this post was submitted on 30 Jun 2024
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If you work for FAANG you're morally bankrupt
But financially bussin'!
And also, it's actually a complicated question. A one-man boycott doesn't do anything. If you work at a FAANG, work for a better world when you're off, and go whistleblower when they do something really evil, I find no fault in that at all.
The other consideration is that pretty much every company you could work for as a software developer is going to try to take advantage of your work. Most companies are morally bad at best and morally terrible at worst. If you discourage any good person from working there, the problem will only snowball from there.
If working at FAANG gives you the resources to support things you're passionate about, and you're willing to stand up for your values when they do something bad, there isn't a problem with that IMO.
FAANG is just as exploitative if not more than the average in the industry.
My point wasn't that FAANG isn't exploitative (my bad if it came off that way, I didn't mean for that), it's that everywhere else is also exploitative to some degree (most probably less so than FAANG, there are definitely a few that are worse though), and that it could still be reasonable to work there for some people.
You can work in bioinformatics, the pay is lower than FAANG, but your code will benefit society.
Benefit society, or go to support a pharmaceutical company that will in some way benefit society in exchange for making a few people rich?
No ethical ~~consumption~~ working conditions under capitalism.
Bioinformatics isn't used only for medical research or within big companies. Sub-topics like metagenomics, that are helpful in many areas of research, require high level of technical knowledge, that the life science people don't have.
You could say the same about eating meat or any other cause. What's the difference, the animal is already dead anyway, right? Well, it's not that simple.
Thanks to the growing number of people who eat less or no meat at all, meat production is decreasing. If all of them kept saying that one man boycott makes no difference, the change would not come.
If you can't find a better job - fine, work for the evil FAANG or whatever. We live in capitalism and it's clear we need to work somewhere. But at least be honest and don't look away from inconvenient truth. There's still something good you could do while keeping the job at
$evil_company. For example, you can support financially those who haven't got nice jobs in IT.Yeah, I do worry someone will read the "work for a FAANG" part, and ignore the other two things listed. It's absolutely not enough to go "welp, I'm just a little cog following orders".
Maybe a one-man boycott is the wrong way to put it. Multi-person boycotts are obviously built from individual people. I guess my real point is that there's not a one-size-fits-all solution; you actually have to look at the world, look at how you want it to be, and figure out how you can help make that happen from your place in it.
I'm not ignoring the other two things listed, I'm realistic.
You described it like it was something rare for FAANG to do bad things. Or like it was bad only when it required whistleblowing... Think how many things got crushed by EEE tactics, and it's only one class of examples of why big tech is inherently bad.
I mean, a lot of companies do stuff like that, and yet you still need money to live. Just working there doesn't necessarily make it your fault; by that logic it would be a sin to work checkout at Walmart, because you'll have the same blood on your hands as the Waltons.
I don't really like talking about capitalism as if it's a well defined concept, but, no ethical consumption under.
I didn't mean you, FYI. I mean someone who does work for a FAANG and is looking for more justification to do nothing for the common good.
Giving up your morals for money is morally bankrupt
Agreed. Just working for somebody bad doesn't necessarily mean you've given up, though. I mean, they made a movie about Schindler, and we all know who he worked for.
Sure but an employee for FAANG and an undercover antifascist aren't really comparable
Why not? Unlike Schindler you don't have to worry about how many beatings are necessary to keep up appearances, and you might have a specific role that exposes you to very little evil at all. Meanwhile, you can donate some of that big wage to people like EFF, or volunteer using the flexible schedule.
You can do all those things while also not supporting FAANG. Schindler couldn't have done what he did if he wasnt part of the Nazi party.
Depends. If you can find another employer that's more ethical (which is not guaranteed just because they're smaller) and pays as much with as flexible a work schedule, yeah, you should probably do that. Otherwise it might indeed be necessary.
I don't know, are we doing concequentialist ethics here, or deontological? I feel like we've reached the level of splitting hairs where we need to decide. For the purpose of actual advice people reading might follow, I'd say just try and be a good person, and don't let perfect be the enemy of better.
Saying things aren't comparable is just shorthand for saying "I've stopped thinking or considering this".
Literally everything is comparable, especially an antifascist and the person they're covering as.
Thats not what was being compared so thats not relevant. You're being pedantic
*If you're in the US.
Some interns in the US make more than experienced engineers in Europe...
I was kind of assuming that, since FAANG are American, but I'd guess they probably have foreign employees as well.
Canadians make pretty much the same as Europeans, I think. The Americans have a bunch of monopolies, and are characteristically weird and nationalist about who they share the spoils with. (I know, it's not all of you guys, but it's definitely some)
they also pay 3000$/mo for a moldy apartment
Yeah, that's true. It amazes me how some of my team in NYC will make double what I make, but live like I lived when I was a student, and be amazed that I own a car.
And go bankrupt when something happens on the way to work because they slipped and fell on the ankle.
Thanks, but I'll take lower pay over financial bankruptcy.
I work at a FAANG company. I've also worked at startups and smaller national companies. They're all morally bankrupt, just in many different ways.
Hell, I've worked for "tech for good" clients that have done reprehensible things that required legal intervention...