Patagonia joins growing list of companies boycotting Facebook ads

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/22/patagonia-joins-growing-list-of-companies-boycotting-facebook-ads.html

477 185 6 years ago

linuxftw2• 6 years ago

Seems like a marketing ploy. Everyone is cutting spending right now due to the economic downturn. What better way to cut spending you were going to cut than turn it into a publicity stunt that translates into likes on Twitter!

Great time to buy outdoor apparel ads on FB, btw.

rubber_duck2• 6 years ago

I sort of agree with the first part but I fail to see how this translates into "great time to buy outdoor apparel ads" when the market leaders are forced to cut spending.

rodiger• 6 years ago

Probably more room for the smaller players to get their ads seen. Idk if pricing or visibility is realistically affected by market saturation though.

jayparth• 6 years ago

It's cheaper to get clicks because there's less competition for the keyword. True for a lot of categories right now.

lowmemcpu2• 6 years ago

Since they're only stopping for the month of July, I now suspect that you're presumption is correct.

pentae• 6 years ago

Wow what a nothingburger this is, and the press took it hook line and sinker. Amazing PR

ryneandal• 6 years ago

Another poster covered this point better than I could: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23602328

libertine2• 6 years ago

I think you underestimate what vision and mission of companies are, maybe because for a lot of them it's fluff.

I'll reframe it: it's being leverage by marketing, it's not a marketing ploy in itself.

And that's fine - they are letting their audience, and potential new audiences, know their stance on a specific matter, to try to make a change. If it's amplified by media, it's great, that's why it's called "earned media".

Plus, they are not saying "We won't allow anyone in our supply chain to use Facebook Ads to advertise our products.", so they're are not hurting any businesses.

They are simply taking a position and owning it - like they did with a lot of things.

Patagonia understands branding quite well, and they understand the power of consistency when you want to build a long term and sustainable brand. Specially if you want to change the world.

You don't have to be a tech company that develops the next level of AI, or a new efficient fuel light-weight fuel, or a pharmaceutical company that develops the cure for a type of cancer, to make effective change.

Patagonia caters to a specific audience. They are doing their part to try to make what they believe is positive change.

baddox3• 6 years ago

If it were a great time to buy outdoor apparel ads, and Patagonia were only concerned with their bottom line, then I expect they would not stop buying outdoor apparel ads. You really can’t have this both ways.

chillacy2• 6 years ago

I think the parent is implying that it's a good time to buy outdoor apparel ads _because_ Patagonia is no longer buying ads. Ad impressions are sold as price per impression, so if a major player is no longer there to bid up the prices, then prices should be lower in theory.

citilife• 6 years ago

They also wont let banks or oil companies purchase co-branded clothing...

https://boingboing.net/2019/04/02/fintech-bros-not-welcome.h...

IMO the whole refusing service is weird, not giving out advertisement dollars to specific companies make sense though.

shoulderfake• 6 years ago

Why is refusing service weird ? They are signalling their values with their checkbook, more than 99.9% than everyone else out there that just put up a few ig posts in "solidarity"

jjice• 6 years ago

An oil company ordering Patagonia would be delicious irony, but why banks? Are banks known for serious damage to their environment? Genuine question.

mc322• 6 years ago

For added irony much of their clothing and equipment is made from synthetic materials derived from oil.

jamespullar• 6 years ago

Banks fund a lot of environmentally harmful projects. For example, here's a list of banks that funded the Dakota Access Pipeline. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dakota_Access_Pipeline#Financi...

dylan604• 6 years ago

The FratBro culture at a lot of the financial sector was using the Patagonia vests as part of their "dress code". Patagonia decided they did not want to be associated with that culture.

_eht3• 6 years ago

As one current example, if you start looking at who is bankrolling and moving money for a lot of the current Amazon Forest destruction you will find the likes of Chase JPM, et. al. To save from picking a source, I'll just say it's a pretty easily duckable.

colechristensen• 6 years ago

For banks it was an image problem, not wanting their outdoorsy customers to turn away from their products because they were popular with wall st types.

If you don’t start firing the wrong customers you’ll enevitably start designing your products for them.

Like how trucks have become godawful expensive monstrosities because their primary customers are buying them for the image instead of actually needing to use them on a regular basis.

adamsea2• 6 years ago

Their ethics correspond with their brand and typical consumer.

baddox3• 6 years ago

And why shouldn’t they? It would be weird if an individual’s or organization’s ethics were generated completely randomly.

vikramkr• 6 years ago

Would they refuse co brand clothing with a community bank or a fintech focusing on serving the underserved, or a bank that finances initiatives that help the environment while avoiding financing initiatives that hurt the environment? Its possible to be a socially conscious fintech with net good generated in the world, since financial services isn't tied to something as fundamentally environmentally complicated as the energy sector.

hprotagonist3• 6 years ago

I respect the hell out of Patagonia and always have. I could go on and on about things they do that are capital-C Correct. This is obviously the right move.

They’re a very rare company in terms of being bullheaded about their principles: for sure, something they maintain from their founder.

I’d love to own stock in them but i’m happier to have them stay private and not beholden to anyone else’s interests.

JKCalhoun• 6 years ago

I spend more than I should there in part because of who they are as a company.

In fact, just picked up a rugged duffle bag and a few more t-shirts from them last week.

justaguyhere• 6 years ago

I hope they stay this way (or improve more) when future generations take over

rlander2• 6 years ago

Yes! Btw, the founder, Yvon Chouinard, a renowned mountain climber, wrote a great book about the story behind the company which is regarded as the “philosophical manual for the employees of Patagonia”. Awesome read imo.

PascLeRasc2• 6 years ago

He did a great podcast episode on How I Built This too: https://www.npr.org/2018/02/06/572558864/patagonia-yvon-chou...

cirgue• 6 years ago

He’s also done a lot of work on dam removal/riparian ecosystem restoration

rlander2• 6 years ago

*Edit: Let My People Go Surfing is the name of the book.

(Couldn’t edit the original)

georgeburdell• 6 years ago

Still largely made in China. That means more recently than it used to.

danpalmer• 6 years ago

There may be quality reasons for this (source: I work in a company that produces clothes).

There are typically two factors that are used to critique clothing production, ethics and quality. Ethically production in China is fairly easy to do well assuming you're not objecting wholesale to giving money to the Chinese economy. Working conditions are normally fine and can be great.

In terms of quality, China is pretty good for a number of types of clothing. I don't know about activewear as we don't produce any, but for many categories at many price points they're basically as good as anywhere else. There are categories where they're not, regardless of how much you pay. I have a feeling that suits might have been one of these but not certain.

For very high end clothing, production in Europe, particularly Italy, is a good sign. For anything else there's no reason why China can't compete on quality for most categories.

mturmon• 6 years ago

I have more "Made in Vietnam" tags on my Patagonia clothes than "Made in China".

Patagonia has been leading the way on ethical manufacturing for a long time. Easily since the late 1990s. They don't appear to be bargaining for rock-bottom price with their Chinese contractors -- they are asking for higher standards, both labor and environmental. According to their website, they have narrowed the list of contractors they work with so that they can monitor them better.

Also, as their website points out, it's important to not fetishize American clothes manufacturing as such. The American textile industry is much smaller than it once was, due to NAFTA and related agreements.

For a lot more, see: https://www.patagonia.com/stories/patagonia-clothing-made-wh...

_eht3• 6 years ago

It should be noted that in addition to this being true, they are also diversely testing other production lines in Vietnam and Sri Lanka. There may be others I am unaware of. This leads to the natural question-- are those countries' factories being managed better than those of China? Are we saying China bad, generally, or are we saying the state of factory workers is bad, wherever they clock in? If you are to believe the Patagucci mission statement, they are in a quest to better the world. One could deduce that this also includes working to better their supply chain.

flattone• 6 years ago

Agree. A system set up in enough detail to allow this principle to exist would be great: ‘here is some of my money, because I believe in you. I would like a return on it in the event your org continues to grow.‘

annoyingnoob2• 6 years ago

I was told by an ex-employee of Patagonia that they pay under market wages. This person left the headquarters office for better pay. This is some time ago, things may have changed. They make good products and have renowned corporate ethics.

milofeynman• 6 years ago

I would personally consider working at Patagonia to be working at a non-profit. Where I take a paycut for the values. See this post for an example as to why they might not be able to pay top dollar: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23601699 If they're making value based decisions, they can't maximize profits like your facebooks or walmarts or amazons. Just a consideration.

Yhippa• 6 years ago

Sometimes you take below-market pay in exchange for other benefits.

dominotw5• 6 years ago

But we don't know how much of their revenue is driven by FB ads. Its possible that its not that significant.

revenue gain from publicity + brand strengthening > loss of revenue

Their future customers aren't red state ppl.

Its possible that they are using this formula. I don't get all the blind praise and "respect" from people who have no idea what equations were used to get to this decision.

They should outline what sacrifices they are making otherwise i take this as a 'publicity stunt' . This stunt is particularly absurd given they have no problem making stuff in china.

Ppl blindly supporting this are politically motivated, obviously.

https://www.patagonia.com/static/on/demandware.static/-/Libr...

Far more of our products are made by those Chinese suppliers than they are by the U.S factories because of their expertise and price
We’ve made the choice not to disengage from countries on the basis of their policies.

Hilarious.

Yet another hypocritical company jumping on the bandwagon.

tobylane2• 6 years ago

That’s a lose lose situation. They could be slammed for sacrificing income for their shareholders, or they didn’t lose out therefore it couldn’t have been a genuine act. Especially in this case where iirc the company founders bought up land for one of the biggest national parks in South America, I can believe it’s sincere.

exacube• 6 years ago

You could say that about any company doing good. "But we don't know how much of this is politically motivated". For example, they run ad campaigns for voting/saving public lands.

Yes, they are spending their profits on it. And people like companies that do good things, so i'm sure it earns them some trust & brand loyalty. Does that mean it's ill intended?

ummonk• 6 years ago

A good company isn't one that sacrifices profits for good causes, since such a company will go out of business eventually as more profitable companies outcompete it.

A good company is one that aligns its own profitability with good causes. Part of that includes understanding how to gain publicity for being a genuinely responsible company.

the_gastropod• 6 years ago

Possibly. But this kind of thinking is pretty universally used against any person or organization trying to do something good.

You can live a life completely devoid of ethical behavior beyond following the law, and nobody will say a word or think anything of it. But as soon as you put any effort to being extra ethical, expect endless criticism. Dave Eggars, in one of my favorite books "You Shall Know Our Velocity", has a quote that sums this up nicely: "The inactive must justify their sloth by picking nits with those making an attempt".

mthoms3• 6 years ago

Their future customers aren't red state ppl.

Red state people don't enjoy fishing, climbing, skiing and hiking? Please.

The rest of your comment wilfully ignores the company structure (A public benefit corp), philosophy, history of transparency, and history of activism. Just one example -

In June 2018, the company announced that it would donate the $10 million it received from President Trump's 2017 tax cuts to "groups committed to protecting air, land and water and finding solutions to the climate crisis.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patagonia,_Inc.#Activism

Ppl blindly supporting this are politically motivated, obviously.

Sounds like you're the one making politically motivated attacks not based on evidence.

Please don't bother cherry picking their mis-steps as "proof" that I'm wrong. Looking at the big picture, their track record of trying to make ethical, transparent choices speaks for itself.

cavanasm• 6 years ago

I think you might be overestimating the thought processes behind this, and underestimating the lack of thought among many people who buy their clothing. They're known as "Fratagonia" at colleges and universities nationwide because of their popularity as status symbol clothing with certain groups. I'll leave which groups for you to guess.

Anyways, Patagonia is a pretty small company despite their nationwide reputation, and they've always put values first and hoped/assumed things would work out, their founder has written about this himself. If your business model isn't a cost cutting / race to the bottom one, then a lot of traditional logic about how businesses are run can end up never implemented in the first place.

mdoms• 6 years ago

When a company has a history of Doing The Right Thing they earn the benefit of the doubt. It's called "good will".

hprotagonist3• 6 years ago

re: “red staters”, you would be quite surprised how bipartisan the fly fishing community is. And how into it Choiunard and thus Patagonia are.

i know this is a fighting word, but eco/conservation groups are a lot more intersectional and (in the US) bipartisan than you’d potentially expect.

smooth_remmy• 6 years ago

I’d love to own stock in them but i’m happier to have them stay private and not beholden to anyone else’s interests.

Stay private = only accredited investors (millionaires) can invest in them

Public companies = everyone can invest in them, including children, the poor, public pensions, etc.

Why would you want them to stay private and have only wealthy investors? You expect a company that has investors that are 100% from the upper class to act ethically? How many POC are wealthy enough to be accredited investors?

excursionist• 6 years ago

This is obviously the right move.

Could you expand on this? Is this obviously right because it's FB being boycotted? I don't use FB - is it noticeably worse than youtube, reddit, twitter?

JPKab• 6 years ago

I have fond memories of Patagonia catalogs when I was a kid. Had a much older brother who could actually afford the stuff, and he'd give us the catalog.

One bummer about the company:

They used to make most of their products in the USA, where environmental regulations are enforced and could be monitored.

The bulk of their manufacturing was outsourced in the last 2 decades. With their price points, it's not like they can't make a profit if they chose to make it here. They just don't.

Pointing this out, because it's an area where companies that have strong brand loyalty and make consumers feel good about things have fallen off. They embrace consumer sentiments on political, racial, and environmental causes, but then pursue fundamental actions that, in practice, radically undermine their stated values.

shiado• 6 years ago

Are there any people trading on companies trading their profitability for moral righteousness? Many companies are doing poorly now anyways, but I wonder if it is actually possible to convert these types of actions into gains.

starpilot• 6 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socially_responsible_investing

I don't think this makes sense in general. It's more effective to trade in whatever is profitable, then donate to causes you care about. Jim Cramer talked about investing in tobacco companies then donating his profits to antismoking charities.

baddox3• 6 years ago

Two obvious potential problems come to mind.

First, not all types of “damage” and “repair” completely annihilate each other with no lasting effects. Protected areas like national parks are a great example of that. Donating to a charity that plants trees does not just “undo” investments in old-growth logging companies.

Secondly, the economies of scale that your tobacco company investments contribute toward may overwhelm the economies of scale that your charity donations contribute toward.

catacombs2• 6 years ago

Not a chance. To Wall Street, social justice, "good morals" and ethics are not profitable.

AnHonestComment• 6 years ago

There’s various funds that do.

Eg, https://investor.vanguard.com/mutual-funds/profile/overview/...

tchaffee2• 6 years ago

Are there any people trading on companies trading their profitability for moral righteousness?

Blackrock controls about $6 trillion in investments. They announced a move to socially responsible investing over two years ago. And it's becoming a common question investors are asking startups: what positive long term impact will you have on society?

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/23/blackrocks-push-for-social-r...

scollet2• 6 years ago

Profit is not a meaningful metric for whether or not a company should exist. When your cash is on the line I'm sure it is very easy to have flexible morals, but making returns on death and oppression is not a world I want to be a part of.

gabagoo• 6 years ago

markets are organisms, and nature knows nothing of 'morality'- everyone who tries to trade on righteousness vastly underperforms the market

RcouF1uZ4gsC• 6 years ago

I do t think advertised boycotts will really sway Facebook. At the end of the day, they provide access to a billion users. That is valuable, and companies are going to pay money to advertise to those users.

JMTQp8lwXL3• 6 years ago

Boycotting Facebook ads for a month and a half. Then they'll be back at it.

https://twitter.com/patagonia/status/1274832569398292480

catacombs2• 6 years ago

Correct. This was a pointless move. Even if Facebook felt a fraction of pressure from Patagonia, they won't budge because the company will just return in August with ad-buys.

The better move was to stop ad purchases _permanently_.

libertine2• 6 years ago

effective immediately, through at least the end of July, pending meaningful action from the social media giant.

The important part is the "pending meaningful action" - end of July is the minimum timing, which can extend if no meaningful action is taken.

The pressure on Facebook is not about the media spend of Patagonia, is being called out by them and taking a stand.

staticassertion2• 6 years ago

"through at least the end of July"

at least

As in, they're starting here, and they'll continue if they don't see action.

Patagonia is privately held and they seem like an organization that would follow principals over profits, in general.

This is a clearer message to Facebook than an outright loss. Facebook now has to say "We lost this month, are we willing to lose next month? And the month after?" as opposed to "Well, we lost the revenue, no use crying over spilled milk".

JMTQp8lwXL3• 6 years ago

Patagonia gets the PR bump today for axing Facebook advertising. If they resume in a month, without FB changing its ways, they get to walk to walk without talking the talk. By giving Patagonia a huge amount of free coverage, it's on them to actually maintain their values until FB changes-- and we have no means of holding them accountable to this.

elchin• 6 years ago

Will they still let Facebook buy co-branded clothing?

bzb3• 6 years ago

...during July.

Goes to show which of the two companies is actually more powerful.

alloutblitz85• 6 years ago

I think you misunderstood their statement.

thedogeye• 6 years ago

What are they asking Facebook to do?

jb7754• 6 years ago

It sounds like they're demanding that Facebook censor content and advertisements, as long as it aligns with Patagonia's politics.

And they are using the power of the mob to guilt trip other companies into joining them.

6AA4FD4• 6 years ago

If I'm a small business owner and I buy billboard space from a guy (Jimmy) who also sells billboard space to advertisers who publish racist/sexist content, is it unreasonable for me to spend my money elsewhere until Jimmy quits his bs? What if Jimmy freely sends mailers too, to anyone who asks, and I want him to not send mailers if they are racist? If I was in that position and you told me you had a problem with what I was doing, I would tell you to get off my lawn.

mhoad• 6 years ago

It would be hard to come up with a less charitable interpretation than that. You're all through this thread making salty comments. It does seem somewhat ironic that you seem to be making some kind of free speech argument for Facebook... by getting irrationally upset that a company decided to exercise theirs by not giving them money for a while.

hoorayimhelping2• 6 years ago

https://www.stophateforprofit.org/productrecommendations

It's definitely interesting. I like these two:

At the request of a member of a private group, provide at least one Facebook-affiliated moderator per group with more than 150 members. Consider more moderators for even larger groups.

Spy on any group with more than 150 members if a someone asks you to spy on them.

Create an internal mechanism to automatically flag content in private groups associated with extremist ideologies for human review. This content and associated groups would then be reviewed by internal subject matter experts on extremism.

Read private group content, analyze it, and flag it if it's thoughtcrime.

jb7754• 6 years ago

They're getting an awful lot of free advertising by grandstanding that they won't pay for advertising.

jb7754• 6 years ago

Facebook should indefinitely suspend any company who partakes in this from using their platform (advertising, fan pages, groups, etc).

See how much those companies like censorship when it impacts their bottom line.

cmdshiftf42• 6 years ago

One would have to approach that very carefully without completely spooking your advertising customers. Suspending a company for suspending its marketing spend on your platform would be one hell of a precedence to set.

Enshrining something like a zero tolerance policy for anti-FB activism on the platform would be one avenue to pursue, but that is also threading a fine line.

Shadow banning activists might be a nice intermediary e.g. you can still post to your page but it absolutely will not show up on other people's feeds.

rsynnott• 6 years ago

"My customers are annoyed with me? I'd better declare war on them."

That's... not usually a very sensible route for a company to go.

stale20022• 6 years ago

This would have a massively detrimental PR effect on Facebook.

It would strongly incentivize people to look for other options, and to diversify.

rconti3• 6 years ago

"censorship"

sorry, but it's business.

ojhughes• 6 years ago

They really do make the best clothing I have ever owned, fantastic comfort, practical, good styling and colour palettes.

A great bonus that they also have a strong ethics. My jacket uses down that is certified as being cruelty free, the factories are checked for fair working practices.

kerkeslager• 6 years ago

This is doing the right thing for the wrong reasons.

I haven't used Facebook for years, because their entire platform is based on collecting data and manipulating users to sell ads. They sell the collected data even when it's a gross violation of users' privacy, and manipulate even when it causes depression, addiction, fear, and anger. I absolutely support boycotting Facebook and in fact all social media[1].

But like it or not, Facebook has become a communications platform for a huge portion of our population, and as such, they have a responsibility to protect the free speech of their users. Starting off as a communications platform and then turning into a censored platform at this point would be a bait and switch, and a serious step toward totalitarianism.

Totalitarianism enforced by corporations isn't better than totalitarianism enforced by government. Free speech is an inalienable human right, and doesn't disappear because you've (foolishly) put a corporation in charge.

And while I do agree that totalitarianism enforced on behalf of good ideas like anti-racism is better than totalitarianism enforced on behalf of bad ideas is better, once we decide to give totalitarian power to corporations, there's no going back. I don't trust corporations with that power--Facebook has already shown that they cannot be trusted with this power when they censored Palestinian journalists in Israel, and cooperated with totalitarian regimes during the Arab spring to censor pro-democracy content. History has shown us over and over again that totalitarianism in the name of noble ideals always becomes corrupt.

[1] I'm notably a hypocrite with regards to Reddit. But just because I'm a hypocrite doesn't mean I'm wrong.

astannard• 6 years ago

As a consumer, I have lost all confidence in facebook adverts. I see no shortage of scams with no real way to report them as a scam. One example was a series of adverts for a bike computer / light / alarm that was launched on kickstarter that I backed. I saw repeated adverts from various companies reporting to sell these devices for $15 to $20. I checked with the actual company who confirmed they were not real. Every time I blocked / reported the advert a few weeks later the same advice would reappear but a different seller.

Often adverts show you a great product sold for a third of what should be charged. If you buy they send you something worth a fraction of what you paid. If you pay they ask you to send it back for a full refund or they might offer to return some of the money. You need to pay for the return though. Facebook have these scams all over the place. I have lost all trust in the platform!

tootahe45• 6 years ago

Where's that picture of obama giving himself a medal when you need it?

lone_haxx0r• 6 years ago

I much prefer Facebook's relatively laissez faire approach instead of Twitter's politically biased approach where hateful things are allowed as long as they are from the left side of the political spectrum.

Drawing the line on what is hate speech is a hard enough problem already, and companies like Google, Twitter don't even try to be impartial, their execs have clearly taken a side. Add to that the weird times we're living in and how people's fundamental moral ideas have diverted so much in the last 10 years, and you have a perfect disaster.

Facebook's approach is less harmful than the alternative right now.

sailingparrot3• 6 years ago

where hateful things are allowed as long as they are from the left side of the political spectrum

Citation needed.

It's not because you hear more often in the media about the right being censored that it means that hateful stuff from the left is allowed.

Darmody• 6 years ago

Need a citation? Get on twitter and see how right wingers get banned on heated discussions with left wingers where BOTH are aggressive to each other.

The left also mass report stuff they don't like as "hate speech" which automatically results in a ban.

Sorry, but the hate speech stuff is just a new way to censor stuff some people don't like and in the end it'll affect us all, no matter if left or right wing.

ApolloFortyNine• 6 years ago

There were an incredible number of tweets calling to "Burn it down" or similar (about the fires in Minneapolis after the George Floyd protests).

I can link a few tweets, but with millions of twitter messages a day, I can hardly link enough to be statistically relevant if you choose to believe the other way, and I don't have the energy to randomly sample twitter.

kukx• 6 years ago

What about the call to dox the Covington kids by a verified account. Is there anything comparable to it on the right side? I do not think so. The rules for thee, but not for me. https://twitter.com/kathygriffin/status/1086927762634399744?...

TheRealSteel• 6 years ago

I'm about as left wing as you can get, but Twitter is incredibly biased.

August Ames chose not to have sex with men who have sex with men. Because of this decision to do what she wants with her own body, she was harassed by people telling her to commit suicide for it.

She DID kill herself, and the people that told her to were not even banned.

https://www.spartareport.com/2017/12/leftists-bullied-august...

mtgp1000• 6 years ago

If these claims of censorship were true, where would you expect to find a citation?

If I linked you threads of people like Tariq Nashad calling for racial violence against whites, my post would likely be flagged and I'd be banned for posting flamebait.

I don't think there's an explicit conspiracy but the forces are aligned such that they suppress content and naturally suppress criticism of suppression, and that creates an internet-wide false consensus.

r00fus• 6 years ago

I feel exactly the opposite of you. Facebook is a right-wing echo chamber, and I've left along with all of my family (moving outwards to more extended family).

JMTQp8lwXL3• 6 years ago

Giving examples of the type of content that's permitted from the left, but not the right, could be helpful to your argument. As someone who leans left, it's hard to see the bias. One other piece of contextual relevance is tweets from POTUS stay up due to their newsworthiness. If a Democratic president tweeted identical statements to Trump, I would expect identical treatment: no removal, but tagged with phrases like "Get the facts" (e.g., on coronavirus) or tweets hidden for glorying violence.

t-writescode2• 6 years ago

The president is a huge exception to the rule. 3 and a half years ago, I think (citation needed) it was found that Twitter was obligated to keep Trump tweets up because he is president and those are now official record. There was that whole big to do wat back then about him deleting one of his tweets and whether that was allowed or not.

onetimeusename• 6 years ago

Here is a demonstrably false thing that Twitter doesn't censor: https://twitter.com/search?q=black%20egyptians&src=typed_que...

I have not seen them censor the Black Egyptian or Black Moor hypotheses in spite of being associated with Black Supremacy and being "demonstrably false" which is a category of things the #StopHateForProfit campaigns are targeting.

In fairness I don't know what content ends up being blocked, maybe there is a way to see it. But I have seen particular efforts, such as the doctored video Donald Trump recently posted, to tag content as misleading but I have not seen this for the above. As you pointed out, they did the same for coronavirus. Perhaps some of this debate is just about the 'reach' of content but afaict the Black Egyptian disinformation is prevalent. I might be wrong, I don't know all the ins and outs of Twitter blocking.

hoorayimhelping2• 6 years ago

I applaud Patagonia for being principled and for standing for something.

I deeply question justifying the decision based on this list of wrongs facebook did:

https://www.stophateforprofit.org/#comp-kba0i6jc

This is not very convincing. It's very emotional and I couldn't find a single source, or link, or evidence of these any of these claims on that website. It's basically one large corporation not really known for its ethics (the ADL) saying "side with us!" and telling you to hate the other large, faceless corporation not known for its ethics.

salimmadjd• 6 years ago

Does Patagonia have influencers or ambassadors on Instagram?

If so, this is a bit of virtual signaling as they're still advertising on FB but not directly.

Facebook/IG ads is one of the best ad placements left on the market, IMHO.

benkarst• 6 years ago

Given there are a very large amount of nearly identical t-shirts and caps you can buy, a clothing company's sole strategy is marketing. If you think this "boycotting" isn't also marketing, you're a sucker. Stop with all the comments about their "principles". They sell goddamn t-shirts. Manufactured in China btw.

pascalxus• 6 years ago

I find it scary that so many companies are asserting their political will so aggressively. I don't think this will end well.

bastawhiz• 6 years ago

Can you elaborate on that? What about this story is scary to you?

fennecfoxen2• 6 years ago

Facebook has made a point that they'd rather not build a world where Mark Zuckerberg's schmucks decide who can express their opinions and who can't. Patagonia is targeting Facebook not because Facebook is full of hate, but for failing to censor things they deem hateful.

Patagonia's stance against hate some merit to it, but it is in the end an illiberal stance, one which fails to acknowledge the concept that freedom of speech may be a broadly good thing. As society becomes more illiberal, the list of "hate" will grow broader and the list of approved politicians and causes will grow narrower. I am sure that there are a few on these pages who would be ever so thrilled to ban the entire Republican party from advertising entirely.

We have had similar episodes in this nation's history. The Red Scare comes to mind. The House Unamerican Activities committee set out to find the Communists and Russian agents who were infiltrating government and society at all levels. And there were, in truth, a lot of Russian agents who had infiltrated American government. And yet today we mostly do not talk about that, for instead, we must talk about how the HUAC, its blacklists which would ban people from industry, was a deranged exercise in paranoia, guilt-by-loose-association, and its own forms of hatred.

Today's cancel culture, in which Patagona's boycott is but the smallest plank, is the new HUAC. It differs in that it is not run by government and it is generally leaderless. It is the same in that there are a lot of things which are legitimately problems, and it finds some of them. It is the same in that it deploys abusive media and social-media attention on small-time nobodies, destroying their careers and their livelihoods, in an effort to create an atmosphere of fear and silence its opposition. And I can only hope that future generations will look back on us aghast and ask, "what the hell was wrong with these people?"

tchaffee2• 6 years ago

It is far more transparent than the companies that donate literally hundreds of millions of dollars in total to political campaigns.

cryptoz5• 6 years ago

I find it scary that you find this scary. Personally, I find it terrifying how few companies dare to take a stand on a topic. It's refreshing to see morals enter business.

What damage do you see coming from a company deciding to act ethically? The damage I see comes only from ignoring the world, plugging your ears, and selling your product to anyone who approaches. That sounds like the more dangerous option, rather than weighing your choices and making informed decisions about how you interact with the world.

rconti3• 6 years ago

This is "letting the market decide".

beart• 6 years ago

Companies have been asserting their political will quite aggressively for decades.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_lobbying_in_the_Uni...

chrisco2552• 6 years ago

Increasingly, I'm bothered by corporate activism. Now, it's not merely a transactional exchange of value, but one of ideological posturing. I prefer business to be transactional, because it's honest and straightforward. Everything else is a facade. This company doesn't care about me. Google, for example, doesn't care about "not being evil". They just want dominance and money. They were supposed to be the anti-Microsoft and now, like the pigs in Animal Farm, I can't tell the difference between them and the humans. Same goes for all the other tech monopolies.

diego_moita• 6 years ago

I prefer business to be transactional, because it's honest and straightforward

No corporation or politicians will ever be "transactional" because that just doesn't sell. You just can't make branding or marketing without posturing.

And for a fashion corporation (e.g.: Patagonia) posturing is even more essential. They don't sell clothes, they sell posturing.

Deal with it: everybody is always acting, even you.

chrisco2552• 6 years ago

Plenty of corporations are transactional. You just don't hear about them, they don't get PR points for being transactional. They just hum along and work quietly in the background and we often rely on their services and products.

rconti3• 6 years ago

I think pressure from individuals on corporations to act (or pretend to act) "responsibly" is a natural consequence of the unchecked power of those corporations, and politics failing to step in responsibly (and likely those two are related).

amachefe• 6 years ago

Yawn... So what happened to the #DeleteFacebook campaign.

With the number of times Facebook has been cancelled, one is still shocked their is anything to boycott.

Haven't been a fan of Zucks but he has earned my respect for being the sane head in the Chaos.

Funny, they are also using Facebook to organize to boycott... That should say something to them

anonymousiam• 6 years ago

Sitting here in my Patagonia shorts thinking that I will never buy another product from them. If they want to play in politics, they will lose half of their customer base.

snowwrestler• 6 years ago

Having opinions about politics is not exactly new for Patagonia. I mean, they changed their homepage to say THE PRESIDENT STOLE YOUR LAND when Trump shrank Bears Ears.

Fellshard4• 6 years ago

Meta: what's with the top-level comments in here? A lot of serious tangents, praising or digging at Patagonia's practices, instead of focusing on the subject at hand. Trying to signal moral standing of the party in question, so people can decide how to respond to this action?

devWithABlast• 6 years ago

I don't like Facebook ads, and I wish there was no hateful messages. BUT I hate censorship even more and I think Facebook's approach is better than Twitter's. And personally even if I like Patagonia and North Face (own multiple products of both), I just won't be able to buy their products anymore with a clear conscience because they push censorship. I think it's fine to be a left leaning company, I know North Face and others have support immigration policies, which I'm all for. But trying to force other businesses to shut up is another level.

The beauty of this country is diversity. But if you are applying selective diversity until it fits 100% your views that's not good either.

fatnoah• 6 years ago

One of my concerns with censorship is that I want to know if people in power are saying these terrible things. When it's simply deleted or hidden, it's like it never happened. I'd much rather it be out there for the world to see.

Patagonia joins growing list of companies boycotting Facebook ads

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