worrying about how to pay their rent next month or threatened by starvation.
It sounds nice but doesn't provide any way to sustain a standard of living. Open source still costs a lot of money, but people just don't talk about it.
There's always the decision of what to spend your life on, and I don't always necessarily blame individual Googlers for working for a company which writes software for drone assassinations. Under capitalism many people including techies are not always free to choose what they do to survive.
@bob
these apologetics always baffle me. there are plenty who are free to choose and choose evil nonetheless. we give them cover when we cloud the issue by immediately referencing those who aren't free to choose
@resist_berlin
@bob @resist_berlin
I mean you literally #NotAllMen the thread when you do that. #NotAllTechWorkers?
@bob @resist_berlin again, this feels like apologetics. no one would dispute what you're saying. the point is emphasis.
@walruslifestyle @bob @resist_berlin
While I agree that developers should feel responsible for the overall behaviour of the company they work for, I think that there are plenty of things that a good boy can do in an evil corp, before quitting.
First she could try to make the evil effects of corporate decision explicit and known to the management and collegues, in written form, so that, when they become an issue, nobody can say they did not know.
Second she can leak info.
And actually more..
@resist_berlin
I'm aware that this might sound like finding excuses, but I think it's also a good idea to act where we are, be it a corporation or just a company big enough for ethics to become a blur.
I think those corporations are full of people who just need to be triggered or convinced.
@resist_berlin Would you also stop paying your taxes to hinder an evil government? I just want to know where you draw the line.
@resist_berlin at the same time, there are degrees of evil. And everyone's got to eat.
But if you're successfully building ye olde Big Data Analytics To Find And Destroy Nonconformists, you should probably try to swap it for work on a less evil, or less competent, project.