Freedom is ethical — it minimizes coercion — and practical — it drives creativity, invention, and prosperity.
So buying a major newspaper and firing (or putting pressure on) anybody who doesn't agree with the new owner's "pillars" is not coercion? Did Bezos get this buff from the mental gymnastics?
PS: surprised nobody mentioned Manufacturing Consent yet, which describes exactly what is happening here, and remains valid in the age of Internet
I offered David Shipley, whom I greatly admire, the opportunity to lead this new chapter. I suggested to him that if the answer wasn’t “hell yes,” then it had to be “no.” After careful consideration, David decided to step away.
That is termination, not resignation.
Fucking scumbag.
Billionaire meddling turns a respected paper into a megaphone for personal agendas.
😼😼
The people who previously respected the WaPo are part of the problem.
Jeff Bezos Announces Resignation
They had us in the first half, not gonna lie
Instead, he asked Freedom Of the Press to step down.
Freedom is ethical — it minimizes coercion — and practical — it drives creativity, invention, and prosperity.
this is a very interesting sentence to find in a post that outlines the ways in which the opinion page will be losing some of its editorial freedom.
It's also gotta be one of the worst sentences I've ever read, yikes. Maybe get an editor to look it over.
They did. They just looked at it and said "hell yes" while sweating profusely.
Trash capitalist propaganda is becoming even worse? I'm shocked. Shocked!!! \s
We are going to be writing every day in support and defense of two pillars: personal liberties and free markets.
Democracy dies in the free market.
Who wants democracy, when we can have an anarcho-capitalist libertarian utopia?
anarcho-capitalist libertarian utopia?
I hate that edgelord libertarians are trying to rebrand themselves as "anarcho-capatalist". Anarchy and capitalism are antithetical to one another. It doesn't have anything to do with anarchy if you aren't evaluating hierarchy, and capitalism is literally one of the most hierarchical organizational structures possible.
"free" "market"
Y’all, stop buying shit from Amazon, completely. That’s where you start.
Bezos has money because we continue to give it to him. So, the first order of business is to simply stop spending money with him.
As in, forever.
Find an alternative vendor, or even schlep on down to a physical store if you need to.
I agree, but also they don't make their money from sales. They make money from AWS servers/ services. I would bet that they lose money or maybe slightly break even on every sale of a physical item.
Last time I looked at Amazon's books, their retail arm was barely profitable. Most of their actual profits came from AWS.
Azure (MS) or GCP (Google) are the alternatives.
Or if you want to avoid Big Tech altogether, there’s DigitalOcean, Akamai, Linode, IBM, Cloudflare, and a handful of other point providers.
if you want to avoid Big Tech altogether, there’s ... IBM
If I had been drinking anything when I read that it would have ended up all over my screen.
IBM used to be big. They still are, but they used to be too.
You have to be careful as some providers and PaaS use AWS under the hood.
For example Heroku is essentially a nice skin over AWS.
Would love to see a really comprehensive list of sites that aren't garbage AI slop scam alleyways that would help cover the goods and services that Amazon acts as a one-stop convenience for. I don't want to support Amazon, but I also don't want to get scammed by handing out my credit card info to any old shopping site.
Feel free to add more suggestions in your own replies.
I'll start :
Electronics : B&H Photo - owned by religious folks so hours of operation are a little odd sometimes, but overall good customer service, fair prices, reliable shipping
Grocieries : Central Market - HEB's high-tier store chain for high-quality groceries, instead of Whole Foods
Kitchen supplies : Webstaurant - Wholesale store for things like home kitchen goods and supplies, as well as things like flatware and dishes
B&H photo isn't just "owned by religious folks". They staff everything above the warehouse exclusively with Hasidic Orthodox Jewish men.
Afaik they aren't tied to supporting Zionism. They had some problems a decade ago with safety standards and union busting.
what's "stunning" about the statement?
All I saw was:
I assumed the stunning part was this:
We are going to be writing every day in support and defense of two pillars: personal liberties and free markets. We’ll cover other topics too of course, but viewpoints opposing those pillars will be left to be published by others.
It's just pretty blatant.
free markets
This one is especially hilarious in the Trump Tariffs era.
Bezos accepted resignation
Bezos constructed resignation, which is legally termination, not resignation at all.
It's a good thing I stopped bothering with the Washington Post even before Bezos bought it. In fact pretty much every news organization that is owned by a singular entity is completely worthless nowadays.
Everyone should resign. Or strike. Striking would be better
We recently got rid of our subscriptions and canceled Prime. Wish we had done it much sooner, but better late than never.
For those on the fence on quitting Amazon: you can still use the website and shop, just search for the manufacturers website on stuff you want and purchase direct from them.
You know, like going to a book store and ordering the books you find there from Amazon.
Also even if something very specific that you want isn't available outside of Amazon, that's all the more reason to definitely not buy it and message the manufacturer/seller and let them know why you're not buying it. Boycotts will sometimes mean not buying something you really want to buy, that's working as designed.
Most decent manufacturers have their own website and fast shipping. I had to leave Amazon just for the fake and damaged merchandise alone.
There was a time when a newspaper, especially one that was a local monopoly, might have seen it as a service to bring to the reader’s doorstep every morning a broad-based opinion section that sought to cover all views.
That's exactly what a journalistic organisation is meant to do Jeff, especially now when the world is increasingly being filled with mouthpieces that regurgitate what their owners want them to.
An organisation that puts out only one opinion, or is only allowed to put out one opinion, is nothing more than a mouthpiece.
Its a shame to see the Post becoming just another mouthpiece.
The gall of these billionaires to just buy a news organization and then blatantly state "we're not going to do news anymore" is just incredible.
Even Rupert Murdock had the courtesy to come up with the Fox News "Fair and Balanced" slogan (even though it was completely full of shit).
Bezos is just like "yeah we're going full on propaganda, go fuck yourself."
He's basically making the exact same argument as Faux News did, 30 years or more after anyone reasonable realized that they were blatantly lying.
"Democracy dies in Darkness"
-Washington Post
"Nah, I knifed that bitch in the back in broad daylight."
-Jeff Bezos
Interestingly, the Post and the NYT both lean heavily on their Opinion sections to pretend they're not licking boots. Now the Post won't have that option.
...in Stunning Statement
Buy your axe grinding wheels now before it's hard to keep them in stock.
I’m writing to let you know about a change coming to our opinion pages.
We are going to be writing every day in support and defense of two pillars: personal liberties and free markets. We’ll cover other topics too of course, but viewpoints opposing those pillars will be left to be published by others.
There was a time when a newspaper, especially one that was a local monopoly, might have seen it as a service to bring to the reader’s doorstep every morning a broad-based opinion section that sought to cover all views. Today, the internet does that job.
I am of America and for America, and proud to be so. Our country did not get here by being typical. And a big part of America’s success has been freedom in the economic realm and everywhere else. Freedom is ethical — it minimizes coercion — and practical — it drives creativity, invention, and prosperity.
I offered David Shipley, whom I greatly admire, the opportunity to lead this new chapter. I suggested to him that if the answer wasn’t “hell yes,” then it had to be “no.” After careful consideration, David decided to step away. This is a significant shift, it won’t be easy, and it will require 100% commitment — I respect his decision. We’ll be searching for a new Opinion Editor to own this new direction.
I’m confident that free markets and personal liberties are right for America. I also believe these viewpoints are underserved in the current market of ideas and news opinion. I’m excited for us together to fill that void.
Can't wait for trans right and abortion opinion piece. No freedom gets more personal.
Wow, you mean he was an enormous sack of shit the whole time??
Maybe it's time for people to start submitting Opinion pieces detailing how we can use the free market to make companies regret discontinuing their DEI programs or Pride merchandise, or telling how bodily autonomy and control over one's reproductive equipment is a central pillar of personal liberty.
Editing to add: in the event your submission is rejected, consider adding an opener such as: "This article was rejected by The Washington Post despite meeting their criteria of focus on the free market (or personal liberty)." And then submitting it to one or several of their competitors. Even the ones that aren't any better, pitting their competitive instincts against their conservativism.
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