“I don’t see the same kind of vitriol on the Microsoft threads.”
Then you arent paying any attention.
“For some reason, many people go out of their way to bash Apple here because of some perceived notion that Apple is a “liberal” company. When in fact, Apple represents the kind of pure, unadulterated capitalism that conservatives should be proud to have in the USA. “
Basically pledging to use everything the company has to target Indiana for the religious freedom law? Cant even imagine where we got that idea that they are a leftist company....not at all. And you can’t hide behind the skirt of “capitalism” as if we on the right are so simple that that’s some sort of catnip to make everything else irrelevant.
“I realize that the founders and top executives at Apple tend to lean to the left politically. Same can be said of most of our companies, including Microsoft, Starbucks and Google.”
And when those companies target conservatives or engage in blatantly leftist activities, how many comments do you recall on FR defending their actions? Hell I screamed at MS for giving that stupid kid in Texas a bunch of free stuff after he brought that dumb clock to school. The type of “circle-the-wagons and make excuses” chorus for those companies simply does not exist on FR like it does for Apple.
“I think conservatives are making a mistake by writing off these companies. Instead, we should be looking to bring them into the conservative fold. We should not cede this ground to the liberals.”
Sadly that shipped sailed back in the 90s as the internet revolution was fueled by leftist in Seattle, San Fran and Silicon Alley in NYC.
For certain they are all about making money, but almost like China is.
You might as well call them “Watermelon corporations”. Green on the outside, but red on the inside. :^/
Yes, the people running these corporations are often politically naive and they take a lot of stupid political positions. Giving that fake bomb-making kid a bunch of free stuff was inexcusably stupid and it wasn't just Microsoft.
I believe they can be won over. I don't think boycotting or badmouthing their products is the way to do it.
A few years back, I started going to the Whole Foods supermarket. For years, I shunned it because it was that place where barefoot hippies went to get their granola. But on a rainy Saturday, I ventured in there and realized they have some very high quality foods there. I quickly became a fan. I started thinking that why should I deny myself good food just to make some obscure political point that would never go noticed by anybody? Why cede the good food to the liberals and resign myself to the Stop & Shop?
I got to thinking more and started thinking that if more conservatives shopped at the Whole Foods, we would force the corporation to take a more conservative positions politically because otherwise they would be alienating their customer base. Then, I found out that the CEO of Whole Foods came out against ObamaCare. Now I'm sure it wasn't just because I decided to shop there! I do know however that if every conservative decided to shop at Whole Foods for a day, to support the CEO's decision, that it would cause the entire Whole Foods executive team to rethink how they approach political issues.
As conservatives we have two choices in front of us. We can circle the wagons, attack everybody outside our circle and remain the angry minority. Or we can go out there, assert ourselves, and start winning over converts.
No, VandeKoik, it is you that isn't paying attention. I haven't seen it either and neither has the keeper of the Windows ping list.
I have challenged others to point out these vitriolic comments on the Windows threads and I just get crickets . . . because they cannot. I am the only one who has done any thing like a systematic study of such comments on FreeRepublic tech threads and I could not find anywhere near the same level of vitriol on Windows threads as existed on Apple threads.
The insults posts on Apple threads outnumbered even mild negative posts on Windows threads by 19 to 1 and the level of personal attack was far higher. When I rated for vitriol on a scale of mild, medium and vitriolic, the vast majority of the "attacks", if they could be called that on Windows threads were of the mild category, while on the Apple threads, vitriolic personal attacks were very common.
On the Windows threads, attacks were rarely targeting the USERS, but almost always targeting the company, the platform, or machines, while on the Apple threads, attacks were almost always targeted to the USERS, the machines, and the company. . . but always the users with vitriol to the users.
I challenge YOU to find personal vitriolic attacks on USERS of Windows machines in the Microsoft threads. Try it. Look for a PERSONAL attack on a user, calling the user a scurrilous name, or attacking their intelligence, their sexual orientation, their computer literacy, or any of a hundred other attacks similar to what you see daily in Apple threads from Windows or Android users toward Apple product users. FIND them and SHOW them to us.