1y ago

People Want To Use Things But Not Own The Consequences Of Its Use.

[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?

You're viewing part of a thread.

Show Context

68 comments

Calm the fuck down. Read it again.
If you want to change the world, rather than just polish your halo, put your narcissism away and do better.
- one of us is clearly tilting at windmills
  maybe cut out the random insults and direct straw manning of people you are talking to if you want to be taken seriously. for real, why derail the conversation with these baseless insults and poorly made personal arguments?
  yes its has always been the epitome of rudeness to look at someone you would call a friend or family member and require them to talk to you on a system that requires you to sign legal agreements and install trackers on your hardware just to communicate with them. just because a large majorty are rude does not change the fact that it is indeed rude.
  being angry at learning you have been rude you entire time you have been on the internet is hard to deal with, realizing people have been playing you is hard to deal with esp when those playing you, youll never get to speak to or get redress from.
  i see you are here so I suspect you are dealing with some level of this.
  remember the subthread here is asserting this is like the carbon situation. ive yet to see anyone prove to me it is. in one people truly have no choice without demanding change and changing thier own governments. in the other personal choice is entirely possible. no one says you have to cut these networks out entirely, your level of engagement is up to you, but know what you are trading when doing so.
  i come to social media to make social posts, I dont come here to check in with Mark and Elon and let them know what ive been up to, where i have been and who all my friends are.
  
  You insult billions of people on the basis that they don't do exactly what you do but find it insulting when someone points out your hypocrisy?
  Grow the fuck up.
  
  saying someones actions are rude is not an insult but i see some wanting to push language that way.
  and yes, i directed a bit at you this time, for the most part i expect people to be ignorant, as I have said in other posts a lot of money is spent convincing people otherwise. none is spent explaining to people what thier actual freedoms are or what they give up by the choices they are making when clicking a colored icon and the Agree button.
  im still waiting for:
  why people expect friends and family to communicate this way
  why that is acceptable
  why is email such a problem
  you are looking to cover these with the same veracity as what is done to support the "big carbon" industry and proliferate them since that is the equivalency that was offered.
  now I think we all get why big carbon claims are bunk, its obvious to anyone that we hopelessly rely on supply chains and only have so much say in thier form or how many layers of crap we have to go through to get staples. People truly have no choice, even if you have the privilege of time and money you are still going to struggle and at best you create a facade of "not relying on big carbon" but you do.
  this is not equivalent here, i get why people feel stuck, i even get why they made the choices they did but when it comes to communications, thankfully we managed some standards of law to ensure our little supercomputers are able to still talk to eachother through comms standards. Every user on the internet has always had the choice, its often only a few clicks away. There is a reason why there is a huge incentive to protect the garden and ensure algorithms, UX and features are such to discourage looking beyond the garden.
  while there are many areas of similarity id suggest saying they are the same is an insult to both user groups (one internet users the other, well everyone) and really it devalues the carbon discussion which while I care about open communications, we know the carbon discussion is much more critical to our species on the timeline.
  
  Neither time nor energy are infinite. We all have to make choices. If you want people to make different choices, try carrots instead of sticks.
  And if you want people to decide that the Fediverse a better place to be, stop filling it up with whining about how not everyone has joined it yet.
  
  talking generally instead of directly again i see. good for the room to be sure.
  i might suggest you look for an instance more aligned with your interests.
  FWIW, i dont see these threads often, but i often hear about users on big instances acting like this is the only thing on lemmy. I think its just the only thing on the server you are on.

68 comments