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Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

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Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#221

Post by oh_sigh »

tptacek wrote: post #2

The first thing everyone needs to know about this is what the case was about, because it implicates one of the most powerful and least known rights tech company employees have. According to Section 8(a)(1) of the NLRA, employees can't generally be disciplined for exercising the rights provided under Section 7 of the NLRA. These rights are commonly understood to be about unionizing (ie, you can't be fired for trying r…

What constitutes a harmful sterotype?

If I say that women are on average shorter than men, is that a harmful stereotype when it comes to mixed gender basketball leagues?

If I say that women are more caring on average than men, is that a harmful stereotype only if it is untrue, or is it harmful to state it even if it is true?

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#222

Post by leereeves »

tptacek wrote: post #215
leereeves wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, the NLRB isn't settling the science. It's saying that discussion of the science renders otherwise protected speech unprotected ("so harmful, discriminatory, and disruptive as to be unprotected"), and effectively removing workers' legal right to engage in science-based discussion of whether a 50/50 gender ratio is the appropriate goal.

You don't have a legal right to engage in science-based discussion of anything at your workplace! Damore's claim is subtly different. He relies on the fact that you do, under the NLRA, have the right to organize to change workplace conditions . But your right to do that is enforceable only through the NLRB, is an exception to at-will employment, and is trumped by federal and state EEO laws. When employee organizing c…

If we have a legal right to discuss something at work, we should also have a legal right to a science-based discussion of that topic.

The Advice Memo seems to agree that discussion of Google's diversity program was protected speech, until it strayed into scientific findings that some people found offensive.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#223

Post by kylemurph »

ThomPete wrote: post #202
TulliusCicero wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If his memo had been exclusively about discrimination against conservatives, he wouldn't have been fired in the first place. The obvious reason Google fired him is that he was now poison in terms of working with others, especially women, because he was saying that women as a whole were either less suited or less inclined to be engineers.

Less inclined (which was what he said) can be tested factually are you saying that it's ok to be fired to state something factually correct?

If it makes your coworkers uncomfortable, yes.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#224

Post by GuiA »

scaryclam wrote: post #88
bjourne wrote: post #27

I don't agree with Damore's message. But Google cultivated an environment were open discussion were encouraged. So firing him for stating his opinion is truly, hypocritical bullshit. People should get fired for not doing their jobs -- not for writing what they think. And I also want to say that before you blame "the Left" for Google's behavior... Had he been fired in "Socialist Europe," the firing would have been dec…

No, here in "socialist Europe" he'd have been fired as well. He broke clear company rules and made the working environment hostile for others. That's not acceptable over here the same was as it's not in the US. However, had he written this out on a personal blog, or just has an adult conversation with HR I believe he'd had been safe on both sides of the pond. People don't just get fired for not doing their jobs. If I…

> No, here in "socialist Europe" he'd have been fired as well.

That's an extremely strong claim that does not match my experience and will highly depend on the company, which country in Europe, etc. For instance I've seen explicitly sexist things happening in French companies, and have had many more related to me by friends and family. My mother works for a large European oil company, and has witnessed execs telling women in meetings to shut up and go back to being secretaries. None of these examples resulted in firing.

And honestly, while Europe is indeed socialist in many ways policy wise, in many places it is far from as progressive as the coastal US. I'd much rather be LGBTQ in San Francisco or New York than Paris or Barcelona. Hell, I have several European female coworkers who have explicitly told me that they do not intend on ever working there ever again because the culture is significantly more sexist than SF/LA/Seattle/NYC.

But again, Europe is big. Paris or Madrid are much more hostile than Berlin or Stockholm in these ways.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#225

Post by tptacek »

leereeves wrote: post #212
ubernostrum wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is this chilling? There are many much-less-disputed things which are obviously factually true but which, nonetheless, could put you on the hook for harassment depending on how, why, and how often you say them. For example, suppose I have a co-worker who is an ardent believer in the cause of the southern states during the US Civil War. It is factually and indisputably true that the southern states lost that war, a…

A more accurate analogy might be a memo claiming that southerners are poorer than northerners because they lost the Civil War. Would you consider such a memo harassment?

Maybe? Most of the challenges on this thread seem to be premised on the idea that Google needs ironclad justification to terminate an employee. The opposite is true. We have, as conservatives vigorously argued for, at-will employment in pretty much the whole country.

The NLRA will protect your right to improve workplace conditions. The NLRB will not enforce that right if what you're doing isn't really about workplace conditions, or is about a desire to change those conditions to something that might conflict with your employer's requirements under the law.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#226

Post by conanbatt »

leereeves wrote: post #173
tptacek wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He was terminated at Google's discretion under at-will employment, the same standard that might allow you to be fired for coming to work with blue hair. He sought relief under an exception to at-will, the NLRA, which protects concerted action to improve working conditions. The NLRB determined that because the substance of his action involved requests that Google might reasonably determine would be problematic under E…

IMHO, the Advice Memo's conclusion is summarized by this sentence: > Damore's statements about immutable traits linked to sex — such as women’s heightened neuroticism and men’s prevalence at the top of the IQ distribution — were discriminatory and constituted sexual harassment, notwithstanding his effort to cloak his comments with “scientific” references and analysis and notwithstanding “not all women” disclaimers. I…

The great fear around this topic. What would be the consequence if it were scientifically proven that men had a slight biological advantage over women in software engineering?

I sense the mob puts a noise layer because the mob has an opinion of what to do in that case that it doesnt want to accept.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#227

Post by brian-armstrong »

ThomPete wrote: post #202
TulliusCicero wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If his memo had been exclusively about discrimination against conservatives, he wouldn't have been fired in the first place. The obvious reason Google fired him is that he was now poison in terms of working with others, especially women, because he was saying that women as a whole were either less suited or less inclined to be engineers.

Less inclined (which was what he said) can be tested factually are you saying that it's ok to be fired to state something factually correct?

Some of the bits in his memo were pseudoscientific bunk, no better than phrenology. Making a lot of noise about 'facts' doesn't help here, in fact it does the opposite. So it seems your stand here is irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#228

Post by joshuamorton »

tptacek wrote: post #215
leereeves wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, the NLRB isn't settling the science. It's saying that discussion of the science renders otherwise protected speech unprotected ("so harmful, discriminatory, and disruptive as to be unprotected"), and effectively removing workers' legal right to engage in science-based discussion of whether a 50/50 gender ratio is the appropriate goal.

You don't have a legal right to engage in science-based discussion of anything at your workplace! Damore's claim is subtly different. He relies on the fact that you do, under the NLRA, have the right to organize to change workplace conditions . But your right to do that is enforceable only through the NLRB, is an exception to at-will employment, and is trumped by federal and state EEO laws. When employee organizing c…

And I may be reading a bit too much into the "ruling", but I expect that their decision would have held even if employees did have a right to engage in "science based discussion" as GP posits. That's why they cite the Honda ruling. Essentially even if the content is not a-priori problematic, the way it is presented was.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#229

Post by janoc »

bjourne wrote: post #27

I don't agree with Damore's message. But Google cultivated an environment were open discussion were encouraged. So firing him for stating his opinion is truly, hypocritical bullshit. People should get fired for not doing their jobs -- not for writing what they think. And I also want to say that before you blame "the Left" for Google's behavior... Had he been fired in "Socialist Europe," the firing would have been dec…

You are very very wrong. In most of Europe (including here in France with their famously rigid labor code) you can be terminated for pretty much anything as well, with a few exceptions. In many cases the employer doesn't even need to justify the firing. The only difference is that in some countries they may have more paperwork with it than in others and that you may get severance or some other benefits in certain situations.

Moreover, what Damore got fired for would be very likely qualified as a gross misconduct here. He was advocating stuff that would go straight against the anti-discrimination laws which are standard Europa-wide. It could be perhaps qualified even as incitement to hate or discrimination against certain groups of population which is actually a crime - typically used to prosecute racism, antisemitism, hate speech against LGBT groups, etc. but not only.

Hate speech laws are MUCH stricter in Europe than in the US, lots of the stuff that is fair game in the US is routinely prosecuted here. And committing a crime (you don't even need to be convicted yet, being indicted is often sufficient) is a valid reason for termination pretty much anywhere in Europe.

Re: Fired Google Engineer Loses Diversity Memo Challenge

#230

Post by bduerst »

manfredo wrote: post #186
georgemcbay wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Curious, why do you believe in that? Have you evaluated the evidence and come to that conclusion, or is it a priori for you? Curious why you question his belief? All of the half-way reputable studies I've ever heard of have either concluded that there is no difference in male/female intelligence or that there are small differences in certain silos, with men scoring slightly higher on average in visuospatial while w…

The memo did not claim that women were less intelligent. It claimed that women _prefer_ to work in fields other than tech. This is a statement of women's choices, not their ability. It also claimed higher variance, but not overall differences. In other words that there are more men on both sides of the extreme.

>This is a statement of women's choices, not their ability.

Wrong. The memo is poorly worded, but it does make the leap from just preferences to abilities in this sentence, despite not having evidence for the latter:

>>I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership.

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