Disney has come under fire after a video resurfaced showing horribly CGI-generated background actors in the movie "Prom Pact."
  • lazylion_caEnglish
    31·
    9 months ago

    I’m as cynical as anybody else and there was a time I also would have repeated it as well.
    But… show me the law. Show me where it says this.

      • lazylion_caEnglish
        3·
        9 months ago

        Your phrasing was “legally beholden” which suggests to me that a law exists requiring directors and officers to choose the most profitable path. The wikipedia page you linked does not mention any such law. It describes a type of lawsuit that investors can bring against those running the company.

        • Bleeping Lobster@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          9 months ago

          Perhaps they didn’t use the right words. Iirc the correct term is ‘fiduciary duty’. A publicly traded company has a fiduciary duty to create value for shareholders.

          The duties of some fiduciaries have been codified, for example, the statutory duty of skill and care which is imposed upon trustees by section 1 of the Trustee Act 2000 (TrA 2000) and the relationship between company directors and the company under the Companies Act 2006

          https://www.lexisnexis.co.uk/legal/guidance/fiduciary-duties

          • lazylion_caEnglish
            1·
            9 months ago

            Good find. I did some quick googling on this (so take it a grain of salt) and found the following:

             A breach of fiduciary duty occurs in a variety of situations, such as when the fiduciary puts his own interests before the company and shareholders or when the fiduciary engages in other behavior that could be detrimental to the company and shareholder interests, such as embezzling company funds.

            I have not dug too deeply, but what little I’ve found says that the fiduciary must act in the best interests of the company and shareholders. As a cynic it is easy to interpret this to mean ‘make as much profit as possible’, which is kind of the point of investing. A look back at history sadly reenforces this.

            But fiduciary duty doesn’t give one a free pass to break other laws like child labor or slavery. Yes many companies still do as evidenced by sweatshops around the world. But if one is acting in the best interests of the company, one should not be doing such things even though they are obviously profitable.

            • Bleeping Lobster@lemmy.worldEnglish
              1·
              9 months ago

              But if one is acting in the best interests of the company, one should not be doing such things even though they are obviously profitable

              Agreed. But then, you and I aren’t CEOs… maybe it’s just a meme but I’m sure there was a study that found CEOs have a much greater proportion of psychopaths than the background rate. Maybe they just don’t consider ethical stuff the way we do!

        • CagiEnglish
          1·
          8 months ago

          Permanently Deleted

        • 🇰 🔵 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 ℹ️@yiffit.netEnglish
          1·
          9 months ago

          They are only legally beholden to do what their shareholders collectively want. While it’s not necessarily just for profit, if the shareholders are only demanding more profits, that’s how the company will behave.