[cltby]

You are correct in your "understatement" claim, though I suspect unintentionally so. Yes, "avoiding politics" cuts into time you could be spending advancing progressive politics. So does writing software. So does watching a movie with your spouse. So does sleeping. So does every single thing that isn't literally "advancing progressive politics."

"No politics = politics" is an utterly vacuous statement.

[blck]

He's not passively stating no politics he's actively discouraging any politics. There is a slight difference.

If you become friendly with a person in the workplace you'll eventually learn their politics, right? Either through how they act or what they say. How do you limit how much a person reveals about themselves at work?

The CEO is saying Coinbase won't take political stances. That's fine in theory but in practice it's not. The whole idea of cryptocurrency itself is political.

There is a difference in being passively apolitical and actively apolitical for sure.

[SpicyLemonZest]

The rules aren't as strict as you're thinking. As the article describes, Armstrong's made it clear that there's no rule requiring employees to just pretend politics don't exist, and employees are still free to discuss politics with each other or create political discussion Slack channels.

[Spivak]

The stance "I am now and forever apolitical regardless of the state of the world or how political decisions affect me or others" is true no politics.

The stance "I am avoiding politics because there's nothing worth my time to be an activist about but I would if that changed and political decisions started seriously affecting me, my family, or my friends" is "the status quo is fine."

The stance "I'm avoiding politics because it's bad for my metal health or $any_criticism" is an act of protest! Super political.

I have genuinely never met someone in the first camp.

[cltby]

There are lots of reasons, good and bad, to avoid politics. But to claim that doing so is inherently political... isn't saying anything. To the extent it's true, it's trivially so. And to the extent it's non-trivial, it's completely false.

[Spivak]

The reason that you can't require people to vote in the US is because the act of not voting is considered protected political speech. Why is not participating in politics any different?

Hell, refusing to engage with certain types of politics isn't just political, it's an act of protest!

[SpicyLemonZest]

Have the people you've met specifically told you this is their stance? I'm worried you may be misunderstanding. I and almost all apolitical people I know fall in the first camp; I don't think the status quo is fine, but I also don't think that engaging in politics all the time improves it.