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"'I don’t like that he made this donation' — Mullvad CEO reacts to co-founder’s donation to controversial Swedish populist party" (www.techradar.com)
submitted 1 month ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[+] -9 points 1 month ago (3 children)

You can not like it and you can run away from mullvad that's a fine thing to be motivated to do hut what the other cofounder said is true. We don't win by being tribal and team based. We when by tolerating and coexisting. I don't know how this "Nazi" had harmed people but giving money to a political party is only a part of the story. If no one cares to hear the other side you are just perpetuating the same hate.

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  • [–] 11 points 1 month ago

    I believe in allowing people to live comfortably and safely no matter their cultural or ethnic heritage. I believe in gay marriage and women’s rights.

    What middle ground am I supposed to find with people who want to remove anyone who they deem not white enough from their country? What compromise do I make for the people who want to imprison homosexuals and violently convert their gay children? What is there to agree on with the man who believes that women are inferior, should stay at home and have 10 children, and owe him regular sex just because he is a man?

    If you tolerate these ideas because you think it will make for a more peaceful world, those fascists are going to take your naivety and run away with it. There is no tolerance for intolerance.

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  • [–] 9 points 1 month ago* (2 children)

    Never heard of the tolerance paradox have you?

    The way to resolve the tolerance paradox is to not tolerate intolerance.

    "Donating money to" and "bankrolling the entire party, 10x-ing their entire funding in 2024 alone" are different things.

    There are SO many people here who would happily dine with actual fascists just because they "make a good product." Completely ignoring what their funds that support them go to and lead to direct harm.

    And if you think I'm hyperbolic, please, tell me how this is an incorrect line of thinking: https://lemmy.zip/comment/27359847

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  • [–] 0 points 1 month ago* (1 child)

    I agree with you about the tolerance paradox. I am sure you’d also agree that we must decide when to apply it because not every disagreement is a tolerance paradox.

    But now that we’ve named the tolerance paradox, now that it’s a meme we can just invoke on a dime, I find it gets used constantly. The word fascist is also everywhere now. Anything remotely draconian and you are a fascist and then a Nazi. The word Nazi gets thrown around very lightly around here. And the conversation slips very quickly from “don’t tolerate Nazis” to “it’s okay to punch them in the face” to “it’s a moral imperative to kill them.”

    I think we should be extremely judicious about deciding it’s a moral imperative to kill anyone. And I don’t see that extreme judiciousness around Lemmy generally. This political party’s beliefs are repugnant. And I am not ready to call for the death of someone who gives them money.

    I’m not saying I know exactly where to draw the line. But when I even try to engage people on where the line should be, I quickly find myself on the other side of it in their eyes. I’m an apologist, a collaborator, a fascist myself, and so on.

    This climate overall is deeply uncomfortable for me and even worse is the lack of self reflection about it.

    Maybe my problem is thinking that discussion actually matters and trying to fully engage the topic, when others are just here to talk big and pronounce death upon their perceived foes.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago* (1 child)

    I get what you're saying. However, we are dealing with rising actual, full fledged fascism on a world stage. And a common rebuttal from a fascist is that "everything I believe can't be fascist" or "I'm not suddenly a fascist, what I believed yesterday wasn't fascist."

    The truth of the matter is that fascism never truly left. The ultra-nationalism became more discreet and diffused with pride for one's country. It eventually became unquestioning loyalty. See: American exceptionalism. Racial purity and bigotry was shamed on a larger scale, so fascists retreated to quieter spaces, but it never left. Through operation paperclip, America did the opposite and welcomed former Nazis and SS and allowed them to start families and provided them land (more than they did for African Americans, that's for sure.) So is it any wonder that the Confederacy, which the Nazis admired and learned from, and the Nazis themselves, would lay low and eventually make a resurgence, as they are now?

    All that to say, the tenant that I go by is what I said. If we have a disagreement, as another person said, about baking a cake, does that make someone a fascist? No, not unless that cake somehow is promoting some form of intolerance/harm/dehumanization of human life and identity (i.e. a Swastika cake probably won't go over too well with the public, and you'd lose my business for sure.)

    I think the ProtonVPN vs Mullvad recent issues are good to look at. Did the Proton CEO say some dumb stuff about Republican antitrusts? Yes. Did ProtonVPN provide an affiliate link to a French far right influencer? Yes. Do these actions make them fascist or fascist supporting? Probably not, that's a bit of a stretch. The company also revoked the affiliate link and put out a statement that they do not share those individuals views. But we should still, and rightfully so, call them out and hold it to them that these are issues. They're certainly warnings at minimum. And a CEO can be removed.

    Mullvad's founder has a lot more sway on the company's path than a french youtuber. Mullvad's founder isn't just donating a small donation to the republican party either. He's, essentially, funding an entire fringe alt right party on his own, one that is in support of ethnic cleansing. That means there is a very high likelihood that the founder shares these beliefs, and even if he doesn't, by funding a party so aggressively, it provides them with an outsized voice amongst legislation and can lead to direct harm all by using money that you or I gave to them for a product where there are several other choices available to us. Does that make someone fascist, or at least aligned with fascism? Well, supporting a party that believes in ultra-nationalism with social and racial hierarchy/purity...I mean...I can't honestly say it doesn't.

    So, is ProtonVPN fascist? No Is ProtonVPNs CEO a fascist? I doubt it Is MullvadVPN fascist? No, not yet at least Is Mullvad's founder a fascist? I'm leaning towards yes Is the Örebro party fascist? Yes. By definition.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago*

    Could you take a shot at stating that definition?

    And similarly, just to help me ground the way you see things, could you point to a current day example of what you mean by “actual full blown fascism?”

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  • [–] -1 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Except everyone thinks this applies to them. Baking gay wedding cakes is a good example because is forcing religious people to do it not tolerating their intolerance or is it being intolerant of their religion.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 child)

    That's a terrible example. No one, individual or government, is forcing anyone to do anything of the sort.

    It is entirely within the right of the business owner to decline a request to bake a cake they don't want to bake.

    Can there be social repercussions for said action? Of course. Do people have the autonomy to decide not to give a business their money for whatever reason? Absolutely.

    I wouldn't give them my money because, I'm sorry, if your "religion" is based on oppression and denial of other humans their basic rights, then no, I won't support you. Fuck off.

    (Ironic as I know this incident and it's based on Christian religiosity, which following the actual teachings of Jesus would welcome the stranger, the wanderer, the sick, and the hungry. Regardless of whether they believe or not, they are all God's children. Given that Lucifer has no power of creation, only trickery, and God created all of his children, would that not imply Chrisitians should be accepting of Gods children in all their myriad forms, and to hate another is to fall for the trickery of Satan? That's not religion, that's just rationalizing bigotry. So double fuck off.)

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    It’s actually illegal in the US to discriminate against certain customers at a place of public accommodation. The famous gay cake case that went to the Supreme Court ultimately went in favor of the baker, but on very narrow procedural grounds that his religion had been targeted in the case. In the opinion, the court affirmed states rights to make anti-discrimination laws generally.

    I still don’t think anti-discrimination laws are the government forcing anyone to bake a cake. They’re saying if you want to bake cakes, you need to be prepared to serve everybody. No one is forcing them to open a bakery.

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