Some people absolutely do judge people who work at those companies, especially Facebook. Google used to have a halo but that's pretty tarnished now, while Microsoft under Satya seems to have pulled off the unlikely trick of redeeming its reputation.

> Should we consider that the engineers who work there are indirectly condoning the no-privacy, ad-infested dystopia that HN hates, and should they be penalized. > [..] then that's only because rejecting them is a no-risk, no-cost, easy thing to do.

Exactly as you say. It's less about enforcing ethical behaviour than getting safe revenge on what is perceived as an easy target. For example considering the rise of LLMs, people affiliated with google search are probably about to feel the full force of 10+ years of increasing frustration with declining quality, rather than being legendary high value hires. Unhirables that are completely ostracized? Of course not. But a black mark? Yes, probably.