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Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

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Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#51

Post by JumpCrisscross »

tetris11 wrote: post #30
mc32 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I kinda get the hate but harking back to the la terreur doesn’t do anyone any favors and instead will engender strange bedfellows.

It took the literal burning down of aristocratic homes during the english reforms of 1832 for the House of Lords to finally sit down with Earl Grey and hash out a bill that would finally grant large populated cities like Manchester actual voting rights. The French Revolution was still fresh in minds of these elites - the July Monarchy having just taken place - and yet still they let it escalate to the point of near c…

The point is a guillotine somewhere else is good. Guillotines at home don’t particularly hurt the rich as a class. (It’s debated whether France’s elite actually consolidated wealth and power through its revolutions.)

Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#52

Post by grayhatter »

nilirl wrote: post #25

> denied her access to the legal system in all her dealings with Meta How ... how is that legal? Why would that ever be made legal? Apparently businesses can use contracts to opt out of regular public courts and agree on using a neutral decision-maker; an arbitrator. But then the post says: > Meta got its arbitrator – a lawyer who is paid by Meta to adjudicate contractual disputes instead of an actual judge Huh? How'…

> I am thoroughly seduced by a power I've never felt, even if I see it as poison.

Meditate on the idea of the negative sum game the people who seek power prefer, and then about what you'd rather see them, or yourself do with that power. Because of the things I actually care about, I find that random fantastical/idealistic desire for power to be hollow, something much easier to see in comparison. I don't care about power, for powers sake (the best way, perhaps only way, to obtain power itself). All my power fantasies involve some sort of stopping people from using their power to abuse and take from others.

There's nothing wrong being seduced by power, if you're worried about how it might corrupt your ethical principals, just don't be foolish enough to copy the small minded power seekers (humans do love to emulate the people the see around them). You can seek and hold power, and then use it to do good things. Is that harder? Probably, but I can't articulate a single reason it would be harder than doing good things without power, which most people already don't do. So don't be tricked into power being the thing that corrupts. Most people are just shitty, and very few have meaningful power; sample bias can be a bitch.

Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#53

Post by dofm »

It's not increasingly bizarre, really, if you just allow for the possibility of one thing:

There's something else worse that they know could be in such a book, but isn't yet, and it is so bad that it is worth doing this.

Perhaps they know that Wynn-Williams could have put it in the book and didn't. Perhaps they know that someone else — someone else British, say? — could write such things in a book and so far hasn't.

Once you assume their motivation is grounded in real fear, it gets easier to see why this isn't bizarre at all; it's inevitable.

Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#55

Post by kmeisthax »

smt88 wrote: post #9
LightBug1 wrote: post #4

I submit that the human brain isn't equipped to handle control of multi-hundreds of billions of dollars cap and the working lives of hundreds of thousands of individuals. Particularly if you're morally suspect to begin with. This is just one of countless obvious examples.

FDR is a very interesting case study. He had the country in the palm of his hand and could have cemented his (or his party’s) power permanently, but instead he left the republic intact.

FDR actually kinda did do that. He broke the Washington precedent and ran for President four times, he scared the Supreme Court shitless to the point where they signed off on blatantly unconstitutional land grabs against Japanese emigrants, and the Democratic Party was able to ride high on the fumes of the Progressive movement for decades afterward.

We don't think of him as a dictator, because a lot of what he did was ultimately reforms necessary to maintain America as a republic. The alternative would have been Nazi America. But he was still exercising dictatorial power, and he was responsible for massively increasing the power of the Presidency as a result. Hell, part of the reason why Trump is so dangerous is specifically because of the damage FDR did to the checks and balances on the Executive Branch.

Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#56

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

gilrain wrote: post #38
mc32 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I kinda get the hate but harking back to the la terreur doesn’t do anyone any favors and instead will engender strange bedfellows.

Oh, well better let them destroy everything with greed then. Wouldn’t want to break, like, five eggs to save every other egg in the world… The ethics become laughably simple, with as far as they’ve taken the resource imbalance. They should be very worried.

You generally don't get to choose how few eggs you'd like to break. As Olympe de Gouges found during the French Revolution, revolutions tend to be run by people who enjoy the process of breaking eggs, and if you call for it to stop they may decide that you are an egg who needs breaking.

Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#57

Post by ryandrake »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #44

I don't understand the purpose of an analysis that goes on for pages and pages without even mentioning that Meta says Wynn-Williams isn't telling the truth. I'm not saying you have to agree with them! But if you don't acknowledge their stated position you're not going to be able to make sense of the situation.

Of course they are going to deny. Whether or not they actually did the things claimed, there is no universe where denying isn’t the best tactic. So their denials in and of themselves don’t mean anything. Every single company accused of wrongdoing publicly denies, all the way up to and including when they settle or are found to have actually done the wrongdoing.

Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#58

Post by unknownfuture »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #44

I don't understand the purpose of an analysis that goes on for pages and pages without even mentioning that Meta says Wynn-Williams isn't telling the truth. I'm not saying you have to agree with them! But if you don't acknowledge their stated position you're not going to be able to make sense of the situation.

Then take her to court for libel and prove it. Facebook execs have absolutely not earned the benefit of the doubt, here.

Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#59

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

ryandrake wrote: post #57
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #44

I don't understand the purpose of an analysis that goes on for pages and pages without even mentioning that Meta says Wynn-Williams isn't telling the truth. I'm not saying you have to agree with them! But if you don't acknowledge their stated position you're not going to be able to make sense of the situation.

Of course they are going to deny. Whether or not they actually did the things claimed, there is no universe where denying isn’t the best tactic. So their denials in and of themselves don’t mean anything. Every single company accused of wrongdoing publicly denies, all the way up to and including when they settle or are found to have actually done the wrongdoing.

Again, I don't think the fact that they're denying it requires you to agree. But if you want to develop an accurate understanding of the world, you have to acknowledge that they are denying it, and evaluate how well this denial explains their actions before launching into complex alternative theories.

Re: Zuckerberg's war on whistleblowers

#60

Post by mschuster91 »

> Lukashenka knew that arresting children for eating ice cream would make him a laughingstock abroad. Zuckerberg knows that threatening Wynn-Williams for standing in wooden silence on a stage makes him look like history's most guillotineable billionaire. But both Lukashenka and Zuckerberg are willing to be thought a thin-skinned bully, so long as that means the people they oppress the most are too terrified to ever challenge their authority.

... but eventually, external circumstances change, despite all the vain hope of those in power that they don't.

For Lukashenka, it's Ukraine blasting Russia's oil infrastructure to pieces - his regime has always depended on Mother Russia, but should Mother Russia (hopefully) collapse, he's done for.

And for Zuckerberg? And all the other vile big tech execs that kissed Trump's ring [1]? The population is fed up, radical (at least when measured by usual US standards) politicians have actual chances of getting elected on the Democrat side... they all will face justice.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jan/09/google-mi...

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