Hacker News Reader

Comment by winston_smith | Hacker News Reader

This is the same level of cleverness as saying "everything is made of atoms so everything is about physics".

Not really? The point I get from GP is that the way America is set up, corporations have a lot of say in (de facto) health care and employment policy. In most other countries, these things are decided democratically rather than though the market. We could have arguments all day on which is a better system, but it's hard not to admit that the American system makes corporations into more political actors.

They just listed off a standard set of "europe good, USA bad" talking points. The "everything is political" argument lets you tie any political issue you want to any company you want, so that you can pressure them into being more political about the issues you care about.

So do you feel that it is a politically neutral choice for an employer to decide that the health insurance they sponsor for employees cannot be used to cover an abortion?

Nobody's claiming perfect political neutrality. The claim is that it's bad for companies to get political in unnecessary ways. Inasmuch as Hobby Lobby decided to push their politics and religion on their employees via their healthcare package, then we shouldn't be surprised at the result.

> Hobby Lobby decided to push their politics and religion on their employees via their healthcare package

And/or did the government decide to push their politics and religion on Hobby Lobby via their healthcare legislation?

Absolutely, because politics is what government is specifically for, unlike, say, toy stores and individual people doing their non-government jobs.

(edit: not endorsing either the government's position, just saying that yes, government is exactly where we see politics being forced on things)

Then it's worth noting that it is easier for a person to change which employer they work for than a business owner to change which government creates laws that apply to their business.

I accept, though, that corporations are artificial constructs that exist (ostensibly) to benefit humans, and therefore placing restrictions and duties on corporations is inherently preferable to placing them on humans themselves.

I wasn't trying to be clever, just explicit. Your atom sentence is true, as far as it goes. You can't build a factory without doing calculations some people would call physics, and you can't build an organization without making decisions some people will call political. What's the issue?

Elsewhere in the thread, you call these "Europe good, USA bad" points. I certainly don't think that's intrinsically true. It's just a different interface that puts more choices in the hands of employers instead of government. A side effect is that employers are going to get judged by employees, investors , customers and the public about how they make those choices.

> can't build an organization without making decisions some people will call political. What's the issue?

The issue is that when someone says "let's stay away from politics", it's pedantic and obtuse to start listing things that in some way involve politics.

It's clear what they meant: the more something is related to politics and unrelated to work, the more we should try to avoid it.

Your response does the exact opposite of that, bringing up a bunch of hot-button political issues tenuously related to work, which is a great way to bring more conflict about politics into the workplace.

People can disagree about what's related to work. They can do so in bad faith by starting fights for personal prestige, or by trying exclude topics just because they are served by the status quo. Or they can do so in good faith, because something impacts the working life or effectiveness of some people in ways that aren't obvious to others.

My list was about how the US has more issues requiring good faith discussion, which certainly opens the door to bad faith as well.

As far as using "let's stay away from politics" as a magic wand to shut down a topic, you are expecting people to agree with you about what belongs at work without discussion or judgement. I think companies and individuals can make things more efficient by clearly articulating a mission, and by proactively taking a stance about how hot-button issues relate to that mission or not. But nothing is going to exempt you from judgement when people disagree, and there's always the chance that you really are the bad guy. That's life with other humans.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com