Are comapnies inherently evil, or is the consumer pushing them towards that?

[busydude]

An anecdote:

"Please find enclosed one pair of your overalls which I am sending you that the head of your fabric department may determine what is wrong. I purchased these from the Brayton Commercial Co of Wickenburg, Arizona, in the early part of 1917 and I have worn them every day except Sunday since that time and for some reason which I wish you would explain they have gone to pieces. I have worn nothing but Levi Strauss overalls for the past 30 years and this pair has not given me the service that I have got from some of your overalls in the past. I know that it is your aim to present a superior article on the market and consider it my duty to help you in any way I can. Please consider this and let me know if the fault is mine."

Do these kinds of people exist anymore? All I see/hear about is people bitching and moaning, they don't have any patience and even a slightest mistake will risk the future of the company.

I know I am guilty of that too, but once in a while I stop and think how wrong I was. People do not own up to their mistakes.. and try their fullest to put the blame on others.

My point is.. people need to stop blaming corporations for every damn thing, and they should start owning up to the fact that they are not entitled to everything. I am also worried that this is going to set up a dangerous precedence to future generations.

 

[Mxylplyx]

A corporation cannot be evil. The people that run it perhaps.

 

[lxskllr]

It's due to the rise of litigation. Due to abuses from both sides, people prepare for battle at the first step instead of using that as the nuclear option.

 

[The Boston Dangler]

A corporation cannot be evil. The people that run it perhaps.

and shockingly stupid at times

 

[rivan]

A corporation cannot be evil. The people that run it perhaps.

Corporations are typically incorporated with a single aim: to make money. From there, it's entirely up to the culture of the corporation to dictate how socially or ethically responsible it's actions are.

 

[Thebobo]

Ever see the corporation? http://www.thecorporation.com/
Its a good watch.

 

[rudder]

It is a change in business philosophy... get the cash while you can and screw the brand name down the road is the way things operate now.

But I guess consumers are partly to blame. They would rather have a cheaper crappily made product than one that costs 4X as much but was meticulously handcrafted. A throw away culture.

 

[Red Storm]

If money is the root of all evil, and corporations exist to make money... does that mean corporations are evil? :hmm:

 

[manimal]

Corporations in and of themselves are not evil in the same way as a gun holds no malice. The operator of said gun or corp may become so if unchecked.


I thought we had the discussion about good regulation vs bad during he Upton Sinclair days. I am kind of sick of the argument.

 

[SlitheryDee]

I wouldn't characterize them as evil, just motivated by a single thing and indifferent to everything else. The cause of that is the fact that they are made up of a bunch of people who are just doing their jobs. Individually, the majority of those people are good, but as cogs in the greater machine they don't always produce good results. These people are ultimately too worried about their own careers to think overmuch about what their individual actions are pushing this greater entity toward. A small group of higher ups who direct the actions of a corporation are the only ones who could be said to do anything evil, and even they may not always grasp the negative effects of decisions they make when they make them.

If money is the root of all evil, and corporations exist to make money... does that mean corporations are evil? :hmm:

"So you think that money is the root of all evil? Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool of exchange, which can't exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil"? ~Ayn Rand

 

[darkewaffle]

Companies essentially have to behave in an "evil" (though I think cutthroat or heavy-handed is more appropriate) manner because for some reason people either want companies to be infallible or even believe they are infallible. Then when they make a mistake, there's absolute hell to pay. Lawsuits, negative press, loss of consumer confidence. Yet when the customer makes a mistake, they'll do their damnedest to still pass the buck (I fried my card overclocking, think I can still RMA?). I think enough customers try to nickel and dime businesses for illegitimate reasons that it's negatively impacted their relationship overall.

 

[ImpulsE69]

I will give you an example from an old employer of mine (who is now gone and out of business after 100+ years).

This company made items that were said to be the best, and longest lasting of their kind. Everything about them was known to be quality and the people who worked for them were proud of their products. Fast forward 100+ years and we have a meeting that basically says "Our products last too long and we don't sell enough due to this, so we're now making our products to fail around 5-7 years (vs 30+). It was all downhill after that and that company is no longer around (in name kind of..but we won't go there). I don't believe there was enough time for that to be the root of their ultimate demise, but the mentality behind it was since it obviously didn't just happen overnight.

Making money is one thing...problem is more and more companies are about more than that. Greed at all costs.

 

[Red Storm]

Yeah nothing wrong with making money, but it seems like corporations today are all about making as much money as fast as possible and anything that disagrees with that mentality gets tossed aside.

 

[dank69]

A corporation cannot be evil. The people that run it perhaps.

Corporations are people.

 

[Exterous]

Both are run by people and, by and large, the mentality seems to be the same:
"Screw them I want my money." Hypocrisy reigns as people who run a corperation by day - trying to screw customers - then go home and try to screw with other corperations as a customer - all with the idea to 'get what is theirs' 'make money' or 'because I can'

Now we have a giant fuck fest by the consumers and corporations where everyone tries to be the first to fuck the other to the hardest possible extent with the cheapest, most self absorded, self righteous shaft possible

 

[child of wonder]

Corporations are not inherently evil because they're not people.

However, a corporation is a money devouring entity that is never satiated and will crush anything in its way to acquire more money.

To me, asking if a corporation is evil is akin to asking "Is a termite evil?"

 

[AreaCode707]

An anecdote:

"Please find enclosed one pair of your overalls which I am sending you that the head of your fabric department may determine what is wrong. I purchased these from the Brayton Commercial Co of Wickenburg, Arizona, in the early part of 1917 and I have worn them every day except Sunday since that time and for some reason which I wish you would explain they have gone to pieces. I have worn nothing but Levi Strauss overalls for the past 30 years and this pair has not given me the service that I have got from some of your overalls in the past. I know that it is your aim to present a superior article on the market and consider it my duty to help you in any way I can. Please consider this and let me know if the fault is mine."

Do these kinds of people exist anymore? All I see/hear about is people bitching and moaning, they don't have any patience and even a slightest mistake will risk the future of the company.

I know I am guilty of that too, but once in a while I stop and think how wrong I was. People do not own up to their mistakes.. and try their fullest to put the blame on others.

My point is.. people need to stop blaming corporations for every damn thing, and they should start owning up to the fact that they are not entitled to everything. I am also worried that this is going to set up a dangerous precedence to future generations.

People that wear the same pair of overalls every day for three years and then write a letter of complaint about quality to the company when the overalls start to shred? Yeah, plenty of those people exist.

I think the letter above is perfectly in keeping with stuff I've seen from modern day consumers, complete with the "you used to be a better company than this!" and the slightly sarcastic, "please let me know if this horrible miss on your part is MY fault."

I don't mean to sound as harsh as I'm coming off, but I think you've slightly idealized the letter writer here. He isn't any different than someone today who uses Apple products religiously, drops their iPhone and then writes, "I am such a fan and have loved your products, and they've always held up really well for me, but the screen on my latest one really seemed to crack too easily. I did drop it, but I dropped my other ones plenty of times without issues, so I just wanted to let you know there may be some quality control issues in the latest batch."

 

[AFurryReptile]

Absolute power breeds absolute corruption.

I'd dare say most big corporations that are okay with paying their employees pennies while banking millions of their own are evil. I realize that they have the right to their own money, but some companies are just disgusting. Look at EA.

 

[Baked]

In the perfect world, a company represents a product with all the rules and terms in writing, and the consumer acknowledges by signing the agreement.

In the real world, some companies will cheat the consumer to get maximum profit. On the other hand, some consumers will threaten to report a legit company to the department of consumer affairs as well as using slander to get what they want.

My company is doing everything that's written on the agreement that the consumer signed, and sometimes go above and beyond that to break the rules so the consumers who don't like to follow rules can be happy. But we're anything but evil. Oh no.

 

[fstime]

The people that make all these "evil" decisions at corporations do so because they know they as individuals have a very limited liability.

Thus we can conclude that if a person knows they can do anything they want and get away with it without any consequence, they will do immoral things.

Remove the limited liability aspect of that business model and you will see how fast they straighten up.

In conclusion: People are evil.

 

[Printer Bandit]

what's google's motto? best reverse psychology ever.

 

[MetalMat]

It's all about making profits and making sure the share holders make money. Everything else is second.

 

[momeNt]

So we still have both customers such as your levi strauss customer, as well as corporations like M&M.

 

[Fingolfin269]

It really just depends... what's the KPI this year?

 

[mmntech]

Do these kinds of people exist anymore? All I see/hear about is people bitching and moaning, they don't have any patience and even a slightest mistake will risk the future of the company.

As someone who has worked in retail, these people are quite commonplace. Just last weekend we had a guy back one of our trucks into a light standard in our parking lot. Despite a fresh dent in the concrete, fresh concrete dust covering the dent on the truck, he denied it and blamed us for not inspecting it properly.

We've had plenty of people rant and rave at us because of something stupid they did and won't fess up to, or people who just don't think the rules of renting cars should apply to them. Of course we've screwed up ourselves too.

Here's the ultimate way to win against customer service. I'm letting go our biggest secret here. We're usually are on your side. We probably hate the company far more than you do, and for us it's personal. If you're nice, you'll get far more than you will if you rant and rave.

BTW, I'm down to the final week of my shit job. So excited.