Yes, but there are varying levels of 'moral acceptability', and online privacy violations are on the low end of that. I find it hard to believe that most people would act differently from Thiel in that situation.

According to Peter Thiel, Peter Thiel believes that online privacy violations are really, really important.

Poisoning the water supply is different because the water supply is managed by the local government, and because it's a crime. These add a personal risk to the decision, which your argument is indirectly relying on when you assume it's obviously a bad thing.

You should choose an example that wouldn't lead the executives being personally attacked by prosecutors:

* An oil spill killing ocean wildlife and damaging the look of a beautiful beach.

* A soda company deciding whether to put 10% more sugar in their sodas to increase sales, even though they know its likely to kill statistical thousands of people.

* A manufacturing company moving to China, pressuring local workers into working long hours in poor working conditions and polluting their country.

I believe none of these is a crime, and I wouldn't argue that someone who voted against these should resign from the board rather than help execute on a decision they oppose.

Do you have a better example?

If the anti-poison faction resigns, they cede any remaining influence over the organization to the pro-poison faction. Voting "no" is better than giving up your vote in favor of someone who will undoubtedly vote "yes" (and get paid for doing so).

>Voting "no" is better than giving up your vote in favor of someone who will undoubtedly vote "yes"

Is it? What do you think does more to further the cause and draw awareness, a no vote that doesn't matter and gets no attention or news articles Peter Thiel resigns Facebook board seat over moral objections to FB Privacy Policy?

The problem with the idea that someone can do no good on a board if they are outvoted on issues based on moral objections is that it assumes all the other people have identical views and motivations, and every vote and issue will be ineffectual. I think that's doesn't match with reality. Look at the supreme court, and the different a single judge can make on the myriad cases they see. People are complex, and have nuanced views. An ineffectual vote six days out of the week may still yield a positive result one out of seven. Do we throw that away out of idealism?

There's a place for grand gestures. Giving away real, tangible power, even if unable to be expressed most of the time, in lieu of increasing awareness about an issue that everyone already knows about is not what I consider a smart move. To have any gain, it would at least need to increase awareness of the issue. I'm not sure that's even relevant in this case, given the widespread public acknowledgement and numerous media outlets addressing the issue already.

It's not really a moral standpoint if you're not going to win and you benefit anyway.

> You're intensely equivocating here.

How so? I think I'm being very clear. If you make assertions, you should support them. I do not take at face value that being on the board of Facebook precludes you from caring about privacy. If there is specific evidence as to his actions apart from that, it should be presented. None was.

> The moral calculus of renouncing your massive profit-making association with a company that you serve on the board of if it chooses to do things that you find morally unacceptable is trivial

It is only trivial in the renouncement is morally unambiguous, it is not trivially acceptable that the opposite is true. I submit that it's entirely possible to remain in a position of some power of an organization that is working counter to what you believe is right. In the simplest case, to change that organization. To reject that would be reject the core tenets of democracy, which requires you to participate in a system you may find has resulted in morally reprehensible actions to bring about change and prevent future occurrences of those actions. A board of directors is fundamentally a very democratic form of governance (in that like the United States, the representatives are often elected so it is democratic in its republicness).

> If you're on the losing faction on a corporate board that decides that the best option is to poison the city water supply, and your mournfully cash the checks, you are just as guilty as the winning faction.

But that's not what's going on here. The equivalent here would be if there was a long standing plan to legally dump poison into the water. Feel free to renounce your board membership. The people that are poisoned in the future will feel so much better that you took an ineffectual moral stand rather than alternate action that might have yielded real change.

There is no difference in this than legislative powers. Money and power are interchangeable, to a degree. Should our legislators resign over voted directions of government they do not agree with? They are, be nature of their positions, benefiting from the increase in power and influence the decision may grant them if it increases the standing of the US (but at the cost of the world as a whole).

So, the be absolutely clear, I believe there exists the possibility to have non-controlling power in an organization that you feel is taking morally reprehensible actions, and believe that the most beneficial action to address this is to continue with your position and work to change the organization. To assert Peter Thiel is exhibiting "sheer cynical audacity" and hope that people aren't "dumb enough to fall for this" purely by his association with the board of Facebook without addressing this is not worthy of taking seriously.

To me, that whole line of argument makes no sense. Facebook is at its core and from the start an anti-privacy entity. It relies on encouraging people to post their whole lives and the lives of others. A privacy-friendly Facebook would not be Facebook at all except in name.

Taking your legislation example, a privacy-minded person investing in Facebook would not just like be a legislator disagreeing with a decision, it'd be like a self-proclaimed anarchist pushing for a more powerful government.

The lives of others it is. The funny thing is when I say to facebook users that I will post their pictures or other info to some other social network that they don't use, suddenly privacy becomes important to them. I really don't get this attitude among friends.