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Comment by randiantech | Hacker News Reader

Im scared of such arguments. And im telling you as a libertarian. No, private companies should be regulated and shareholders cant be the only voice to be heard. I mean, what if starbucks shareholders decide that, lets say, african americans are no longer allowed to buy coffe on their shops. Would it be ok to allow it?

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> I mean, what if starbucks shareholders decide that, lets say, african americans are no longer allowed to buy coffe on their shops.

If the shareholders are motivated by religious belief? Great question. I'm afraid to consider how the supreme court would decide

I never said not to. But complaining on the platform itself is not petitioning your representatives to regulate Twitter. Its wasting time and throwing words into a bottomless hole.

And given the studies showing how little the will of the people influences the conduct of congress in the US I'd strongly consider petitioning the government barely a step beyond an equal waste of time.

Which isn't just rolling over and taking it - but actually fixing it goes way beyond a moment of outrage enshrined in text on the Internet.

No. We have the civil rights act of 1964.

But presumably, were this discussion taking place in 1963, there would be someone saying:

<company> will do whatever the hell it wants on its own property and has no obligation to listen to anyone except the voice of 51% of its shareholders.

Yes. Exactly what I tried to suggest.

This is all well documented history. I encourage you to look at the circumstances and conversations in govt that lead to the civil rights act.

I think that's really beside the point I am making. My argument is that history is full of people defending the status quo, until it stops being the status quo. Then it becomes taken as truth that the new status quo is how things must be.

We can have discussions about what a business can and cannot do beyond what they are currently allowed to do.

So you agree that they should be regulated. Law is regulation.

That would be against the interests of the shareholders. But if they all got together and decided to do so, the result would be that racists would go under, and I do not want to help racists succeed in business!

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