It's more accurate to say they've withdrawn advertisement due to pressure from Color of Change.
Given Fox's ratings I'm sure they can fill the void with less picky companies. The network's demos don't mesh with Apple's target market anyway.
Given Fox's ratings I'm sure they can fill the void with less picky companies. The network's demos don't mesh with Apple's target market anyway.
That may or may not be the correct answer, but there is a zero chance Apple was running those ads if they weren't backing out for them one way or another.
Apple markets to a "me to" younger market.
They are very different IMO.
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The commercials on any conservative TV or radio show are more than enough to get me to never watch.
Unless Fox tried to force them to buy a package, I do not see why they could just avoid advertising on Beck's show.
The 'best financial interest of shareholders' for Apple is long-term, and they believe the good will generated by doing the right thing will make the market look more favourably upon them. I know I do.
It's a lack of a short-sighted, myopic view that's gotten Apple where it is today. Putting their advertising dollars into ads on another channel (or websites, etc.) instead of Fox News isn't going to cost them a significant amount of sales in the long term, but it is going to hurt Fox in the short term (well, the boycott will).
Meanwhile, Apple's not worried about their profits for the next year; they've got so much cash in the bank they don't even need their employees to show up to work for the company to outlive any of us. Their iPad ads will go elsewhere, and will earn them sales, and the shareholders won't suffer at all.
I think it would be more correct to say: They think it is the right thing to do.
I do not share their opinion. I am a buyer too and I do not look more favourably upon them because of this.
(I am not talking about Fox news here; don't receive it and have barely watched it, and can't form an opinion over that.)
The framework of much of our political debate seems to assume a particular political direction.
For example, the terminology "progressive" indicates that we're only making progress when we engage in these policies, particularly redistributive tax policies.
Another example is the common usage of the term "special interests". It seems to me this is commonly used as a synonym for "corporate interests". But more realistically, everything is a special interest. That includes the education establishment and the NEA, unions, and environmentalists. Yes, businesses are a constituency of special interests, but so are those others that support the other side of the spectrum. It can't objectively be said that one side is the common interest of the people, and the others are special; they all hold equal roles in the debate.
Usually these responsibilities do not conflict. When they do, the financial interests of shareholders should not always be the highest priority.
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Closer to home though, Beck directly promotes a political party whose platform is explicitly anti-empiricist, anti-civil-liberties, pro-internet-content-restricting, etc., and does it in a vile and toxic tone which threatens reasonable political discourse.
But legally it is. CEOs who disagree go to jail.
It is my understanding that breach of fiduciary duty is very difficult to prove and it is usually included along with several other claims (breach of contract, fraud, negligence, etc) when there is already wrongdoing.
This is why you don't see successful prosecutions when an officer donates company money to charity, for example.
By this logic, Apple should pull ads from any network with any political commentary. They didn't.
I think you're mistaken when you assert that Beck is a Democrat. I mean, isn't that the party that
* backs the environmentalist approach of corrupting peer-reviewed science?
* seeks to remove our 2nd Amendment right to self-defense?
* supports the SCOTUS justices that allow State governments to take our property (viz Kelo)?
* promotes restrictions on speech critical of protected groups?
* etc.
Note: I'm not a Republican by any means. My point here is that the two major parties are much closer than most rhetoric would suggest, to the point of being two sides of the same coin. Choose which evil you hate the least.
It should be clear that both DEM and GOP pick-and-choose which values are most important, and discard the others. What they really share is a common disregard for the individual, and a propensity for an increase in the power of the State at the expense of the liberty of the individuals.
Edit: I'm constantly shocked at how easily people blind themselves to the abuses of their own team, while condemning their opponent. Back in the cultural revolution in China, there was a painting made for which the artist was imprisoned. It showed an owl (which in Mandarin is almost a homophone for "Mao") with its left eye closed and its right eye open, signifying that Mao was blind to the abuses of the Left, while alert for any slight from the Right.
> backs the environmentalist approach of corrupting peer-reviewed science?
Which Democratic Party leader said that? Come on, name him. Is it Obama? Steven Chu, our energy secretary? Lisa Jackson, the head of the EPA? Pelosi? Barbara Boxer? Come on, let’s hear it.
> seeks to remove our 2nd Amendment right to self-defense?
You’re confusing “self defense” with “carry a semiautomatic weapon”. That’s okay though, it seems to be a common confusion. In any case, current social consensus about reasonable ways and places to carry guns has almost nothing to do with the 2nd amendment, as was copiously documented by Stevens’s and Breyer’s dissents in Heller.
> Supports Kelo.
You’re right that Democrats mostly support the Kelo decision, if only because the opposite decision would set a precedent they view as dangerous. I’m not going to get into the merits of the case because it is complicated. What does it have to do with Apple? No one has any kind of eminent domain claim for One Infinite Loop.
> Supports restrictions on [hate speech]
That’s true. Personally, I’m conflicted about government responses to hate speech, because while it is reprehensible and can be harmful, I generally am happy to let bigots and fools say whatever damn thing they want to each-other. The Democratic party is hardly unified on this, and has a complex and nuanced history with free speech issues.
> Choose which evil you hate the least.
If current policy is “evil”, what are you personally doing about it? Shouting from the sidelines is utterly useless. If our current politicians can be called “evil” as a group, then the word has lost all currency.
> people blind themselves to the abuses of their own team
Are you talking about me? You know nothing about me. Keep your vague implied insults to yourself, thanks.
From the WSJ: "In the House, the Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming held a hearing on what Chairman Ed Markey said was 'the urgent consensus view . . . that global warming is real, and the science indicates it is getting worse.' But the only witnesses were officials from the Obama administration, who support dramatic action on climate change. Republicans asked to have a global-warming skeptic appear but were denied." (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870434240457457... )
In the larger picture beyond climategate, Gore once said "I believe it is appropriate to have an over-representation of factual presentations on how dangerous it is, as a predicate for opening up the audience" (see http://www.grist.org/article/roberts2/ ). This is a little out of context, but in the context of what we now know about the distortions taking place, it's quite ominous.
Self-defense: Umm. You don't know what you're talking about. Carrying a semi-auto weapon is certainly self-defense. But the question is much broader than that. Here in New Jersey, as a matter of policy, it's impossible to get a carry permit for anything, including mace.
The fact is that there's a concerted attack on any form of defense, at least in parts of the country, and it extends far past even what some people feel are evil weapons, even to weapons that are clearly of only defensive use.
What does "current social consensus" have to do with it? This seems to be circular reasoning, the argument reduces to saying that "those holding the power say so, and that's sufficient justification".
Takings: This has nothing to do with Apple. What did your preceding comment have to do with Apple?
My point was that ones right to ones own property is certainly a civil right, and one which the Democrats trample with great abandon.
Hate speech: It seems to me that this isn't complex at all. "Slippery slope" might be a lame argument in general, but it turns out in practice that these laws are used more often to silence unpopular speech than to protect anyone from any real harm.
Choose your evil: My personal actions have no bearing on whether politicians singly, in parties, or across the board, are evil.
If our current politicians can be called "evil" as a group, then the word has lost all currency. You sound like a victim of BDS syndrome, the very kind of person who says that GWB is so evil that anyone else ought to be elected, just to get that evil administration out. (And, of course, there is a mirroring group ODS-sufferers now). But such actions are precisely what give politicians to be evil. They can be as evil as they want, right up to 1 unit less than whatever they can convince others is the evil of their opponent.
Blind to ones own side: Huh? What an amazingly self-centered response. Why in the world would you think I was talking to you specifically? If it matters, the answer is no. I'm talking much more broadly. That should have been obvious from my example of the phenomenon way over in China.
> these laws are used more often to silence unpopular speech than to protect anyone from any real harm.
You’re clearly right. The US has no history of intimidation or violence against racial or religious groups, women, gays, etc. Hate speech laws are actually about scary government types “silencing” our god-given redneck right to shout obscenities at poor brown people.
Angry white men: oh why does the world heap so much injustice on their heads.