Earlier quoted context omitted.
Probably a company with an above-average amount of moral character amongst its development staff.
There is little reason to believe that. It could just as likely be sour grapes.
We can agree to disagree.
Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
61–70 of 134 posts
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
A couple of honest questions coming in. I would very much like to engage in a good faith conversation with you. > ... unwilling to represent the failings your company has done to society, then I need to hear a justification before moving further in the conversation. I'm going to replace 'company' with 'organization'. Do you harbor similar opinions about people who have previously or currently work for a federal gover…
I work in the security org now, and so I deal with a lot of exmilitary and exfederal employees. Considering that the military is a institution in this country that helps a lot of working class kids get education and training... It really comes down to choices and consent for me. If you're in the military, that may have been the option for an 18 year old and certainly I wasn't thinking about ethics when I was 18. But…
[deleted]
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
I hope so. I wish I could give more information but maybe it's best to keep names out considering the context ;)
I mean, without knowing anything about you or your company other than what you posted above, it's hard to say. But in my experience the industry could use more morality based hiring standards, as well as morality-based repercussions for bad behavior. Kudos to you.
A little odd patting someone on the back for claims with no substance. It’s easy to make up a story with all sorts of feel-good ingredients to virtue signal in a thread about a bad guy. If it was all unicorns and butterflies, why not name the company so the morally-aligned folk can find safe haven?
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
A couple of honest questions coming in. I would very much like to engage in a good faith conversation with you. > ... unwilling to represent the failings your company has done to society, then I need to hear a justification before moving further in the conversation. I'm going to replace 'company' with 'organization'. Do you harbor similar opinions about people who have previously or currently work for a federal gover…
I work in the security org now, and so I deal with a lot of exmilitary and exfederal employees. Considering that the military is a institution in this country that helps a lot of working class kids get education and training... It really comes down to choices and consent for me. If you're in the military, that may have been the option for an 18 year old and certainly I wasn't thinking about ethics when I was 18. But…
I'd like to point out a few things.
First, the military is not a socialist organization, because the workers (soldiers) do not own the means of production. They don't have a say on where they fight and who they fight. The military is an arm of the bourgeoisie and is guided by the whims of those in power, not the people within the rank and file of the military or those who go and die.
Second, Yes, the military provides recruits with opportunities (e.g. postsecondary education, etc). But would they join the military without those incentives? i.e. If everyone had their basic needs met through redistribution of wealth, would they choose to go into the military? It's more like that they join the military, because it's one of the few ways of getting out of their economic situation. It's a form of coercion. It's the carrot that gets them to join the military institution.
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not to defend the op, since I think they're taking a particularly hard line, but qualifying candidates based on their previous work is just something that happens. I've personally been disqualified because I've worked at a legal, but "vice" based company - I've seen others not hired because their previous company was too "legacy", even though they did very similar work. It's not necessarily right, but companies use t…
I'd like to emphasize the nature of the answer which was a defensive "I was just following orders". At that point, I was conducting dozens of interviews a year, and I think that sort of question came up... maybe three times? One of those people was from a medical company with a very large and very embarrassing contemporary incident, and the interviewee and I talked about development process problems. In fact, they ad…
exactly this... I think there are more factors at play than “Didn’t you think about what you were doing?” such as, maybe they have a family they have to provide for and they actually like the people they work with and what they do it’s just Jim from sales all of the sudden suggests a feature that’s unethical but the company believes it’s the thing to build... at some point, leadership should be blamed, not the engineer who just implemented it so they can go home to their spouse.
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
I work in the security org now, and so I deal with a lot of exmilitary and exfederal employees. Considering that the military is a institution in this country that helps a lot of working class kids get education and training... It really comes down to choices and consent for me. If you're in the military, that may have been the option for an 18 year old and certainly I wasn't thinking about ethics when I was 18. But…
While you have a point about 18yo, it is very difficult to overlook the main job of the military: kill people. NSA flies below the radar or at least used to, but it is very difficult to not notice that the US military mostly come to foreign countries and kill people there. Even if you are a teenager. However, with FB it is less obvious due to their fancy talk about community and shit. I understand your outrage about…
>While you have a point about 18yo, it is very difficult to overlook the main job of the military: kill people.
Yes. And I have never been faced with someone with a long military career. If they were interviewing straight out of a long career, it would definitely fit into the "senior person" context as mentioned.
It's a tough question, for sure, but I don't think I would be able to shy away from it. I guess we'll find out if I'm ever in that position... I should probably prepare for if that ever happens.
My stance on this has been getting firmer and firmer the more senior I get. I honestly wonder if I'd have the presence or guts required to ask that hard of a question.
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is absolutely fair. When I ask people coming from Amazon why they left, I am very carefully listening to whether they like how Amazon treats its people or not. If I were interviewing an ex-Facebook employee, I'd want to hear some discomfort with Facebook's ethics.
Not sure if it's reasonable to expect people to badmouth their current employer in an interview, especially when you don't know the result of the interview.
The last ex-Amazonian I interviewed managed to express his discomfort with Amazon without "badmouthing" anything or anyone. I was impressed with his diplomacy. We hired him.
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
Exactly why we have interview problems in engineering. I respect engineers for having opinions and ethics and they should lean on them, but to bar one from employment because they were doing their job is wrong, immoral, and potentially illegal.
How would it be illegal? Doctors are often required to attest their ethics before doing a job.
But engineers are not. There are jurisdictions that this could be framed as discriminatory. Not in the US, but other markets.
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
I hope so. I wish I could give more information but maybe it's best to keep names out considering the context ;)
I mean, without knowing anything about you or your company other than what you posted above, it's hard to say. But in my experience the industry could use more morality based hiring standards, as well as morality-based repercussions for bad behavior. Kudos to you.
Frankly, because I just shit on Facebook in a public place around the hiring topic. These are all sensitive subjects.
And it would REALLY be shitty if some hack blogger posted the context-destroying "FooCo refusing to hire Facebook employees because of ethics concern"
Re: Facebook staffer sends 'blood on my hands' memo
#70I've taken a hard line with people who work at Facebook. If you're still there and unwilling to represent the failings your company has done to society, then I need to hear a justification before moving further in the conversation. I don't think I've ever felt this strongly about a tech company. I know that's tough but it's a matter of ethics. And frankly, Facebook is an amazing technical institution, and I would lov…
A couple of honest questions coming in. I would very much like to engage in a good faith conversation with you. > ... unwilling to represent the failings your company has done to society, then I need to hear a justification before moving further in the conversation. I'm going to replace 'company' with 'organization'. Do you harbor similar opinions about people who have previously or currently work for a federal gover…
If you're hiring someone, it seems reasonable to ask about someone's ethical considerations to make sure they're in line with your company's. You're going to put a certain amount of trust in them. I, too, would be skeptical of hiring someone who didn't even recognize the tension of working for Uber or Facebook and both the good and bad things they have put into the world. I'm also not sure I'd draw such as hard line as OP, but I get where the line of questioning comes from.
I have worked for companies that do things I disagree with. I've thought about it and come to terms with it, even as I have expressed my disagreements when I believed it made sense to do so. I'd be happy to hire someone in a similar situation, because it shows they at least are aware that their work has ethical considerations.