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There's ethics and there's legality. If a practice is truly abhorrent then it should be illegal and penalised as such, and ethics for consumers at that point is moot. What was going on at Blizzard was illegal and they go in trouble for it and that's all to the good.

I'm all for customers apply pressure through their buying habits, as you say that's entirely ethical. It's your right as a citizen. However most people don't know about any of this stuff and they shouldn't really have to.

Companies are huge organisations, many of them have many conscientious and ethical employees that do a lot that's great, but then some that are less ethical or are under a lot of pressure or have few options all shitty and bad things happen. Most of those things we never hear about. The chances that this one thing you hear about is truly representative and differentiating from the competition is probably actually pretty unlikely.

So sure, especially if you have a cause close to your heart that's fine. We should be holding companies to account, but laws and regulators exist for a reason. They represent us and are our primary tool for dealing with this sort of issue.

I highly doubt that your way of thinking reflects in any way the definition of ethically.

Of course not everything is black and white, but its probably more ethical to not play something from a company with clear violations of ethical rules than not.

Of course using a product from a company implies supporting or not caring enough about it.

There is no need for you to play games from blizzard.

I personally bought and play Diablo 2 and not because i think its 'ethical' to do so but because i actually care less about the current blizzard controversy than i care about playing a game which has very strong childhood memories.

I'm fully aware that i'm doing what plenty of others are doing:

- Driving by car while we are aware of climate change - sometimes keeping my PC running while not necessary - Buying sweet and highly processed food - Not using my money to help people to eat

And if we all would actually be more aware of this and agree altogether we could make the earth a much more awesome place. But thats not how it is.

> however, it's also completely ethically valid to not boycott such a company and simply pick the best product

that would rule out anything recent by Blizzard then

Replace “play video games” with “use fossil fuels”. Is it still ethical to participate when outcome is climate change?

You could s/play video games/ with a whole plethora of morally objectionable strings but that doesn’t make it equivalent to playing computer games.

It might not be an easy way to avoid using coal electricity.

Not buying a game in game saturated market is not that hard or essential to quality of life

Yes, if it's used in efforts to combat climate change, e.g. powering alternative energy research, or attending climate change conferences, etc.

Is it ethical to pay taxes to a government that does unethical things?

Well, I do use fossil fuels in various ways (I have a car, I have a heated home, and I consume electricity which is approx. half fossil locally) - and yes, I do not consider continuing to do so unethical. It would be preferable to use less fossil fuels, which is a consideration for me, but I definitely do not consider that there's an ethical duty for me to use zero fossil fuels.

While we can (and should!) agitate for policy changes to reduce fossil fuel usage, it's appropriate to request that, I do not consider that it would be ethically appropriate for me or you to demand total "fossil abstinence" from any person around us - freedom and respecting others' freedom is also a valid ethical value, and actually imposing your will on others requires substantial justification, and having ethical ends do not imply all means would be ethical.

You can however question platforming an entity with such a shitty history or at least contextualise it like in the op.

Is playing a computer game "platforming an entity"? It's really fascinating how these neologisms evolve.

No more fascinating than the root-level claim that

>Guilt by distant association is an abhorrent concept that should not be validated - using someone's products does not imply supporting the company's policies or leaders/owners personal behavior or political actions

eliding the simple fact that buying products from a company, shitty or otherwise, is literally supporting that company and its owners. I can't think of a more meaningful way to support something than to give it money...

Perhaps I chose an inexact word - buying from them is not a gift but a business transaction, it does not imply endorsing those aspects.

IMHO the core concept of a civilized society is the ability to have reasonable interactions even if people strongly disagree or hate each other - thus the legitimacy of doing business with, supplying products to everyone and using everyone's products.

To use a different controversy as an example where both sides are somewhat large, we do see both ends of the abortion debate consider each other as grossly unethical, sufficiently unethical to justify asking for a boycott of vocal supporters of the opposite side. That's understandable, you have freedom of association and you can not patronize someone you despise, however, once you start to demand that others join your boycott and say it's an ethical duty or "with us or against us" IMHO that's crossing the line of how a civilized society should behave; people holding all kinds of opinions (including various opinions I despise and consider harmful) are still part of our society, and we should be able to combine criticizing the abhorrent opinions while still allowing those people to participate in society - i.e. buying from them, selling to them, employing them, working for them, renting them apartments and renting from them as landlords - and "platforming entities" as well, even if they are from your "enemy outgroup". I very much do not want internet service providers or pamphlet printing companies or fast food deliveries to start refusing service to my political opponents vocally advocating for things I consider ethically despicable - that form of exclusion is simply not appropriate, and I would not consider it fair if I was on the receiving end, so what's sauce for goose is sauce for gander.

Asking for a proper exclusion of an unliked group or opinion reminds me of all kinds of centuries-old historical issues of boycotting shops because they were ran by [people from the political party hated in this neighbourhood] or [someone who doesn't go to the same church as us] or [this ethnic group with whom we had/have war], which (at least in retrospective) seem unethical - IMHO it's much safer to draw the line at excess inclusion rather than excess exclusion.

>I very much do not want internet service providers or pamphlet printing companies or fast food deliveries to start refusing service to my political opponents vocally advocating for things I consider ethically despicable - that form of exclusion is simply not appropriate, and I would not consider it fair if I was on the receiving end, so what's sauce for goose is sauce for gander.

Why not use this logic to justify buying from a supplier who uses slavery, because what if you were the slaver? Is there anything someone can do to justify another's refusal to buy from them in future? I assume you wouldn't buy from someone who ripped you off somehow; would you consider this to be a moral failing on the part of the seller? Is slavery a moral failing?

>Asking for a proper exclusion of an unliked group or opinion reminds me of all kinds of centuries-old historical issues of boycotting shops because they were ran by [people from the political party hated in this neighbourhood] or [someone who doesn't go to the same church as us] or [this ethnic group with whom we had/have war], which (at least in retrospective)

I don't think "C-suite execs who use slave labour to save a buck" is the sort of protected group that you're invoking here, and IMO comparing them is hideous. You're suggesting that "someone doing something unethical" is the same as "someone doing something I don't like", and therefore boycotting either is essentially the same thing.

>IMHO it's much safer to draw the line at excess inclusion rather than excess exclusion

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

> You're suggesting that "someone doing something unethical" is the same as "someone doing something I don't like", and therefore boycotting either is essentially the same thing.

"Ethical" is subjective, not objective, so yes ... "someone doing something I don't like" is literally the same meaning as "someone doing something unethical".

> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

My observation is that everyone who quotes this link hasn't read the original source, or else they'd know that it doesn't support their argument, and instead is a support against their argument.

I agree with the parent's claim. This kind of consequentialist thinking is highly fashionable and increasingly vacuous.

We should be less concerned with consequences and more concerned with actions in themselves. Buying an iphone is not "supporting slave labor". Paying taxes is not supporting your government's foreign policy. Turning on the heater is not killing the planet.

> eliding the simple fact that buying products from a company, shitty or otherwise, is literally supporting that company and its owners.

No, it's literally paying money in exchange for a good or service.

> I can't think of a more meaningful way to support something than to give it money...

You can't? That's somewhat shocking.

Buying a product of slave labour isn't supporting slave labour? If no one bought the slave labour object, would the slaves continue to make them?

>>> eliding the simple fact that buying products from a company, shitty or otherwise, is literally supporting that company and its owners.

>No, it's literally paying money in exchange for a good or service.

No, it's supporting the company. The company wouldn't exist if buying things from it didn't support it. Companies need money to support their supply chains, workers, and management, in order to sell things in order to make money. What does "supporting a company" mean to you? Taking it out to the pub after a bad breakup? Ridiculous. Companies, the general economic unit of our capitalist world, are fed by money, be it VC or customer. "Vote with your dollar" is woefully inadequate to address the problem, but beyond building pipe bombs it's the most efficacious tool we as individuals can wield.

Buying something is not "literally supporting anything," it is exchanging money for a good or service. It is reasonable to not buy something from a company because you dislike the company (hopefully for some factual reason). It isn't reasonable to equate buying something with "supporting slavery".

Your moral thinking is so impoverished that you conclude by recommending "building pipe bombs". Back to the drawing board.

Well, if giving a company money doesn't support it, then you're absolutely right. But, of course, giving a company money does indeed support it, and insulting me doesn't change that.

Your moral thinking is so incredibly wealthy that you can't accept that financially supporting slavery is wrong.

No, but recommending it to a lot of people is. Literally.

Sometimes I'm torn between boycotting a company and understanding that surely not everyone who works for Blizzard deserves said boycott.

Who does a boycott really hurt?

In all but the most large scale example it’s only the company’s shareholders that are hurt which arguably is the perfect target as they ultimately control the company.

I.e. you hurt the retirement funds and people owning ETF's (the largest Blizzard shareholders are Vanguard, Fidelity and Blackrock, through their ETF funds which track e.g. S&P 500 so would not/ could not divest Blizzard because of that, nor would attempt to control the company), and do not hurt the particular company managers who are actually making the unethical decisions.

Owning stock means being responsible for the companies actions, the fact most people want to passively invest is part of the problem.

> Who does a boycott really hurt?

The largest shareholders? ATVI has dropped significantly since this episode started. The assumption is this forces changes in management and leads to changes to address the toxic culture that triggered the boycott (more likely general instability hurting confidence in ATVI's ability to deliver).

It looks like that's how this is playing out.