- cross-posted to:
- usa@midwest.social
- cross-posted to:
- usa@midwest.social
Balaji’s parents have questioned the circumstances of their son’s death and refuse to believe that he died by suicide, as ruled by the office of the chief medical examiner.
They have demanded an FBI investigation into his death. The demand, Ramarao said, stems from their belief that the San Francisco police department lacks the ability to conduct a thorough investigation into a case that includes issues such as cybersecurity and whistleblower protection.
Police found Balaji dead in his apartment on 26 November after Ramarao had failed to get in touch with her son for three days. She filed a missing person complaint where she lives in Union City, about 40 miles from San Francisco. Police there contacted San Francisco authorities.
Ramarao said it took the medical examiner 40 seconds from the time they arrived at the scene to declare it a suicide.
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the San Francisco police department lacks the ability to conduct a thorough investigation into a case that includes issues such as cybersecurity and whistleblower protection.
As well as the ability to be objective when it comes to Silicon Valley billionaires, I bet.
That’s who they ACTUALLY work for, after all.
They work for anyone who can ensure their sky-high wages and benefits and near-immunity from prosecution or firing. But yeah, that would be the billionaires who fund the predictable media drumbeat/circlejerk on “law and order” (read: prosecution for the poor, total invisibility for most “white collar” crime), who thereby are effectively the prime supporters of the police state. The billionaires hardly give a shit personally about policing or justice, beyond the basic level of “I just want clean streets and a safe home and car”, but they use the law-n-order schtick as an obvious yet unbeatable tactic to buy almost any political outcome they desire.
Expect this to become more common.
You can know a lot
you can know a little
but whatever you know
just don’t blow the whistleIn the handful of first person whistleblowing stories that have been reported, the whistleblower has always mentioned how hard their and their family’s lives became as a result and how close they came to suicide.
Anyone who chooses to whistleblow has the biggest balls among us and deserve our utmost respect. Now if only law enforcement weren’t working on behalf of the owner class…
Yeah, I fear that these calls for investigations may be a grief-ridden family grasping for some meaning. If there were some deeper nefarious goings on behind this death, then that might allow them to make sense of their pain. I’ve been fortunate to have not lost anyone to suicide, but I understand it’s especially difficult to come to terms with.
I feel angry because as you allude to, retribution upon a whistleblower need not directly kill them in order to ruin their lives. Morally, I’d say that OpenAI may still be responsible for this death even if this wasn’t an assassination. Unfortunately, the legal system isn’t well suited to respond to diffuse responsibility, so the family is unlikely to find justice regardless (even considering that one version of “justice” would be OpenAI being held accountable for the original things that were highlighted by the whistleblower)
When I imagine how much pressure Balaji must’ve been under, and how I have felt under much milder circumstances, I can understand how that might’ve made a person feel suicidal. Blowing the whistle sucks because although it’s rarely a case of just bringing the truth to light and letting the world do with that information what it will; becoming a whistleblower doesn’t mean participating in a singular act of revelation, but adopting a new identity for the foreseeable future, as you continue to be defined by the one act, whether that’s in terms of professional reputation, harassment of one’s family, or being required to be a witness in court.
My greatest sympathies go to Balaji’s loved ones.
Better investigate it quick. In a few weeks, it’ll be a whole different FBI, one much more friendly to big tech companies.
I imagine the current one isn’t filled with workers’ champions either.
I hate OpenAI but this just seems like parents unable to process their grief.
I’ve seen how hard suicide is for parents to process and how much they blame themselves. Another option, one that doesn’t lead to the painful and repetitive soul searching, would be hard to ignore.
