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After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

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601–610 of 841 posts

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#601
> I think if the bar is "don't kill minorities"

Take this as my personal possibly wrong opinion, but this kind hyperbolic phrasing is only going to hurt your cause.

The same as people defending "punch a nazi" slogans.

They will give your tribe influence, but also steadily decrease your chance at long term victory.

Honestly I cannot understand how many people (I don't care about sides) can believe in progress via violence, promoting violence, or extreme polarization.

I cannot change your minds, but sure I hope it were easier to have a moderate to moderate conversation.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#602
post #14

What a bummer that workers are publicly demanding this, and (presumably) seeking press attention on it. I'm no fan of ICE – a very large percentage of my friends in the US are immigrants, and I generally want my country to be a welcoming one. ICE has certainly committed unethical and probably illegal acts (probably true of most federal agencies). But to expect that a _federal agency_ will be denied service from a pri…

> But to expect that a _federal agency_ will be denied service from a private entity, especially for essentially political reasons, is lunacy.

I mean, it's also lunacy that the US government would run concentration camps, right?

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/06/aoc-holocaust-why-mi...

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a27813648/concentratio...

The issue I take with your argument is, politics in the United States aren't "normal". Maybe they never were "normal". But I think the notion is, this is more than a "political" disagreement over whether the tax rate should be 23% or 25%. We're in the midst of a fundamental moral disagreement about whose lives matter.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#603
post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is using the correct definition of concentration camp, you are the one in error. Concentration camps have existed outside Nazi Germany. Just because that was the most horrible instance doesn't mean that other instances stopped being "concentration camps" just like how a particularly horrible murder doesn't make a less violent murder into a non-murder. https://www.britannica.com/topic/concentration-camp

The colloquial definition of the term is different from the technical definition, but they don't even meet the technical definition. According to your definition, a concentration camp is an "internment centre for political prisoners and members of national or minority groups who are confined for reasons of state security, exploitation, or punishment.." People of certain minority groups aren't being rounded up. Illega…

Illegal immigrants are a minority group. Whether or not there is a legal argument for the concentration camp is orthogonal to whether or not it is a concentration camp. The Nazis didn't break the law either.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#604
post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But to expect that a _federal agency_ will be denied service from a private entity, especially for essentially political reasons, is lunacy. Um, think you've got this backwards. Private entities shouldn't have to take on anyone they don't want as customers (for whatever reason - do you have to justify who you do or don't want in your livingroom?), but publicly-funded institutions shouldn't be able to deny service o…

I am strongly against a private business being able to refuse service to a person/organization on political grounds, even when the "victim" may seem to be performing evil actions, as long as it is not breaking any laws. One should not discriminate on the basis of race, political orientation, gender, origin or religion. Refusing service is clearly a form of discrimination. When you aim that towards your own Government…

Your argument is full of false equivalencies.

A government agency cannot be a victim of discrimination, at least not in any way that matters. It is not a person, and does not have rights.

A government agency refusing to follow its orders is in no way parallel or analogous to a private company refusing to serve a particular customer. In the first case it's an illegal act, where the result will be the firing/jailing of the offenders (with the removal of their access that enables them to disobey), while in the second case it's just a normal, legal, expected outcome of business sometimes.

> the correct attitude is to fight for a Government change

Private entities refusing to do business with certain parts of the government is an aspect of fighting for government change. GitHub refusing to do business with ICE is a collective way for GH's employees and executives to lobby the government for change.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#605

I guess this is the reason lot of corporates try to stay out of politics. Because once you set a precedence then people will use that as to push their own political agendas. I personally don't like the slippery slope argument since it's very lazy and justifies inaction in many cases. But at the same time when I see news like this, I just wonder how long it will take two different subgroups trying push their own confl…

I think the slippery slope argument is actually quite relevant here. In my opinion it is about how you argue things. If the CEO or who has power just says "I decided to drop this client because of my personal advocacy" then there is no slippery slope, if they say "this client is too immoral we cannot support them" then you are very easily open to direct comparisons.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#606
post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This goes way too far in limiting freedom IMO. It makes sense to not let people discriminate on things that are immutable (like skin color), but it's crazy to not let discrimination happen on things that are a choice. Just like I can decide not to let people not wearing shoes or shirts into my business, why shouldn't I be able to deny entry to a neo-Nazi? What if I'm losing black customers because I have racists regu…

> [...] but it's crazy to not let discrimination happen on things that are a choice. Religion is a choice. Does that mean that you're fine with discrimination based on one's religion?

And why not? If you say you are very religious and pray to your god before you push your branches I would look at you very weird, I am sorry... Maybe I am a bad person but...

And more over, everyone can register a religion these days, look at Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption... So if someone wakes up one morning and starts a religion out of a joke I should be forced not to discriminate against him?

But replace John Oliver with Jewish religion and now this argument sounds different.

But that is the problem with context... I don't like blanket laws making me do things.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calling ICE nazis is idiotic.

Not too long ago the company where I worked was having a similar debate concerning services provided (through an intermediary) to ICE. One particular facet in the discussion that stuck with me more than the rest was a comment by a co-worker who was visiting from the Berlin office. They talked briefly about small monuments on the street by their home marking the spots where people were arrested and taken to concentrat…

These monuments are called Stolpersteine ("Stumbling Stones"): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolperstein

There are tens of thousands of them now, every one of them installed by the artist who originally came up with the idea.

They are installed in front of their last place of residence. So it's really decentralised, and the realisation that the Holocaust happened in your street (or even to people living in the house you now life in) is powerful.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#608
post #450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what happens when everyone refuses you EVERY single service If I'll ever find my self in a situation like this - I'll pack my things and run. I'm not going to be happy in a place like this even if government will force those people to tolerate me. > if a majority of businesses gradually decide to be racist and refuse all services just because they can That means anyone entrepreneurial enough will have access to an…

Unfortunately, packing your things and running is basically impossible for most people anywhere close to that situation because borders are enforced and countries will find any excuse possible to avoid granting refugee status. The "you could've slept in a forest, never interacted with anyone, and foraged for plants for survival" kind of excuse that LGBT folks fleeing from countries where they're likely to get murdere…

I think your parent comment is neither here nor there on actually leaving, but rather just using hyperbole to demonstrate that this isn't a problem easily fixed with laws.

A food establishment forced to serve you might serve you food that's gone bad, a mechanic might not fully tighten the nuts on your brake pads, or any other variety of horrible things that people could do to harm you while leaving room for plausible deniability.

At least if they can legally deny service to you, you know that the ones serving you aren't a risk to your wellbeing. And to that end, I think it's a bit unfair to suggest that less money means there would be no businesses to serve that group of people. If every restaurant is discriminating, the singular restuarant that serves the less wealthy group would have plenty of business, simply due to the lack of competition.

The "pro-regulation" argument is valid with regard to a less commoditized market though, which is interesting. For example, I wouldn't want the only company that makes a life-saving drug to be able to legally discrimate who they sell it to.

It's a challenging problem and I certainly see both sides. My gut goes to regulations affecting large businesses but not smaller ones. It feels like there are probably some difficult edge-cases within there though.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#609

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> then people will use that as to push their own political agendas It's always a very small number of very loud people too. Worse yet, these people have mastered the art of silencing dissent from their colleagues by using kafkatraps. There are tons of republicans and libertarians in tech, but in the average office, you wouldn't know that given how effectively such people have been silenced for fear of being accused o…

> There are tons of republicans and libertarians in tech, but in the average office, you wouldn't know that given how effectively such people have been silenced for fear of being accused of thoughtcrime and heresy Have they tried growing as people to not be so horrid that people would recoil if they knew what was really inside their heads? We have no obligation to tolerate the intolerant.

Aaand that is exactly what GP is talking about: Massive assumptions about what people believe, without even an attempt to understand.

Re: After GitHub CEO backs Black Lives Matter, workers demand an end to ICE contract

#610

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the U.S. context, concentration camp is used almost exclusively to refer to the extermination camps run by Nazis in World War II. I know not everyone on here is American, but that bit of information is useful for understanding why so many people make the association between concentration camps and the extermination of Jews in WWII. And it also explains why it is disingenuous of Americans to state that the US gover…

That's a very roundabout way to say "Americans have a comfortably whitewashed, frankly ignorant version of reality and everybody else should walk on eggshells to help them maintain it". Concentration camps were not solely the purview of the Nazis, and already had quite the history before they even came on the scene. In fact, while we're on the topic of World War II, the US government held people of Japanese decent in…

FWIW, I think you're being needlessly antagonistic. I'm trying to help the misunderstanding between Europeans and Americans on this issue (and leveling criticism against people using the term in a certain way in the American context—ICE is an American government agency, after all). Different cultures use words to mean different things. And I can tell you that, in the American context, concentration camp = Nazis killing Jews and internment camp = Americans putting Japanese Americans in camps. However you think it should be, that's the way things are on the ground here.

As a result, calling whatever ICE is doing "concentration camps" doesn't make sense in the American context, unless maybe you're an academic or specialist speaking to there academics or specialists. And it's actually worse than "doesn't make sense in the American context", since it makes people who are only familiar with the American understanding of the term think that you are a deranged ideologue. And that's bad for discourse and finding a shared understanding, which I think we can all agree is a good thing.

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