This Is the Age of the Coward : collapse

[–] Jarix 64 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (6 children)

Unpopular opinion warning.

The real cowards are the masses who don't stop bitching about these entities and then keep on using them. You are enabling them and you are not just missing the ring, you are gagging on their chode

Want to talk about courage?

Stop buyng Apple.

Stop buying Disney and anything it produces.

You can start with whatever you have now being the last you will ever have.

Burn all your socials and go out until the world around you with the people around you.

Take your power back by sacrificing the convenience they provide you.

Do this in enough numbers and they will cease to exist. And if it takes 25 years to accomplish it, so be it.

Start today

[–] [email protected] 40 points 6 days ago (2 children)

In spirit I totally agree with you, but that kind of strategy just doesn't work anymore. Boycotting Apple is relatively easy. Boycotting Disney is a little harder, unless you're already a pirate, but not impossible. Then there's companies like Nestle, arguably worse than any of them. Companies like Nestle, Johnson & Johnson, Kraft, Coca-Cola, and Pepsi are so diversified, with so many subsidiaries and shell companies spread the world over. It is damn near impossible for the average person to boycott Nestle in any meaningful way.

Network graph of major subsidiaries or global food and drug corporations.

Go ahead and try to boycott just one or two of the corporations in this image. Boycotts may still impact specific brands at a local level, but they have become pretty ineffective against corporations.

All of the boycotts in the world can't beat the apathy rotting away the foundation of democracy. Boycott one company or brand and another will step in to fill the political void. Apathy keeps young voters out of the voting booths in local elections. These companies have a vested interest in convincing you that your vote doesn't matter and that government regulation is ineffective. It's a lie to keep you apathetic and disinterested in politics because your vote is the only part of the system they can't directly influence.

[–] Jarix 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I personally have been boycotting Nestle for almost 2 decades

And yeah there's times i slip or didn't realize that something is a nestle product but it's certainly possible to do it, without getting amishly extreme about it. But it's possible to do even if it's only as much as you can.

But i think your counter argument is a little flawed, not entirely. In spirit i do follow what you mean but i think you also changed the argument as well.

Boycotting everyone won't work, but i think it's important to pick you battles like any form of activism.

And while there are evil entities that should be burned down root and all and salted for good measure, they are a different breed of problem that should also be fought.

Boycotting is a tool, and some tools need to be used carefully to make anything useful with then, and that's where we seem to differ.

Taking a brand that is so iconic and ending it the way to go. Making them fill the void is a goal worth pursuing, it says watch the fuck out, this can happen to you.

Ending apple, or Disney, would scare the every living shit out of anyone who chose to fill that void, and it will pay dividends to all of us.

I don't expect it to happen, but it would be incredibly effective to do no matter how inevitable that void was filled.

Im sure this is full of holes and im not explaining well, wish we could grab a drink and discuss this, think we would enjoy exploring where we align and where we diverge

[–] some_designer_dude 5 points 6 days ago (2 children)

Boycotts, from the perspective of the organizations you’d want to hurt the most, look like a few ants throwing fists at an elephant. It probably doesn’t even know it’s happening, let alone suffering some kind of consequence.

Refusing to buy something from an evil corp is in its own way cowardly. It won’t accomplish anything meaningful but it feels good enough that it stops any actual useful action.

I don’t think us “normies” can be blamed either way though. Even for those who can afford alternatives, they may not be able to afford the loss in quality or convenience or whatever value they’re giving up. I’d love to not buy or use Apple, but I’d also like to keep my job.

Also consider who you’d even be hurting if everyone somehow did participate in a boycott. Apple’s sales plummet but they’ll never disappear, and so long as there’s any money coming in at all, the last to go would be at the top. So we’ve all just put hundreds of thousands of people out of jobs, and the rich, evil pieces of shit at the top haven’t really felt anything.

It is cowardice to convince yourself that a flawed idea would work and then to just dig in and try to convert as many as you can. These people won’t change until they’re forced to empathize.

What’re they missing that keeps them so disconnected from us? The one thing we can give the people who truly otherwise have it all? The thing that really separates us: fear. Fear of repercussions. They keep dancing away from lawsuits and convictions, mocking us with their unlimited freedom. All while imprisoning us for crimes dwarfed by their own.

All that’s left is violence. They dodge everything else ¯_(ツ)_/¯

[–] LovableSidekick 3 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

And yet stores have pulled CDs and other products as soon as Christians have objected to them. And companies plaster slogans like "Eco Friendly" all over their products and take great pains to try to send the right messages so they don't get demonized, because they know public opinion DOES affect profits.

[–] Jarix 3 points 6 days ago

Blame the mob not the individual. Shift enough individual and the "normies" acting united, consistently sometime for years and decades will be a force of good. And maybe that first little frozen crystal that is the catalyst for snowflake in hell with enough other little snowflakes together tight enough to form a snowball can help one of them land on the magnesium that will start the reaction that will have a significant reaction much larger than the little crystal, or the snowflake or the snowball would ever expect to cause on its own.

FIGHT for the world you want, even in small ways you may not live long enough to see. Do it because it could help, dont be apathetic and so self centered that you think what effects you, real or imagined, is the only thing worth putting some effort towards.

Bernie marched in 60s hes still fighting today, but he was there, and he helped make a difference. Because he may be here, but it took everyone else he marched with who didnt achieve what he was able to for him to succeed.

It happens again and again, but the examples of taking a stance, having principles and intwgrity, even if we fail, especially when we fail, to not give in to, "they are all the same so it doesnt matter" mentallity that kept people from voting and letting faschists win. Becsause they want you to give up. They want you to lay down and stop making their lives easier.

Be a nuisance, even if its one moment, in one day in one lifetime.

Someday you and i will be dust. But our actions now even in infinitesimly small ways can help bring about change. But giving up, laying down will always make it worse than it other wise could be.

Thats it. The small wins add up. Not BUYING something you dont need, even just as often as you can, still helps.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Not to be a dick, but it looks like it's easy to boycott 90% of that picture by just not being an unhealthy person

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago (1 children)

This made me double check. Ahem

Tide? Dawn? Cheer? Gain? Cascade? Gillette? Charmin? Tampax? Crest? Oral B? Vicks? Duracell? This list is hardly exhaustive, especially because a lot of times the discount brands that you buy are made in the same factory, same supply chain, different box, so in some cases, you're still paying P&G even when you buy the off brand. AND THIS IS JUST PROCTOR AND GAMBLE, AND IT'S PROBABLY NOT EVEN A FULL REPRESENTATION OF THEIR PORTFOLIO AT THAT.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (2 children)

Can't even remember the last time I bought any of those brands you mentioned. Maybe Gain. I might have a box of dryer sheets I barely use because it makes my clothes feel weird.

Also I'm Canadian, so lately I've had my phone out while shopping to make sure the umbrella company of anything I buy is at least a Canadian investment giant, or preferably not and I pay more for less if it means supporting local

EDIT: gum! I definitely buy gum without thinking about my purchase impact

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 days ago

Don't worry, some of them are a different brand in Canada.

Just like how half those brands on the lists are different brands in the EU.

You may have bought from the same company, rebranded more than you know.

That doesn't even get into the fact that generic brands and sometimes smaller brands often use the same factories as big brands but pay them for production time (butter is notorious for churning out 5 different brand labels on the same production line)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago

Okay, fair enough

[–] PlantDadManGuy 5 points 6 days ago (2 children)

It's easy and realistic to boycott one shitty company that supports Nazis. It is literally impossible to convince enough people to stop buying from every single company that has kissed king Orange Fantasy tiny little ring. You can't boycott everything, and literally none of them are putting up a fight, because they aren't interested in becoming a corporate martyr.

[–] stickly 3 points 5 days ago

People view boycotting as if enough homework will find them the fabled Free Market Unicorn©️, with sparkling udders they can ethically consume from to their hearts content.

Guess what: your coffee and chocolate are slave labor all the way down. Nestle owns all your water and 6 media conglomerates get your entertainment money no matter where you swipe your credit card.

But do you actually need to make those purchases in the first place? There's nothing other than habit, comfort, and convenience keeping you from cutting most of it out of your life. It makes the ethical calculus so much easier.

Of course, how much austerity you can stomach in your modern life is a personal threshold. But every dollar you don't spend is a dollar less to our corporate overlords. You could even donate it to a worthy cause for double the satisfaction (if you care to do that homework...)

[–] Jarix 1 points 5 days ago

Exactly that's exactly what I'm saying

[–] LovableSidekick 5 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

I agree that's the way to resist corporate control, but I wouldn't really call people brave for changing their shopping habits. Maybe if they actually face some kind of hardship - like if they stop playing Steam games instead of bitching about Steam - [shudder OMG NOT THAT!]

[–] Dasus 5 points 6 days ago (2 children)

Ah the ol' "you can't participate in a society you gave criticisms about".

"Don't like capitalism? Stop buying things."

"Hate fossil fuels? Don't use transportation or electricity which relies on it."

"Hate slavery? Manufacture your own clothes."

"Don't like the country? Move away."

Even just social media is a sort of must today. It isn't, not really, but neither is a car or buying things if you really get down to it.

But for like a teenager, social media is pretty much a must. We can all pretend it isn't and how brave it is to be against the mainstream and do your own thing but you might feel a twinge of regret 20 years down the line when you have little to no relationships.

It's easier to use the things, complain about them, organise and change them, then it is to change them via expecting everyone to make the same personal choices. There's clearly something worthy or interesting about the systems. So let's just try to take out/regulate whatever makes them shit.

[–] Feathercrown 10 points 6 days ago (1 children)

[–] Dasus 3 points 6 days ago

[–] LovableSidekick 4 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (5 children)

Ah, the ol' strawman approach - argue with a ridiculous version of what somebody said instead of what they actually said, which in this case was don't buy from companies you object to. Seems pretty straightforward and not at all stupid like move to a different country or stop using electricity. No need to be a dick.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Stopped my Netflix, Amazon Prime, Audible, Spotify, Disney accounts.

Stopped buying at Amazon.

Closed my instagram accounts. Was already permabanned on X-twitter.

I can't do much more than that.

[–] Jarix 5 points 6 days ago (1 children)

My point is being missed it seems.

It's not that im saying we can just stop. Being part of society, but, that if we can pick the right target, a target that will say send the right message, then boycotting something as a united front, and sticking to it, ending that one thing, if its the right thing, will do a lot of the heavy lifting, so you dont have to cancel everything that you are willing to use as long as its worth it

There isnt anything wrong with liking things and wanting those things, but they also arent needed.

I used 2 examples. Apple and Disney, because i think those 2 are good targets for the message ending them would send.

Apple is the first company to cross the Trillion Dollar worth. (IIRC)

they had products built in factories that literally had to put nets around them to stop people suiciding themselves due to the conditions they work in. Its modern slavery if not worse.

Ending that company BECAUSE they are worth so much sends a strong message that that level of success will not be tolerated any longer. But the sacrifice is that we cant let them come back to us. And if we simply repeat for everyone else that crosses the same threshold, while still showing that it isnt that we dont like the industries they belong to, we will need to be diligent in saying, NO you have too much you are cancelled.

Disney is different but they are so iconic. They are a culture that has grown like a cancer.

And many of us have strong emotional memories of their IP

Saying we reject you because of what you have become, inspite of our attatchment to them, will send the message that we dont need you if this is what you have become.

Not sure if this helps, but its not about trying to ignore the world, its about making a united effort and sending the right message.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 days ago

And I'm saying, I'm already doing my part.

The only thing I can't quit, is my phone, kinda need one in today's society. And I chose not to support Google, (and I've been swindled by Sailfish in the past) so went with an Apple device.

[–] MITM0 2 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

YES, Thank you for saying this. E.g: People really want to pretend Youtube wasn't clunky back in the old days

[–] [email protected] 29 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

These aren’t businesses making tough choices – they’re paper empires run by moral cowards—simpering, whimpering, and weak.”

How desperate to hide from reality can someone be??

These are the most powerful people on the planet making perfectly reasonable decisions for their own benefit, because that's literally the only thing they've ever cared about.

The idea that corporations and the people who run them should be "brave" and stand up against the very system that enables them to exist, or somehow give a single fuck about society at large, otherwise they're "cowards" (and not simply self serving oppressors) is so far beyond absurd, it's actually enraging at this point.

[–] PlantDadManGuy 4 points 6 days ago (3 children)

While I disagree with the usual joke that says "corporations are people," I do think they represent the people who run them. In modern USA, our big companies are infinitely more powerful than our government, and it seems like SOME of them should be putting up a fight, standing up for their queer employees, Hispanic customers or at least the Palestinian family members of the board. Literally no one with real power is opposing this fascist takeover, and it fucking disgusts me. Companies are jumping at the chance to appease orange Hitler, and all struck down their gay pride policies before even being ordered or threatened. I guess somehow I was naive enough to hope that Starbucks or Patagonia or Target would pretend to resist the erasure of queer people, or even just push the oppressors into a courtroom before kneeling down to lick their spray tanned boots. This is America. Land of the cowards.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

our big companies are infinitely more powerful than our government

The big companies ARE your government. Wtf do you think "lobbying" is? Who the fuck do you think funds both your parties? (Hint: It's bribery and billionaires, respectively)

and it seems like SOME of them should be putting up a fight, standing up for their queer employees, Hispanic customers or at least the Palestinian family members of the board.

Why the fuck would they?

Because they used pink/green/crip/whatever wash for a few days each year to fool you in to believing they care? They don't. Never have.

Companies exist to make profit, as long as appropriating marginalised peoples' struggles and pretending to care made them money, they kept the mask on, now it no longer does, nor do they have rules like (what they would consider) that "silly" DEI keeping them from openly discriminating and maintaining the white supremacist cis-heteronormative ableist patriarchy they still openly favoured even when the rules were in place. Bending the knee to fascism (which capitalism will always decay in to precisely for this reason) will ultimately be much more profitable for them - the billionaires who own the companies (the companies are just a shell, that they will drop for a bigger one. Prison labour? Deportation camp labour? Slave labour? They're already here, and are about to have a growth spurt) in a fucking flash.

Literally no one with real power is opposing this fascist takeover, and it fucking disgusts me.

Literally anyone with real power under capitalism is fascist, or at least dedicated to maintain the the capitalist system that leads to it, what the fuck did you expect?

Companies are jumping at the chance to appease orange Hitler, and all struck down their gay pride policies before even being ordered or threatened.

Welcome to pinkwashing, queers have been telling you for decades that rainbow capitalism is a mask and a trick you shouldn't fall for.

Also maybe consider doing some research in to war and other oppression, see how motherfuckingly eye-wateringly profitable it is.

I guess somehow I was naive enough to hope that Starbucks or Patagonia or Target would pretend to resist the erasure of queer people, or even just push the oppressors into a courtroom before kneeling down to lick their spray tanned boots.

I'm sorry, but that is beyond naive, that is wilfully out of touch. These companies, the government, and capitalism itself have been telling you all along who they are, and those who they oppress have been scream it forever, it was all there for you to see and hear, but you chose not to, probably because it was more comforting to believe the lie, and marginalised people couldn't possibly be right with our "cynicism".

This is America. Land of the ~~cowards~~ corporation.

FTFY.

These people are not cowards, and the longer you continue to frame them as such, instead of as the intentionally oppressive individuals, and their machine, that they are, that machine will continue to chug along uninterrupted.

The idea that corporations and the people who run them should be “brave” and stand up against the very system that enables them to exist, or somehow give a single fuck about society at large, otherwise they’re “cowards” (and not simply self serving oppressors) is so far beyond absurd, it’s actually enraging at this point.

[–] PlantDadManGuy 1 points 1 day ago

Yeah thank you for that 12 page rambling. Essentially you just confirmed every single point in my original post. As I already stated, I'm under no illusions that corporations are people. It just sucks seeing them all fold under a month into our fascist dictatorship with literally no pressure on them.

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[–] BigBenis 7 points 5 days ago

Companies aren't your friends.

[–] lewdian69 18 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

~~He~~ She used PBS as an example of a "corporate behemoth". I stopped reading at that point.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

Yeah I like a lot of her writing, but this just doesn't sound accurate.

That said, I think PBS does have some cultural clout. So it would be nice to see them take a hard stand against these anti-DEI measures. Obviously there's only so much they can do, since I'm pretty sure they're publicly funded. But IMHO better to go down in a blaze, than bend the knee.

EDIT: I kept reading. The rest of the article is pretty good. Especially the part about Tim Cook.

[–] lewdian69 2 points 6 days ago

I saw some other critiques in this thread but admit I recognize the site and did enjoy previous articles. I should have given this one more of a chance perhaps. But I do using the Corporation for Public Broadcasting would have been a better choice if going to use them as an example. And yet they are indeed publicly funded and a non-profit. It's kind of the antithesis of the point she was trying to make. They were also established and still funded by the federal government so in their survival interest to not go against Trusk/Mump

But I perhaps am not thinking about this correctly and have facts wrong.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Sorry, but the idea that powerful corporations ever had values is naive to the point of stupidity. The only value that ever mattered to these corporations is the one sitting in their bank account and the fact they used to pride-wash once a year implying they had values is bizarre. They've not folded, they're just following the profit.

[–] stickly 3 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

It's literally illegal for these publicly traded companies to do anything that would be detrimental to their shareholders. The guy in oval office is telling them there will be consequences for not following his EOs (ie: lowering shareholder value). There's not any decision to be made here (not that they aren't laughing to the bank either way)

[–] whotookkarl 8 points 6 days ago

Defining an age while it's happening is the same mistake as trying to define a generation outside of an historic context. You either use arbitrary boundaries to define the category, or you wait for a historical context to define boundaries and categories under. We're in the ages of glass, plastic, misinformation, cowardice, social networks, corporations, etc. You have no idea what the defining characteristics will be to history until you are looking back from the next category or epoch.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Unpopular opinion, but a company removing their DEI policies as to not pick a legal battle with the US government is not the problem, assuming their actual hiring practices are not really changing. If Google from now on only hired straight, white people, it would be detrimental to them for missing out on a huge pool of talent and they know this. If all they are doing is removing diversity requirements from writing and canceling black history month pizza parties (which face it no one really cares about celebrating culture at the workplace), then essentially nothing has changed and they can roll all this back in 4 years.

... on the other hand, Apple advertising on X is coward shit. 💩

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago (2 children)

assuming their actual hiring practices are not really changing

Why on earth would anyone paying even the slightest bit of attention assume that?

If Google from now on only hired straight, white people, it would be detrimental to them for missing out on a huge pool of talent and they know this

Even with DEI they still hire more straight white men than any other group, and they do so because they don't give a shit about the talent they might be missing out on because they don't consider marginalised people to be as talented in the first place, that's literally how white supremacy along with other systems of oppression function, and they aren't something that is just happening now, they are literally what America and capitalism are founded on.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 days ago

You think Google, Meta, and all those silicon valley companies in CALIFORNIA are going to stop hiring Indian and Asian engineers because they don't have an official DEI policy anymore? Really? Do you even know who Google's CEO is?

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[–] grue 5 points 6 days ago

This inaccurately presupposes that the execs running Disney and Meta don't simply genuinely want the changes they're making and are happy that Trump gave them an excuse.

[–] LovableSidekick 2 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (2 children)

demonstrating that their much-touted values have all the staying power of a Snapchat message.

Does this author need help spelling "DUH?" Given that she managed to find her way to a keyboard, it seems impossible that she doesn't know corporate flags wave in whatever direction the current wind happens to be blowing. It makes perfect sense that the same companies that wrapped themselves in rainbows and Black Lives Matter banners are now kowtowing to nazis - unless she's dumb enough to think corporate gestures are ever sincere or genuine.

[–] isles 6 points 6 days ago (1 children)

An author is writing to an audience, and surely you can't be surprised that there are larger-than-desired groups of people who actually do think corporations can act morally?

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[–] Jhex 5 points 6 days ago (6 children)

Why attack one of the few journalist (?) author (?) actually calling the bullshit of corporations when the rest of them are just toeing the line and licking the boot?

This is literally why nobody cares about the common good, it's incredibly thankless

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collapse of the old society