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upside-down thinking: the law is not for entrepreneurs (news.ycombinator.com)

submitted 1 year ago by corbin@awful.systems to c/techtakes@awful.systems

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A well-respected pirate, neighbor, and Lisper is also a chud. Welcome to HN, the Nazi Bar where everybody's also an expert in technology.

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[–] fasterandworse@awful.systems 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It’s good to obey the law. I certainly try. But treating it as some kind of holy grail of ethics is fraught with peril. You’re outsourcing your thinking to the lowest common denominator: it’s what people in positions of power feel is justice. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it isn’t. And when it isn’t, do you really want to be the kind of person that believes it should be obeyed no matter the tradeoffs?

Kinda sad to hear a person say something like this.

I grew up in the western suburbs of Sydney and this reminds me of the typical bogan attitude that drink driving is only bad if you get caught. This is no different.

[–] fasterandworse@awful.systems 9 points 1 year ago

Sometimes it is. Sometimes it isn’t. And when it isn’t, do you really want to be the kind of person that believes it should be obeyed no matter the tradeoffs?

I'm not about obeying blindly but when it doesn't feel like "justice" it doesn't mean it isn't. These people want to sound smart, seem smart, and believe they are smart, but they are allergic to learning to understand.

[–] bobtreehugger@awful.systems 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That line stuck out to me as well -- the law isn't some holy Grail of ethics, it's literally the bare minimum.

[–] insurgenRat 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

what?

I think that guy is an idiot because stuff like airbnb is so demonstrably bad it's had to be banned in places to help house people but the law doesn't seem related to ethics except accidentally to me?

Sometimes the law if aligned with ethics, e.g. don't kill people cause you get mad at them in traffic. Sometimes it's monsterous e.g. put peoples struggling with addiction in cages, force abused women back to their husbands, follow this racist order etc.

I don't think it's wrong to say we should be careful about what laws we follow.

[–] fasterandworse@awful.systems 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You properly explain how laws can be actually horrendous. Unfortunately the person in the HN post didn’t because they want to justify their breaking of copyright law to level the playing field of breaking copyright law.

Anyway this tweet was relevant. (Sorry, direct link because nitter seems to be dead and archive.org failed to archive it)

https://x.com/iwriteok/status/1692702405111292205

[–] insurgenRat 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm sorry, potentially I'm a moron but I don't understand what you said/the post formerly known as a tweet

[–] fasterandworse@awful.systems 4 points 1 year ago

It was just a tweet I saw while writing that seemed relevant to the subject. Don’t read too much into it. I have a short attention span.