- cross-posted to:
- noncredibledefense@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- noncredibledefense@lemmy.world
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Dan the company man felt loyalty to the corp After 16 years of service and a family to support He actually started to believe the weaponry and chemicals were for national defence 'Cause Danny had a mortgage and a boss to answer to The guilty don’t feel guilty, they learn not to.
(The Irrationality of Rationality by NOFX).
Fuck the military complex of this species. I’m gonna build my own aerospace company, mine the asteroid belt, and build my own human habitat. With black jack… And hookers… And universal healthcare…
If you can get a job for LM, you can get a job somewhere else. If a bit more money persuades you to help build child pulverizing machines, you never had any ethics to begin with.
The four horsemen of selling out:
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Big Pharma
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Big Oil
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The military-industrial complex
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Surveillance tech companies
What about open source jobs and funding? Since it seems like most of them come from either FAANG or government unless my research is wrong.
Was just having a conversation about the phrase “selling out”. Seems you don’t hear it used much anymore. I reckon that’s because the concept is seen as more of a life skill now than some despicable practice. But I feel sure it would be argued I’m just jealous of those sweet living wages.
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Someone has to learn the government secrets so they can spill it to the revolutionaries later when they become disillusioned so they can build their own weapons.
Or you know, on that tank? Game, where a bunch of specs have been disclosed.
Tankie
How? How is that person a tankie by posting this meme?
mabye shared username with .ml account
in ghat case probably. yes
*that
It could be worse like the insurance industry. It’s bad that we need tools of war, but it is not like raping you and your doctor for your health care while making the CEO and investors rich.
“it could be worse” the majority of the world would disagree the healthcare system is bad for America but your military corporation are bad for the planet. Israels little dog will supply them with all they need to bomb the middle east and have killed hundreds of thousands already. I promise you every genocide and massacre nowadays America is often complicit in
Wait, will it make my body look that fit?
After I left Boeing, I made a pledge to never work for or belong to any groups that create weapons. Thankfully the X-32 failed and I got out when I did.
It’s not like China is going to stop making weapons if I refuse to make weapons.
“It’s not like drug addictd will stop taking drugs if I quit heroin.”
My parents said the same thing about air pollution and carbon emissions
I suppose the difference is that a country doesn’t just get conquered by force if it stops polluting.
Even if the US suddenly lost all its fighter jets, naval force, missiles and bombs. How likely would an invasion be in the next 10 to 50 years?
It is quite a big country with a big population, with a practically uninhabited and difficult to cross country in the north, and a poor drug war ridden country with significant amount of jungle in the south. To the west and east are oceans with some thousands of kilometres until the next sizable and properly inhabitated landmass.
So purely in geographics terms, invading and conquering the US is a huge pain.
Now add to it all the issues of the US dominance in global trade and the ramifications such an invasion would have.
The US doesnt need that army or MIC for defense. It is offense focused and it needs to keep murdering people all over the world to keep its wheels turning.
I don’t disagree with you, especially in the short term, but Noah Smith (economist at https://www.noahpinion.blog/) does have some eye-opening opinions on the industrial might of China, and what that could mean for USA influence if China wanted to push things. (All this assumes no one uses nukes, of course.)
I’m going from memory, so errors are probably mine, not Mr. Smith’s. But, basically, wrt manufacturing, China is already where the USA was during / near the end of WWII. Even if we had the tech and raw materials, the USA would not be able to up with China’s factories if it came to war. They could basically just keep throwing drones and bombs at the USA until we literally ran out of anything to defend ourselves with, much less fight back with. Even if much of the rest of the world’s factories were on our side.
CHIPS act is one way the Biden admin was trying to restart strategic manufacturing in the USA. We’ll see how that goes.
Almost all pollution is by industries and not your parents, so…
If anything you could criticize them if they voted to keep the pollution going.
Buying a big SUV, shopping at h&m, eating red meat multiple times a week, and flying to the other side of the world during summer, are all worse than voting for climate change. Companies don’t pollute for the sake of it.
Check out the EPA’s stats on ghg emissions at this LINK. 28% of emissions total are from non-agriculture/shipping transportation, and if you break that down then 57% of the 28% are light duty vehicles, all larger road vehicles are 23%, and aircraft are 9%.
Since 2005 emissions carbon-equivalent total of the USA has fallen about a billion metric tons thanks to awareness and federal programs to reduce and eliminate emissions, almost exclusively in the Electrical Power sector.
So even if you cut out all consumer non-business transport you’re left with 72% of emissions. A person who votes to curttail polution does more good than a person who drives a hybrid.
Hybrids don’t reduce CO2 emissions that much anyway. Better to go all electric and vote for climate protection.
yeah this is a really stupid argument
“It’s not like Israël is gonna stop killing Palestinians if I refuse to kill Palestinians”
I mean
That’s true tho, pretty much nobody else murders Palestiniains but Israel still does.
Change on all of these scales has to come from societies around the world, not from individuals.
pretty much nobody else murders Palestiniains but Israel still does.
https://afsc.org/gaza-genocide-companies
Shortly after Oct. 7, the U.S. government started transferring massive amounts of weapons to Israel. By Dec. 25, Israel received more than 10,000 tons of weapons in 244 cargo planes and 20 ships from the U.S. These transfers included more than 15,000 bombs and 50,000 artillery shells within just the first month and a half. These transfers have been deliberately shrouded in secrecy to avoid public scrutiny and prevent Congress from exercising any meaningful oversight. Between October and the beginning of March, the U.S. approved more than 100 military sales to Israel, but publicly disclosed only two sales. A list of known U.S. arms transfers is maintained by the Forum on the Arms Trade.
Much of these weapons were purchased using U.S. taxpayers’ money through the Foreign Military Sales program, while some were direct commercial sales purchased through Israel’s own budget. An undisclosed amount of weapons was also transferred from U.S. military stockpiles already stored in Israel, known as War Reserves Stock Allies-Israel (WRSA-I). The use of WRSA-I to provide Israel with weapons serves to further obfuscate the full picture of U.S. arms transfers, as there is no public record of these stockpiles’ inventory.
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This is a form of corporate welfare not only for the largest weapons manufacturers, like Lockheed Martin, RTX, Boeing, and General Dynamics, which have seen their stock prices skyrocket, but also for companies that are not typically seen as part of the weapons industry, such as Caterpillar, Ford, and Toyota (see below).
I’m not saying the US government and US citizens aren’t contributing, but almost nobody, and I did specify that earlier, is going to get out of their chair, fly to Israel, and pull the trigger. At the end of the day, Israelis are the ones killing people no matter where the weapons come from. Whether or not each individual american decides to fly to palestine to commit a war crime doesn’t have any impact on the war crimes being committed: votes do.
almost nobody, and I did specify that earlier, is going to get out of their chair, fly to Israel, and pull the trigger
Why would you need to fly to Israel when you can pilot a drone bomber from Langley?
The USA has admitted to using their own surveillance drones over Gaza, do you have a source on the USA troops or remotely operated equipment firing into Gaza?
yes but I’m saying that doesn’t mean you should just start killing Palestinians as well
“I can’t force the world to behave as I would like it, so I may as well not have morals”
You know, every country has an army. Either their own, or another country’s…
Ask the dead about honour
Doesn’t make you any less responsible when the fruits of your labor are used to murder civilians.
What if I have only ever worked constructively on anti-missile defense systems?
A THAAD still could potentially be used for offense even though they don’t use any warheads.
A better argument could be early warning systems, or even their space division where they may have NASA or ESA contracts. Products closer to scientific research, like the Osiris, crew capsules, or the lunar rover they are supposedly teamed up with GM to design.
That’s a harder question to answer and depends more on your own moral compass. Do you believe that having better defensive capabilities empowers the users of your creation to feel safe enough to do evil things? I certainly don’t think you could absolve the makers of anti-missile systems who supply militaries that are committing genocide.
Such as if Trump would start to send anti-missile systems to Russia.
I wonder how many arms companies aren’t involved with Israel.
Potentially the prosthetic arm companies
When you realize they actually have an adverse incentive to support indiscriminate bombardment…
If we don’t build the bombs dropped on Gaza, China will.
Israel builds weapons so they could do it themselves
https://afsc.org/gaza-genocide-companies
Between October and the beginning of March, the U.S. approved more than 100 military sales to Israel, but publicly disclosed only two sales. A list of known U.S. arms transfers is maintained by the Forum on the Arms Trade.
Much of these weapons were purchased using U.S. taxpayers’ money through the Foreign Military Sales program, while some were direct commercial sales purchased through Israel’s own budget. An undisclosed amount of weapons was also transferred from U.S. military stockpiles already stored in Israel, known as War Reserves Stock Allies-Israel (WRSA-I). The use of WRSA-I to provide Israel with weapons serves to further obfuscate the full picture of U.S. arms transfers, as there is no public record of these stockpiles’ inventory.
…
This is a form of corporate welfare not only for the largest weapons manufacturers, like Lockheed Martin, RTX, Boeing, and General Dynamics, which have seen their stock prices skyrocket, but also for companies that are not typically seen as part of the weapons industry, such as Caterpillar, Ford, and Toyota (see below).
Every corp you work at has a dark side. Maybe not Lockheed Martin level of destruction.
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My current job, we build systems to get people to spend more for things they don’t need.
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My last job, we provided technology to “free speech” folks and looked the other way unless legally obligated to take it down
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The nonprofit i worked for spent 80% of their time and energy just for funding. Like $2mil a year, and 1.6mil went to paying staff.
Sometimes jobs frame it to look like it’s a positive.
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I worked at one company that “gave opportunities” to offshore engineers because they were a fraction the cost of Americans.
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Another company outsourced our graphic design to people on Fiverr to help fund “freelancers”, and then repurpose the work for million dollar ad campaigns.
And for me, I just constantly think of what the line is and how much of it I can cross to feed my kids.
Very rational take. You learn entering the world that every company has a dark side, and every person has a line, but that line shifts.
Personally I’d avoid Lockheed, but when it comes to paying the mortgage, the bank is surprisingly not very amenable to me not having a job. I’d love to avoid working at any bad company, but I’d probably have to sell my house and live out of a studio, and my family would suffer for it.
So I give some graces. For example, people shame folks who work at amazon, but Amazon pays the bills. What I personally have changed to is judging people for being gung ho about a company, happy with what the company is doing, or are they just there as a job. If you’re in accounting and you just loooove working for Amazon and think they do no wrong, then yes I judge a lot
Thank you for this incredibly rational take.
What I personally have changed to is judging people for being gung ho about a company, happy with what the company is doing, or are they just there as a job. If you’re in accounting and you just loooove working for Amazon and think they do no wrong, then yes I judge a lot
This. I’ll usually get along fine with my fellow working class folks in the trenches wherever I end up, and I’ll make friends with the cool managers even if they’re managers.
Few people are excited to be forced into a corrupt and awful system to justify their existence.
But more often than not, they’re the True Believers™ that are so utterly brain-warped into thinking some job actually cares about them, and make it part of their identity to “represent the brand”. I give these simps a wiiiide berth.
When it’s a grunt employee with that mindset, it’s even more pathetic.
I work in healthcare IT, we develop medical systems which help physicians to help people. It sounds like a good field to work in, but it’s still about money in the end, looking for ways to maximise profits, because we live in a capitalist system. As long as profits play the main role, there always is a dark side.
Absolutely. There’s a line between “willfully sold out to Evil Corp because money good and I like money lol”, and “I need a job because eating is nice and they were hiring.”
The original post about Lockheed makes sense, but someone’s gotta be on an extremely privileged self-righteous high horse to shout “Baby killer!” at like, the dude working the lobby desk. Lol
Yup. “Capitalism values only what it can count, and it can only count dollars. Every capitalist wants to invest as little and profit as much as possible.”
Sometimes you find maybe a startup that is for-purpose. So, not necessarily nonprofit, but exists to do something with a predominantly positive impact.
We have so few years here on earth that it feels good to do something that at least is not making any problems worse.
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I never would. And never have.
Everybody has their price.
That’s actually just something people who sell out their morals say to make themselves feel better. There are absolutely people who don’t have a price. It’s not particularly many and society and those in power are generally able to deal with them in other ways, but there are in fact people who stick to their lines in regards to money.
No they don’t.
I could earn double my low salary, as a software developer, working for say a gambling company, but I’d rather make less and not propagate misery from predatory industries.
Bang on. Right there with you.
I’m working on becoming a game developer but I live in a place chock full of casinos, so looking up “games company” on a map is very disappointing here.
They can sure pay well sometimes, though. The temptation is real. But I really couldn’t have any sort of passion for even sweeping their floors, much less constructing flashier products that merely serve to more-efficiently short circuit people’s rational thinking into emptying their wallets.
I think the loud secret is that these “games” thrive on desperation en masse, rather than the comparatively few wealthy and “responsible gamblers.”
I don’t judge the plenty of good folks who make a living doing it because they need to make a living, but I’d rather struggle more towards something I can believe in that doesn’t compromise my soul or contribute to ruining anybody’s life.
Now if only high moral standards could pay the bills…
Oh well, I’ll just keep remembering Matthew 6:26 :)
Bullshit. I prefer being able to sleep at night over being rich.
It’s not about what they could give you, it’s about what they could take away.
I’d make way more money in defense. I’ve actively avoided it in my career. I spent one summer at LM as an intern. Never went back.
Some of us don’t have our souls up for sale and never will.
What if the corpos threaten to unalive your family?
You’re an edgelord? That’s a pre-existing condition.
Do you think corpos wouldn’t unalive people to increase their profits?
This is Lemmy, you can say “kill” here
Looking at how badly I am getting down voted, I am afraid to say anything too controversial. I have probably been reported several times for being correct.
Sure, my price is making enough money on my first day there to solve world hunger.
My sib has a friend that constantly criticizes others b/c they marginally contribute to injustices in the world (one example is how a family friend votes that specifically puts others at a disadvantage for affordable housing, making them commute for hours on end). That friend also worked with Purdue Pharmaceuticals defense team during their lawsuit lol
It’s crazy to me how so many ppl can be so oblivious to their own hypocrisies.
I think this is a big stumbling block with Lefties we need to get over, especially young and eager ones.
People want so badly to belong, but there’s so much of a culture of purity-testing and pre-judgement that they’re terrified of being eaten by their own for doing any wrong whatsoever.
I appreciate trying to minimize harmful impact and maximize helpful impact, but people get so hostile because someone like, buys anything, or has a job. Get over yourselves, kids.
Well someone has be on the defense
Who has the least ethical job at Lockheed?
My money is on the salesman, “this bad boy can kill so many children”
By shifting what you sell to “this bad boy can disperse your targeted package across an area x by y in z time frame” instead of “we can turn the entire school to rubble” you help them sleep at night.
Consider for instance some comfortable English professor defending Russian totalitarianism. He cannot say outright, ‘I believe in killing off your opponents when you can get good results by doing so’. Probably, therefore, he will say something like this:
‘While freely conceding that the Soviet regime exhibits certain features which the humanitarian may be inclined to deplore, we must, I think, agree that a certain curtailment of the right to political opposition is an unavoidable concomitant of transitional periods, and that the rigors which the Russian people have been called upon to undergo have been amply justified in the sphere of concrete achievement.’
- George Orwell
Boy Boy has a video where they sneak into a military weapons convention.
One guy was selling crowd control armor and advertised the dissociation from your actions that armor like that creates, divorcing you from guilt.
Found the vid + timecode
CEO because he likely gets paid mostly in shares, and it’s really shareholders (not employees) who have the most choice in the matter.
Does their workforce in D.C count?
Selling out being an option for people just means the system is working as intended. People are so poor they are willing to compromise their morals to keep food on the table
Exactly. The desperation is a workforce supply assurance feature, not a failing of the system as designed.
