Question: I know that this is probably off-topic but I am posting it anyway.

I am having difficulty reconciling myself to contributing content to a site that is now owned by a subsidiary of [Naspers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naspers), a South African company with a racist past of supporting decades of apartheid and white supremacy.

The company *refused* to comply with requests from South Africa’s Truth and Reconcilation Commission to detail its complicity. Instead, 127 individual employees told the commission that Naspers “had formed an integral part of the power structure which implemented and maintained apartheid”.

As the company became more global, it decided to “apologize” for its role, but its apology has been [criticized](http://www.thejournalist.org.za/the-craft/whats-missing-naspers-late-half-apology-for-apartheid/) as insufficient.

I mentioned Naspers’ past in a comment to the CEO’s [blog post](https://stackoverflow.blog/2021/06/02/prosus-acquires-stack-overflow/?cb=1&_ga=2.18515705.1961585004.1622783814-482213257.1622783814), and it was removed. Twice. This is censorship. My comment was completely truthful, but inconvenient to the image of Stack Exchange. Well, in my opinion its image is now *awful*.

I am going to take a break while I consider whether I can be morally complicit in the new corporate regime.

I am not interested in being encouraged to stay, but I will respectfully listen to opinions arguing why Naspers’ past should be irrelevant.

Answer: 
The company’s past is not irrelevant, but what the company does *now* is more relevant.

Moreover, to quote [Desmond Tutu](https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/desmond_tutu_454135):

> 
> If you want peace, you don’t talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies.
> 
> 
> 

Engagement always works better than annihilation. I suspect that continually posting respectful and well researched questions on their website, and organizing others to do so, will in the long run have a greater impact than boycotting the company, but of course the run might be *very* long.
One thing to consider is that actions of any individual, company or a nation that has existed for a significat amount of time (on the appropriate time-scale) can be called in question:

1. if we apply modern day standards to the actions committed sufficiently far in the past
2. if we look into it in sufficient detail
3. if we apply standards of our community to other communities

I could give many examples of acceptable points of things generally considered *horrible/awful* or horrific sides of some people or historical events that are treated as honorable... but this would necessarily generate lots of outrage and name-calling.

Let me also point out that boycotting is not necessarily the best strategy to help those in need - it may actually have the very opposite effects, and thus be just as immoral. In this case, when the crime is in the past, boycotting probably comes at the expense of overlooking human right abuses elsewhere.