Live data from Hacker News

One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

bloomberg.com

31–40 of 603 posts

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#31
post #19
post #11

How about everyone goes to work and does their job and goes home. You can believe X, I can believe Y, and both of us believe Z, but XYZ doesn’t have anything to do with doing our jobs so we shouldn’t let it prevent us from doing our jobs. Super cool that everyone likes their own things though, I support liking things unrelated to job, just weird that people demand that their job adheres to whatever weird thing they l…

How do you square that with stuff like whether your company should, for example, support same sex partner benefits, trans inclusive healthcare, prayer rooms, etc?

The company must provide benefits required by law. Everything else is discretionary.

What’s definitely optional is for a company to take a stance on a political issue just because a vocal minority of their employees demands that.

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#32
post #29

At our company if the HR goes through your social media, and finds any evidence you may be socially activist or virtue signaling or otherwise very loudly proclaiming your disapproval of something some entity is doing, you will not be hired. You will not even get a call back. You will be labeled as a potential troublemaker (not in the good way) and be placed on the blacklist.

And what if you do not give HR access to your social media?

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#33
post #11

How about everyone goes to work and does their job and goes home. You can believe X, I can believe Y, and both of us believe Z, but XYZ doesn’t have anything to do with doing our jobs so we shouldn’t let it prevent us from doing our jobs. Super cool that everyone likes their own things though, I support liking things unrelated to job, just weird that people demand that their job adheres to whatever weird thing they l…

> You can believe X, I can believe Y, and both of us believe Z, but XYZ doesn’t have anything to do with doing our jobs so we shouldn’t let it prevent us from doing our jobs.

It's easy to say this if your coworker likes football and you think sports are dumb.

But what if your coworker likes attending KKK rallies and you're African-American? Or your co-worker is out there on the weekend holding signs that say "Death to Gays" and you just happen to be gay?

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#34
post #24
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you square that with stuff like whether your company should, for example, support same sex partner benefits, trans inclusive healthcare, prayer rooms, etc?

> same sex partner benefits, trans inclusive healthcare Aren't things like this governed by local laws? In Canada we have private insurance for things above and beyond basic health care, but only the government gets to decide who is a partner, dependant, etc... > prayer rooms Are they going to build chapels for every religion? Who decides which religions get chapels or prayer rooms? Or does only 1 religion get a pray…

The reference may be to the fact that Amazon (for example) provided only space for Muslims to have prayer rooms, but no one else.

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#35
post #11

How about everyone goes to work and does their job and goes home. You can believe X, I can believe Y, and both of us believe Z, but XYZ doesn’t have anything to do with doing our jobs so we shouldn’t let it prevent us from doing our jobs. Super cool that everyone likes their own things though, I support liking things unrelated to job, just weird that people demand that their job adheres to whatever weird thing they l…

> just weird that people demand that their job adheres to whatever weird thing they like

What about "weird" things like not being comfortable with taking on a new project with the military that ultimately helps kill people, or amassing as much personal data on the entire population as the NSA?

I mostly agree with your sentiment on the surface. Dont talk politics or religion at work, do your job, and things usually go just fine. But life is way too complex to label individuals' moral objections to employers crossing into controversial territory as weird.

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#36
post #33
post #11

How about everyone goes to work and does their job and goes home. You can believe X, I can believe Y, and both of us believe Z, but XYZ doesn’t have anything to do with doing our jobs so we shouldn’t let it prevent us from doing our jobs. Super cool that everyone likes their own things though, I support liking things unrelated to job, just weird that people demand that their job adheres to whatever weird thing they l…

> You can believe X, I can believe Y, and both of us believe Z, but XYZ doesn’t have anything to do with doing our jobs so we shouldn’t let it prevent us from doing our jobs. It's easy to say this if your coworker likes football and you think sports are dumb. But what if your coworker likes attending KKK rallies and you're African-American? Or your co-worker is out there on the weekend holding signs that say "Death t…

Or management wants to help a foreign government trample its citizens' human rights?

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#37
post #11

How about everyone goes to work and does their job and goes home. You can believe X, I can believe Y, and both of us believe Z, but XYZ doesn’t have anything to do with doing our jobs so we shouldn’t let it prevent us from doing our jobs. Super cool that everyone likes their own things though, I support liking things unrelated to job, just weird that people demand that their job adheres to whatever weird thing they l…

I generally agree. Just like a cashier at Chick-fil-a doesn’t necessarily condone the company’s religious and political beliefs. From personal experience, I work for a big tech company which very publicly says it stands for certain things and the CEO recently has been going around saying a lot of political things. It’s unrelated to the job although it feels like an explicit part of the “company culture”. It doesn’t r…

People have become militarized with activist results like the departure of Brendan Eich. Lines have been blurred. People are making demands sometimes that are unreasonable.

Metoo movement in tech caused expulsions of many heads. Even if unrelated to the job.

Connections to Jeff Epstein is causing people to lose positions.

Political positions of support for Trump is causing customers to take stand against heads.

Where do we draw the line between association and belief and job?

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#38

As an engineer, I revel in avoiding these monolithic supercorps. I don't know why anyone would want to work in centralizing innovation and creativity into the hands of a few greedy people.

Money, "Impact", resources.

This is a very HN comment, but I'm not sure how you can't see why someone would want to work for bigcorp...

Re: One Google Staffer Fired, Two Others Put on Leave Amid Tensions

#39
post #24
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you square that with stuff like whether your company should, for example, support same sex partner benefits, trans inclusive healthcare, prayer rooms, etc?

> same sex partner benefits, trans inclusive healthcare Aren't things like this governed by local laws? In Canada we have private insurance for things above and beyond basic health care, but only the government gets to decide who is a partner, dependant, etc... > prayer rooms Are they going to build chapels for every religion? Who decides which religions get chapels or prayer rooms? Or does only 1 religion get a pray…

> Aren't things like this governed by local laws?

In the US this is governed by a patchwork of federal, state and local laws as well as employer policies.

Post reply on HN