not denounced […] when questioned

Jesus. Fucking. Christ.

But this is the crux, right? That they refused the struggle sess, not that they’ve done anything particularly bad. Because materially:

funded the […] multiple times

False. Once, and even that is is tenuous. The laptop was one of many not to support the recipients, but to ensure compatibility. During the 3 weeks that the Internet thought Omarchy was cool.

chooses to KNOWINGLY work with and FUND them

False. Funding had already happened by the time the issue was flagged, and there are no indications that any more money is going DHH’s way.

And moreover Anarcat, who originally raised the issue, soon agreed that Framework are in the clear:

it matters, so much, that Framework did that research. for me this is the key difference between uncertainty about the politics of Framework (where the whole thing would have been dog whistlings) and due dilligence (where this is all a basically massive misunderstanding

But that is not the remedy requested. Instead, they are invited to performative self-humiliation:

concerns of others

apologize for funding him

admit the fault

…which they never did. And this makes some people angry. Because this is a power struggle where a small online clique is trying to assert its authority to gatekeep the in-group.

So why don’t you do all of us a favor, and redirect that struggle session shit to any of the AI companies, or the suppliers pivoting to cater to them, or the surveillance-tech, or Alex fucking Karp in particular — all of whom are materially making our world worse and are much closer to actual fascism — and away from an OK-ish little electronics manufacturer that is doing quite all right for the narrow purpose that they have?

There are no ethical large computer manufacturers. Framework, like its competitors, financially supports unethical people, projects, and governments, and there’s no such thing as an end-to-end ethical supply chain right now.

People want Framework to be ethical because they champion repairability, and on a relative scale, you could do a lot worse. But that’s also the problem. Most people buying a new MacBook or ThinkPad never think about ethics. Framework puts ethics front and center, then drops the ball the moment you dig deeper than repairability.

If you want to buy “ethically,” your best option is used. The device was still made unethically, by a company that funded abhorrent causes, and the seller will likely reinvest your money into the very ecosystem you’re trying to avoid. But at least you kept something out of a landfill a little longer, and put one more degree of Kevin Bacon between yourself and the worst of it.

To keep things in perspective, Framework is probably less unethical than most manufacturers, and they’re doing more for repairability than most. And even Doug Forcett wasn’t good enough for the Good Place, so you know… you have to draw your own lines.

@budududuroiu Nothing activy pub aware, but I love using GeoActivityPlayground: https://github.com/martin-ueding/geo-activity-playground

It does make images for sharing on socials