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On Resigning from Google

alphabetworkers.org

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Re: On Resigning from Google

#111
The oil and gas industry is essential to the well being of billions of people. It's literally the fuel for the world’s economy.

Without it we would have substantially less food, travel would be all but impossible, and the technology sector would grind to a halt.

Eliminating the industry would cause harm on a scale the world has never seen. An entirely predictable and preventable catastrophe done in the name of a naive environmental absolutism.

Maybe let’s come up with solutions that don’t require pushing millions of people into poverty because they can no longer heat their homes or grow their food.

Also FWIW, the moral accountability argument here is pretty shaky reasoning. A great many people use Google products for evil. That doesn’t make Google morally responsible for it.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#113
post #26

Random thoughts: 1. I applaud the fact that they are actually quitting the company to voice their disapproval of these policies. In my mind all the "internal activism" happening at Google and others is massively hypocritical. One cannot publicly criticize a company while enjoying cushy paychecks fueled by those very activities they despise. 2. If they think Google is discriminatory towards LGBT employees and minoriti…

Strikes are more effective than unorganized internal advocacy and quitting. They force management to consider the viewpoint of workers or they lose control and money.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#114

The solution to climate change is not to make energy producers like oil and gas companies go out of business. The way these companies became so successful was by providing something of value at a low cost. Do you really want to pay substantially more for heating/cool, gas, and almost every good? Instead, the Tesla model is the way to go. Build products that are 10x better than their fossil fuel reliant competitors. T…

> Do you really want to pay substantially more for heating/cool, gas, and almost every good?

Until carbon taxes become ubiquitous, this seems like the only viable option to combat climate change. The current model is functionally subsidizing goods and energy at the cost of future and current environmental damage. While I certainly agree that government solutions (carbon taxes, subsidies for clean energy) are optimal, they are not currently in place - that they may someday does not excuse inaction (or actively damaging action) in the present day.

Improving alternatives and choosing not to support fossil fuel companies are not mutually exclusive.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#115
post #26

Random thoughts: 1. I applaud the fact that they are actually quitting the company to voice their disapproval of these policies. In my mind all the "internal activism" happening at Google and others is massively hypocritical. One cannot publicly criticize a company while enjoying cushy paychecks fueled by those very activities they despise. 2. If they think Google is discriminatory towards LGBT employees and minoriti…

https://i0.wp.com/thenib.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/mist...

That oversimplifies things a bit — leaving a company is not as extreme as "leaving society".

Re: On Resigning from Google

#116
post #39
post #26

Random thoughts: 1. I applaud the fact that they are actually quitting the company to voice their disapproval of these policies. In my mind all the "internal activism" happening at Google and others is massively hypocritical. One cannot publicly criticize a company while enjoying cushy paychecks fueled by those very activities they despise. 2. If they think Google is discriminatory towards LGBT employees and minoriti…

Strongly disagree. > In my mind all the "internal activism" happening at Google and others is massively hypocritical. One cannot publicly criticize a company while enjoying cushy paychecks fueled by those very activities they despise. Absolutely incorrect. Paychecks have nothing to do with whether you as a person find the company's policies palatable or not. Google employees provide a lot more value to Google than th…

> Paychecks have nothing to do with whether you as a person find the company's policies palatable or not

The very reason Google is paying employees is that they are contributing to the company's goals, either directly or indirectly. So it isn't really Google the abstract entity that is causing climate change, it is all the employees working under the "Google" banner — including the people complaining about climate change. That is what is hypocritical.

For the second part — "have them STFU" is a bit extreme, but I think Google does have the right to be held to a similar standard than the companies they are competing with and the rest of the country/world. If the response every time they make some progress is "you aren't going far enough!" - even though they are miles ahead of everyone else - eventually they'll just stop making the effort altogether.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#117
post #71

I’m guessing they made enough money from google to retire. I’d imagine any company that may hire him would look at this website and probably pass on them.

Ha, right? Easy to talk about morality and such after they’ve already cashed out.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#118
post #83
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consider what happens if everyone who has a moral complaint about their employer immediately quits rather than staying around and attempting to chase the complaint up the management hierarchy and/or educate and organize other employees to voice the complaint. I think utilizing one's power as a worker and aligning other workers to increase workers' power is far from hypocritical. It's a great way (perhaps the only rel…

> Consider what happens if everyone who has a moral complaint about their employer immediately quits This is in fact the quickest way to ensure that this behavior immediately stops

It's really not. This decision is a very personal one unique to each employee. Internal activism can be very effective especially if done in a way that gets more attention among existing employees. On the other hand, this is extremely risky to their employment (and in America that means their housing and healthcare) and on top of that it's a ton of work.

It's great when someone who quits has the resources to also try to bring some attention to the reasons why.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#119

> Attacks like this were an attack on people’s jobs and physical security: if you can strip a reform-oriented pastor of their PCUSA ordination, you also strip them of their employment and their health insurance If I'm understanding correctly, the argument with regard to "physical security" is that if you try to get someone fired, which would result in them losing their employer-provided health insurance, that they wo…

I actually feel this way about attacks on employment in general, so I'll try to give some quick context about the belief.

I grew up in a lower-middle-class household. We declared bankruptcy once when I was young, and I was told to prepare to have "strangers come and take away furniture" (which, thankfully, never materialized). I never went hungry, but we did live paycheck-to-paycheck and frequently relied on the charity of our extended family to make ends meet. In short, money stress was a thing, and it was obvious from a very young age.

So I consider an attack on someone's employment to be a very serious road to go down because:

- Most people don't have savings, and it isn't necessarily their fault.

- Not everyone has a support structure, we were immensely lucky to have wealthy and generous relatives.

- 4 weeks of unemployment is plenty of time for bills to pile up if someone doesn't have savings, I've taken longer than 4 weeks to find a job every time I've looked.

- COBRA is insanely expensive and may be required if, for example, a close relative is very sick. Fighting with an insurance company as an individual is immensely difficult and interrupting someone's care to have that fight can be life-threatening.

- Desperation breeds poor decision making. That individual may take a pay cut or change careers and never recover.

- The various social consequences of being fired can make finding a job extra difficult.

Basically, I've seen my own family one fail-safe away from disaster, so its easy to imagine the bottom. In fact, that money stress from my childhood has haunted me as an adult -- even though I've never needed to worry about it from a factual standpoint.

I don't have any of these concerns if the individual is obviously wealthy, and I wouldn't go so far as to say one should never try to have anyone fired. But I do personally believe the bar to do so is very high.

Note: I'm not interested in convincing anyone of my point of view. Just giving context for why people think like this.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#120
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay thank you for your input. We'll continue to fight for the rights of everyone who is being discriminated against. You should learn more about intersectional activism :)

Please do, but doing so in the name of LGBTQ+ and not simply as a fellow human/coworker is hurting the label, as @maps said.

Learn about intersectionality.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersectionality

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