Originally this was a reply to this article about a Windows feature called Recall, but there’s a good argument the author’s concerns resonate far beyond Windows and Meta to proprietary generally.
Unfortunately, not everyone has a choice in who they work for in end-stage-capitalism. Work is about survival, not ideology. The majority of Americans are not far-right capitalists, but the vast majority of CEOs are, and it’s not really possible to survive long enough to start a small business in most of the US without investment from a far-right capitalist or inheritance (usually also from a far-right capitalist family member).
If you have the skillset and CV to work at Meta, you have a choice to work somewhere slightly lower on the scale of exploitation.
Dude, look around. Most of us are way, WAY past the “We’re all in this together! We can do it if we try!” method of living and have been operating in survival mode for the past 5 years. And can you blame them? The flood waters are rising and people are wanting to make sure they have a life raft. If that means working for evil people/companies, then so be it. It’s not like working somewhere else will stop or slow the flood. Morals are nice, but they won’t keep you afloat.
Yes morals won’t keep you afloat. But FAANG, military defense contractors, and the other most terrible industries waaaay overpay on cost of living, and other industries are also looking to compensate well for expertise (minus some compensation for all the exploitation you wouldn’t be contributing to).
What you’re describing is the development of a paranoid conservative mindset in response to traumatic global events. This is how my conservative Fox News brainrot parents describe the world, and they are the type to own guns because they’re deathly afraid of home intruders even though their city’s crime index is among the best in the country.
Very big window between participating in society via capitalism vs working directly for, eg. FAANG or a military defense contractor. It’s leaping over every less shitty option to get to the end because that’s what pays best. How funny that I considered writing a pre-reply for this exact comic in my original comment.
Not really. I can’t think of a major social media software company that isn’t exploitative. If that’s where their specialty lies, then they either learn new skills which takes time, requires partially resetting your career, and money only to have that company then absorbed by an exploitative big company in a decade and do it all again, or just keep your job that started as a decent company and got corrupted already.
