[throwawaylinux]

> "Most corporations" don't do global surveillance on the scale Facebook does. It's that simple.

It's never that simple.

What corporations are okay to work for, in this unidimensional worldview? Exxon Mobil? Philip Morris? Pfizer? Dupont? Boeing? Nestle? BHP? Fox News? Volkswagen? Nike? HSBC? Is it okay if your employer's owners or executives have appeared in the panama papers? Are or have been on the boards of FAANG companies or own stock in those companies? Are you allowed to buy Google or Apple products and use their services?

What about companies that collect and trade on the personal information and habits they collect about their customers, just not on the scale of Facebook or Google? Are they okay? Even if they would like to be able to sell more personal information but don't presently have the means to would that be okay?

So where do you work? What products and services do you buy?

[sofixa]

Everybody decides where to draw their own line. For some it's Raytheon or Bayer or Boeing, for some it's HSBC, for some it's Facebook. Doesn't matter, you can't invalidate a person's moral compass with whataboutism. There are plenty of small and medium businesses that aren't terrible.

[chillacy]

I think this has to go both ways, many in this thread use phrases like "lack of morals" implying One True Morality scale, presumably one where surveillance capitalism is.. most evil?

I'd personally love to know what everyone actually works on. In real life I know people who work on guided missiles and ICBM-adjacent tech who manage to sleep well at night.

[throwawaylinux]

I wasn't invalidating it any more than they were invalidating my opinion that facebook isn't the devil with their response to telling me that is the dealbreaker. "It's that simple".

Note this wasn't the poster I initially asked the question of. It was someone else just coming in and trying to tell me "it's that simple". My reply was not whataboutism, it was explaining why it's not "that simple".

And it wasn't a rhetorical question, I really want to know, from someone who does have this very simple "line", whether it's okay to use Apple or Google or Facebook services or products, whether it's okay to work for companies whose owners or executives own stock? Whether it's okay to vote for politicians who take money from them or who themselves own the stock?

This isn't whataboutism, it is exploring the consequences of this moral position.