That's only one concern. Another concern is not normalizing such policies to propagate back over here. When you as a decisionmaker make excuses as to why it's okay to cooperate with information suppression in another country, then there are no principles stopping you from doing the same things back home--just precedent and personal incentives.
For a cartoonish example let's say Adolf Hitler approaches you to buy large quantities of morphine as a substitute for Zyklon B. Surely this is an improvement for the victims of extermination over their current situation, but you're still participating in the Holocaust.
I think utilitarianism has a big problem with myopia. It's extremely hard to do a real global calculation for outcomes so faithful practitioners inevitably end up following local gradients. I think a solid ethical equilibrium requires a certain amount of deontology, a framework of things that We Do Not Do.
For a cartoonish example let's say Adolf Hitler approaches you to buy large quantities of morphine as a substitute for Zyklon B. Surely this is an improvement for the victims of extermination over their current situation, but you're still participating in the Holocaust.
I think utilitarianism has a big problem with myopia. It's extremely hard to do a real global calculation for outcomes so faithful practitioners inevitably end up following local gradients. I think a solid ethical equilibrium requires a certain amount of deontology, a framework of things that We Do Not Do.