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Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

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Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#571

Post by happyguy43 »

dang wrote: post #518
sebastos wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your vision for the future of America sounds incredible, how can I sign up? Seriously, I had never thought about it before but just dividing everybody up into high-school cliques that openly loathe each other, with no pretense of a common societal fabric... you should give speeches. This is a message people need to hear. Can I find any more of your writing on this topic? I, and I'm sure many others, want to hear more…

Please don't feed an egregious comment by replying like this. That breaks the site guidelines as well: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html .

Why is this meta post on the front page: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16409768?

I thought meta posts were a “weed” https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16370081

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#572

Post by scarface74 »

birken wrote: post #342
manfredo wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work in the Bay Area and I have personally worked with (as in, on the same team with and working directly in cooperation. CEOs, founders, etc. are not included in this count), exactly one person who discussed their conservative views. This is in comparison to hundreds of liberals. Sure, you may be able to identify at least one person on variety of ends of the political spectrum, but I don't think anyone can sanely…

Just to counter this anecdata, the startup I used to work at was founded by 4 conservatives, 2 of whom met working in the George W Bush White House. We used to discuss and debate all sorts of politic topics, and in fact I was quite often in the minority (a position that didn't bother me... it was a good way to learn different perspective on some key issues). They were then and I'm sure still now are quite openly cons…

There are different types of people that call themselves conservative. The Bush's were both pro-business conservatives, but never really expoused the type of populism that Trump does. You could admit in polite company that you supported the Bushes, or Romney. You really can't admit that you support Trump in polite company without being judged harshly.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#573

Post by masterleep »

refurb wrote: post #535
adventured wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that supposedly San Francisco's ideology would be extremely favorable to taking superior care of the homeless vs more conservative cities. The actual results, are that SF does an extraordinarily mediocre job at it. SF is an affluent city, with a homeless problem consisting of 5,000 people, and they're unwilling to fix it financially. They can afford to, and they refuse to. It's disgusting.

That's what gets me. In SF you have a huge liberal majority and is a wealthy city. This is in a state with a liberal majority. Yet the social problems in SF are probably some of the worst in the US. It's pretty shocking.

Your observation is consistent with the belief that progressive policies are not the answer.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#574

Post by [deleted] »

s73v3r_ wrote: post #557
bsbechtel wrote: post #519

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brendan Eich, James Damore?

Brendan Eich lost his job because he supported a campaign whose sole purpose was that of bigotry and hate. After doing so, he could not be seen as an effective leader, because many other companies did not want to work with Mozilla.

[deleted]

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#575

Post by scarface74 »

manfredo wrote: post #467
door3 wrote: post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does conservatism mean to you? When you say 'conservative', what beliefs are you describing?

These terms are ambiguous and have fluid meaning. But in general, anything on the Republican party platform, or supported by a substantial portion of Republicans or self-identified conservatives, is something I would consider part of mainstream conservatism. Quick examples include: * That affirmative action should be illegal or more heavily restricted. * That unlawful residents should be removed from the country, eve…

Until Trump, you never heard the anti-immigration, anti-trade rhetoric from mainstream elected conservatives.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#576

Post by dang »

sebastos wrote: post #560
dang wrote: post #518

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't feed an egregious comment by replying like this. That breaks the site guidelines as well: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html .

Apologies. I guess the nature of these threads is that everybody jumps in thinking that they're above all the bickering, then promptly and utterly fail to rise above it. Reminds me of those emails that accidentally bcc the entire company, only to have thousands of idiots reply-all with "please remove me from this list", followed by even more idiots reply-all'ing "DON'T REPLY ALL". Anyway, mea culpa. Thanks for modera…

Much appreciated!

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#577

Post by manfredo »

s73v3r_ wrote: post #513
manfredo wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it? I've never witnessed a Bay Area tech company state that their under representation of women and minorities is due to a different distribution of preferences in these groups as compared to men and whites & Asians. On the contrary, in some tech companies doing this appears to be a fireable offense. Also, the point is not that less conservatives are in tech companies is the issue. I am under no illusion that prob…

I don’t hear the tech companies saying it, but go into the comment section here on any story related to those things, and it will definitely come up as a very popular opinion. And not too long ago, hell, even currently in some places, it was considered a mainstream conservative view that gays should not have the same rights to marry. If a person holding that view were to work at, say, Grindr, I would absolutely expec…

This isn't contradicting anything I claimed. If anything, it's reinforcing it. Pointing out the disparity between the prevalence of conservative views (or at least, views that go against the majority in big Bay Area tech companies) on HN vs. in real life reinforces the notion that many tech workers are having to censor themselves and lie to their co-workers to fit in at work.

Marc Andressen said something similar in an interview, I'm going to dig it up and post it here as an edit. Here it is, the relevant bits are around 28 minutes: https://a16z.com/2017/05/15/andreessen-primack-dc-tech-polic...

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#578

Post by stevebmark »

huffpopo wrote: post #52
nodesocket wrote: post #15

I recently moved (fled) from downtown San Francisco to Nashville TN and couldn't be happier. I lived in SF for over 5 years, and there is absolutely a mass exodus of people and engineers leaving the bay area because of extreme ideology, hypocrisy, constant outrage, and the echo chamber that engulfs everything. Downtown San Francisco is a great place to visit for a few days but no place to start and raise a family.

I left SF before the election, I could tell early on that Trump was going to win and figured free speech clampdowns in SV would follow and I knew my work was going to be affected. I worked in search and I remember the scandal within the industry when Yahoo accepted money from the Chinese government to censor pages on the 2008 tainted milk scandal. They charged $10K per link. At the time Google was seen as a beacon of…

I'm saddened every time I hear the perceived narrative of the "attack on free speech", the false cry of persecution from those who aren't persecuted. Some rally around this belief, even want to believe, their rights are being threatened or taken away from them. Free speech is not under attack. There is no "clampdown." Echo chamber? Sure, probably. Preference for liberal over conservative views? Of course. Some sort of systemic "attack" on "free speech?" Unrealistic at best.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#579

Post by TheAdamAndChe »

rmrm wrote: post #570
TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #554

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There might be other logical reasons that they are in power, but even knowing that affirmative action made their sex or race a factor and that my biology would work against me if I were to apply for their position is enough to make me jealous and bitter about it. I think affirmative action sows divides because of it, and is probably counterproductive nowadays. If discrimination based on race or sex is bad, then why i…

I can speak from my own experience only as I dont study the statistics, but in 20 years of work as a white male I can categorically say ate that my race and gender has never been a hindrance in my career progression. I dont doubt the possibility exists, but I do not based on my network feel its to any noticeable degree. As in, I havent ever observed it happen, as a hiring manager myself or by a hiring manager. As to…

> its clearly in response to a multigenerational systemic suppression of certain classes.... I continue to see firsthand much more of the lingering slights and biases against certain classes and groups, that affect their career and their inclusion, than I ever have any anti white male sentiment or anti white male advancent credo.

This statement shows a big divide between our worldviews. You believe that they fail to succeed in our country because they are part of a disadvantaged group, while I believe it's because they either 1) lack the money to earn social status signals required to start a career(degree, social network), or 2) their culture prevents success. There are plenty of disadvantaged white folk who are held back by those two issues too, yet mainstream media calls them "privileged" because they happen to be white, despite the fact that they grew up poor, live in an economically depressed area, work manual labor, and have a culture that doesn't strive for more.

Sure, historic racism would explain why the divides aren't symmetrical, but I think the whole nation would be better if our politicians would focus on economics instead of identity politics.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#580

Post by [deleted] »

dang wrote: post #518
sebastos wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your vision for the future of America sounds incredible, how can I sign up? Seriously, I had never thought about it before but just dividing everybody up into high-school cliques that openly loathe each other, with no pretense of a common societal fabric... you should give speeches. This is a message people need to hear. Can I find any more of your writing on this topic? I, and I'm sure many others, want to hear more…

Please don't feed an egregious comment by replying like this. That breaks the site guidelines as well: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html .

[deleted]
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