Apple Hides Taiwan Flag in Hong Kong

What's it take for an engineer in the US to actually do something like this?

If my boss/product manager wanted me to do something like this, I'd be calling them out for shitty politics, and telling them they need to find a new engineer because I'd quit immediately - and likely incite others to come with me.

Maybe I have a higher sense of morality than others, but I'm no shill for China's power over Taiwan. I can use my entitlement/privilege as an engineer to say "fuck off" to anyone who wants me to do things I find immoral. Furthering the needs of a power hungry regime looking to assert dominance over others? Nope. I spend all my day working to further democracy and freedom, not to enable free thought and self-determination to be squashed.

Whoever coded this change and approved this PR, shame on you.

Perhaps the engineer in question is a Chinese citizen, or immigrant from China who still has strong ties to their homeland. Maybe they think it was right to remove the Taiwan flag, and has been quietly annoyed for years that it'd still been there.

Or, hell, maybe the person is an American citizen, not even of Chinese descent, and agrees with the PRC's stance on Taiwan.

(Frankly I probably wouldn't get along with someone like this, but at a company the size of Apple, there are bound to be more than a few.)

but why not? It sounds like your personal opinion.