If a software engineer writes software that hurts people, they believe in hurting people and believe people should be hurt.
If they didn’t, they wouldn’t write software that hurts people.
The impressive amount of freedom tech workers have to choose what they work on means the ethical and moral issues with their production should fall on each person’s shoulders, but it doesn’t.
This attitude implies an unambiguous, black and white world where such decisions are always clear. In other words, a fantasy world which does not exist.
I agree it's a bit hyperbolic. But it seems weird to suggest that developers, who are hired for their intellectual power and subtlety, are great at figuring out the implications of complex decisions except when ethics are involved.
I think it's more likely that their sudden inability in this one aspect is related to Upton Sinclair's observation: " It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."
If a software engineer writes software that hurts people, they believe in hurting people and believe people should be hurt.
If they didn’t, they wouldn’t write software that hurts people.
The impressive amount of freedom tech workers have to choose what they work on means the ethical and moral issues with their production should fall on each person’s shoulders, but it doesn’t.