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Comment by mattmaroon | Hacker News Reader

Do we expect corporations to take on other governments for us?

It’s not unethical to comply with the law in foreign countries and, while I obviously don’t agree with China’s censorship, they can point out lots of poor human rights abuses on our end yet Chinese companies are expected to follow our laws here too.

Apple is just doing what any rational actor would, obeying the laws of recognized governments, and I don’t think it’s fair to expect them to do more. If the American people care that much about the free speech of Chinese citizens it’s a matter for our government, not our corporations.

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> It’s not unethical to comply with the law in foreign countries and,

It is, when that very law itself is unethical.

> while I obviously don’t agree with China’s censorship

Oh? And why is that an "obvious disagreement" for you? Are you trying to say something like everyone has a right to freedom of expression? If so, then you should stand with companies that try to promote those rights, rather than those who help remove those rights at the expense of turning a profit.

Last I checked, Apple has plenty of money already. They could have done better, in this case, and set the moral example.

We have plenty of unethical laws too. We lock up far more people than they do, for instance. We’re getting ready to ban Tik Tok despite no allegations of any wrong doing, just because it’s Chinese. Should Chinese corporations refuse to do business here? Should Apple not comply with our government when it bans Tik Tok too?

“Plenty of money already” doesn’t mean much when your entire business is selling hardware made in China. Are they supposed to bankrupt the company just because China doesn’t want Threads on people’s phones?

> It is, when that very law itself is unethical.

Great, so Apple should pull out of the US due to the TikTok ban.

> If so, then you should stand with companies that try to promote those rights, rather than those who help remove those rights at the expense of turning a profit.

Which mobile phone manufacturer am I going to do that by using. Samsung might not sell phones in China, but they've got the exploding batteries, photoshopped camera images, throttling of third party apps. Huawei and Xiaomi _are_ chinese, Motorola have consistently been in support of oppressive regimes, Google are in the midst of bad press for their handling of the protest this week.

My bank and workplace all but require a modern iOS or Android device to participate, and this is not a hill I'm going to die on against multiple bilino dollar companies.

Don’t worry, the big corporations are supposed to fall on their sword, not you.

That's not the point.

There are no good options other than eschewing participation, and the consequences of that are incredibly broad.

Right. The people who think Apple should take a stand against the Chinese government simply aren't thinking deeply about the topic. It's just emotions. Freedom of speech good, big corporation bad. If you think any deeper than that at all, it falls apart.

There's no good option for you, there's no good option for Apple. You're supposed to what, not participate in the modern economy because Chinese citizens haven't had freedom of speech for 70 years? Apple's supposed to what, disrupt the manufacturing of the world's most profitable product because China added 2 apps to the list of a zillion they've banned?

This is a problem for governement, not corporations. The US and our democratic allies could exert slow, steady pressure on China, and in fact, that's exactly what we've been doing. It's building. We're re-shoring/near shoring at an increasing rate. Politicians in both parties in the US are now pro-tarriffs, which prior to 2016 both were against them.

How can a country's legal system be unethical? Unethical in relation to what? Each society creates its own political and ethical system, period.

I suggest you read up on the very basic and fundamental differences between law and ethics. Sometimes they overlap, but it's not a necessary requirement. Indeed, there are many many examples of laws around the world that you will find unethical.

Obviously, any country can have an unethical legal system relative to another country's ethics. That is just another flimsy foundation for colonialism. On the other hand, give me a single example of a country whose legal system is unethical according to its own standards. And thanks for telling me to educate myself - valuable advice, that.

No, of course not.

The governments of where these global digital infrastructure providers reside should sanction China. These global companies will then be forced to close their China businesses down just like what is happening right now in Europe with Russia at the US' request.

Of course this would mean that, unlike in banking where Europe is the biggest loser when liquidating their Russia business (see Austria and their RBI), this time the US would be the biggest loser. Ergo, the only way we'll ever see betterment is if someone else (i.e. the EU) sees these sanctions through.

Since the lobby building is right next to the EU's HQ in Brussels and they go partying together every Thursday, I highly doubt this will ever happen.

Right, if we truly cared about Chinese citizens, we would do this, not just get mad at Apple for not sabotaging one of the world’s most lucrative businesses just for being asked to remove a couple apps.

I’ve actually long thought we should create a global free trade regime among democratic nations, along with sanctions for the rest. Just set some basic standard of human rights (it’d have to be low so we can meet it despite our mass incarceration) and tariff the rest.

Unless corporations have more actual influence on politics than citizens. People are used to reject referendum that still gets applies in some other ways by the politicians. Sure, voters can then get them ousted at the next opportunity but at some point, people realize that money have far more power than votes to impact the real world.

They don’t in China though, see what happened to Jack Ma.

Nice. A simultaneous conflation of law with ethics, an appeal to others' immorality as a way to justify your own, and an appeal to corporations only being held to the fiscal rationale ethics system, which is to say, none.

No conflating, ethics are subjective, laws are not. (Or at least, close to not.) One can't build a system on non-codified ethics because they change so much and vary from place to place.

Our own legal system has plenty of ethical issues. We lock up almost 5x as many people per capita as China. Should they not do business with us?

If corporations stopped doing business with any country someone on HN found to be doing something unethical, we'd all go back to the economic stone age.

There's no real argument here, your sentiments are just "big company bad, China bad" with more words.

I haven't said anything about China or any company.

Compliance with laws is not ethically relevant. You are trying to justify unethical behavior with appeals to pragmatism or "fairness" with whatabout appeals to other countries.

Which maybe you believe, but it is cowardly and manipulative to imply that the behavior is not unethical because you think it should be done anyway.

That's just modern evil 101.

You are putting a whole lot of words in my mouth that aren’t there. And we were discussing something that happens in China, so I was giving you credit (unfairly, apparently) for having any point at all. I’ll discontinue this since it’s merely off-topic, nonsensical ad hominems.

Ok great let's be explicit and cite your own stupid words

You believe that Apple should follow a law that is unethical.

evidence: > I obviously don’t agree with China’s censorship

You believe this is ok though because other countries have bad laws sometimes.

evidence: > they can point out lots of poor human rights abuses on our end yet Chinese companies are expected to follow our laws here too.

> Our own legal system has plenty of ethical issues. We lock up almost 5x as many people per capita as China. Should they not do business with us?

You also believe it's ok to do this because it's practical evidence: > Apple is just doing what any rational actor would, obeying the laws of recognized governments, and I don’t think it’s fair to expect them to do more. If the American people care that much about the free speech of Chinese citizens it’s a matter for our government, not our corporations.

> If corporations stopped doing business with any country someone on HN found to be doing something unethical, we'd all go back to the economic stone age.

pathetic

What’s pathetic is that you think your third grade level of reasoning on the topic makes you morally superior. It doesn’t. It just makes you a buffoon.

Every government requires corporations (and thus people) to do things I think are unethical. All of them. I still expect foreign ones to follow our laws, and us theirs, because to not do so is also unethical.

It’s not the role of a corporation to fight every battle. Apple shouldn’t tank a trillion dollar company (their profits come entirely from things manufactured in China) to fight removing two more apps. A lot of livelihoods in both countries might be lost over something that makes no difference, which itself could be considered ethical.

The world isn’t as simple as you are. And you’d remove those apps in two seconds if Apple were dumb enough to put you in charge.

> Every government requires corporations (and thus people) to do things I think are unethical.

Great, we agree you believe you should follow an unethical law.

> All of them. I still expect foreign ones to follow our laws, and us theirs, because to not do so is also unethical.

Great, we agree that you justify it as not unethical because its the law / practical / what others do.

You are justifying actions as something you think should be done, and reasoning that because you want it to be done, that it must not be unethical.

Justifying evil because you think it is worth it is one thing. Concluding that evil is not evil because you think it is worth it is the scum of society.

Again, if only the world were as simple as your reasoning ability. Removing two apps from the app store doesn’t exactly qualify as evil. China’s lack of free speech may be, but that existed before Apple and will continue to do so no matter what Apple does.

It’s neither ethical nor unethical, nor is it a corporation’s job to decide whether it is. That’s the role of government.

A system in which corporations can simply decide which laws they comply with would be totally broken, and so to not comply with the law is itself unethical. Apple made the ethical choice. I think our congress’s potential banning of TikTok is unethical, I don’t think Apple and Google will be when they comply.

What would you have them do? Sacrifice a trillion dollar business in token protest? You’re just a keyboard warrior with no point at all who would make the same choice and justify it the same way you imagine I do if you were ever in the position they are.

For the first time in 18 years I wish this site had a block feature. People like you ruin the internet. You can have the last word if you like, it won’t be worth reading Im sure, so I’m done with you. GFY.

> It’s neither ethical nor unethical, nor is it a corporation’s job to decide whether it is. That’s the role of government.

The government does not define ethics. Abiding by laws does not factor into the ethics of a choice. It is up to everyone, including corporation leadership, to pursue ethical standards.

You do not seem capable of recognizing that you support unethical actions. You appear convinced that choices you support are de facto ethical because you've deemed them worthwhile. This is a cancerous worldview. It's ok to say that following a law is unethical but still worthwhile. It's deeply harmful to say that it is ethical because you think it is worthwhile.

Everything you're saying boils down to "I'm just following orders" or "I'm just a part of a system" as an argument that you have no culpability to your actions. Or perhaps much more toxically, "I'm a good person therefore my actions have been good".

I don't really care about banning whatsapp or tiktok personally. Your rhetoric is the disgusting thing here.

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