[throw123xz]

Perhaps they don't, but some do. And those who avoid Amazon or Google might be fine with using Russian companies.

We don't have the mental bandwidth to support every good cause or the capacity to avoid every bad player. That doesn't mean that you have to be fine with and use products from every company/country.

[jszymborski]

Agreed. Just because acting ethically isn't always easy, doesn't mean you need to give up on every cause.

[dcow]

The point is not to not try and support causes you believe in, it’s about acting in an internally consistent way.

If you don’t support war, then you cannot indirectly support anything that has any part in supporting any war anywhere. You can’t pick and choose which wars and products are convenient enough to stand against while funding Google’s amoral corporate, US tax paying, attention machine because you won’t use a product which almost certainly undoubtably has contributed to vastly less harm than Kagi has (assuming we take as granted the premise that purchasing products of a company that is headquartered in a country at war has any political or financial significance whatsoever so as to be culpable for causing harm in the first place).

I mean you can, but the idea that you’re truly doing any good is entirely vapid. You’re just lying to yourself to feel good.

I guess most people probably don’t care if someone lies to themself to feel good. But to go piss on some product because they don’t have quite the same moral alignment as you do is rather silly and it’s entirely fair to see people calling this immature behavior out.

[jszymborski]

> If you don’t support war...

Wait, can't I just not support _this_ war? I don't think the invasion of a peaceful democratic country is OK, so that means it is morally inconsistent for me to believe it was right and just for the allies to go to war with the axis powers?

> You can’t pick and choose which wars and products are convenient enough to stand against while funding Google’s amoral corporate, US tax paying, attention machine because you won’t use a product which almost certainly undoubtably has contributed to vastly less harm than Kagi has.

What you're saying here is that, since it's hard to stand for the right things, you shouldn't try standing for anything. If only those without sin could do good, we really should just pack it in.

> But to go piss on some product because they don’t have quite the same moral alignment as you do is rather silly and it’s entirely fair to see people calling this immature behavior out.

Listen, there are some people who won't feel good about a product if they think it's going to make tomorrow worse. It's, shockingly, not about Kagi, or about you, but strictly about how some people wish to govern _themselves_. Kagi can make the decisions it wants, it's not a moral entity, it's a for-profit company which means its sole purpose is to seek profits. In fact, I'm not even trying to pick on Kagi here, generally speaking I think my values align with the product on offer.

The point stands though that corporations get to make decisions as to whether or not the ethical dilemmas they face are worth the customers (future and present) they'll lose over it.

> ...while funding Google’s amoral corporate, US tax paying, attention machine because you won’t use a product which almost certainly undoubtably has contributed to vastly less harm than Kagi has.

Why it's particularly relevant for Kagi to care about this sort of thing is that the users, like myself, who do not use Google and are willing to go through pains (be it worse results or monthly fees) to not fund them, are exactly the kind of person who won't use a service for not divesting from the Russian economy.

[dcow]

You are welcome to govern yourself however you want. I said that. But if you actually think that Kagi is going to make tomorrow worse then all I can say is, “good luck out there”.

I prefer to use my valuable time and limited attention supporting causes I care about in ways that actually matter and are consistent. I don’t need to “govern myself” to be happy. I don’t extend moral culpability for harmful actions beyond those who commit them. I don’t hold the inventor of the scientific method responsible for all the harm scientific discoveries have caused.