Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#51

Post by packetslave » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:09 AM UTC

Disclaimer: I have no opinion whatsoever about what this guy did or didn't tweet, or whatever the reason may be that he's no longer at Facebook.

That being said, WOW that's some crap reporting: the only source mentioned in the article is what the guy himself wrote on Twitter. From the bottom: "Facebook and Dail did not immediately respond to requests for comment."

Reuters chose to spin that into "Facebook fires employee who..." Come on, a Journalism 101 teacher would go nuts over a student who wrote that headline with no credible sources.

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#52

Post by m_ke » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:10 AM UTC

Few things to consider:

1. Peter Thiel sits on Facebook's board and was one of its first investors.

2. Thiel donated 1.25 million to Trump's campaign right before the election when it looked like he had no chance of winning.

3. Thiel also donated millions of dollars to Mercer's Super PAC which was funding Cambridge Analytica (which Mercer cofounded with Bannon).

4. Thiel is looking to start a conservative news channel with Mercer.

5. Thiel is an author of great pieces like "The Case Against Affirmative Action" and "The Diversity Myth".

6. Mercer has great opinions like: "...Mercer, for his part, has argued that the Civil Rights Act, in 1964, was a major mistake. According to the onetime Renaissance employee, Mercer has asserted repeatedly that African-Americans were better off economically before the civil-rights movement. (Few scholars agree.) He has also said that the problem of racism in America is exaggerated. The source said that, not long ago, he heard Mercer proclaim that there are no white racists in America today, only black racists. "

7. Theil's Founders Fund has great libertarian projects like Palantir, Space X and Anudril, which have picked up billions worth of government contracts over under this administration.

https://www.axios.com/peter-thiel-the-bridge-between-trump-a...

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/16/technology/peter-thiel-do...

https://mashable.com/2018/03/22/facebook-peter-thiel-cambrid...

https://stanfordmag.org/contents/the-case-against-affirmativ...

https://www.amazon.com/Diversity-Myth-Multiculturalism-Polit...

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/27/the-reclusive-...

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-02-25/peter-thi...

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#53

Post by dvtrn » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:11 AM UTC

mgleitub wrote: post #16

nsainsbury wrote: post #4

I think a key phrase here is "he was dismissed for publicly challenging a colleague’s silence". In other words, he publicly harassed a colleague who (for what could be any number of perfectly valid reasons) preferred not to publicly state their beliefs. That would seem to me to be an eminently reasonable reason to fire someone. If you go around publicly harassing your colleagues to publicly state their political opin…

Indeed -- here is some additional context that the article doesn't provide: The fired employee Tweeted today: >In the interest of transparency, I was let go for calling out an employee’s inaction here on Twitter. I stand by what I said. They didn’t give me the chance to quit [0] He then specifically cited [1] the Tweet in question that was the cause: >I asked @Vjeux to follow @reactjs's lead and add a statement of su…

And he seems from replies and subsequent tweets to still be taking shots at the former coworker. I passively wonder if there wasn’t already some history between the two we just aren’t privy to

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#54

Post by dceddia » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:11 AM UTC

JohnBerea wrote: post #28

dceddia wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The phrase has some history. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_the_looting_starts,_the...

Is the history of that phrase commonly known? That long and detailed Wikipedia Article was only created after Trump said the phrase: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=When_the_looting_...

I must admit, I didn’t know the origin of the phrase when Trump said it. I only learned about it after the fact, and passed on the link here.

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#55

Post by toyg » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:11 AM UTC

holler wrote: post #38

rubber_duck wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He decides because he believes something strongly it permits him to publicly attack someone he works with... Imagine having to deal with this guy in a team when he has a strong opinion on something the team disagrees with ...

Agree. It's endemic of the political and cultural climate we're in right now, where mob rule is becoming the status quo. Personal politics should be just that, personal.

Politics by definition cannot be personal. It's the practice of resolving conflict within society; if you don't interact with society, there is no politics possible.

(Note: this doesn't mean I agree with the behaviour shown in this case - nobody says politics between colleagues must be done over Twitter.)

(edit: sad downvotes without actual logical counterpoint are sad.)

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#56

Post by rmellow » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:12 AM UTC

baby wrote: post #31

JohnBerea wrote: post #5

> Trump’s posts included the racially charged phrase “when the looting starts, the shooting starts” How is that racially charged?

I wish you weren't getting downvoted because I was wondering the same, and I'm happy someone asked so that I could learn the answer.

Seconded. Us non-Americans watching what's going on can't be expected to know something an unremarkable American cop said 50 years ago.

Is it such a well known phrase among Americans or something that most people just learned was a thing?

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#57

Post by baddox » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:12 AM UTC

underwater wrote: post #29

nsainsbury wrote: post #4

I think a key phrase here is "he was dismissed for publicly challenging a colleague’s silence". In other words, he publicly harassed a colleague who (for what could be any number of perfectly valid reasons) preferred not to publicly state their beliefs. That would seem to me to be an eminently reasonable reason to fire someone. If you go around publicly harassing your colleagues to publicly state their political opin…

He called out a colleague, and then when the colleague reached out to him privately so they could discuss, called him out again for not conversing in public on Twitter. I'm sympathetic to his motivations, but his behaviour was unprofessional and unwarranted.

It's a public open-source project. Why shouldn't the response of an open-source project toward a current important movement be conducted in public? It seems to me that the fact that both people are Facebook developers is not particularly relevant. If the other person had not been a Facebook employee, should Facebook have fired this person?

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#58

Post by pnako » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:13 AM UTC

PiggySpeed wrote: post #36

dvtrn wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kill em with kindness. “Thanks for letting me know how you feel about this, I consider this a valuable opinion and think deeply on it”. Then go ahead and do whatever you were going to do anyway, but at least let them know you’ve heard and acknowledged what they had to say. Sometimes folks just want to be acknowledged, that doesn’t seem like too much of a burden.

I this this is a good approach that I've used before. I think it starts to crumble when people start to demand you to do stuff like posting on your social media or showing them donation receipts.

Why not just ignore them?

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#59

Post by packetslave » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:14 AM UTC

packetslave wrote: post #51

Disclaimer: I have no opinion whatsoever about what this guy did or didn't tweet, or whatever the reason may be that he's no longer at Facebook. That being said, WOW that's some crap reporting: the only source mentioned in the article is what the guy himself wrote on Twitter. From the bottom: "Facebook and Dail did not immediately respond to requests for comment." Reuters chose to spin that into "Facebook fires emplo…

edit:

Re: Facebook fires employee for publicly scolding a colleague

#60

Post by dvt » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:14 AM UTC

m_ke wrote: post #52

Few things to consider: 1. Peter Thiel sits on Facebook's board and was one of its first investors. 2. Thiel donated 1.25 million to Trump's campaign right before the election when it looked like he had no chance of winning. 3. Thiel also donated millions of dollars to Mercer's Super PAC which was funding Cambridge Analytica (which Mercer cofounded with Bannon). 4. Thiel is looking to start a conservative news channe…

I'm not sure why your default position is that conservatism is anti-minority. It just seems intellectually lazy. Thiel is a pretty hardcore libertarian, so it makes sense that he looks at the world through a lens of personal responsibility, as opposed to group tribalism. It's merely a question of first principles.

If you disagree, that's fine (and plenty of people do), but accusing him of being racist (or racist-adjacent) is silly. I expect a tad more insight out of HN comments.