361
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 27 Sep 2023
361 points (98.4% liked)
Europe
8332 readers
1 users here now
News/Interesting Stories/Beautiful Pictures from Europe 🇪🇺
(Current banner: Thunder mountain, Germany, 🇩🇪 ) Feel free to post submissions for banner pictures
Rules
(This list is obviously incomplete, but it will get expanded when necessary)
- Be nice to each other (e.g. No direct insults against each other);
- No racism, antisemitism, dehumanisation of minorities or glorification of National Socialism allowed;
- No posts linking to mis-information funded by foreign states or billionaires.
Also check out !yurop@lemm.ee
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
I'm not sure if we are on the same side, and honestly in this case it doesn't matter, since you are right: a corporation only has to care about the externalities as much as they are forced to and not even an inkling more than that.
People who think that an enterprise in a free market will respond to any other force than economic force are wasting activism time that could be better used elsewhere.
If you want a corporation to stop performing a socially harmful business, you need to make that business unprofitable.
I agree with your sentiment, but I wouldn't call activism (and especially not journalism) a wasted effort in that regard. Bringing issues to light is the first step in creating a visible dent in the balance sheets. Public perception shapes consumer behavior to some degree and can put pressure on lawmakers to introduce legislation against harmful conduct. On the other hand, if the general public only hears the company's side of the story underlining how clean and ethical they are, there will never be any pressure for change.
This is neigh on impossible. I don’t shop at Amazon, but I doubt they even noticed. I try to avoid brands like Nestle but they’re still going.
The last thing I ordered that wasn’t from Amazon was still delivered by Amazon. I was shocked.
My intention was to suggest that you make those businesses unprofitable by intervening in the market with far-reaching regulations.
You are right, but a corporation is not run by robots. There are individuals making these decisions, and they must - and will be - held accountable.