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Comment by adventured | Hacker News Reader

> Such as aidding and abetting authoritarian foreign governments to suppress freedom of speech.

Over half of all countries have few to no protections on freedom of speech. Is your premise that Apple should only sell its products in about four dozen countries? If we wanted to be really strict about it, only a few nations have strong protections on freedom of speech.

You are aware of just how bad the individual liberty protections are in the bottom 100+ countries, right? Freedom of speech protections are rare, and it's even more rare for them to be regularly enforced.

Major countries as diverse as Turkey, Singapore, Thailand, China, Russia, Venezuela, Sudan, Libya, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia - have no or very little freedom of speech. The bottom 40-50 nations on human rights barely have any actively enforced rights protections at all.

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As a regular Chinese citizen, freedom of speech is at the bottom of list of things I care about, and I would happily sell that for profit if it is sell-able.

I lived in US for quite some time and travel to US regularly. But seriously, I feel much less safe or comfortable when I am in US, and a lot of things Americans care so much about doesn't mean anything

Wow, I would've never thought that being raised in a decades-old dictatorship could effect one's world view...

Also, makes you wonder if China's censorship might play any role in this lack of interest in discussing things... Heck, maybe they're not so stupid these Chinese rulers! But of course that's only for the best interest of the Chinese citizens, right, dear Chinese citizen?

Speaking of naivety, if selling to Chinese customers is the most important thing Apple has to worry about, banning Apple products would incense Chinese users. It's the lost of their manufacturing capabilities that's of concern.

And no, I think Apple should sell to as many countries as possible, but not at a cost of compromising integrity and universal value. Apple should sell their products INTACT across the world.

Those countries might be diverse, but they accidentally happen to be all authoritarian or authoritarian-leaning countries...

And yes it would be right in general to avoid doing business with authoritarian countries. Of course it ought to be a country-wide policy, but even if it's not it's still more ethical for a company to do so.

The "theory" that trade fosters democracy has been tested for long enough.

> Is your premise that Apple should only sell its products in about four dozen countries?

I think that public disagreement consistent with their principles regardless of region would be appropriate. I don't think many are asking them to not sell or not abide by the law, just that their pinciples ring hollow if they only voice them against certain governments.

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