Could the ESG army finally do some good for Australia?

Could the ESG army finally do some good for Australia?
In March this year, Meta decided to help undermine the integrity of Australian Journalism by stopping payments to media companies for news feeds.

"The idea that one company can profit from others' investment, not just investment in capital but investment in people, investment in journalism, is unfair," Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told reporters. Meta shrugged it's shoulders, flipped the Australian Government the bird and carried on.

One of the key principles of Australia's free and fair society is a robust, free press, it's in all our interests to ensure the Fourth Estate remains independent and strong.

The perceived damage done to our society by social media companies is so bad the NSW Government recently convened a summit to discuss harm reduction - given the social media companies wont do it themselves.

So here is the challenge to the squadron of ESG warriors spending their days ensuring Australian mining companies are suppressed - why don't you stop your employers from spending money on social media platforms?

Mining companies comply with Australian laws, generate billions in taxes and royalties (According to EY, Mining Companies contributed $42.5 Billion in Tax and $31.5 Billion in Royalties) and employ thousands and thousands of Australians. Compare that to Social Media companies, who employ very few people in Australia (for example, Meta employs around 150 locally) are not the biggest tax payers (Meta paid tax of just $42m on the ACCC's estimate of $5 Billion of Australian turnover or $1.4 Billion by Meta's numbers) and, as you can see from the quote above, are happy to laugh in the face of our elected Government. If Meta have 150 employees, revenue of $1.5 Billion, where does the $1.2 Billion of other costs go to reduce their tax bill to A$42m ? Servers, Advertising OR are those costs incurred in low tax jurisdictions ? The only thing guaranteed is if Meta was a mining company, they would be contributing significantly more to the public coffers.

Why wont the ESG teams fire up in light of such behavior that is clearly not in line with the S or the G of ESG ? Simply because the 500 plus ESG commandos currently working for Australian companies know that pulling revenue from social media companies - no matter how poor their practices - will result in lost sales and, anyway, no one else is boycotting so its not fashionable yet. How about the Australian Government - having been slapped so hard in the face by Meta - lead the charge? Ban paid advertising on Facebook & Instagram as has been done in the past.

As it turns out ESG is only a thing if it doesn't affect your company's earnings, railing against an industry (mining) that helps provide the necessities of life is fine as long as your organisation remains unaffected.

ESG has the power to change behavior, do the ESG Officers have the courage to use that power now the protagonists are also business partners?