I'm very sorry about your experiences, and at the same time thank you for sharing them.
Here and elsewhere in the thread you make really good points about prevention and about non-obvious benefits of mundane things. That said, within the context of the topic, I can read your remarks in two ways:
1/ Helping society is much less obvious than it looks at first, so just drop the whole techie do-gooder savior attitude and get back to your job.
2/ Helping society is much less obvious than it looks at first, so please think about this space hard, and make sure to look at the unsexy, non-obvious places.
I'm not really sure which of the two you mean more, but I'll choose to read it as 2/.
Or, 3, it can be read to mean exactly what I said in my first remark:
I think the best social good comes from fostering a more civilized environment.
There are myriad ways to foster a more civilized environment. Pick whichever one fascinates you and go with that. Some people find snails endlessly fascinating. Others find computer security endlessly fascinating. Both interests have potential to be used to further the greater good.
Just because it is boring to you or me doesn't mean it will bore everyone. Sometimes it helps to have a larger perspective, like the story about the two brick layers. When asked what they are doing, one says "Building a wall." and the other says "Building a cathedral!" Both answers are equally valid, but I bet the second guy is a lot more jazzed to go to work in the morning.
Here and elsewhere in the thread you make really good points about prevention and about non-obvious benefits of mundane things. That said, within the context of the topic, I can read your remarks in two ways:
1/ Helping society is much less obvious than it looks at first, so just drop the whole techie do-gooder savior attitude and get back to your job.
2/ Helping society is much less obvious than it looks at first, so please think about this space hard, and make sure to look at the unsexy, non-obvious places.
I'm not really sure which of the two you mean more, but I'll choose to read it as 2/.