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What still gets me is how people could justify this type of behavior. I suppose, it's not just one person, but a group (possibly large) that are complicit in al

What still gets me is how people could justify this type of behavior. I suppose, it's not just one person, but a group (possibly large) that are complicit in all of this. At the end of the day, Jim or Monica goes home and thinks "sure, I know this was an immoral course of action, but I'm glad we just got control of the narrative". We see these scenarios in movies all the time, but I just wonder how people could do these things in real life? Are people really that short sighted that they think it's ok to own the patent on genes for a plant created in nature just because the law says so? And then on top of that, they make some nasty chemicals that kill things other than their patented plant.. I'm not a dystopian acknowledger really, but wow, life is stranger than fiction sometimes. Anyway, I just don't understand how Monsanto could be seen by any rational person as a step forward in humanity's progress.. To me, they are a prime example of how humanity will self destruct at some point.

accountface 10y ago
I'm going to Godwin myself here, but it kind of echoes Hannah Arendt's 'Banality of Evil' — this summary from Wikipedia covers it a bit, but I recommend reading the actual text, especially in the context of today's political climate... for those who aren't familiar, Eichmann was a Nazi on trial in Israel who was defending his complicity as "following orders." "Arendt's book introduced the expression and concept "the banality of evil". Her thesis is that Eichmann was not a fanatic or sociopath, but an extremely average person who relied on clichéd defenses rather than thinking for himself and was motivated by professional promotion rather than ideology. Banality, in this sense, is not that Eichmann's actions were ordinary, or that there is a potential Eichmann in all of us, but that his actions were motivated by a sort of stupidity which was wholly unexceptional. She never denied that Eichmann was an anti-semite, nor that he was fully responsible for his actions, but argued that these characteristics were secondary to his stupidity."
- rosser 10y ago
  "Godwin"-ing is comparing your opponents in an internet argument to Hitler/Nazis, not relying on their historical example as an existence proof for how terribly our cognitive gaps can be exploited.
  - accountface 10y ago
    I'm comparing Monsanto to the Third Reich, so I considered it Godwinning (what an amazingly terrible phrase). Fair enough though, I don't disagree with you.
- enraged_camel 10y ago
  I could buy that regarding a regular company employee or even a mid-level manager. But there are a lot of corporate executives who do shitty, evil things and also happen to be quite cunning, if not brilliant. Those are the scary ones, because they know how to get away with their actions.
  - accountface 10y ago
    But at the end of the day a lot of low-level employees are the ones making this stuff happen — they're doing the gruntwork and ghostwriting this stuff. They might be shielded by some specific data that is direct top-down evil, but many people are complicit.
ashark 10y ago
When faced with the choice to harm themselves a great deal (i.e. losing their job, especially in such a way that might make it hard to find another) in order to probably accomplish nothing at all, or to contribute in a small way to evil, most people choose to go along with evil. The ones who don't we rarely hear about (there are exceptions, obviously) because... they didn't accomplish anything.
- fdupoo 10y ago
  There are cases of rebelious scientists who have lost their job in the FDA when rGBH was being 'evaluated' They have since then become activists. And that's really not a bad job. You can have a lower-middle class lifestyle as a consumer advocate. The movie 'the world according to monsanto' is a fine piece of journalism that goes into the stories of these fellas.
  - stagbeetle 10y ago
    > You can have a lower-middle class lifestyle as a consumer advocate. The same lower-middle class that's shrinking? I personally am afraid of joining the ranks of the lower class, especially if I end up as another rural overdose datum.
marze 10y ago
In general, a scaffolding of mental rationalizations is constructed. Happens a lot. And generally, it isn't completely black and white; in this case, roundup has benefits to humanity as well as risks and costs. Further down, we have PR firm controlled "sock puppets" discussed. Certainly a reality on the internet and HN. In my view, a sign that discussion of a given issue being influenced by a lot of PR dollars/industry propaganda is an excess of emotion. The emotion is a side effect of all the propaganda, as invoking strong emotions appears to be necessary to influence people using PR/propaganda techniques.
Kalium 10y ago
> Are people really that short sighted that they think it's ok to own the patent on genes for a plant created in nature just because the law says so? If it lets them feed, shelter, and educate their kids? I imagine you'll have limited difficulty finding someone OK with this.
Joeri 10y ago
> What still gets me is how people could justify this type of behavior. To quote Upton Sinclair, it is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it. Companies like these are run by psychopaths who want nothing but money and power, and their employee base is self-selecting for the quality of being cowed into complacency.

accountface 10y ago

I'm going to Godwin myself here, but it kind of echoes Hannah Arendt's 'Banality of Evil' — this summary from Wikipedia covers it a bit, but I recommend reading the actual text, especially in the context of today's political climate... for those who aren't familiar, Eichmann was a Nazi on trial in Israel who was defending his complicity as "following orders." "Arendt's book introduced the expression and concept "the banality of evil". Her thesis is that Eichmann was not a fanatic or sociopath, but an extremely average person who relied on clichéd defenses rather than thinking for himself and was motivated by professional promotion rather than ideology. Banality, in this sense, is not that Eichmann's actions were ordinary, or that there is a potential Eichmann in all of us, but that his actions were motivated by a sort of stupidity which was wholly unexceptional. She never denied that Eichmann was an anti-semite, nor that he was fully responsible for his actions, but argued that these characteristics were secondary to his stupidity."

rosser 10y ago
"Godwin"-ing is comparing your opponents in an internet argument to Hitler/Nazis, not relying on their historical example as an existence proof for how terribly our cognitive gaps can be exploited.
- accountface 10y ago
  I'm comparing Monsanto to the Third Reich, so I considered it Godwinning (what an amazingly terrible phrase). Fair enough though, I don't disagree with you.
enraged_camel 10y ago
I could buy that regarding a regular company employee or even a mid-level manager. But there are a lot of corporate executives who do shitty, evil things and also happen to be quite cunning, if not brilliant. Those are the scary ones, because they know how to get away with their actions.
- accountface 10y ago
  But at the end of the day a lot of low-level employees are the ones making this stuff happen — they're doing the gruntwork and ghostwriting this stuff. They might be shielded by some specific data that is direct top-down evil, but many people are complicit.

ashark 10y ago

When faced with the choice to harm themselves a great deal (i.e. losing their job, especially in such a way that might make it hard to find another) in order to probably accomplish nothing at all, or to contribute in a small way to evil, most people choose to go along with evil. The ones who don't we rarely hear about (there are exceptions, obviously) because... they didn't accomplish anything.

fdupoo 10y ago
There are cases of rebelious scientists who have lost their job in the FDA when rGBH was being 'evaluated' They have since then become activists. And that's really not a bad job. You can have a lower-middle class lifestyle as a consumer advocate. The movie 'the world according to monsanto' is a fine piece of journalism that goes into the stories of these fellas.
- stagbeetle 10y ago
  > You can have a lower-middle class lifestyle as a consumer advocate. The same lower-middle class that's shrinking? I personally am afraid of joining the ranks of the lower class, especially if I end up as another rural overdose datum.

marze 10y ago

In general, a scaffolding of mental rationalizations is constructed. Happens a lot. And generally, it isn't completely black and white; in this case, roundup has benefits to humanity as well as risks and costs. Further down, we have PR firm controlled "sock puppets" discussed. Certainly a reality on the internet and HN. In my view, a sign that discussion of a given issue being influenced by a lot of PR dollars/industry propaganda is an excess of emotion. The emotion is a side effect of all the propaganda, as invoking strong emotions appears to be necessary to influence people using PR/propaganda techniques.

Kalium 10y ago

> Are people really that short sighted that they think it's ok to own the patent on genes for a plant created in nature just because the law says so? If it lets them feed, shelter, and educate their kids? I imagine you'll have limited difficulty finding someone OK with this.

Joeri 10y ago

> What still gets me is how people could justify this type of behavior. To quote Upton Sinclair, it is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it. Companies like these are run by psychopaths who want nothing but money and power, and their employee base is self-selecting for the quality of being cowed into complacency.