[Edit 2: I think anyone commenting should identify how much they use Facebook in their comment lol]
On the list of people I describe in the subject, I place myself first. If you’re here to defend yourself by showing me your receipts, congratulations, you win, I just saved us who knows how much time. I’m typing this out in an attempt to describe phenomena, not persuade you of anything in particular, other than, this is a thing I see happening a lot; too much would be my take.
I’m just gonna grab [a] most egregious example, but I would like to talk about this, not as a horrific fail, but as an exemplar; at the moment I believe that most people categorize it as the former.
[edit: there really is no “most” egregious example, and I just thought of a much worse one, and unlike Facebook I am fully guilty of this one: I own and drive a car, a lot, and boy am I ignoring some real world consequences there.]
That example being, Facebook Acted As The Main Propaganda Outlet For A Genocide Of The Rohingya In Myanmar, and therefore, Anyone Who Uses Facebook Is Using A Tool That Has Bloodstains On It And Are Somehow Not Horrified.
To more easily conceptualize this, it’s much the same as me needing a shovel, and having a neighbour that I happen to know murdered someone with their shovel, but has not been arrested for it, and right when I need the shovel, they walk over with their bloodstained shovel and offer to let me use it for my non-murder task. And I just go “Wow how convenient that you happened to be here with that bright-red shovel just now, I think I’ll use this one one of yours with the little spatters of brain on it, instead of walking over to my shed and getting my own shovel out!”
We are talking about murder here, Facebook was used to foment mass murder and in a world that made sense, Zuckerberg would be handed over to the ICC years ago, along with Henry Kissinger and a number of others who instead hang out at the Nobel Peace Prize club where Barack makes a mean Mai Tai.
The problems that people use Facebook to constructively solve is connections to family and close friends, event and interest group organizing, the marketplace, and for the avid user it constitutes a daily journal.
These problems could each be solved using something else that is also just as gratis. It might be a small amount of effort more, but then you maybe don’t ever have to touch the remains of a human life that once existed and now does not, due to this particular device being used to end that life.
But it seems that it’s more convenient, easy, zero effort, to simply ignore the gore.
That’s what I see on the internet. I don’t think anyone has ever accepted a bloodstained shovel and set to digging a ditch with it who didn’t also feel that their life was next if they didn’t, but as long as there’s no visible bloodstains, as long as it’s just a few articles and podcasts from known radical leftists, eh, look at little Jimmy’s recital, isn’t he cute?
Social media’s whole thing is the social aspect - if a community and/or its users are entrenched somewhere, they’re not likely to move because a minority has issues with the platform. It’s not unreasonable to want people to move away from Facebook/etc., but it’s not really true to say that’s a choice everyone has, if friends, family, and the communities or activities someone wants to engage with are there; if the options are communicating with loved ones on an ‘unethical’ platform or not communicating with them at all, it’s unreasonable and unfair to expect everyone to choose the latter.
in the past we would drag companies who made such walls in our telecommunications systems to courts and force them to allow open comms, now we have people making excuses for allowing walls.
If you’re implying that the belief that companies should be held accountable for their actions and that communication platforms should be democratized is mutually exclusive from not villainizing people for wanting to communicate with their loved ones, I strongly disagree.
I’m not making excuses for the companies. I’m making excuses for the people at their mercy, who are just trying to survive with the hand they were dealt. People can’t be blamed for following the path of least resistance; the blame lies squarely with the path and those who made it, and fighting the people on that path who would gladly follow another is counterproductive.
i see a lot of this injection in these replies, id suggest re-reading my statements and try and disassociate yourself from the anger of previous convos, no one is calling the users out here beyond saying they dont understand beyond maybe some of OPs statements.
however I do still see a little blame on the users since anytime this topic comes up people come in attacking those discussing it and often being quite rude and frankly overly defensive (common when one suggests to another the wool is over your eyes).
its important to note that those actions that forced those companies to move was initiated by representatives of the people.
at some point everyone made a choice here, they arent necessarily bad people for those choices but ignorance for whatever reason is on the menu. Hard to deny when the networks themselves work so hard to distort views for people. Algos you dont own are not made by friends they are made by those looking to monetize.
this was why we had these cases to begin with, if the incentive of a company providing communications platforms becomes perverted and at a fundamental cross of facilitating those communications its understood to be erosive and dangerous.
in short, communications are a fundamental public utility and should be treated as such.
It seems like we’re having two different conversations; I reread your comments as you suggested and it seems as if you’re responding to someone else. You’re talking about things completely unrelated from what I’m saying, and then implying I’m being unreasonable for being angry over something I’m not even angry about.
I agree completely. This was never in question and it feels like you’re implying I think otherwise when you keep reinforcing this point.
This is what I take issue with. As a personal example, my grandpa knows how to make phone calls and use facebook; he doesn’t use technology much more than that, and he’s not in a state to learn how to use anything else right now.
So I use Facebook to talk with him. Not because I support Facebook, I just want to talk to my grandpa. I find it offensive when you imply those who use closed and/or ‘unethical’ platforms inherently do it out of ignorance, and that there’s always a choice; my only other choice is to not talk to my dying grandfather, and I won’t feel guilty for not taking that.
To be clear, in terms of big picture I’m with you on everything else you said.
That sums up my thoughts nicely.
I don’t feel this discussion has been in good faith; your last comment has some gaslighting (whether intentional or not) that I don’t think has a place in respectful conversation, so I won’t be responding further.
so wait, its better to say these people are knowingly choosing to be on these platforms and requiring others to do so communicate with them as well? im not even sure what you are saying but it does seem we may be at cross purposes
we have come a long way since breaking up the bells, wow
is your instance seeing everything?
im not supporting OPs post, if you look at the thread this is a reply to someone trying to equate these choices people are making to the lack of choice people have in the carbon argument https://lemmy.intai.tech/comment/632241
which to me is a watering down of the carbon argument where people truly have no choice vs having put themselves in a mental box for whatever the reason.
And yet, here you are on Lemmy, rather than on Reddit. Why is that?
The thing about it, though, is that we are all already on a universal network; the internet. We all have email, give or take a few weirdos. We are perfectly capable of reaching our loved ones that way.
It is a question of convenience in this case, not necessity.
In my car example, I can argue - or rather, I used to be able to argue, because I work fully remote now - that I had no choice but to commute, and since I moved to the country with not even a bus service into the city, it was quite arguable on the basis of your comic.
But I left facebook and my friends and family did not change; they had less of me, perhaps, but I had just as much of them.
I believe you responded to the wrong comment, as I didn’t post that comic. Either way-
It isn’t always a matter of convenience over necessity. For a personal example, my grandfather knows how to use Facebook and basically no other communication technology; he isn’t really able to learn new things now, so my options are to use Facebook or to not talk to him. If you’re saying I’m acting unethically unless I do the latter I don’t think much more needs to be said; if not, well, that’s my point.
He can’t operate a telephone?
Time zones and limited schedules are the issue there. Smartphones for texting are difficult for him. But either way, that’s beside the point; what I’m trying to get at is that an inconvenience to you might be more than that to someone else. Learning a new platform might be easy for you, but it’s basically impossible for someone with dementia. Leaving a job that requires you to use unethical tools might be fine if you can get another one easily, but some people can’t. Not talking with friends on unethical social platforms might be fine if you have more social opportunities, but to someone with social issues, finding a group of people that you can be comfortable around isn’t trivial.
The comment I originally responded to was saying it’s unfair to compare oil/plastics industry with social media, because you have a choice with the latter but not the former; while that’s the case more often than not, it’s far from universal, and applying the same standards to someone for whom the opposite is true is unreasonable. You never know how much someone has to sacrifice to do things that might seem easy, and you never know how easy the things that seem hard might be.