Boycotts that have worked in the past have worked not because they made a material dent in profits but because they were public relations disasters and brought social and ultimately legal attention to the behaviour that was being resisted.
Firstly, I’m not sure if that’s true. But assuming it is for argument, then clearly what would be called “idealist liberal moralizing” has actually worked historically. More so than first-world “I can do anything I want because I’ve labelled myself proletarian, it’s every other class who’s morally compromised.” Which is why you people switch from “morality doesn’t exist” to “it’s immoral to make ‘1st world workers’ (actually you) not eat slave chocolate.”
And you’ll say, actually socialism is more effective at improving working conditions than boycotts, but it’ll be based on a bad implication that boycotts hinder the advancement of socialism and can’t be done at the same time.
But assuming it is for argument, then clearly what would be called “idealist liberal moralizing” has actually worked historically.
This is sophistry. What has worked is organizing around a moral cause, expressing one’s own moral convictions, and inviting others to join them. This is fundamentally different behavior than telling people they are bad/immoral people who are supporting the suffering of others (i.e. demonizing them).
More so than first-world “I can do anything I want because I’ve labelled myself proletarian, it’s every other class who’s morally compromised.”
False dichotomy / strawman that no one in this thread has actually put forth.
Which is why you people switch from “morality doesn’t exist” to “it’s immoral to make ‘1st world workers’ (actually you) not eat slave chocolate.”
Way to out yourself. No one proposed it was immoral to make 1st world workers not eat slave chocolate. In fact, that’s the only thing that would work short of revolutionary liberation - organize a group of people with shared moral conviction and get a reform in place to structurally prevent access to these products, either through law or through “voluntary” capital allocation, both of which require interest convergence.
And you’ll say, actually socialism is more effective at improving working conditions than boycotts, but it’ll be based on a bad implication that boycotts hinder the advancement of socialism and can’t be done at the same time.
How do you propose that we cause those interests to converge shy of convincing people to share those interests with us? A revolution is also a convergence of interests.
Capitalists respond to legitimate threats to profit. Organizing a loud boycott that demonstrates the ability to move a concentrated amount of people in a condensed timeline at numbers large enough to be noticed statistically creates interest convergence, because the capitalist interest of preserving profit becomes threatened if they continue to do the behavior that the boycotters are protesting.
Thia is reformism though, and there’s a major problem with reformism, which is that the boycotter boycotting chocolate candy due to child labor in the supply chain will only succeed in getting a specific candy bar company to choose to buy it’s cocoa from somewhere else. This will not end child labor, and in fact, since it reduces the demand for child labor on cacao, it reduces the price of using that child labor for something else. In fact, given that most of the thousand food brands are actually owned by only 8 companies, they’ll just shift the child labor pool to a different product line under the same company.
Thank you for the information, comrade! I’ll be sure to tell the next BDS organizer I see that boycotts are impossible by virtue of Zeno’s Paradox, which implies that we can add together any number of individual( action)s without ever arriving at a collective( action).
Firstly, I’m not sure if that’s true. But assuming it is for argument, then clearly what would be called “idealist liberal moralizing” has actually worked historically. More so than first-world “I can do anything I want because I’ve labelled myself proletarian, it’s every other class who’s morally compromised.” Which is why you people switch from “morality doesn’t exist” to “it’s immoral to make ‘1st world workers’ (actually you) not eat slave chocolate.”
And you’ll say, actually socialism is more effective at improving working conditions than boycotts, but it’ll be based on a bad implication that boycotts hinder the advancement of socialism and can’t be done at the same time.
This is sophistry. What has worked is organizing around a moral cause, expressing one’s own moral convictions, and inviting others to join them. This is fundamentally different behavior than telling people they are bad/immoral people who are supporting the suffering of others (i.e. demonizing them).
False dichotomy / strawman that no one in this thread has actually put forth.
Way to out yourself. No one proposed it was immoral to make 1st world workers not eat slave chocolate. In fact, that’s the only thing that would work short of revolutionary liberation - organize a group of people with shared moral conviction and get a reform in place to structurally prevent access to these products, either through law or through “voluntary” capital allocation, both of which require interest convergence.
You can stop othering me any time you want.
How do you propose that we cause those interests to converge shy of convincing people to share those interests with us? A revolution is also a convergence of interests.
Capitalists respond to legitimate threats to profit. Organizing a loud boycott that demonstrates the ability to move a concentrated amount of people in a condensed timeline at numbers large enough to be noticed statistically creates interest convergence, because the capitalist interest of preserving profit becomes threatened if they continue to do the behavior that the boycotters are protesting.
Thia is reformism though, and there’s a major problem with reformism, which is that the boycotter boycotting chocolate candy due to child labor in the supply chain will only succeed in getting a specific candy bar company to choose to buy it’s cocoa from somewhere else. This will not end child labor, and in fact, since it reduces the demand for child labor on cacao, it reduces the price of using that child labor for something else. In fact, given that most of the thousand food brands are actually owned by only 8 companies, they’ll just shift the child labor pool to a different product line under the same company.
Thank you for the information, comrade! I’ll be sure to tell the next BDS organizer I see that boycotts are impossible by virtue of Zeno’s Paradox, which implies that we can add together any number of individual( action)s without ever arriving at a collective( action).
You gotta stop trying to bait me. It’s cringe.
😆💚