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James Damore and three others end Google suit

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Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#51

Post by conception »

This topic is quickly going downhill in the comments, but I just wanted to clear some stuff up because there seems to be some "what he said isn't that bad!"

People wrongly think he said women are bad or stupid but that's not what he did say. He also didn't -just- say men and women are different.

He did say a 5-10% difference in certain traits is why there are huge discrepancies of women in leadership and science/engineering positions. And maybe that's ok and we should just let it be.

Sorry, but "girls don't like to make hard choices or do 'nerdy' things" isn't a real thing. Hundreds of years of "stay in the kitchen" is what proactive programs to bring women into these positions are trying to reverse. It's not biological.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#52

Post by Ididntdothis »

threeseed wrote: post #31
streamingvac wrote: post #26

[flagged]

Politics doesn't belong in a professional environment. So employees should be avoiding the topic.

I don't like that attitude. We should be able to discuss politics without the need for judging each other.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#53

Post by KungFuJohnny »

azinman2 wrote: post #15
vmception wrote: post #3

I think conversations can be had with people like him, instead of taking the worst part of their views and ostracizing them for it. I think it is fine to acknowledge angst in the implementation of progressive ideals, that angst will often be mixed in with purely insensitive and uneducated thoughts. There are productive outcomes possible by parsing and separating those issues. I think it has been a big mistake of tech…

Except this wasn’t a conversation between people. It was an email blast nobody asked for or opted into.

Much like your post.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#54

Post by waheoo »

devindotcom wrote: post #19
vmception wrote: post #3

I think conversations can be had with people like him, instead of taking the worst part of their views and ostracizing them for it. I think it is fine to acknowledge angst in the implementation of progressive ideals, that angst will often be mixed in with purely insensitive and uneducated thoughts. There are productive outcomes possible by parsing and separating those issues. I think it has been a big mistake of tech…

Not that you're wrong, but this sort of presumes that no conversation was had or attempted. It doesn't seem likely to me that this is so. It sounded to me at the time (if I remember correctly) as if there was a conversation, it broke down, and Damore's response was the document we all saw. It feels more like he simply didn't like the way the conversation was going.

No conversation was had.

James sent a memo (common thing to do) as a draft to a few people for comment. Got fired in about two seconds flat by people who clearly did not even read the thing.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#55

Post by look_lookatme »

azinman2 wrote: post #17
look_lookatme wrote: post #12

Damore does not fit into the neat ideological right or left classification but it would be impossible for an institution like Bloomberg to have nuance on this issue. Just because some deplorable lifted him up doesn't mean he should be defined specifically on an ideological axis. But, of course, who gives a fuck. The rage machine rages on.

But he did become an alt-right / Fox News / conservative machine darling.

And Snowden defected to Russia. Sometimes you just have to go where you are free to state your case and not be shouted down which sometimes means an enemy-of-my-enemy scenario.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#56

Post by ergothus »

daenz wrote: post #16

I remember at a previous job, a female engineer talking to other engineers when the Damore story broke. She said "I can't believe he said that women can't be good engineers" and indicated he deserved to be fired. As someone who actually read what he wrote, I just had to bite my tongue. That's not what he said at all , but even making the distinction makes you one of "them" and politicizes the workplace. It's just dis…

> As someone who actually read what he wrote, I just had to bite my tongue. That's not what he said at all,

As someone that also read it, those arent the words he used, but that is very much what he was saying. A facade of misrepresented psuedoscience doesnt change the intent, motivation, or reality.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#58

Post by streamingvac »

conception wrote: post #40
streamingvac wrote: post #26

[flagged]

Might be how you approach the topic. I hang with some pretty far left folks and no one likes China's government and is pretty open about it. Might just be your circle. You could ask them I guess?

Hmm yeah maybe I should. Because my coworkers don’t mind making crude jokes and personal attacks on the president. Yet they shrink when I bring up CCP

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#59

Post by BurningFrog »

streamingvac wrote: post #42
threeseed wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Politics doesn't belong in a professional environment. So employees should be avoiding the topic.

My coworkers have no problem discussing Donald trump and republicans. They laugh about our president a lot. Yet when I bring up the Chinese government, silence could be heard.

Are they discussing politics or bonding over their contempt of Trump?

Those are quite different things.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#60

Post by exogeny »

daenz wrote: post #16

I remember at a previous job, a female engineer talking to other engineers when the Damore story broke. She said "I can't believe he said that women can't be good engineers" and indicated he deserved to be fired. As someone who actually read what he wrote, I just had to bite my tongue. That's not what he said at all , but even making the distinction makes you one of "them" and politicizes the workplace. It's just dis…

This view to me is just as tone deaf at Damore's piece itself.

Whether or not you agree or disagree, it clearly had an impact of making a very large and significant segment of female employees at Google feel as if they were biologically inferior or otherwise not suited to do their jobs. You can sit here and say "Oh, that's nuts, that's not what he said" - but you're also not hearing the same internalized misogyny and bias that a LOT of female engineers are, day after day, at every company they've ever been at. He should have known it had the potential to have that impact, so I have approximately zero sympathy in that regard; what his true intentions are/were is irrelevant.

I would bet any number that the largest cohort of people who are baffled by the reaction to his memo are white men. I'm sure it's not even close.

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