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Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

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Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#331

Post by iratewizard »

monoideism wrote: post #142
nemo44x wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s generally a small but vocal group. And I wouldn’t call it politics so much as activism. A sort of religious zeal has made its way into our institutions like schools and universities. Some people have taken to it like a missionary would religion and believe it’s their duty to spread the word everywhere at all times. The Inquisition was no different in this regard. You just have to read what the activism says. It…

> It’s far beyond politics and more a religion than anything. I believe this is a result of the fact that Americans have turned away from organized religion in recent years (note: I'm not religious myself). There seems to be something deep inside of most people that requires a shared spiritual experience. Wokism has emerged to fill that need.

The book Sapiens talks about this well. People have a limited number of relationships they can maintain in their head. The only way societies can form to be larger than that number is shared myth between people. University graduates are in large part taking on the role of clergy in this wokist cult.

The cynical side of me sees it as America being transformed into an economic zone instead of a country. This is just what a religion looks like when you're binding people together in one large brutalistic finance zone.

Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#332

Post by frob »

michaelt wrote: post #200
chii wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you can’t truly be apolitical; that's one of those "you're either with us or against us" type of deal - which is not the right way to deal with anything imho. You _can_ be apolitical - as in, you do not let your political views affect what you do. You keep your political views private. You do not try to change anyone else's political views as part of your job.

IMHO it's job-dependent. For example, can you be a gun shop owner without being pro-gun? Some would say actions speak louder than words. On the other hand, if you own a bakery being apolitical is a lot simpler. Avoid the Masterpiece Cakeshop case and there's as little politics as you'll find anywhere.

It's funny you bring up bakeries. In 1905, the Supreme Court ruled that a NY law limiting daily working hours for bakers was unconstitutional under the 14th amendment (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lochner_v._New_York). The point of the law was to keep overworked and tired bakers from making a mistake and blowing the place up (aerated flour is quite the accelerant). This ruling began the era of the Lochner court during which many of the labor protections we take for granted like child-labor laws and overtime protection were struck down under the 14th. Fortunately, we have since pivoted, but that bakery owner's seemingly benign decision to work his employees a bit harder had massive political ramifications for years.

It's not as easy as one thinks to just steer clear of politics. Just about everything has an impact.

Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#334

Post by _fat_santa »

ldd wrote: post #312

I will offer a personal take on keeping politics out of my 1-man video game company. In theory, I am all for it. I do not use hashtags on twitter, or openly support any ideologies. However, as a light brown dude whose parents immigrated here to Canada, my existence itself is a political statement (in support of legal immigration) that is bound to offend people. I try, to the extent that is possible, to not say politi…

Just keep in mind Twitter is a piss poor reflection of society. There are some radical ideas on Twitter, but ask people in person what they actually think and everyone will sing a different tune.

Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#335

Post by ForHackernews »

Zenbit_UX wrote: post #120

Why is a company wanting to be apolitical is controversial? That should be the default, is this an American thing like how masks and healthcare are controversial? I would expect a government to have proper separation from church and state, so why is it weird to want a company to separate politics and mission? I can't see any good coming from being in a work environment where the company supports a political issue I'm…

Coinbase is not "apolitical". Proof-of-work cryptocurrency is an explicitly libertarian political project and an environmental disaster.

This is just the boring old dodge that "politics I agree with is apolitical, why are you being so controversial!"

Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#336

Post by albedoa »

disposekinetics wrote: post #282
pornel wrote: post #56

This is going to work great for Coinbase. It's very helpful for employers to select for conformists who can be told to shut up, and not stand up for what they believe (unless they believe in the status quo and the company, which is called non-political). Selecting for groupthink^W mission is pretty important in the business of cryptocurrencies. Reduces chances of anyone having a different moral stance that would push…

This all makes Coinbase more attractive to me. I probably won’t be deplatformed no matter my ideology which is a desireable trait.

If Coinbase are more attractive to people who are worried about being "deplatformed" for their ideology, then they are selecting for that group. You write "no matter my ideology" when you mean "despite my ideology".

Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#337

Post by geofft »

Zenbit_UX wrote: post #120

Why is a company wanting to be apolitical is controversial? That should be the default, is this an American thing like how masks and healthcare are controversial? I would expect a government to have proper separation from church and state, so why is it weird to want a company to separate politics and mission? I can't see any good coming from being in a work environment where the company supports a political issue I'm…

Coinbase is a deeply political company already. Here are some political claims that they support that are not universally agreed upon:

- Cryptocurrencies are good and should be legal.

- Private ownership of unrestricted amounts of capital is good.

- Central banks controlling the money supply are bad.

- The ability to send and receive money across borders and avoid capital controls is, in general, good.

- The existence of corporations is good.

- Venture capital is good, as is making money for the stock exchange.

- Reporting large amounts of customer information to federal tax agencies is bad and should be fought in court.

- Spying on individuals on behalf of governments with poor human rights records is bad, and moreover, having supported this work makes you ineligible to be an employee. (This is new as of March 2019; previously, the company did not have a position here.)

Now, these are entirely reasonable positions to take (in the sense that they're well within the Overton window, at least in the US), but they're absolutely political positions! (If it helps, note that the negation of all of these is a political claim.)

I'd understand the argument if it's something like "I don't want my company to mandate that I support expanded bike lanes on Market St." or whatever, but it's very silly to pretend that a company doesn't have a mission in the world or that its mission doesn't have political aspects. If you don't agree that cryptocurrency is making a positive difference in the world, why are you even there?

(And even so, I think it would be entirely rational for the company to say, "It's okay if individual employees disagree, but as a company, expanded bike lanes on Market St. is important to our business because it's how half the company commutes to work.")

Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#338

Post by hnrodey »

cblconfederate wrote: post #159
kkhire wrote: post #65

I’ve never worked in the Bay Area, so could just be OOL but I’m genuinely surprised that this is such a big deal, or that this blog post got so much praise. Never discussed politics at any of the companies I’ve worked for, we were always too busy with...work!

I often wonder about the other side: Why do people who work in SV seem so militant on political issues? After all they live in a very privileged space (or "bubble") which is severely disconnected from the reality of most of the Earth, and even nearby american cities. I don't know enough about the demographics of the region and what can drive this behaviour but it is full of contradictions. For example, while they all…

>After all they live in a very privileged space (or "bubble")

It's my personal view that so much of the current political vitriol is because as a society, we've run out of things to worry about. We've reached critical mass of people solving Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs and therefore, we are dwelving in to other arenas where we are feeling neglected.

Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#339

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

sdfqasdghj2 wrote: post #283
dkdk8283 wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked at a media company with a reach of 400 million ADI. We had internal meetings more or less instructing employees how to vote. Our hand curated content intentionally catered to this same narrative. It was completely politically biased. I was hired when the company was neutral but over the years the extreme left narrative settled in and we tended to only hire people with the same ideologies. Executive discussio…

> We had internal meetings more or less instructing employees how to vote. Is that legal?

Yes, unfortunately. Most states don't have any law against employers politically pressuring their employees.

Re: Coinbase offers exit package for employees not comfortable with its mission

#340

Post by chii »

dmos62 wrote: post #311
chii wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you can’t truly be apolitical; that's one of those "you're either with us or against us" type of deal - which is not the right way to deal with anything imho. You _can_ be apolitical - as in, you do not let your political views affect what you do. You keep your political views private. You do not try to change anyone else's political views as part of your job.

> not let your political views affect what you do That's a political stance. As long as you're part of society, you'll always have a political stance. That's what the other commentor was getting at. Why would you ever want your views to not influence what you do? If not yours, whose perception would you use to inform what you do? And why would you want to keep your views private? If you think that your views are so i…

> It's a very different question than whether or not you should have/share your worldview.

the very act of sharing your view (implying it's unsolicited) is trying to change someone else. Let me use as an obnoxious example: vegans trying to sell the idea of veganism to non-vegans.

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