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Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

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Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#271

Post by jfarmer »

fawefawef wrote: post #260

What the hell is this fucking article even talking about? Silicon valley hires THOUSANDS OF BLACK CODERS from India every year. Some anthropology: The modern day Dravidians are descendants of the Harappan civilisation. WHOSE SETTLERS CAME FROM AFRICA DURING THE BRONZE AGE AROUND 3000 BC. Another fucking shill article by H1B lobbyists to try to lower wages to middle class americans. Class war at its best.

This is like those folks who say that Arabs can't be anti-semitic because Arabic is a Semitic language and the Arabic people are a Semitic people. Or that some people are anti-semitic because of their hostility towards Arabs.

At best, they're ignorant of the fact that the word "anti-semitic" is not defined literally but rather defined by the historical, sociological, cultural, and linguistic context in which it was minted and used over the intervening years.

But usually the folks who say those things tend to have other, totally unrelated problems with the Jewish people. They were just making a point about people's sloppy word usage — really!

So it is for "black" when used in the racial sense, at least in the US. It is not as simple as black = genetic ancestors from Africa.

Somehow I suspect you understand this...somehow.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#272

Post by School-Cotton »

pingou wrote: post #126
joslin01 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by the French try to assimilate people more? I'm confused because France is notoriously horrendous to tourists. I've seen polls rate it as the worst place for customer service with tourists and my own brother's experience got him nearly in a fight with some French guys bullying him. Furthermore, this is just a cultural thing. I'm white and was in a team with a bunch of white engineers that loved cars…

Well I'm not an expert but it seems to me that in France we expect minorities to leave a good part of their culture and become "real french", eat cheese, wear beret and never walk without a baguette under their arms, whereas in the US I was under the impression that there's a lot more effort from minorities to differentiate themselves. I don't think we can really talk of a "black culture" in France (at least not in t…

You keep talking about "Blacks" vs. "real Americans" as though "real American" is defined as "belonging to White culture".

Blacks in the US are not a "less-American" minority. US culture is multipolar. Why would Blacks assimilate to White culture? Why not Whites assimilate to Black culture? To me this sounds like saying Europe is bad at integrating minorities because French people haven't become German or English yet.

A big difference is that Blacks have been in the US for hundreds of years, whereas they have only been in France in large numbers since after the war.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#273

Post by strictnein »

tw04 wrote: post #108
skywhopper wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't find it surprising. I'm white, and I've been on all-white teams where everyone else watched the same TV shows or went to the same movies or played the same video games, and I didn't. Those common interests would feel like the only thing they ever talked about, and it would feel very unwelcoming. Part of the problem is just luck of the draw in terms of the team you get placed on. If that team is all into the…

So... you either decide you want to be included and try joining in some of the team's shared interests, or you don't. I'm not sure what the problem is - it's no different than being in a regular group of friends when some of them decide to pick up a new hobby/show/whatever. You can either engage and join in, or you can choose not to. Don't whine or act like there's something wrong if you make the decision not to part…

I follow sports almost for this reason alone.

Really couldn't care about the NBA, NHL, NFL, NCAA, etc, but it helps to at least understand the sports and the major teams and how the seasons are going.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#274

Post by zo1 »

mafribe wrote: post #137
golergka wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haven't you heard that racism = power + prejudice, so black people by definition can't be racist because they don't have power? (This is not an opinion that I agree with, but a lot of people actually think that way).

I'm not sure they deep down believe it. It's a rhetorical technique of frame shifting that has been quite successful, and allows some people to avoid facing their own racism. Since it works, why not continue using it? I have found a near perfect antidote: I point out that the USA is the world's most powerful nation (I'm from a small weak nation that has historically been trashed a lot). So, I continue: are you saying…

>"I'm not sure they deep down believe it. It's a rhetorical technique of frame shifting that has been quite successful, and allows some people to avoid facing their own racism. Since it works, why not continue using it?"

Well, it's a "rhetorical technique" then that appears to have gripped mainstream discussion on the matter. It's why blatant double-standards are accepted when it comes to the topics of race, sexism and equality. Either that, or it's the whole "outrage culture" that's causing me to see way more of the blatant outrage rather than the reasoned discussion.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#275

Post by ebola1717 »

devalier wrote: post #128

Computer programming is one of the most cognitively demanding professions in existence. Ability to program correlates pretty highly with cognitive test scores, such as the SAT Math. If you look at the top scorers on such tests in America, only about 1% are black. The ratio of black engineers in Silicon Valley matches what you would expect based on the test scores. To see it visually, this is the bell curve based on m…

Wow, I'm sorry, but programming is not that demanding. Theoretical CS work can be, but the typical programmer is working on maintaining a crud app, especially as a junior developer.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#276

Post by fawefawef »

This article is so wrong on so many levels. Why are the southern Indian Dravidians whose skin is darker than any of these interviewees' skin not included in the figures for black hiring rates? YES. THEY ARE BLACK. THEY ARE DIRECT DESCENDANTS OF AFRICANS WHO MIGRATED DURING THE BRONZE AGE TO THE INDUS VALLEY. Wipro, Cognizant, Infosys and other body shop companies hire hundreds and thousands of blacks every year to send to companies like Microsoft, Oracle and others. Smells like reverse racism.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#277

Post by noobermin »

colmvp wrote: post #269

“There are not a lot of people of color in the Valley—and that, by itself, makes it kind of unwelcoming” Oh I forgot, us Asians don't when it comes to people of color or diversity.

They might specifically mean blacks when they say "people of color", not that asians aren't a minority, but they person saying that might only be referring to their own race. I am not making a judgement call on what should be a "person of color", I'm just pointing out what they might mean.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#278

Post by School-Cotton »

panglott wrote: post #191
yoz-y wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say the main problem with French is that they really do not like to speak any other language than French. It is quite common that, for example, during the lunch with international participation and a French majority the conversation will start in English but then very quickly slip into French and then foreigners are lost. It has also happened to me, when speaking English or being in non-french speaking groups…

I would say the main problem with Americans is that they really do not like to speak any language other than English ;)

Why's that a problem? English is the global standard lingua franca. English-speaking people in America only need to learn other languages as a hobby, or if they have a specific interest in a particular country.

BTW, I don't think there's any moral reason why English should be the global language, but it is. I speak French too, and if the global language magically became French tomorrow, I would feel perfectly fine.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#279

Post by School-Cotton »

fawefawef wrote: post #276

This article is so wrong on so many levels. Why are the southern Indian Dravidians whose skin is darker than any of these interviewees' skin not included in the figures for black hiring rates? YES. THEY ARE BLACK. THEY ARE DIRECT DESCENDANTS OF AFRICANS WHO MIGRATED DURING THE BRONZE AGE TO THE INDUS VALLEY. Wipro, Cognizant, Infosys and other body shop companies hire hundreds and thousands of blacks every year to se…

Everyone is the direct descendant of Africans. That's not what "Black" means in the sense it's being used. The people you are talking about are culturally Dravidian Indian, not culturally African-American.

Re: Silicon Valley and Black Coders: Howard University fights to join the tech boom

#280

Post by ebola1717 »

colmvp wrote: post #269

“There are not a lot of people of color in the Valley—and that, by itself, makes it kind of unwelcoming” Oh I forgot, us Asians don't when it comes to people of color or diversity.

https://medium.com/message/the-tech-diversity-story-thats-no...

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2014/01/...

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