Outraged about the Google diversity memo? • Hacker News Board

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#751

Post by tchaffee » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:14 PM UTC

t00l2 wrote: post #713

tchaffee wrote: post #707

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Wasn't this memo a reply to survey about diversity within Google? I don't know. Does anyone have a reliable source on this? > "On average we don't get much productivity return from pursuing black candidates specifically and here's why" is probably more acceptable, Just as bad. This has nothing to do with scientific truth or even how to better word scientific truth, although it's not surprising many HN readers like…

I agree that grouping by skin colour is statistically insignificant, just trying to re-phrase your title. Although, I still think that if the content underneath that question was about even more diverse workforce: in additional to blacks hiring Mexicans, Asians, Arabs etc. it would be acceptable if a company was targeting only blacks at the time. > There is just some shit you can't say in a workplace without making s…

> I get intimidated everyone tells me I should speak more with clients or be more social during lunches.

Talk to HR about it! If they are good at what they do, they will find a way of letting other people know to lay off a bit on the introvert employees, without mentioning you specifically.

> it bugs me how often people with people skills tend not to have enough people skills to understand I don't have enough people skills and sometimes prefer to be alone or to text instead of speak

Well said. And it's hard for people without people skills to stand up and take action for themselves too.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Post by KirinDave » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:15 PM UTC

Sacho wrote: post #641

KirinDave wrote: post #570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pair Programming is not a technique to improve social contact in software. It's a technique to improve product reliability and give more practical mentorship opportunities. We might argue James says women are asking for good mentorship opportunities herr. So why do women benefit from this specifically (and that's okay) but other mentorship program are considered unfair in this rubric? You say "we need pair programmin…

That's a wholly uncharitable reading of what he's saying. A way more good faith interpretation would be the very simple equation of "working with just computer - more thing oriented, working with computer + partner - more people oriented". This may be wrong(I don't have any evidence to back it up, and neither did Damore), but it is wholly different from the sinister undertones you are seeing. (In fact, taking your "m…

> That's a wholly uncharitable reading of what he's saying.

I'm sorry, what?

> A way more good faith interpretation would be the very simple equation of "working with just computer - more thing oriented, working with computer + partner - more people oriented".

Except that women entering the field now have no such expectations but he is still complaining about special treatment.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Post by KirinDave » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:16 PM UTC

HelloNurse wrote: post #690

KirinDave wrote: post #570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pair Programming is not a technique to improve social contact in software. It's a technique to improve product reliability and give more practical mentorship opportunities. We might argue James says women are asking for good mentorship opportunities herr. So why do women benefit from this specifically (and that's okay) but other mentorship program are considered unfair in this rubric? You say "we need pair programmin…

If you impose social contact, people are going to practice social contact and improve at social contact. It might not be what some relatively antisocial people want, but it seems like an important improvement for the whole team.

I'm not sure why "pair programming" is the go-to tool here. It certainly implies something different to a lot of people, myself included.

Pair programming is not a "social" outlet. It's collaborative, but "social?" That's quite a stretch of the word from where I think James used it.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Post by jshevek » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:19 PM UTC

yebyen wrote: post #743

losteverything wrote: post #593

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never got that. Ty. But isnt one of the mechanisms to get feedback making input anonymous? Did they ask for authored input? Really? About diversity?

From what I gathered, yes. Unquestionably! In a message board with the name "pc-considered-harmful" What did they think was going to get posted onto that board, if not this memo?

In retrospect, it almost seems like they were fishing for people who have 'unsavory opinions' so they can force them to attend diversity training (even the name is Orwellian) and fire them if it doesn't work out.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Post by dcole2929 » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:21 PM UTC

rtx wrote: post #344

timgrahamtech wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not pretend he didn't know what he was doing. There are textbook examples about people who blast off a rant to the entire company and then are somehow surprised when it becomes public ( http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/1... ).

Again he didn't share it with the entire company.

He shared it in a forum that any and everyone in the company can access, and is intended to be able to access. That's essentially the same thing. This wasn't a private email chain that was leaked but an intentional dissemination by the engineer to google's employees at large.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Post by dromedary512 » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:24 PM UTC

yebyen wrote: post #743

losteverything wrote: post #593

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never got that. Ty. But isnt one of the mechanisms to get feedback making input anonymous? Did they ask for authored input? Really? About diversity?

From what I gathered, yes. Unquestionably! In a message board with the name "pc-considered-harmful" What did they think was going to get posted onto that board, if not this memo?

For the record, "go/pc-considered-harmful" is not a message board but is rather an internal URL convenience link that the author (or someone else) created specifically for this document. Anyone can create one of these for anything they like (as long as it's not already taken) but these links only resolve inside the corporate network.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Post by TimJYoung » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:24 PM UTC

KirinDave wrote: post #733

TimJYoung wrote: post #612

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really didn't want to comment on this topic, but who can pass up a chance at self-immolation ? Being left-leaning, I've been doing a lot of looking into some of the ideas floating around amongst the right-leaning crowd since the election. Based upon that, I would say that yes, that is an unreasonable reading. My understanding (subject to being completely off-base, of course) is that the argument is about biological…

I think it's a bit of a popular straw man that a 50/50 split is desired. It's more along the lines of, "There are no obvious artificial disadvantages for people in these groups, and if that happens then the resulting distribution will almost certainly change." If you look at the published #s right now, they're... very striking. It makes the hypothesis that it's just the preference of women and people of various minor…

I'm having a hard time making sense of your first paragraph.

As for the second, which published numbers are you referring to ?

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Post by jshevek » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:25 PM UTC

losteverything wrote: post #711

hashberry wrote: post #635

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> I just dont understand how people who are supposed to be so smart can be so dumb. Aspergers or something similar. Watch the Jordan Peterson interview. He's not well-spoken and he's not even that passionate. It's a joke the mainstream media is calling his memo a "manifesto" when it was just his attempt to analyze gender and diversity in his own socially awkward way. This really is about outrage culture.

Who is Jordan Peterson and whom did he interview?

Jordan Peterson is great. He's a thoughtful, honest person who is delightfully transparent in his efforts to make sense of the universe. He publicly spoke up in support of free speech, and therefore become a target to be intimidated and harassed by - well, the usual suspects. When he refused to back down, he became a minor celebrity among those who value free speech and who are concerned by the recent rise of totalitarian ideology on the left.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

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Post by jshevek » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:35 PM UTC

tchaffee wrote: post #716

sersi wrote: post #669

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Ok, where is the intimidation or harassment? He expressed unpopular opinion and unenlightened points of view but is there harassment? In another comment, you say it's the mention that women tend to have on average more neuroticism although you seem to acknowledge in that comment that it has basis in research [1]. If, as you say, it's a fact, then how can it be harassment? You cannot have reasonable discussions, if yo…

> where is the intimidation or harassment? Many employees felt intimidated and that they now had to prove in a work setting that they are not "more neurotic on average than men". This is about human relationships. If enough people say they felt intimidated, how can anyone dispute that? Can you prove they didn't feel intimidated? Can I prove they did feel intimidated? No to both questions. It's not in the domain of sc…

> Many employees felt intimidated and that they now had to prove in a work setting that they are not "more neurotic on average than men".

Since we can't read minds, we don't know how they felt. We only know that they said they felt that way. When you believe it is for a higher cause - like fighting the patriarchy - lying about your feelings is a minor consideration.

Witness how many of these identity activists lie about being pushed, lie about having their space invaded to accomplish their ends:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRlRAyulN4o

Not a single one of them says "Hey, no, lying isn't right." The collective values of that massive group of identity activists has no regard for truth, on this level.

We can't deny that there is cultural overlap between the identity activists in this video, and the identity activists currently working at Google.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#760

Post by tchaffee » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 7:53 PM UTC

cmcglochlin wrote: post #715

tchaffee wrote: post #645

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Which part of the memo was intimidating, harassing, "Women on average have more neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance)." is one example. Just because something is true or a fact does not give some magical guarantee that people will not feel intimidated or harassed if that fact is presented in a certain way or in a certain context. And perhaps people who have lived an entire life of being discriminated…

This entire post is incredibly dangerous. > Having good people skills often has little to do with science or even the truth. I can only assume you're liberal based on your stance, but you do an enormous amount of damage to progressive values and true diversity when you state things like this. Establishing harassment as something independent and impervious to truth creates the ultimate echo chamber that enables a post…

> Establishing harassment as something independent and impervious to truth creates the ultimate echo chamber that enables a post-fact world.

Why is harassment determined by humans in a court of law, very often using their gut instincts, if it has some ultimate test tube truth that can be used to decide whether or not it occurred? What's the lab test I'm not aware of? Ok, I'm being a little facetious, but still, can you even guide me to an written objective source of truth that describes exactly what harassment is and isn't? I can provide tons of concrete examples and we all know it when we see it, but I think it's incredibly hard to give an objective description. It's certainly never about words. One person's "nigger" is friendly, the other person's "nigger" is harassment and how it was intended and how it was received both have to do with what each person was feeling. Is there a way to to objectively determine truth about how people felt when they said or heard something?

> So anyone who comes to you with a fact or a quantum of reality you don't like should be considered a harasser?

I never said that. I did say that harassment is about human relationships and people skills and not in the domain of facts. You can lie to someone and harass them. You can tell them the truth and harass them. You can lie to someone and make their day better. You can tell the truth to someone and make their day better. There is very little relationship between objective truth and people skills.

> You create a strawman

No, it's an analogy. And a very very close one. The original document made sweeping generalizations about women. I simply replaced "women" with "blacks" so it's easier to see the pattern of how offensive it is to make sweeping generalizations. True generalizations, or false one, folks don't like being put in a bucket of "you tend to act this way because you are an _fill in the blank_".

> Truth is what allows us to move forward as a society,

Agreed. Scientific truth and emotional truth are two very different things. Relationships don't really have a "what's right" or an objective truth do they? It's always very objective.

> Good people skills has everything to do with leading us to better and positive understanding of objective truth.

And understanding of the objective truth is a goal for some people. Other people have zero interest in the objective truth and are more interested in their emotional life and relationships with others. Or something else. Maybe art. Or sales. Both of which have little to do with objective truth. Don't assign your personal values to others.

> but strive to be like John Milton

I don't know Milton. I'll check him out. Thanks for the recommendation.