Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

nickoneill.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 112 posts

Re: Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

#21

Post by xnxn »

mthreat wrote: post #18

I started thinking this through and here's a problem I see. If companies decide to only do business with other "good" companies, then they have to decide whether every potential customer is "good" or not. How do you define it - where do you draw the line? Do you hire another person to make this decision? Outsource it? Or maybe there's a y-combinator startup that provides an API call - isCompanyEvil(company_name).

I could have sworn CrunchBase had a metric for public opinion of a particular company, but either I was mistaken or they've discontinued it. "Monsanto" would certainly be followed by an angry frowny face.

Re: Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

#23

Post by cellis »

How about next protesting Microsoft, Oracle, Dell and any other company that contracts the Department of Defense ( one of the biggest suppliers of violence in the modern world )? Guess that means we also need to start going after thousands of subcontractors too, and anyone who buys Windows, Dell computers, or uses government services. While we're at it protest the police departments; they purchase weapons, which funds makers of weapons, like Smith & Wesson, HK, and Remington. But let's not stop there, how about those chemical companies like Dow and BASF. Surely they supply those Devils Monsanto! I'm 100% that I can find a link from them to gasp Apple! Omg! We must shut down the evilness that is Apple!

Re: Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

#24

Post by Alex3917 »

zzzeek wrote: post #16
nostrademons wrote: post #7

Do you buy any food at all that is not grown by local organic farmers? If you do, chances are you have a much stronger business relationship with Monsanto than Paul Graham does. After all, you are directly giving money to a supermarket, which is giving it to a big agribusiness, which either is Monsanto or is a customer of Monsanto. All these evil things that Monsanto does? They're done with your money. Contrast that…

this "voting with your dollars" thing is a bunch of bullshit. It's virtually impossible to live in modern society, engaging in commerce with any number of vendors that are invariably linked to multinational companies which are themselves highly interlinked, without money going to many companies we'd prefer it didn't, any more than it's feasible to live in a town governed by a government you vehemently disagree with,…

"This 'voting with your dollars' thing is a bunch of bullshit."

It's not all or nothing. If everyone would just subscribe to a CSA and buy the rest of their stuff from the grocery store then that alone would completely shift the face of food production in this country.

Re: Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

#25

Post by cb18 »

nostrademons wrote: post #7

Do you buy any food at all that is not grown by local organic farmers? If you do, chances are you have a much stronger business relationship with Monsanto than Paul Graham does. After all, you are directly giving money to a supermarket, which is giving it to a big agribusiness, which either is Monsanto or is a customer of Monsanto. All these evil things that Monsanto does? They're done with your money. Contrast that…

efficient

Not efficient so much, as it externalizes costs away from the customer purchasing transaction and onto other actors in the system, like farmers and the environment.

Monsanto is not the only beneficiary of their evil ways, though: because of their evilness, millions of Americans spend less on food than they otherwise would.

Have you thought this through? Are you saying exploitation of some to the 'benefit' of others is okay?

Re: Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

#26

Post by dotBen »

anigbrowl wrote: post #6

'Fuck Monsanto, and by association, fuck Cloudant' is not a constructive opening to a conversation. If that poster had started by saying 'This announcement makes me not want to do business with Cloudant. Here's why...' then I'd largely agree with you. You are right that Monsanto is a politically radioactive company, so putting out a cheery press release about becoming a core technology supplier displays a misundersta…

I didn't write the original comment being referred to but I reserve the right to drop the F bomb where appropriate.

This is real life, we're adults, and it is possible to communicate and deliver an astute/sophisticated/poignant perspective using expletives (just as much as it isn't). If you're offended by someone writing 'fuck' then you need to grow some testicular fortitude.

swearing is not equal to the 'aggressive ranting of an insane person' - that's ridiculous.

Re: Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

#28

Post by maratd »

zzzeek wrote: post #16
nostrademons wrote: post #7

Do you buy any food at all that is not grown by local organic farmers? If you do, chances are you have a much stronger business relationship with Monsanto than Paul Graham does. After all, you are directly giving money to a supermarket, which is giving it to a big agribusiness, which either is Monsanto or is a customer of Monsanto. All these evil things that Monsanto does? They're done with your money. Contrast that…

this "voting with your dollars" thing is a bunch of bullshit. It's virtually impossible to live in modern society, engaging in commerce with any number of vendors that are invariably linked to multinational companies which are themselves highly interlinked, without money going to many companies we'd prefer it didn't, any more than it's feasible to live in a town governed by a government you vehemently disagree with,…

> It's virtually impossible to live in modern society

If you truly consider those "multinational companies" to be so unethical and dastardly, then don't. Live outside of modern society. Many people do. You do not.

Your hypocrisy is telling.

Re: Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

#29

Post by thebmax »

You premise that Monsanto is an evil company. And yet people are buying their product willingly. Their GM products increase yields allowing farmers to grow more, leading to lower food prices, which means less people starve. How is this evil?

If there wasn't an advantage of using their product nobody would be buying from them.

You seem to be proposing that the government should ban farmers from buying from Monsanto. Or maybe you want the government to let some people buy from them but not everyone? Or maybe you only want farmers to be allowed to purchase a product approved by some FDA bureaucrat instead of letting the farmer decide for themselves whether a product is worth their money.

Perhaps, like many of the protesters sleeping on the street recently, you have not thought through the consequences of what you propose, and really you don't know what you want.

Re: Why The 99% Should Protest Against Y Combinator

#30

Post by zzzeek »

maratd wrote: post #28
zzzeek wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this "voting with your dollars" thing is a bunch of bullshit. It's virtually impossible to live in modern society, engaging in commerce with any number of vendors that are invariably linked to multinational companies which are themselves highly interlinked, without money going to many companies we'd prefer it didn't, any more than it's feasible to live in a town governed by a government you vehemently disagree with,…

> It's virtually impossible to live in modern society If you truly consider those "multinational companies" to be so unethical and dastardly, then don't. Live outside of modern society. Many people do. You do not. Your hypocrisy is telling.

how is this different from a simple proposal that dissenters simply leave society ?

I'd prefer dissent to be a little more structurally integrated into our society, thanks.

Post reply on HN