I get the boycotts for Target, Walmart, and Amazon for rolling back their DEI programs and bowing to Trump. What companies are treating employees fair or standing up for human decency? Seems like Costco gets brought up?

Most things I need I can get from my local grocery store which seems pretty non evil but where do you go if you need like a new keyboard?

  • davel@lemmy.mlEnglish
    13313·
    22 days ago

    ACAB: All Corporations Are Bastards. Corporations are not your friends. Brands aren’t your friends.

    • Lumberjacked@lemm.eeOP
      634·
      22 days ago

      I used to not vote because all politicians are evil. Someone pointed out that if everyone picks the lesser of two evils then things are going to get less evil. I’ve voted every opportunity since.

      Corporations are just legal structure organizing people together to do something. The soup kitchen, local artisan, person cutting hair out of their house, they all set up an LLC to operate under. They didn’t instantly become evil.

      But if I need to buy a blender, plywood, or underwear (my shopping list this weekend), I’m going to have to buy it from a corporation. If I could buy it from a less evil corp then hopefully I make things less evil.

      • barneypiccolo@lemm.eeEnglish
        14·
        21 days ago

        One way to fight the corporations is to stop worshipping at the altar of blind consumerism, and embrace the concept of “Reuse, Repair, Recycle.”

        Stop buying stuff you dont need. Keep using what you have, sell/buy used items, repair things, and if it cant be fixed or repurposed, then recycle it.

        Repairing things is a big one. Often repairs are remarkably easy. My wife has been ready to replace numerous appliances over the years, and I figured it was worth taking a shot at fixing it, if I can save a few hundred bucks, and successfully extended the life by years.

        Very satisfying, and it forces your wife to rethink her conclusion that you are an incompetent dolt.

      • multifariace@lemmy.world
        133·
        21 days ago

        Voting for lesser evil just slows down the evil, it doesn’t reverse it. It’s still going in the wrong direction.

        • Analog@lemmy.mlEnglish
          86·
          21 days ago

          If people would vote for good that’d be a choice. Consistently voting for “less evil” works towards that goal - having good candidates.

          If “more evil” candidates keep winning, what message does that send to candidates?

          • Lumberjacked@lemm.eeOP
            74·
            21 days ago

            Yeah. Lots of people didn’t vote because we had two evils. The greater evil won…

            • kreskin@lemmy.world
              53·
              21 days ago

              You cant run a candidate who supports a far right wing genocide from the left and expect to win. Its really that simple. It’ll probably be that simple next time as well.

              What we need is Russian and israeli influence kept out of the US government with no exceptions. Zionist influence on the dems is why Harris lost, not some ‘voters dont understand that voting for evil is just necesssary’ like you pretend. Stop telling the voters they need to be ok with war crimes. Thats cowardly BS. I’ll never be OK with murder and you shouldnt ever be either.

              • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
                52·
                20 days ago

                Russia and Israel do not control the US Empire. Both have a minor fraction of the power and wealth of the US, it is not that easy to influence US policy. The US’s relations with other countries are dominated by the US.

                The US props up Israel not because the US is controlled by Israel, but because Israel secures the US’s interests in the Middle East via massive terror campaigns.

      • Sickos [they/them, it/its]@hexbear.netEnglish
        6·
        21 days ago

        In the prosecution of its purposes, the Slave Power has obtained the control of both the great political parties. Their recent nominations were made to serve its interests, to secure its supremacy, and especially to promote the extension of Slavery.

        …

        I hear the old political saw, that “we must take the least of two evils.” My friend from Ohio [Mr. Giddings] has already riddled this excuse, so that I might well leave it untouched; but I cannot forbear a brief observation. It is admitted, then, that Cass and Taylor both are evils. For myself, if two evils are presented to me, I will take neither. There are occasions of political difference, I admit, when it may become expedient to vote for a candidate who does not completely represent our sentiments. There are matters legitimately within the range of expediency and compromise. The Tariff and the Currency are of this character. If a candidate differs from me on these more or less, I may yet vote for him. But the question before the country is of another character. This will not admit of compromise. It is not within the domain of expediency. To be wrong on this is to be wholly wrong. It is not merely expedient for us to defend Freedom, when assailed, but our duty so to do, unreservedly, and careless of consequences.

        -Abolitionist Charles Sumner, encouraging a third party vote in the 1848 election

        • boonhet@lemm.ee
          12·
          21 days ago

          Yes, because a third party vote is going to do so much in a FPTP system.

        • Lumberjacked@lemm.eeOP
          2·
          21 days ago

          Thank you. This sent me on a rabbit hole of differences between LLC and Corporations. LLC being a pass through protects the owners a little bit but passes through all the tax and some of the liability (hence Limited Liability). I remember reading something about how banks got significantly more risky with investments and predatorily with their practices when they started moving from partnerships to corporate structures.

          Maybe we should get rid of corporations and force all companies into a partnership or LLC structure. Less to hide behind.

      • Grapho@lemmy.ml
        54·
        21 days ago

        pointed out that if everyone picks the lesser of two evils then things are going to get less evil

        That’s just absolutely not how it works even if you take it at face value. Both evils can be greater than the one rn, that has absolutely no bearing on which one is “lesser” among them.

      • Anise (they/she)@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
        10·
        21 days ago

        Yup. Everyone has to buy something. The point is to direct people to do that at places that are LES evil rather than giving in and saying “nothing matters I guess I’ll just do whatever.” Defeatism is collaboration.

          • davel@lemmy.mlEnglish
            102·
            22 days ago

            I’m not saying we should boycott every corporation. I’m saying it’s a fool’s errand because there is no ethical consumption under capitalism.

            • showmeyourkizinti@startrek.website
              84·
              21 days ago

              And we shouldn’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. A poke with a stick isn’t good but it’s sure as shit better then a pistol whipping.

            • Hacksaw@lemmy.ca
              32·
              21 days ago

              We’re not trying to boycott EVERY corporations. We’re voting with our wallets for the lesser evil the same way we vote at the ballots for the lesser evil.

              • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
                23·
                20 days ago

                If the extent of your participation in politics is choosing between evils, and not trying to actually achieve good, then you’re accepting evil as eternal and unchangeable. It is much more important to focus on organizing, and thus working towards good.

  • vfsh@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    54·
    21 days ago

    Dr Bronners soap has specifically reaffirmed their DEI policies since Trump’s reelection, and they have a 5-to-1 cap on the top-level exec’s salaries compared to their lowest paid retirement-vested employees. They seem to walk the walk from what I’ve seen and read.

    • Landless2029@lemmy.world
      5·
      20 days ago

      Holy shit. Imagine if more companies did the 5 to 1 cap thing.

      Even at 20 to one it would drastically change some company payscales.

      Needs to apply to “bonuses” so there’s no loopholes though.

  • eldavi@lemmy.mlEnglish
    45·
    22 days ago

    i use the nothanks app on my phone to scan the bar codes and it tells me if it’s okay to buy or if i should boycott, along w why

    • Pudutr0n@feddit.cl
      611·
      22 days ago

      I found the thing you mentioned a good idea so I googled the app to find out how they decided who should or should not be boycotted. I landed their homepage and it said they offered digital marketing solutions.

      I’d love to use something like that if community driven but sounds like an important conflict of interest.

      • eldavi@lemmy.mlEnglish
        19·
        22 days ago

        that’s good to know that they’re doing the same thing as adblock plus did.

        there are other apps that do the same thing and i’ll be trying them now; thanks for the heads up.

        edit: maybe this one?

        • Pudutr0n@feddit.cl
          13·
          22 days ago

          Buycott seems promising cause campaigns and boycott lists are user-driven (which, you know… could also be faked I guess) and haven’t found anything fishy in their policies yet, but still snooping around on them. Gonna look into their ownership now.

          Edit:

          So umm… apparently Buycott was founded by a random 20 something year old LA dev (Ivan Pardo), a 2008 CS guy from Colgate University who basically coded it on his own. Boycott’s social media has been inactive since 2016.

          Their business model is they sell access to their barcode API, which basically means they sell the pics of the barcodes and the product descriptions people add voluntarily to companies to do what they want. Not great but you know… better than digital marketing services.

          Buycott is related to solidarity tech, which Ivan Pardo also founded, and is a CRM who claims to be “helping unions & grassroots organizations build people-powered movements that transform society…” which could be legit. They’re not free and they’re not cheap and they claim to cater to unions, advocacy orgs and non profits… but idk. Am I full paranoid delusional or does this sound like a honeytrap kinda thing? Like if I was an evil right wing politician this is exactly the kind of company I’d want to have leverage over to be able to sabotage opposition. And we don’t know who Pardo’s partners are. Only that he’s founder.

          Oh, also, solidarity tech openly claims they give their customer info to Google analytics in their terms, which, you know… Kinda concerning when your “I’ll handle your grass roots movement” software sees no reason to not freely give your information to the most blatant and thinly veiled CIA front in contemporary history.

          In their webpage they say they are “Trusted by Progressive Campaigns and Causes” and name a full total of 5 clients: Debt Collective, UAW, Pilipino Workers Central and CWA. As a non american I don’t know what these things are…

          idk I don’t trust them. But I’m also running out of options at this point. Might as well use something. They seem like the best so far.

          • eldavi@lemmy.mlEnglish
            4·
            22 days ago

            based solely on what you’ve found (and not doing my own homework): it seems like they’re going the adblock plus route where they’re good to use until they get a critical enough mass of users to start selling their data and the we’ll have to switch to the ublock origin like alternative.

            • Pudutr0n@feddit.cl
              2·
              22 days ago

              I’d go with buycott until something better appears tbh. I’m gonna see how it works for me. Too tired to keep snooping for today.

              • eldavi@lemmy.mlEnglish
                2·
                22 days ago

                i think i’m going to start using more than one at a time as a cross comparison and investigate the dissenter.

                • Pudutr0n@feddit.cl
                  21·
                  22 days ago

                  Not a bad idea but keep in mind you’ll also potentially be adding yourself to lists. i assume i just ended up in a few databases i’d rather not be in by doing this snooping alone. Hard to tell the sheep from the wolves. I’m not an american though and my country isn’t currently on “hardcore mode” political setting. Stay safe, friend.

        • Pudutr0n@feddit.cl
          9·
          22 days ago

          I checked out boycat.io

          Searched a bunch of “everyone knows they’re bad” companies and the info they provided seemed accurate, reasonable and well sourced.

          However, their business model seems kinda fishy. first of all they sell “I’m a nice company” certifications, which in itself s a conflict of interest, but especially if you can’t find who the owners of boycat are anywhere on the site or the internet, their whois information is private and if you look at their privacy policy, they allow themselves the right to track “usage data” (i.e. what you scanned) and “location data” which they later allow themselves to “share” with “service providers”, which are “companies providing hosting, data analysis, marketing, customer service, and technical support.”… so umm… Yeah. Basically same conflict of interest as the other company, but less explicit.

          And again,. not once do they say who owns them, how they started or is behind them nor do they provide an explanation on why they don’t talk about themselves… Cause I could understand well intending devs trying to keep private to stop companies from threatening them, but tell the community this is why you don’t share your info. Their contact us doesn’t work either.

          I would really like to see something community driven but i guess big companies could infiltrate something like that easily. I’ll look into other solutions and let you know if i find anything promising.

          ps: 90% of their news were about Israel-palestine, which, you know… OK, good and important but ummm… I’d also like to know about other stuff.

        • Pudutr0n@feddit.cl
          2·
          22 days ago

          Sure. Mentioning them helped me remember i have to get my act together regarding who i give my money to, so even if they’re evil now something good may have come from using and naming them. Thanks for the reminder. I needed it.

    • Wigglet@beehaw.org
      4·
      22 days ago

      Is there a way to add brands i want to avoid that aren’t on their list? I live in Aotearoa so I’m not sure if the list will have everything included

      • eldavi@lemmy.mlEnglish
        41·
        22 days ago

        agreed, but only for now.

        if you read further on in this post, it’ll appear that their ultimate goal is to give brands the opportunity to clean any ghoulish reputation w money.

    • lemel@lemmy.mlEnglish
      35·
      21 days ago

      Clicking around, it seems like everything is on the boycott list. The reasons are also so bad. For example, Mars Inc is banned for working together with Israeli academic institutions to further foodtech innovations. Bullshit like this is why Republicans are able to link together antisemitism and reasonably critiquing the actions of Netanyahu.

      • IndustryStandard@lemmy.world
        41·
        21 days ago

        Mars directly investing in Israeli startups and working with the university of genocide is a pretty good reason to boycott Mars

        The app simply puts every company which invests money into Israel on the boycott list.

  • usrtrv@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    332·
    22 days ago

    You can always go for smaller/niche companies. System76 and Wooting come to mind for keyboards.

    You have to do research and pay a premium. But you’re way more likely supporting a business that cares about its employees.

    In general consume less. And when you do need to make bigger purchases, do your research.

      • usrtrv@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        6·
        22 days ago

        Yep, Dutch with manufacturing in Taiwan. So not super relevant to this thread.

        System 76 is US based including keyboard manufacturing. They’re a small company that gives a lot back to the open source community.

  • zenforyen@feddit.org
    25·
    21 days ago

    Bandcamp, because it is the best place for independent music and there is nothing close to it.

    Steam, because they started with non-horrible DRM (compared to other options) and now they are one of the companies that help Linux succeed for gaming (Steam Deck is just a Linux computer with controllers attached, and Proton is awesome for running Windows games on Linux).

    • boonhet@lemm.ee
      151·
      21 days ago

      Steam, because they started with non-horrible DRM (compared to other options)

      Au contraire, Steam was LOATHED back in the day, they were the first to force you to install a store just to play a single game.

      For other games, you needed to enter a CD key on install (which keygens helped with) and then you needed the CD itself in the drive (which cracks helped with). Steam started the trend of online DRM in games, which was then adopted by others who made even more draconian offerings (I think for Spore you could only get 3 hardware IDs registered?)

      • zenforyen@feddit.org
        1·
        20 days ago

        Ah good point, totally forgot the early times, I was too young back then I guess. Okay then the impact of Steam is kind of mixed then. From practical experience it is more up to the game developers to enforce or not enforce it and often in practice especially indie games are DRM free or it is easy to circumvent. Steam at least does not install some surveillance rootkit on your system. And I’d claim that it plays about the same role in the indie game ecosystem as Bandcamp plays for music and GitHub plays for open source software, at least that is my impression.

        And contra Bandcamp is of course, they recently sold out i.e. got bought by some larger fish with totally different but music legal stuff related business and Bandcamp lost a lot of employees. But at least for now I don’t see drastic enshittification ot Bandcamp yet.

        I guess ultimately there is no perfect saint company, they are entities that must generate profit, and only sometimes it really means making customers happy, but more often than not it doesn’t - that’s just capitalism, how it works everywhere.

  • John@lemmy.mlEnglish
    20·
    21 days ago

    I don’t really believe in ethical consumption, but Penzys spices are awesome! They’re such troll too, I love it!

    • Lumberjacked@lemm.eeOP
      121·
      22 days ago

      I mean… is that union busting? I thought I read the union threatened to strike. Costco raised wages to advert a strike. Isn’t that just unions working as intended?

      • Empricorn@feddit.nlEnglish
        5·
        22 days ago

        It’s absolutely not, lol. Like, I have no problem demonizing the worst companies, but we should be less critical of the better options. Unless you want to create a grocery and retail store chain and distribution network out of nothing…?

      • deathbird@mander.xyz
        1·
        21 days ago

        I’m not sure if the exact details, but based on what you’re saying, that’s a union busting technique. You strike for recognition of the union and to bring the company back to the table to negotiate the contract. If a company is raising wages in response to a strike that’s generally an attempt by the company to show that they will “take care of you” without the union contract. Anything the company does to “help” in response to worker action other than adding it as a concession in the contract is an attempt to avoid having a concession in the contract.

    • ctkatz@lemmy.ml
      4·
      22 days ago

      costco being anti union is news to me. especially since they are very loudly not dropping their dei program.

      • davel@lemmy.mlEnglish
        163·
        22 days ago

        Literally every corporation that has ever existed—or ever will—is anti-union.

        • ctkatz@lemmy.ml
          5·
          22 days ago

          there’s anti union as in “we think they’re a nuisance but we are tolerating them” and anti union as in “we are going to do everything in our power, legally and otherwise to make sure a union does not form or actively work to break the union that is in existence now”, companies like amazon and walmart and starbucks. if costco is anti union they are definitely not the second from what I’ve seen.

          • Terrarium [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
            5·
            22 days ago

            Costco is the latter but it’s a grocery store so their mechanisms are limited. Here’s a Costco union busting just a few days ago: https://dailyiowan.com/2025/03/30/workers-accuse-coralville-costco-of-union-busting/

            Also you should accept that every company with a union wants it gone and is trying to find ways to kill it. Hire more staff to non-union positions, shrink union positions, delay contract negotiations, close unionized shops preferentially, buy off union leadership with perks/collaborationism. Many a petite bourgeoisie has shuttered their union shop citing financial problems only to reopen a few months later, suddenly union-free. And of course, slowly whittling away union sentiment and pushing a decert.