[codersarepeople]

What are you even saying? Facebook and Google engineers are just writing code, just like (presumably) you. Very few of them make any key decisions, and most of them work on good things. For every engineer working on disallowing FB signout on oculus, there are 10 writing tools for small businesses to more easliy share their pages, helping people stay in contact with loved ones.

We (rightly) don't go after Northrop Grumman engineers when the US decides to bomb Yemen. Put down your pitchfork and show some compassion.

[devwastaken]

Compassion is the reverse of what you're thinking. If you make bombs in modern day you're a murderer. We have no active world war, no real threat to our borders, and any basic level of research shows those bombs are used for proxy wars over resources and land in foreign continents. If youre in a position to design bombs you're in a position to work anywhere else too. No excuses for behavior.

[kcb]

Rising totalitarian nation across the sea with an ever expanding military, infinite resources, and a desire to expand reach around the globe.

"JuSt StoP MakinG Bombss"

[devwastaken]

Provide evidence that were at any risk of WW3. In the U.S. Those bombs are exclusively used for proxy wars and are made in significant abundance to continue that "war". They're not for any other purpose. If your intent is actual defense, sure, but we don't have that reason.

[mthoms]

Outside of the US, many (perhaps most) educated and politically-aware Westerners do look down on people involved in the Military-Industrial Complex.

Nobody civilized wants to "go after" them of course, but make no mistake - it's not something you'd want to brag about while overseas if you're trying to make friends.

This is true even in friendly places like Europe, Canada or Japan. Make of that what you will.

[dessant]

Working for Google and Facebook is often a choice, with a highly desirable outcome. People rarely become engineers at Facebook because they just couldn't find a job at a different company.

Those engineers could decide to build similar tools at a company that does not aid, you know, genocide. Those engineers could also decide to not continue working for a company that normalizes mass surveillance.

When you decide to work on your awesome things at companies like Facebook and Google, you are propping up megacorps that harm society, and that's your choice.

Regarding compassion, I'm looking forward to the next mass walkout of Facebook engineers, condemning the spread of hate and violence that their employee enables.

[derivagral]

I have a (good faith) question for you: since it seems as though many large corporations accumulate skeletons and incentivize negative behavior, is your position effectively against large corporations? Or is there a counterexample? Is this a complaint against the FB(/IG/SNAP/whatever) style feed, or do you feel this is endemic to any communication platform at scale?

[jdgoesmarching]

It’s always interesting when I see HN on the verge of grasping the importance of worker solidarity. Ironically by following political philosophies of “self” empowerment, tech workers have ceded all real power to their majority investors.

You’re both right, but your argument is one logical jump away from “they were just doing their jobs”

[unix_fan]

I find tech workers on HN, and other places, to be incredibly privileged and Entitled. Some of the responses you’re getting show it pretty clearly.