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How Basecamp Blew Up

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Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#51

Post by ashtonkem »

The through line for all of these disasters seems to be a thirst for attention and adulation. Fried and DHH have always been super excited to tell us how to work, but it turns out when a crisis came to their company, they managed to mess it up to an unbelievable degree. Fried was so thirsty for attention that he told us how to manage a crisis like this before he’d even bothered to handle it himself or even tell his own employees about the policy changes first.

If this is how these two are going to manage after decades at this, maybe they should bring in some executives willing to do the actual work of managing instead of bungling it themselves.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#52

Post by tomschlick »

ashtonkem wrote: post #50
tomschlick wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its also common to not to explain things you think are obvious when initially talking but when someone asks you about it you clarify your position.

He also has every single motive to lie here.

Or he just thinks that the whole situation is ridiculous because there is zero evidence that we have seen relating any of this to white supremacy. Instead, those allegations are just brought out by people on the left anytime they want as a cudgel to stop all debate on a topic.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#53

Post by [deleted] »

peterthehacker wrote: post #4
baggy_trough wrote: post #3

Why was Singer suspended? I don’t get it.

I think these comments were the main reason: > “I strongly disagree we live in a white supremacist culture,” Singer said. “I don't believe in a lot of the framing around implicit bias. I think a lot of this is actually racist.”

[deleted]

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#54

Post by ashtonkem »

tomschlick wrote: post #52
ashtonkem wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He also has every single motive to lie here.

Or he just thinks that the whole situation is ridiculous because there is zero evidence that we have seen relating any of this to white supremacy. Instead, those allegations are just brought out by people on the left anytime they want as a cudgel to stop all debate on a topic.

Given that he has a history of quoting Breitbart, the primary newspaper of “actually racism against whites is the issue” and “black crime” I do not buy that.

I also don’t buy it when they rush to scrub a ton of his chat history after this. That’s fishy as hell.

> those allegations are just brought out by people on the left anytime they want as a cudgel to stop all debate on a topic.

The irony of course is that this entire situation was accelerated by DHH and Fried creating a new policy saying “no politics or get out”. The people stopping all debate here are management, not the amorphous “left”.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#55

Post by tomschlick »

ashtonkem wrote: post #54
tomschlick wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or he just thinks that the whole situation is ridiculous because there is zero evidence that we have seen relating any of this to white supremacy. Instead, those allegations are just brought out by people on the left anytime they want as a cudgel to stop all debate on a topic.

Given that he has a history of quoting Breitbart, the primary newspaper of “actually racism against whites is the issue” and “black crime” I do not buy that. I also don’t buy it when they rush to scrub a ton of his chat history after this. That’s fishy as hell. > those allegations are just brought out by people on the left anytime they want as a cudgel to stop all debate on a topic. The irony of course is that this e…

> Given that he has a history of quoting Breitbart, the primary newspaper of “actually racism against whites is the issue”, I do not buy that.

You have no idea if that's true or not or the extent of his comments. You're going off of an unsubstantiated claim and treating it as fact.

> I also don’t buy it when they rush to scrub a ton of his chat history after this. That’s fishy as hell.

They didn't scrub history after this. They deleted those forums a week or two before all of this (according to the article), in an apparent attempt to stop the political chatter. It seems when that didn't work they came out with the no politics policy.

> The irony of course is that this entire situation was accelerated by DHH and Fried creating a new policy saying “no politics or get out”. The people stopping all debate here are management, not the amorphous “left”.

There is still zero evidence that any of this has to do with white supremacy, so someone making that claim is ridiculous and is meant to stop all meaningful conversation. Once someone makes that claim the entire debate becomes about that claim and there is no turning back from it. That is very much the reason it is used so much.

It seems they have/had quite a few political activists that were causing contention in the company. I don't blame them one bit for wanting to quell political stuff while on company time.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#56

Post by eloff »

ashtonkem wrote: post #47
eloff wrote: post #2

There is a great supporting argument for keeping discussions of politics, race, religion, etc out of the workplace to begin with. It's not possible to call it from outside, but there was no actual racist behavior cited, apart from the list of funny customer names, which is not really racist (more culturalist - if that were a thing), but it is a terrible idea anyway. It sounds like a bunch of people got upset and quit…

I think announcing policies on the company blog without telling employees first is always going to go poorly. You don’t have to be an “activist” employee to feel slighted by that.

Yes, although that doesn't seem to be the proximate grievance leading to people quitting. Pretty dumb thing to do though.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#57

Post by eloff »

ashtonkem wrote: post #49
tomschlick wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Singer clarifies in the later follow up to say he was referring to the people at Basecamp, not in reference to the whole country. > To which Singer responded: “I said we have different ways of framing … If you want to debate whether it exists anywhere, then yeah. But not here at this company, not with the people I associate with.” Edit: to add quote

Sorry, I think he’s lying here to cover his own ass. Especially if he’s been in the habit of quoting Breitbart, him pulling the “actually racism against whites is the real issue” is entirely believable.

That's not what he said though.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#58

Post by anon7725 »

fallenfromgrace wrote: post #14
baggy_trough wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t follow. Why would you be suspended for that?

It has hints of "reverse racism" and tends to dismiss that racism is an issue...and if it is an issue, racism against white people is the actual and bigger issue. That's closer to the camp of "white supremacist" or at the very least, a common defense used by white supremacist. Generally, this would be someone who is, in his position, at the very best, wilfully ignorant. I was not the one dismissed him, nor do I work…

> It has hints of "reverse racism" and tends to dismiss that racism is an issue...and if it is an issue, racism against white people is the actual and bigger issue. That's closer to the camp of "white supremacist" or at the very least, a common defense used by white supremacist.

This is the problem with cultural Marxism / “wokeness”. It’s a sanctified, totalizing ideology that admits zero daylight between “100% agreement” and “you are a white supremacist/literal Nazi”.

In that way it functions exactly like a “state religion”: in public, you’re either a true believer, act like one or are mute and don’t give away your position. Soon they will make you mouth the words or face denunciation. Perhaps we are already there in the vanguard of coastal tech companies.

This whole thing is counter to the very spirit of liberalism.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#59

Post by tha0xa1 »

Threeve303 wrote: post #13

This story is so strange. First of all, it has been considered unprofessional to talk about politics at work for as long as I can remember. It's odd how you would need a rule implemented about that. Is this just a generational thing? On the other hand, when did racial equality become an inherently political topic? Especially racial equality inside the workplace. This also doesn't mean that the Basecamp founders are r…

>On the other hand, when did racial equality become an inherently political topic? Especially racial equality inside the workplace.

When acronyms became "white supremacy culture"[1], public magnet schools became "systemic racism"[2], showing up to work on time and objective thinking became "whiteness"[3], etc. "racial equality" became just another Motte and Bailey in the hyper-polarized toxic political world we live in.

No one sane opposes racial equality, conservative or liberal. What many do oppose is the entryist toxic leftism that's making it's headway into every facet of society. That's the "politics at work" that many are opposed to. Leftism became a religion, and "wokeism" is its proselytization.

>What has happened to everyone? It's like we have taken the social media rage machine and applied it to real life interactions.

That's exactly what's happening. As an example, this is the (former) head data analyst at Basecamp:

From https://janeyang.org/2021/03/18/live-forward/

> If you are white or a man, especially a cis-gendered heterosexual able-bodied white man, do the fucking work. Learn about the characteristics of white supremacy, push through your discomfort, and reflect on how you show up in the spaces you have power. Be ready to apologize when you screw up (we all do!) and then do better. And whatever you do: do not demand that your friends or colleagues or employees or neighbors or acquaintances who belong to historically marginalized groups explain to you all the ways you perpetuate harm and how society got here. Pay an anti-oppression professional for training and coaching; don’t expect us to get you up to speed for free.

[1]https://abc7news.com/sfusd-renaming-schools-board-meeting-sa... [2]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lowell_High_School_(San_Fran... [3]https://tri-statedefender.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/whi...

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#60

Post by cozuya »

tha0xa1 wrote: post #59
Threeve303 wrote: post #13

This story is so strange. First of all, it has been considered unprofessional to talk about politics at work for as long as I can remember. It's odd how you would need a rule implemented about that. Is this just a generational thing? On the other hand, when did racial equality become an inherently political topic? Especially racial equality inside the workplace. This also doesn't mean that the Basecamp founders are r…

>On the other hand, when did racial equality become an inherently political topic? Especially racial equality inside the workplace. When acronyms became "white supremacy culture"[1], public magnet schools became "systemic racism"[2], showing up to work on time and objective thinking became "whiteness"[3], etc. "racial equality" became just another Motte and Bailey in the hyper-polarized toxic political world we live…

Its so, so rich to see criticism of "leftism" as "becoming a religion", when the right in this country literally worship a golden idol of The Former Guy at their politics conventions.

"No one sane opposes racial equality, conservative or liberal." Hmm. Is the likes of Tucker Carlson "sane"? He and other mainstream right wing "thinkers" consistently put out viewpoints that oppose racial equality and oppose anti-racism.

Are you an anti-racist?

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