Comment by iJohnDoe
3 days ago
Very true. This is why Hitler was surrounded by so many people. They went where the power was. Even if it’s not “who he is”, it is who he became.
The nazis were prosecuted decades later. Tim Cook’s actions shouldn’t be magically forgotten once Trump is out of office.
This pattern has historical precedent. Adolf Hitler’s inner circle included people like Albert Speer, a trained architect who was not an early ideologue but aligned himself with power as the regime consolidated control. Speer benefited professionally, became Minister of Armaments, and later claimed political detachment. These claims were rejected at Nuremberg, where he was convicted for his role in the Nazi state.
The fact that alignment can be opportunistic rather than ideological did not absolve responsibility then, and it should not automatically do so now. Accountability is not erased simply because a political era ends.
There's a big difference between being a party member actually in a government position (war related, no less), and being a businessman surviving under that regime. You're not only making an absurd comparison, you're calling for punishment for somebody who hasn't even remotely broken any laws. Can't you see you're being authoritarian?
Law and morality are not the same thing. The apologism for Apple on HN is comically and selectively gymnastics. I think the biggest shame here is the brand identity for a corporation that many of you have self deluded into adopting. Even now the voices that tell you to stop bootlicking them and warning against them get shouted down.
That may be true, but if you think your definition of morality is correct and anybody who thinks otherwise needs to be punished, then no wonder you've ended up with an authoritarian who's beaten you at your own game.
It's also got nothing to do with Apple fanboyism. The same is true for all corporations in the US.
Somehow I doubt Tim Cook would have trouble surviving if he did not choose to bend the knee.
He might be lynched by his shareholders :)
> Even if it’s not “who he is”
We are what we do.