6 ms·

> “I realize that there’s a population of people who just refuse to use anything associated with Musk because politics have eaten our brains” People have value

by tene80i 25d ago

> “I realize that there’s a population of people who just refuse to use anything associated with Musk because politics have eaten our brains” People have values. Many people strongly disapprove of Musk’s actions. Many don’t - fine! Personal choice. But for people who do, refusing to support him commercially is hardly brain-eaten territory. There’s plenty of competition, and competition isn’t the only value at play.

timr 25d ago
Yeah, OK. You’re making excuses for letting politics eat your life. Enjoy yourself, I guess. Setting aside the actual legitimacy of whatever complaints you have about Musk, you aren’t “supporting” him by using Grok, any more than you’re “supporting Xi Jinping” by using DeepSeek, or “supporting Jeff Bezos” by using Amazon, or “supporting the CEO of Exxon” by using energy. Or “supporting” any of a million other people you probably don’t like simply by existing in the world as a consumer. What you’re actually doing is called spitting in the wind. Major conglomerate providers of commodities are not controlled, or even operated to the benefit of, any single person. Musk is the operating officer of a corporation of many thousands of individuals. He has shares in that company, but so do millions of other people. It would be far more rational if you could point to some specific “evil” thing SpaceX is doing as a company that you oppose, but you can’t even do that. It’s all gotta be about one guy who you don’t like.
- apsurd 25d ago
  It can be ineffective to act based on principle but ineffective isn’t the same thing as meaningless.
- phist_mcgee 25d ago
  You're forgetting the part where he is a near majority shareholder in spacex, so half of the profit made on your dollar spend winds up benefiting him personally.
  - timr 25d ago
    > so half of the profit made on your dollar spend winds up benefiting him personally No, it doesn't. Aside from the face-slappingly obvious fact that SpaceX is losing a half a billion dollars a quarter, that's not how corporate revenue works. Unless the corporate profits are paid out in dividends, you don't just get to hoover them up as a shareholder.
    - apsurd 25d ago
      akshully it does work like that. it sounds like you’re arm-chairing macro economics so ill try my hand too. No one said anything about dollar-in revenue dollar-out dividend. only you. if i have vested interest in a company and that company’s value is perceived to increase then i get to leverage that value into economic power. yes
- hombre_fatal 25d ago
  You say it's "letting politics eat your life" yet we're talking about alternative services that are all very similar. Clicking a different website's checkout button is to consciously decide who benefits from your decisions. I think that's how you should live -- pick the oat milk too. There are other reasons to not use Elon Musk's AI beyond politics, though this month he's investing $200 million to sway the Texas midterms back to an awful politician, far closer to home than what Xi Jinping might be doing. It wasn't long ago that Elon tried to bias Grok to not say bad things about him to the point that Grok would say that Elon was the best piss-drinker in the world and that Elon was in the top three of every category (basketball, mathematics, physics, etc). https://newrepublic.com/post/203519/elon-musk-ai-chatbot-grok-praise-pee-blowjobs https://newrepublic.com/post/203519/elon-musk-ai-chatbot-gro... If I have to tie-break between competing AI services, I'm hella not choosing that one.
  - timr 25d ago
    > yet we're talking about alternative services that are all very similar. Yes, that's what "commodity" means, and why I used the word. > There are other reasons to not use Elon Musk's AI beyond politics, though this month he's investing $200 million to sway the Texas midterms back to an awful politician, far closer to home than what Xi Jinping might be doing. It's amusing that you can't even help yourself from mentioning politics when you're trying to deny that it disproportionately impacts your thinking. Literally, "there are other reasons to not use it...but I'll spend the rest of my comment listing a bunch of reasons I don't like Elon." I've heard all of it before. I'm telling you that it doesn't sway me, any more than telling me I should stop buying things at WalMart, use energy, or any of a million other things I do on a daily basis that probably, very likely, in some direct or indirect way, benefit someone I don't like. You do you, but if I eliminated every product or service that was associated with a "bad person", I'd be living in a cave in the wilderness, crapping in a hole and eating berries. I'm just eliminating one less than you are.
    - hombre_fatal 25d ago
      You put more heart and emotion into your comments here than I spent picking a non-Grok AI service.
- leptons 25d ago
  Thanks for reminding us what it looks like to lack a moral compass.
  - deleted 25d ago
    [deleted]
- tene80i 25d ago
  I imagine we’re not as far apart as you might think. Leave Musk to one side for a second. Is there no one, even hypothetically, whose actions would make you turn away from their company’s products and services? Even if it has no effect on the overall viability of their business? A local restaurant where you know the owner is a bully to his staff? A tradesman who was unbelievably rude to your friend? A newspaper whose owner personally made sure they trashed the reputation of your business? A wedding photographer who proudly refuses to work for couples who had children out of wedlock? Surely your devotion to the principle of competition doesn’t override all your other beliefs?

by tene80i 25d ago

timr 25d ago

Yeah, OK. You’re making excuses for letting politics eat your life. Enjoy yourself, I guess. Setting aside the actual legitimacy of whatever complaints you have about Musk, you aren’t “supporting” him by using Grok, any more than you’re “supporting Xi Jinping” by using DeepSeek, or “supporting Jeff Bezos” by using Amazon, or “supporting the CEO of Exxon” by using energy. Or “supporting” any of a million other people you probably don’t like simply by existing in the world as a consumer. What you’re actually doing is called spitting in the wind. Major conglomerate providers of commodities are not controlled, or even operated to the benefit of, any single person. Musk is the operating officer of a corporation of many thousands of individuals. He has shares in that company, but so do millions of other people. It would be far more rational if you could point to some specific “evil” thing SpaceX is doing as a company that you oppose, but you can’t even do that. It’s all gotta be about one guy who you don’t like.

apsurd 25d ago
It can be ineffective to act based on principle but ineffective isn’t the same thing as meaningless.
phist_mcgee 25d ago
You're forgetting the part where he is a near majority shareholder in spacex, so half of the profit made on your dollar spend winds up benefiting him personally.
- timr 25d ago
  > so half of the profit made on your dollar spend winds up benefiting him personally No, it doesn't. Aside from the face-slappingly obvious fact that SpaceX is losing a half a billion dollars a quarter, that's not how corporate revenue works. Unless the corporate profits are paid out in dividends, you don't just get to hoover them up as a shareholder.
  - apsurd 25d ago
    akshully it does work like that. it sounds like you’re arm-chairing macro economics so ill try my hand too. No one said anything about dollar-in revenue dollar-out dividend. only you. if i have vested interest in a company and that company’s value is perceived to increase then i get to leverage that value into economic power. yes
hombre_fatal 25d ago
You say it's "letting politics eat your life" yet we're talking about alternative services that are all very similar. Clicking a different website's checkout button is to consciously decide who benefits from your decisions. I think that's how you should live -- pick the oat milk too. There are other reasons to not use Elon Musk's AI beyond politics, though this month he's investing $200 million to sway the Texas midterms back to an awful politician, far closer to home than what Xi Jinping might be doing. It wasn't long ago that Elon tried to bias Grok to not say bad things about him to the point that Grok would say that Elon was the best piss-drinker in the world and that Elon was in the top three of every category (basketball, mathematics, physics, etc). https://newrepublic.com/post/203519/elon-musk-ai-chatbot-grok-praise-pee-blowjobs https://newrepublic.com/post/203519/elon-musk-ai-chatbot-gro... If I have to tie-break between competing AI services, I'm hella not choosing that one.
- timr 25d ago
  > yet we're talking about alternative services that are all very similar. Yes, that's what "commodity" means, and why I used the word. > There are other reasons to not use Elon Musk's AI beyond politics, though this month he's investing $200 million to sway the Texas midterms back to an awful politician, far closer to home than what Xi Jinping might be doing. It's amusing that you can't even help yourself from mentioning politics when you're trying to deny that it disproportionately impacts your thinking. Literally, "there are other reasons to not use it...but I'll spend the rest of my comment listing a bunch of reasons I don't like Elon." I've heard all of it before. I'm telling you that it doesn't sway me, any more than telling me I should stop buying things at WalMart, use energy, or any of a million other things I do on a daily basis that probably, very likely, in some direct or indirect way, benefit someone I don't like. You do you, but if I eliminated every product or service that was associated with a "bad person", I'd be living in a cave in the wilderness, crapping in a hole and eating berries. I'm just eliminating one less than you are.
  - hombre_fatal 25d ago
    You put more heart and emotion into your comments here than I spent picking a non-Grok AI service.
leptons 25d ago
Thanks for reminding us what it looks like to lack a moral compass.
- deleted 25d ago
  [deleted]
tene80i 25d ago
I imagine we’re not as far apart as you might think. Leave Musk to one side for a second. Is there no one, even hypothetically, whose actions would make you turn away from their company’s products and services? Even if it has no effect on the overall viability of their business? A local restaurant where you know the owner is a bully to his staff? A tradesman who was unbelievably rude to your friend? A newspaper whose owner personally made sure they trashed the reputation of your business? A wedding photographer who proudly refuses to work for couples who had children out of wedlock? Surely your devotion to the principle of competition doesn’t override all your other beliefs?