American Companies Help China Censor the Net 54
KyleNicholson writes "It makes you wonder what is really being taught in Business Ethics classes today. American companies such as Sun, Microsoft, Nortel are helping to limit the
freedoms of people around the world, even leading to executions. Here is a report by Amnesty
International."
Re:Wouldn't be the first time... (Score:3, Insightful)
A conspicuous example was the ferocious anti-Semite Henry Ford, who received the highest civilian medal from Adolph himself -- and saw no reason to reject it. Another prominient American medalist was aviation hero Charles Lindbergh. As with newly-Soviet Russia, a lot of people made very poor judgments, and others may have had more sinister motives. IBM -- and I have to read that book, too -- appears to have been a case of willful blindness.
This is all a good reminder of the moral indifference of technology itself. Like a gun, it can be put to purposes as varied as the imagination of the humans who use it.
Re:Wouldn't be the first time... (Score:3, Insightful)
In the 1930's, nobody knew the extent of what the Nazi regime was going to do -- including most of the Nazis. They were just one of many right-wing nationalist regimes.
If IBM was evil for selling typewriters and calculators to the Nazis, then you are evil for buying Arab oil, chinese consumer goods, or a korean car.
America throws stones? (Score:2, Insightful)
I am horrified by the tales of China's brutal use of capital punishment on crimes as nonviolent tax evasion, their well-documented corruption, and the brutal infliction of the penalty itself. A nice final touch is that the family is billed for the price of the bullet, the thought being they share culpability (and may well suffer repercussions regardless).
I'm also a patriot. And in the spirit of impartiality, remember that Amnesty International -- and the European Union -- condemns us, also, as one of the countrie practicing capital punishment, particularly on juveniles. I'm sure all these companies play a hand in that somehow.
Those are the legal aspects of our system; the practical ones include a disturbingly high error rate despite the greater integrity and defendant rights in our system. For example, after a dozen exonerations of death row inmates on the basis of innocence and not legalisms -- for reasons such as witnesses recanting, other persons confessing, and DNA evidence proving impossibility -- the state of Illinois placed a moritorium on executions until they could figure out what was going on. There are numerous examples.
The point of all this? Well, if we take issue with certain foreign practices, we may well be right to do so. But that same indignation should perhaps we applied at home. I offer no conclusions about capital punishment, but many questions.
Disclosure and digression -- I clerked for a Chicago federal appeals court for two years, and although I never worked directly on a capital case I saw the sorts of defects that occur in trial of "mere murderers" (I wrote up a judicial bribery case concerning a murder-for-hire). I also witnesses the unfolding of the incredible case of Rolondo Cruz, who went through three trials before several investigators and prosecutors were indicted for manufacturing evidence and other abuses(!). BTW, Scott Turow was one of the local attorneys who took up this particular cause, all the way to the Supreme Court as they say; he came and spoke about it and other corruption cases (he's a good attorney as well as writer).
But I digress. How about this truism: Technology like business is a double-edged sword, with no inherent moral authority.
Re:Business ethics have nothing to do with it (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Business ethics have nothing to do with it (Score:4, Insightful)
Let's extrapolate that to its logical extreme.
Let's say I offered to pay you $500,000 to shoot someone in the head, and you knew that if you didn't do it, I'd go to someone who you know doesn't really care about having blood on his/her hands and would do it if you wouldn't. Is it then okay to shoot our poor captive in the head?
How about if I were going to go shoot someone in the head, and asked you to sell me the gun. You know full well what my motive is. Would you really sell me the gun and ammo and defend yourself by saying that you had done nothing wrong, and were just engaging in commerce?
Blame capitalism all you want. Capitalism is just an ideal that has some shitty implications. If someone helps to bring them about, we blame the person, not the ideal. If a neo-nazi went around burning synagogues, we wouldn't say, "Oh, don't blame him, blame neo-nazism!" If I joined a cilque whose culture was such that the best way to gain respect is to spraypaint storefronts, I would still be to blame for spraypainting the storefronts if I did it.
Sorry, I don't think your ethics reasoning holds water, either.
..don't worry (Score:5, Insightful)
Humans don't change, they use every bit (and byte) of available technology to oppress people, to be predators, this is the nature of governments made up of at the top clinically insane megalomaniacs, similar to the international profits at any cost konzern heads. No matter how much these governments and the corporate cartel sponsors start out as a "deal" for the people, they always de-evolve into heinous dictatorships. The time line is the only variable, but the outcome never varies, that be carveth in stone. Whether the slogan is "hail caesar!" or "sieg heil!" or "let's roll!" or "power to the people!", or "allah akubar!" or "viva la revolucion!" or whatever, it always turns into a dictatorship.
One of the first clues is government controlling the media and your access to it, and pushing their propoganda media efforts at you. This is called the "big lie", just keep saying it over and over again, eventually the bulk of the people believe it, because it's easier than finding out what's really going on. The second clue is not allowing citizens to be adequately armed. The third clue is massive government sponsored demonization of citizens outside their nation and inside, a de-humanizing effort to reduce some humans to less than human status. Currently in china you might belong to the "evil cult", in the US you might be called a "racist" for wanting the borders controlled, in europe you might be called a"nazi" if you really don't approve of massive socialistic command and control efforts, on and on. It never changes. In the past it was "he's a dirty injun" or "she's a filthy jew" or "they are just ragheads" or "they are guilty of crimes against the state", the all encompassing "terrorist" label that fits most situations.
When governments go down that path, expect the "disappeareds", executions, torture, kangaroo courts, death camps eventually, it just happens, some nations at different times than others but it always happens.
Blame the stockholders (Score:3, Insightful)
They're the ones who would cause the stock to fall when a competitor entered the market instead. And it's a BIG market.
There is no mystery about what is being taught in business ethics classes. Business ethics is first about due diligence and accountability to shareholders.
Every system, including capitalism, has shortcomings. Of course there is a much better system, but I don't think it's been invented yet.
Re:Wouldn't be the first time... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Business ethics have nothing to do with it (Score:3, Insightful)
When I say 'is it okay' and 'defend yourself', I mean in the moral sense.
Besides, in this particular case I think the arguments are equally valid (for different reasons) in both law and ethics.