Enshitification is /our/ fault, not the enshitifiers
The whole capitalist infrastructure is designed for corporations to fully exploit profitability to the most extreme possible result. Sure, we can blame capitalism, which is a useless activity. In fact, it’s a harmful stance because blaming capitalism artificially puts solutions out of reach.
Within this capitalist system we are stuck with, can you blame the corporate enshitifiers? Again, same problem. Doing so puts the solution out of reach as corporations who work for their shareholders (not you) laugh all the way to bank.
It’s our fault. We have control and we squander it. You don’t have to solve CAPTCHA puzzles. You don’t have to switch to the clearnet every time a website blocks Tor. You don’t have to send a message to a GAFAM recipient. It’s because spineless pushovers fail to stand up for themselves and solve CAPTCHAs, tolerate cookie walls, and do whatever dance the corps force on us. We need more people to get a constitution and stop licking boots.
Corporations are doing their job (profiting). We are not doing our job. As consumers, it is OUR job to reject the garbage and ensure that we don’t make enshitification profitable.
"If all those stupid other people would do as I do the world would be a better place": great way to make oneself feel good for being the best person on earth while everybody else is shit.
I know some of the things happening out there because people don't seem to care are absolutely heart wrenching. But yelling at others "If only you would change!" doesn't help - especially calling them names like "spineless pushovers" is only going to make matters worse. Instead try to understand where they come from and take them by the hand to somewhere more wholesome.
It doesn’t help to conceal the fact that there actually are people who do not lick boots.
Instead try to understand where they come from
I know where they come from. They come from addiction to convenience. They come from a place where they’ve not read Tim Wu’s “Tyranny of Convenience” essay, as they are surrounded with others who just roll with the garbage. They don’t know the fighting opposition exists because there are so few of us. It’s first and foremost important for them to know there are those who do not solve CAPTCHAs, and click through cookie walls, etc. We exist -- that’s the most important msg to take away from this.
You exist, and you are convinced that whatever you are doing to make the world a better place has to be the status quo, and everyone doing less than that or doing something different is a bad person. And on top of that you insist in being insufferable about it. Do you believe this approach is going to change anything? Or is making yourself feel superior so much more important than actually approaching others and work together, even in an imperfect way?
It’s like voting in elections. I cast my drop-in-the-ocean vote to do my part, which on its own has negligible power but it gives me the satisfaction of knowing that I am not part of the problem. It gives peace of mind and a kind of freedom amid the various prisons around us.
Do you believe this approach is going to change anything?
Non-voter shaming is indeed a strategy used in US elections. If it did not have effect, they would not spend money on it.
This gives me an idea. The equivalent of bumper stickers for our fedi traffic. An icon or something at the bottom of my posts signaling that I don’t solve CAPTCHAs, or use clearnet, or email MS/Google recipients, etc. It would have to be a tiny 1-liner that’s not severely cluttered or noisy, but /something/ like the blue ribbon campaign decades ago. Maybe avatar is a good place for that, to keep things tidy.