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Comment by optimalsolver | Hacker News Reader

If Googling your company name also brought up a bunch of See Also links to various genocides and military coups, the company executives would certainly care.

In an age of ethical consumerism, it's undeniable that not breaking with the past would've had a significant impact on their profits.

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Googling "United Fruit Company" doesn't give any Related searches that mention genocides or coups for me. OTOH, the very first thing when googling Chiquita is "People also ask... Is Chiquita a bad company?" with an answer that is basically "yes".

Genocide might be pushing it, but DuckDuckGo [1] first result is a Wikipedia article:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Fruit_Company

Some entries in the table of contents sound a bit embarrassing, like "Banana massacre" and "Aiding and abetting a terrorist organization". Description of a coup is to be found if someone reads the entry about Guatemela.

Various other top DDG results are about the same three things, dictionary entries and Pablo Neruda's poem.

[1] https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffcm&q=United+Fruit+Company&ia=web

Maybe, but there are a lot of companies with negative links, although perhaps not to the level of UFC's genocide or military coups. Nike, IBM, Mercedes, etc. Either way, management would have changed twice or thrice over by now. But I would still guess the vast majority of people do not care how their bananas got to them as long as they are 49 cents per pound or their avocados regardless of which Mexican cartel sent them.

Does anyone really think clothing brands are avoiding Xinjiang cotton if their product still comes from China or another south/east Asian country?

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