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0 pointspdimitar6d ago0 comments

I don't know what is so mysterious about the following:

People can't just leave Wednesday and be in a new job with the same or better pay next Monday.

Rent/mortgage, bills and food are still due.

Comments like yours always baffle me. Empty idealism.

For the record, I usually get called to clean up and make things good again as well. Most of my career was like that.

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dns_snek6d ago

> People can't just leave Wednesday and be in a new job with the same or better pay next Monday.

They don't have to leave, they can refuse to comply with unreasonable requests which are likely to cause harm by jeopardizing the security of user data.

Maybe your position is too precarious to risk getting fired, but if your job is asking you to do something unethical then you should be doing everything you can to get yourself out of that situation, either by supporting unionization or by being willing to take a manageable pay cut to find a new job as soon as possible.

If you're a software developer then you can almost certainly afford at least a moderate pay cut for upholding ethical conduct. The vast majority can even if we don't want to, but these situations are where we find out if our ethics are for sale or not.

pdimitarOP5d ago

A fairly filter-bubble take.

> Maybe your position is too precarious to risk getting fired

You mean yours isn't? Or even that of at least 95% of all devs worldwide? I can definitely say "no" to my CEO if he wants something too big that would take too much time and energy for questionable business results -- I am even expected to ground him. But if my colleagues hand me a ticket, I cannot just refuse without repercussions. I'll not get fired on the spot, that much is certain. But if it happens 2-3 times they'll start looking for a replacement. Same will happen if I outright tell my CEO I can't do something due to ethical concerns. That's how it is almost everywhere I looked and asked (and have very rarely worked with US companies).

> If you're a software developer then you can almost certainly afford at least a moderate pay cut

I can't even afford a 10% pay cut. I want to live in your world.

salawat5d ago

The thing you two are missing is "solidarity" and our industry sucks at it. In fact, it's been relied upon and conditioned into most IT/tech types we're "special" somehow in a way blue collar workers aren't. We aren't and the same dynamics apply. If everyone stops asking the boss how high to jump, and refuses to jump, only then will you see a meaningful reining in of behavior in executives. That action potential has to start somewhere, and as the current generation of alleged adults in the room, we're it. Our juniors need an example set or the cycle repeats. It isn't empty idealism. It's hard effing pragmatism at it's most brutal. If we don't change, nothing can change. Therefore, we must change.

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