That’s a really hard question for me. It’s mostly a feeling more than a science so it becomes a bit hard to lay it down rationally and I know that doing that will result in weird inconsistencies but if I had to define it, it’s probably these three things.
The influence of the author or vibe
I find myself thinking that if I associate a particular piece of art as the vision of a single person rather than a collective work, I tend to be more critical of that art or product. Rationally speaking, I know Kagi is made by more than one person and I know the same to be true of Brave but the fact that I strongly associate both to, in my view, very concrete people whose ideology is very clearly shown in the product, it becomes very hard for me to dissociate the product from supporting that person. Of course, if the vibe of the product or art is off, I just don’t want to indulge with it - it’s essentially an instant turn off. Sometimes it’s just a little thing but it lives rent free in my mind.
The timeframe
If the person that has an influence is dead, well, I don’t have a feeling of contribution to something bad and I might overlook that dislike for the author.
The need
If I don’t need it and I don’t vibe with the author, well, I won’t buy it. There’s better things out there. On the other hand, if I have no option but to use that product, I might swallow my pride.
Not at all. I’m a user of the product/service, not the creators friend or even acquaintance. If their product sucks, I’m more apt to speak against that. If the persons worldview sucks, that’s their problem; so long as it does not infect their tech or media. If/when it does, that’s a different aspect.
Its tricky, because how much do I really know about people’s views who I’ve never met? Especially more famous people who might just be crafting a public image. They might be hiding aspects of thier views that are bad publicity, or just being controversial to drum up attention.
I think it’s a little silly for anyone to grandstand on self-important moralistic consumption, because you can’t be a consumer of most things in the US without contributing to evil labor practices on some level.
Nearly everyone owns a computer or cell phone, and those are all produced with parts sourced unethically on some level or labor that is impoverished in a more remote or regressive part of the world.
And some artists are so incredibly good it’s impossible to ignore the quality even with their questionable morals, like Michael Jackson or Salvador Dali for example.
Everyone should make an effort to be mindful of their consumption, in my opinion, but I will always roll my eyes at people who are preachy about it. As some have mentioned, the secondary market is a great thing for trying to manage the problematic side of things, and even better, you’re upcycling when you by used.
My.limit is where the utility provided is less than the annoyance I get from the creator. JKR is immensely annoying, far more than I enjoy their work so they will never see a dime out of me. Melon husk is a shit head and not entertaining so they don’t get my money or content and so on. But Google gets some data out of me since they don’t literally shitpost in my general direction about their opinions on people different from them.
If I know who the CEO is there is already a problem at the company level. If I care about who the CEO is, there is a MASSIVE issue for the company as I am many times more likely to make a decision based on who they hired rather than the quality of any product. The same goes for arts.
A lot. Also, thanks for the heads-up on Kagi. Anybody have recommendations for a privacy-respecting search engine that isn’t run by chuds? Paid is fine as long as it doesn’t suck.
Having kind of a rough week with wrestling with identity stuff. Things are generally good for me, but I just keep having these questions about myself coming up and I can’t seem to just drop it. Not sure where any of it is going, or if it’s going anywhere, but I’m getting kind of tired of it tbh…
I posted last week about being anxious for a big exam I had coming up. I was getting physically ill from the anticipation, and so I decided to just send it instead of waiting and studying until the last minute (it’s a WGU OA, so I can take it whenever.)
I’m super happy to say that I absolutely crushed it! That’s my last sit-down test, so now all that’s between me and my Bachelor’s is some essays and a work-based-learning experience! Needless to say I’m doing pretty good. :)
Certainly. There’s a big difference between me giving cash and uplifting someone who is actively harming people today, and supporting a dead man’s art.
Of course remember there’s nuance as well. It doesn’t cost me much to stop interacting with JKR’s output, but buying quality shoes that don’t in some way support sweatshop owners or fast fashion represents a significant time/money investment on my part.
And if there’s something important for my health than it goes right out. idk, maybe Dr. Scholl was there on Jan 6 and I was prescribed those Dr. Scholl’s foot goobers by a podiatrist, I’m not going to quibble too much.
Which ties in to the privilege of being socially conscious. It costs me nonzero money and energy that some might not have to do all of these things. I cannot blame or fault the person who works at Chick-fil-A paying rent, even if their work supports CFA.
Strongly, generally, although I also try to see who they are today versus who they might have been. It also depends on what they are saying and less on what somebody tells me they believe. For example, if someone doesn’t understand or is uncomfortable with a trans person but at the same time believes everybody should have the rights and ability to live life as they choose (basic tolerance, essentially), I don’t consider that transphobic specifically. Some people would though.
I avoid altogether, look for alternatives, or do my best not to support them financially at least. So I avoid anything written by Lunduke, I don’t avoid all of JKR because I like the franchise, but I get anything secondhand.
A creator’s worldview influences me a whole lot on whether I’ll use their stuff or not. I don’t think we can afford the luxury of supporting jerks anymore. There’s just too much shit going on. Consuming is voting. That’s the rational part. The affective part is that when I learn that the creator’s a jerk, I just don’t feel like engaging with their stuff anymore. It’s basically a turn off for me.
The kagi controversy is unfortunate. I’ve been considering biting the bullet, but there’s no way I’m paying for a search engine I don’t feel good about. Also I very naively didn’t realize until now kagi was just aggregating Google, Yandex or whatever, stripping the advertisement rot and applying some extra magic. Won’t they get the rug pulled right from under them the second they reach any sort of relevance?
How much does a creator’s worldview influence whether you use their tech or consume their media?
Depending on what we call “worldview”… either 0%, or 100%.
In this particular case:
SearXNG
SearXNG is a free internet metasearch engine which aggregates results from more than 70 search services. Users are neither tracked nor profiled.
OpenSource
Free
Self-hostable
User configurable
Kagi
Kagi Inc. is a company […]
Closed
For profit
Not verifiable, not controllable
You pay for the privilege
Google, Bing, etc.
Closed
For profit
Not verifiable, not controllable
You don’t pay, you’re the product
How much does their respective owner’s worldview matter to me?
Being open and verifiable: 100%
Giving full control to the user: 100%
Wanting to sell my tracking data: 0%
Misrepresenting their intentions: 100%
Having an unrelated opinion about politics, religion, human rights, or other: 0%
As for art, my opinion of the art doesn’t change whether I think the artist is a great or a horrible person; doing otherwise would be either dishonest… or imply the art can’t stand on by itself (I call that kind of art “trash”, no matter the author).
I definitely think people like Roman Polanski need their work to be eclipsed by their crimes. I won’t watch anything by Polanski, he deserves to be remembered primarily as a brutal rapist, his work should not be celebrated.
But Polanski is an extreme example. I’ll still watch and enjoy something like Firefly, for example. Although, learning that Whedon had been kind of a verbally abusive creep, and that Baldwin is kind of a right-wing shithead does kind dampen my enthusiasm for the show in a way I can’t help.
When I watch it I tend to get distracted sometimes by some of the elements that now come off as more obviously sexist than when I first watched it.
I am a very “death of the artist” kind of guy, but I won’t give my money to people will will use it for evil. So while I’m perfectly happy to, say, buy a Roman Polanski movie secondhand, I’m not going to purchase a new copy.
Kagi is hard because it is so very much better than any alternative I have tried. I don’t like the guy’s views but it would substantially impact something I do for work and pleasure dozens of times every day to give it up, so I’m really struggling with that.
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