Watching the drama around kagi unfold and it has me wondering how much you take into consideration a creator’s view on things like homophobia, sexism, racism, etc. when deciding to use a product. I think most of us have a bar somewhere (I would imagine very few on this website would ever consider registering on an altright platform), so where is that bar for you? What about art? Have you boycotted JKR or dropped your opinion about Picasso because they’re transphobic and misogynistic respectively? Is it about the general vibe of a product or piece of media, or are you more discerning? What goes into this decision and why?

  • Thevenin@beehaw.orgEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    Also nihilism is fucking [redacted], I’m not sure why you are attributing that to me.

    To recap:

    There’s nothing I can do unless I want to become a hunter gatherer. […] there’s no way around doing infinitely more harm by living […] morally it’s a drop in an ocean of wrong. […] it’s not a moral question, same with the other stuff

    If you had just said that you don’t bother boycotting because your effort is currently being spent in more productive activities, then I would’ve given an upvote and left. But that’s not exactly what you said. You said that any attempt at improving society through personal morality (short of removing yourself from it) is pointless due to the scale of the harm society inflicts. Even if you didn’t mean it, that’s what you stated, so that’s the point I’ve been disagreeing with over here.

    The stance that personal morality should have no place in the shaping of society (and that the common man’s fight to improve society is irrelevant and naive due to the scale of the ultimate victory of the strong over the weak) is a paraphrasing of Nietzsche’s disavowal of “slave morality.” The stance that a person should only advocate for things that help them personally is a paraphrasing of Nietzsche’s ideal of “master morality.” If you don’t want people associating you with that philosophy, you should be careful not to repeat it.

    • FluffyPotatoEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      Sorry, if I came off as too agro, I really hate nihilism.

      It wouldn’t be entirely true to say I don’t do boycotts because I’m busy doing other things, a more accurate reason would be twofold:

      1. Consumer boycotts are notoriously ineffective and almost never have any results.

      2. Morally it’s only harm reduction, you aren’t doing good, but avoiding doing something bad, on a scale where the reduction is insignificant.

      Even if the stars aligned I probably wouldn’t do boycotts for those reasons, I prefer actions that bring about good results if I choose to do something.