[pear01]

The problem with this summation is the government is complicit in their actions. Thus it undermines this simple private gain, public pain argument.

A lot of the times when Meta does something like this the fact the governments in question essentially demand that action seems to be ignored. Would you have a better view of corporate power if corporations could unilaterally ignore the laws of sovereign countries in which they operate?

Wouldn't it normatively be more in keeping with a proper distinction between public and private to say lobby your congressman to stop the ceaseless funding and weapon deployments to countries in the ME that don't share our values? I have the same feeling when people complain about Meta and privacy. I mean at least they are giving you a "free" service and you essentially take part in a transaction. The NSA has all your data anyway. Does anyone remember their congressional rep trying to convince them this is a good idea? You can log off from Facebook at any time. In some jurisdictions you can even claim a right to be forgotten. Try sending such a request to the NSA or your local police department. Do you really think such public entities are more trustworthy than their private bedfellows merely because they fall on opposite lines of the public/private divide?

If you want a new public culture you should probably identify the real target is not private companies which really don't care about these questions and just want to do whatever moves margins. Your real problem is a lot less easy to propagandize about - the fact that a majority of your fellow citizens (in the USA at least) don't actually care about their (and by extension - your) privacy or human rights in the Middle East. They want cheap oil and cheap products.

Not sure how many election cycles American liberals need to live through to get this through their heads.

[0x5FC3]

I hear you, there are countless problems to solve. My "..in a just world.." was doing a lot of heavy lifting.

> I mean at least they are giving you a free service and you essentially take part in a transaction.

Yes, it is akin to a transaction, but we cannot ignore the power imbalance between the user and the corporation. They actively engineer their platforms to keep you glued to the screen. It is far from free. You pay with time, money spent on whatever is advertised to you and a lot of other things.

My proposal was analogous to say tobacco tax or carbon tax and the like. We somehow made it essential to be on social media, it is proven to be harmful, policy action to shift priorities.

[pear01]

Fair enough, I appreciate the response. Just note in this case I think the precedent should not be private company can ignore public demand. If they can unilaterally ignore the demands of the Saudi government then why not any liberal government? If you operate in a country you should have to follow their rules. If the rules themselves are bad that is a different question.

The remedy in that case then would not be a tax but to ban them from operating in that country. We already have these sorts of export controls with other countries. It is just the case that despite their egregious human rights record (bone saw, anyone?) the United States has propped up the Saudi regime since basically it first came to exist roughly a century ago.

The reason is obvious - Saudi brutality is a feature not a bug. It secures access to cheap oil.

[0x5FC3]

The export control angle is interesting. I was treating addiction, radicalization, capitulation to authoritarian govts, abetting human rights violations, productivity loss, etc., as the symptom of a common cause: the hyper-optimized engagement model and curbing it with a policy. You're right that some of these harms might warrant categorical exclusions rather than pricing the whole business model out.

I may have had an overly optimistic ideal of people running small federated mastodon servers for friends and family for free/donations being the only type of "social media".

[pear01]

I appreciate your optimism actually. Someone (it's me) can also share your ideal for social media while also having slightly different takes on what makes the prevailing model wrong exactly.

Thanks for the back and forth.

[runtime_terror]

> Wouldn't it normatively be more in keeping with a proper distinction between public and private to say lobby your congressman to stop the ceaseless funding and weapon deployments to countries in the ME that don't share our values?

If an individual lobbying the government wouldn't be overpowered by monied corporate interest in the government, maybe. Sadly that's not the case, at least in the US.

> The NSA has all your data anyway.

Yes, and this is incredibly unpopular and if we had a real representative democracy we'd be able to do something about it.

> In some jurisdictions you can even claim a right to be forgotten.

This too is popular and would be codified more broadly if, again, it wasn't for corporate lobbyists.

> Do you really think such public entities are more trustworthy than their private bedfellows merely because they fall on opposite lines of the public/private divide?

To beat a dead horse...

> the fact that a majority of your fellow citizens (in the USA at least) don't actually care about their (and by extension - your) privacy or human rights in the Middle East

Factually untrue.

The Iran war is incredibly unpopular, beating Iraq and Vietnam in unpopularity this quickly into the operation [1]

Most Americans want us to stop funding Israel [2]

Most Americans are against spying on fellow Americans (esp democrats/the left; tho republicans love a good ole police state)[3].

I'd argue strongly the reason these numbers aren't more in favor of anti-intervention and privacy is decades and decades of propaganda and fear mongering (about socialism/communism during the Cold War and before, about the Middle East/muslims since the oil crisis and before) because of, you guessed it, corporations lobbying for military engagement, oil contracts etc.

There is a thoroughly documented history of American corporations lobbying the government to, here is a brief list:

- Hawaiian overthrow (1893): sugar (dole, spreckles) - Spanish-American war (Cuba, Philippines, Puerto Rico) (1898): sugar, tobacco, shipping - Columbia/Panama (1903): canal rights - Nicaragua (1909-1933): United Fruit, banking - Honduras (1903, 1907, 1911, 1924): United Fruit and others - Dominican Republic (1916–1924, 1965): sugar again - Iran (1953): oil - Guatemala (1954): United Fruit! - Congo (1960-61): copper/cobalt - Brazil (1964): mining - Indonesia (1965–66): mining, oil - Chile (1970-73): copper - Iraq (2003): oil, war contractors - Iran (2025-26): oil, war contractors

There are many more - some more contested than others - but the above list have clear historical documentation linking them to corporate interests.

Socialism, communism, "terrorism", the war on drugs, "democracy", and Iran getting nukes have all been helpful tools for US corporations to curry influence with bought politicians to have the US colonize or dismantle other countries for their benefit.

Your analysis puts all the blame directly on citizens vs looking at root causes and the obvious successes of corporate and government propaganda on the opinions of Americans.

Let's instead look at who benefits most from these wars and try and dismantle their ability to influence opinion and government and work towards a more representational and fair government we have a say in.

[1]: https://www.natesilver.net/p/iran-war-polls-popularity-appro... [2]: https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260519-poll-shows-majori... [3]: https://yougov.com/en-us/articles/52425-what-americans-think...

[pear01]

The Iran war is unpopular because of prices at the pump. Prior interventions in Iran (and elsewhere) that also violated rights did not garner the same reaction because to the average American they incurred no cost. If for some reason the war had caused prices to go lower the war would be popular. The fact you think otherwise would lead me to simply conclude you are in denial re the psyche of the American electorate.

You aren't telling me anything I don't already know. You cannot be pro democracy and at the same time treat the electorate like children. Propaganda is part of electioneering. Parties advocating for their own interests should be a feature in a healthy democracy. Are you suggesting the electorate is incapable of dealing with their basic obligations as citizens of a free society? And your scapegoat for this is the corporations?

What is your theory of democracy if the population is so susceptible to "corporate lobbyists"? Why trust such a body to make decisions if it can't even cope with basic propaganda?

Have you been to red counties? I think you are severely over-indexing on your own biases. Corporate lobbying has nothing on tribalism, racism, and general parochialism. You seem to be well read enough when it comes to history. I am surprised your assessment of human nature has not caught up.

The fact is most Americans don't care. If they did they would elect different leaders. If your theory is that the electorate is simply brainwashed well that seems to me as much an indictment on the notion of democracy itself as a criticism of any allegedly brainwashing entity.

Of course I put blame on citizens. Your attempt to shift all the blame to "corporate lobbyists" is about as convincing as the "they were about to get a nuclear weapon" responsibility shift.

Citizens are responsible because in a democracy they are the ultimate arbiters. You don't get to shift the responsibility, it's not optional. The notion of democracy itself rests on it. If you feel a need to control what information citizens consume so that you can personally legitimize their decisions I would suggest to you perhaps you don't really believe in democracy. As George Carlin said, garbage in garbage out.

[cess11]

"If they did they would elect different leaders."

Like who? Notable candidacies are predicated on million dollar budgets, and pretty much everyone who runs on justice and gets into an office in the US then neuters themselves.

It's not a democratic state, and US society has very little tolerance for or understanding of democracy.

[pear01]

If your point is to suggest no alternatives have ever been contemplated then that is simply factually untrue and I think you know that. In some cases, such people succeed locally/statewide even if failing nationally.

My point is simply you don't get to rob the electorate of its agency because you don't like the choice its made. That's about as silly as the grandparent to your comment citing random polls to establish some authoritative notion of what Americans believe.

[cess11]

Name some then.

What "agency"? Participation in US elections is junk level, politicians openly and routinely 'redistrict' and suppress voting, and the median US citizen is revulsed by the prospect of egalitarian organising.

The current US president is an Idi Amin style autocrat, and the "electorate" is responding by lulling around in the streets with one hand occupied by a live streaming spy device and then getting beaten by cops or cop adjacents.

[pear01]

Are you aware that the current US president won the popular vote? What redistricting and voter suppression came into play in that case?

I'm supposed to conclude from this election that the electorate didn't support the current president?

Your post is really unimpressive. You care about these things yet you need me to provide you the name of progressive politicians? You want to take agency away because of redistricting and voter suppression yet immediately claim that the "median US citizen is revulsed by the prospect of egalitarian organising"? So do they have agency or not? Did the politicians program their revulsion too? Or was that the corporations? Maybe they need to hang out with you for a few weeks to be sufficiently deprogrammed.

I'm sure it will look like many other such ventures in that domain. I can see the people desperately trying to crawl over the walls now as you go into another second paragraph non sequitur.

I think what is clear is you don't believe in democracy. How can you given the obvious contempt you show for the American electorate.

Unlike you I know the difference between someone who doesn't have agency and someone who isn't worth my time. Have a good day.

[runtime_terror]

So if I'm correct, your post basically implies that individual voters are 100% responsible for everything, is that your claim?

That billions in lobbying into political campaigns, advertising, etc have no effect on how people think or vote?

Your entire argument seems to be "if people can be influenced, why democracy?" That's such a simplistic view of the world and human psychology.

I can guarantee you too are influenced by propaganda in ways you're not aware, I'm sure I am, we all are. Humans are influenced by culture, propaganda, family, religion, etc. To think we're all perfectly rational actors who have pure agency is nieve at best and disingenuous at worst.

My argument is that we should do what we can to combat the influence of corporate interests in our elections. I backed up why I think this is the case. I've made my points as clearly as I care to.

Yours is, what? Individual voters want everything that's happening? That because Trump won the popular vote, everyone who voted for him wanted every thing that's is happening (e.g. invading Iran despite him being the "anti-war candidate")?

If your entire argument is "people asked for this" than there is not much more to discuss...

[8note]

>> The NSA has all your data anyway.

> Yes, and this is incredibly unpopular and if we had a real representative democracy we'd be able to do something about it.

no, this is something people dont care about, and is a low invasive way for the government to solve a problem people do care about - terror attacks