Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

blog.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

411–420 of 1001 posts

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#411

Post by moduspol »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #370
grey-area wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead we should try to understand them as human beings, and interpret them with generosity and kindness. Advice Damore would have done well to heed when writing his essay. You should also note there are serious questions about its validity - this is not just a matter of tone or style. https://www.wired.com/story/the-pernicious-science-of-james-...

So I read that, and it's not so much "serious questions about validity" as "overall weak agreement disguised as rebuttal". The main takeaway in the form of disagreement is that social science findings are mostly untrustworthy/not usable?

> The main takeaway in the form of disagreement is that social science findings are mostly untrustworthy/not usable?

No, I think they're fine as long as they're consistent with the idea that sexism and oppression are the only relevant factors.

Otherwise, better keep that science to yourself.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#412

Post by nodamage »

tracker1 wrote: post #366
nodamage wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Once we acknowledge that not all differences are socially constructed or due to discrimination, we open our eyes to a more accurate view of the human condition which is necessary if we actually want to solve problems." This is conciliatory to you? Implying that the opposing side is blind to the truth and such blindness is preventing them from actually solving problems? Because to me this comes across as hostile and…

So, you're saying that all differences are either "socially constructed or due to discrimination?"

No. Note that my post makes no argument as to whether the claim "all differences are socially constructed or due to discrimination" is accurate or not. I could have left that part out, but didn't want to only quote half a sentence.

My only point was that the sentence, as written, was hostile and condescending and does not represent a conciliatory approach to conversation.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#413

Post by mathw »

generic_user wrote: post #280
jandrese wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's entirely possible for an argument to be correct, but too narrowly focused. If you're saying "group X is inferior and and I can prove it mathematically", that's still wrong because those people don't have a choice about being a member of that group and still exist in society. Discriminating against them drags society down. It's a prisoners dilemma. If everybody hires fairly then the relative drag is spread across…

Or you can just move most of your operations to Asia or Eastern Europe where they don't have these western liberal ideological impediments to business. And Ironically provide a higher percentage of highly qualified Women in STEM professions.

Well what do you know, I think you just proved that the ratio of qualified women in STEM professions in the Western world is due to cultural discrimination or disincentivisation instead of inherent capability!

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#414

Post by ehsankia »

johnp_ wrote: post #79
rpiguy wrote: post #6

I really enjoyed the well reasoned discussion. I think a lot more constructive dialog is happening now that people have calmed down. Of all the sentiments expressed in the article, I mainly disagree with the comment that Damore did the company harm. He posted his thoughts on an internal discussion board and someone else leaked this internal document to the press. The leaker did harm to Google not Damore. In fact, I t…

As far as I have been able to put things together as a non-Googler he went to an unrecorded "diversity summit" about a month and 1/2 ago, where, according to his statements in the Jordan Peterson interview, practices where put forward that he considered to be potentially illegal. He then wrote the document in his free time and posted it to a forum dedicated for feedback to the summit (? or more general diversity rela…

Just to cleanup what you said:

1. He went to the summit, which wasn't recorded mostly to allow people to be open and share their private stories without fear

2. Something about that summit didn't sit right with him, so he wrote up this document and send it as feedback directly to the organizers (not openly)

3. When he got no response back (it's arguable if organizers should reply to every single feedback, but you can also argue that this was a pretty big one), he posted it to an open but not huge discussion board (skeptics) specifically made for people to argue ideas and have discussions.

4. Eventually, it caught some attention outside of the board and it blew up across the entire company

You were pretty close but just wanted to clarify a couple small points.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#415

Post by jshevek »

tedivm wrote: post #26
rpiguy wrote: post #6

I really enjoyed the well reasoned discussion. I think a lot more constructive dialog is happening now that people have calmed down. Of all the sentiments expressed in the article, I mainly disagree with the comment that Damore did the company harm. He posted his thoughts on an internal discussion board and someone else leaked this internal document to the press. The leaker did harm to Google not Damore. In fact, I t…

Lets assume that we're in an alternative universe where the document was never leaked. The document still did harm. Just read this quote from the posted article- > When I walk into my job at a tech company, how do I know which of my colleagues thinks I’m an outlier among women versus someone who was hired because I’m female that doesn’t deserve the job they have? How do I prove myself to people one way or another? Th…

I don't see any evidence of harm being done.

How is this harm? And how is that alleged harmed Damore's fault?

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#416

Post by ebbv »

Anybody who sends out a political bomb like that to a large internal mailing list should expect to get fired.

And the memo was poorly thought out and the dude was not well informed. All this hand-wringing is silly. He deserved to get fired and he did not have any really salient points beyond "Could Google do MORE to encourage diversity?"

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#417

Post by lliamander »

dguaraglia wrote: post #376
lliamander wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if you think the issues you are bringing up are already a problem for the company, and the company just isn't willing to admit it?

In that case you have an off-line discussion with a group of friends to validate your idea. If there seems to be a consensus, you raise the point at the next TGIF (the internal Alphabet-wide gathering every Thursday), tactfully and without making generalizations about gender and without inflammatory arguments against your perceived political leanings of the company. I was there during the whole Nest reorg/culture dra…

> In that case you have an off-line discussion with a group of friends to validate your idea.

He brought it to the Google Skeptics group for precisely that reason.

> If there seems to be a consensus, you raise the point at the next TGIF (the internal Alphabet-wide gathering every Thursday), tactfully and without making generalizations about gender and without inflammatory arguments against your perceived political leanings of the company.

What point would that be?

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#418

Post by ykler »

I would like to hear more about why so many people feel it would be intolerable for a woman to be assigned to work with this guy. I'm a Jewish man, and I feel that I could deal OK with being assigned to work with a radical anti-Semite or a feminist who professed beliefs about men being evil, or with someone who held me in contempt and thought my technical abilities were subpar.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#420

Post by bluecalm »

tedivm wrote: post #26
rpiguy wrote: post #6

I really enjoyed the well reasoned discussion. I think a lot more constructive dialog is happening now that people have calmed down. Of all the sentiments expressed in the article, I mainly disagree with the comment that Damore did the company harm. He posted his thoughts on an internal discussion board and someone else leaked this internal document to the press. The leaker did harm to Google not Damore. In fact, I t…

Lets assume that we're in an alternative universe where the document was never leaked. The document still did harm. Just read this quote from the posted article- > When I walk into my job at a tech company, how do I know which of my colleagues thinks I’m an outlier among women versus someone who was hired because I’m female that doesn’t deserve the job they have? How do I prove myself to people one way or another? Th…

Quoted argument doesn't make sense. If the hiring standards are the same for women an men then you know that any women at the company is as qualified as any men at least until you get to know more about them, there is just less of them - no reason to prove anything.

If on the other hand any kind of affirmative action is in place then you would be right to assume average women is less qualified than an average man because that's what affirmative action is: lowering the bar for certain groups.

The very presence of affirmative action ("diversity efforts") should be the reason for women at the company to feel unsafe because then the prejudice against them becomes rational.

This should be obvious in my view. The place to take action is in early schooling to get more women interested in tech or give them more opportunities to get involved not in hiring more of them from already smaller job seekers pool.

Post reply on HN