I am familiar with the saying, however, in this case, voting for government officials and creating a "demand" datapoint in markets by completing a purchase are not synonymous.

When we go to the polls, we are literally making decisions about what you call "paternalism". Who should write our laws? Who should manage our criminal justice system? Who should regulate our industries? These are pretty direct decisions to make.

But when we go to Best Buy or Apple Store to buy an iDevice, almost all consumer are not making a decision about the "paternalistic" decisions of Apple, who they employ, etc. They are buying a shiny object that makes their brain give them the happy juice.

I fear for our society if these two actions become one and the same.

You need to step back one more level from "The iPhone buyer does not get a say" to "The phone buyer does get a say"; buy an iPhone or buy an Android device if you have an issue with their business arrangements.

"They are buying a shiny object that makes their brain give them the happy juice."

That doesn't sound unlike many voters of all sorts to me!

I personally believe that it is naive to think that Apple cares what consumers think as they have enough money to take $0 from consumers for say 30 years straight and be fine. They are post-capitalist.

I understand that in an ideal market, a business has to react to demand. That in many industries, if you don't do what the customer wants, the customer leaves.

I do not think Apple operates in that world or by those rules.

Apple doesn't care what you think and they don't care if you buy their products.

Ironically, the only way you might get Apple to change isn't with your wallet, it's with your government. EU notching wins against Apple bad practices on behalf of Apple's European customers that their wallets never won them.