James Damore and three others end Google suit • Hacker News Board

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#681

Post by crankylinuxuser » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:21 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #390

Damore was not offered a chance to receive forgiveness by either the company or the outrage mob, therefore I don't respect what people generally have to say about whether what he did was right or wrong. It's astounding that people are still debating this in this very HN thread. A society of any size that makes virtue claims while simultaneously adding an undue price to being wrong or insensitive deserves to be mocked…

Im only posting the memo at hand. I know I didn't read it initially.

https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/3914586/Googles-I...

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#682

Post by username90 » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:21 PM UTC

mokus wrote: post #534

ultrawox wrote: post #491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the modern conservative movement largely is explained by "a group of people that oppose liberalism." That's why you have such a weird coalition of religious groups, older intellectual conservatives, young Republicans, business people, trolls. They really don't have a ton in common, but frankly I get it. I live in the Midwest and while I consider myself an independent, most of my views are moderate or left-win…

This is speculation but it seems like we should inevitably see political factions in the US being defined in this way (and it happens in the Democratic Party too, maybe not in as obvious or extreme a way) as a result of the well-known two-party endgame of our voting system. If your faction isn’t one of the two, your choices are to join one or be irrelevant. So you jump on the bandwagon with whoever you hate least, an…

> and it happens in the Democratic Party too, maybe not in as obvious or extreme a way

Democrats is just as extreme. You have the science part of Democrats who vote for them since Republicans largely rejects science for religious reasons (see evolution etc). Then you have the identity politics part of the Democrats. I am 100% certain that a majority of software engineers doesn't agree with the identity politics parts of the Democrats platform, yet they still vote Democrats since they at least doesn't have the religious fanatics on their side which are even worse.

In countries where you can vote right wing without voting for science denial software engineers tend to vote right wing since it gets them lower taxes. Left wing parties are mostly for people with less money.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#683

Post by catalogia » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:22 PM UTC

AsyncAwait wrote: post #652

catalogia wrote: post #644

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do members of the IDW avoid criticizing Israel because they support Israel, or because they think criticizing Israel would make it too easy for their opponents to label them as antisemites? I don't think there is any way of knowing, but I suspect different individuals listed on that page have different reasons and motivations for saying what they say and not saying what they say. I'd bet on Ben Shapiro genuinely supp…

> Do members of the IDW avoid criticizing Israel because they support Israel, or because they think criticizing Israel would make it too easy for their opponents to label them as antisemites? That I do not know for sure, but isn't their trademark to speak openly regardless of what their opponents would label them as? It's easy to attack college students. If they're afraid to criticism Israel, they can't claim to stan…

> but isn't their trademark to speak openly regardless of what their opponents would label them as?

That's not clear to me, no. To be frank it's not clear to me the 'IDW' categorization has much worth at all if it includes people as diametrically opposed as fervent zionists and antisemitic neonazis. It's a very loose categorization at best.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#684

Post by ausbah » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:23 PM UTC

temporalparts wrote: post #639

I don't understand why people are characterizing his firing as political. If you read his memo, it should be clear that he was fired for being sexist. His memo included a section which stated that women are biologically inferior to men. This immediately makes it very difficult to work with him for women and their allies. I know tech skews male, but software engineers have to interface with many other teams and many o…

well there are some who do believe "biological differences" between the sexes IS the reason for disparities in workforce representation. to them these are the "facts" and people who disagree are those ones politicizing facts and ignoring "truth"

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#685

Post by wpietri » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:23 PM UTC

jariel wrote: post #628

thosakwe wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. I don't recall him ever "asking for forgiveness," or doing anything besides doubling down on his memo. 2. The "outrage mob" isn't real. You know who got James Damore fired? Himself. It's especially telling that you, and people who defend him, attribute zero fault whatsoever to the person who actually wrote the memo.

Damore, trying to make an earnest intellectual contribution, got a lot of people really upset, and they campaigned to have him destroyed. This is the most visceral and obvious example of an outrage mob possible.

Damore's action was explicitly political. Its whole point was that Google was just too darned left, and foolish for being so.

One can't reasonably try to reach a large audience with something intentionally upsetting and then be surprised that those people are in fact upset. Freedom of speech cannot mean freedom from other people's speech.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#686

Post by n4r9 » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:23 PM UTC

JSavageOne wrote: post #408

It's annoying that Bloomberg refers to the memo as being "political" and expressing "political conservatism". The memo was attempting to explain the underrepresentation of women in tech via biological differences. That has literally nothing to do with politics, and framing it as such misrepresents and discredits the contents of the memo.

The memo was undoubtedly political; it claimed that Google has an inherent left-leaning bias and that this blinds it to the facts.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#687

Post by hackissimo123 » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:23 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #459

twomoretime wrote: post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's naive is bending over backwards to pretend that men and women are identical, after millions of years of sexually dimorphic evolution. It's absurd that this is even a debate in our society. Scientific? Everything we know about genetics, hormones, and psychology clearly points to gendered differences and if you objectively look at the data, at the very least you must concede that you cannot conflate inequality o…

It's absurd but, by and large, people don't actually care about science, let alone understand it. They may occasionally appreciate the rewards of science, but only when it makes them happy. When it sends a negative signal, people are quick to ignore science, or only pay attention to tidbits of science that reinforces their world view. It's not even a question of intelligence. Smart people all the time, including on t…

> Damore might have been granted some more understanding if he had presented his memo to some scientists. Even then, there would have been a high probability that he would have been told to hush-hush or be asked to leave.

FYI, here are responses to Damore's memo from a few different scientists with relevant expertise: https://quillette.com/2017/08/07/google-memo-four-scientists...

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#688

Post by wpietri » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:24 PM UTC

abstractbarista wrote: post #676

jariel wrote: post #628

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damore, trying to make an earnest intellectual contribution, got a lot of people really upset, and they campaigned to have him destroyed. This is the most visceral and obvious example of an outrage mob possible.

I feel bad for anyone who disagrees with this. Their bias prevents them from seeing the world as it truly exists.

I feel bad for anyone who believes that their political opinions just happen to represent "the world as it truly exists".

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#689

Post by _57jb » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:24 PM UTC

AsyncAwait wrote: post #571

ravenstine wrote: post #390

Damore was not offered a chance to receive forgiveness by either the company or the outrage mob, therefore I don't respect what people generally have to say about whether what he did was right or wrong. It's astounding that people are still debating this in this very HN thread. A society of any size that makes virtue claims while simultaneously adding an undue price to being wrong or insensitive deserves to be mocked…

I am going to be honest, I consider myself on the left side of the spectrum, but I am disgusted by the outrage culture on Twitter etc. Besides censorship, I believe it's a tactic by neoliberal types to pretend to be on the left by virtue signaling, but not actually addressing any of the economics I care about, (medicare for all, free college etc.), so I actually agree with you there. That being said, what I also disl…

Your last line invalidates everything you just said.

The point is not whether he is deemed unpopular or takes a risk....the idea is that the ability to have that conversation should be honored. It is a debate and if there is an argument to be made, let it be made.

If the majority disagree that is their right but respecting the fact someone has a differing opinion is the point.

"Great minds think alike....lesser minds seldom differ".

Let's take your statement and apply it to something else. Are you indicating the early women of the #MeToo movement got what they deserved for speaking up about the disgusting acts committed against them in the early days? The ones whose careers were destroyed?

This cuts both ways and what we are looking for is balance.

Re: James Damore and three others end Google suit

#690

Post by oh_sigh » Sat, May 09, 2020, 5:24 PM UTC

rbanffy wrote: post #504

lonelappde wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damore was character assassinated via leaks and libel, yes. Pragmatically, he could have prevented his fate if he took the opportunity to back down when challenged by corporate, instead of defending his right to free honest speech at a megacorp. He erroneously thought that because controversial party-line free-speech was job-safe even when intellectually dishonest, that controversial anti-party-line free speech was a…

The character assassination weapon was his own memo and opinions, stated over and over by himself. It's character suicide.

The repeated false claims about statements in the memo and abbreviated versions shared don't count as character assassination?