Shareholders Pressure Internet Companies on Rights

whamett writes "A group of investment firms is putting their shareholder weight behind asking high-tech companies that deal with repressive regimes to pay more attention to rights violations. Meanwhile, two of the firms have drafted a separate resolution for Cisco shareholders that's up for vote on Tuesday. All this comes not long after Yahoo's involvement in the jailing of a Chinese journalist left a bad taste in everyone's mouth." This isn't the first time that investment firms have stepped up to the plate on human rights violations.

Comments

Re:The comedy of capital

[JesseMcDonald]

Well, it is rather hypocritical to tell other nations how they should behave, when our own govenment is violating fundamental rights on a massive scale. The best way to influence other countries is to set an example for them to follow, and we're not doing that very well right now. Even if we could force our ideology on other countries (and we can't), we have no right to do so. "Relevance" is far less important than integrity, whether on a personal level or as a nation.

Re: Your sig

[JesseMcDonald]

Support free speech. Don't post anonymously. If you are anonymous, don't bother replying to my comments, I won't see it.

If free speach is hurt in any way by anonymonity, then why do the most repressive, anti-free-speach regimes always try to stamp out anonymous speach? Anonymonity ensures that personal prejudice, association, and political or economic influence play no part in how the message is received, and allow people living under a repressive regime to speak out without putting themselves or others in even more danger than they are already in. Anonymous speach is an essential part of freedom of speach, and should be accepted or rejected solely on the basis of what is said, not rejected out of hand.