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Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

economist.com

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Re: Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

#171

Post by Opt_Out_Fed_IRS »

cgrealy wrote: post #156
nitrogen wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The supply of non woke workers just isn't there The responses to the Basecamp and Coinbase announcements were equally mixed between people who wanted to avoid them, and people who want to seek them out. There are plenty of people who want work to be about working together on work. I for one want work to be welcoming and productive for everyone. Ironically, the best way to accomplish that is to focus on work, and not…

> I for one want work to be welcoming and productive for everyone. Ironically, the best way to accomplish that is to focus on work, and not non-work. Sure, if you’re a white, middle-aged, straight, cis male (speaking as one myself). But for other people, it’s not as easy to “leave your politics at home”, especially if you’re politics are “can I please be paid fairly in comparison to other workers” or “sorry, I’m late…

> Even saying you don’t have a position is tacit endorsement of the status quo.

No it's not. It's a statement that your goal is to elevate yourself as an individual not via group association

Because duh you delegate the group elevation part to the representatives you select when casting your vote

That's the whole point. Delegate group elevation so you can take care of business with regards to your own individual social elevation

Re: Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

#172

Post by antihero »

eric4smith wrote: post #7

People are human. But work is work. The canonical point of a workplace is to come together to fulfill the aims of the entrepreneurs. The personal aims of the workers are fulfilled best outside of work. Just stop to think about it logically for a minute... is the workplace the best place to circulate a petition condemning something that has nothing to do with work? The workplace necessarily is going to bring together…

The workplace is 8+ hours of most people's day. You cannot divorce it from the very real problems that exist in the world.

Re: Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

#174

Post by jimmyswimmy »

duped wrote: post #21
eric4smith wrote: post #7

People are human. But work is work. The canonical point of a workplace is to come together to fulfill the aims of the entrepreneurs. The personal aims of the workers are fulfilled best outside of work. Just stop to think about it logically for a minute... is the workplace the best place to circulate a petition condemning something that has nothing to do with work? The workplace necessarily is going to bring together…

The office exists within society. Some things exist everywhere you go in society. You don't give up ethics and morals because you cross the threshold of your place of business. Ignoring social problems in the workplace because it is a workplace is how we avoid solving those problems as a society. The office is exactly where we should be advocating for things, because it is where we spend the most time and can affect…

Oof. There isn't room to just go to work... to work?

I want to go to the office and interact with people who are the best at what they do, I want my company to hire those people, and I expect them to hold me to equal standards. When the office was explicitly segregated, men vs women, black vs white, whatever,sure,they're could have been room for politics to change that in the workplace. It doesn't seem the same now. We hire the best people we can get,and we go to work to achieve a common aligned with whatever our work is.

I'll deal with, or avoid, politics outside the workplace. I can't imagine trying to work through all the nuance of my personal political views with a coworker or, God forbid, an employee.

How much would you enjoy discussing your potentially opposing political views with your boss? I trust him to be a good person, but once you pay that seed of doubt in someone's mind, things are never the same.

Re: Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

#175

Post by smegger001 »

ffggvv wrote: post #159
jdgoesmarching wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was about to say, this is the most chilling HN sentence I’ve ever read. The totality of our existence from 8-5 is not owed to someone who profits from our labor and skills because they got lucky with some seed money or an inheritance a decade ago. That’s just the divine right of kings with extra steps.

no you get this magical thing called a salary for your work. your compensation isnt woke virtue signaling. they arent "profiting off your labor because they got lucky on some seed money". youre profiting off their ingenuity and idea. If many other entrepreneurs didnt do this, you wouldnt have a job because they wouldnt be available. and most people dont have the risk appetite to do something like that. so no youre no…

while I agree in principle I would say leeching is a bit strong, more a symbiotic less zero sum.

Re: Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

#176

Post by geofft »

Aerroon wrote: post #136
geofft wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The canonical point of a workplace is to come together to fulfill the aims of the entrepreneurs. Absolutely not, and for a very clear reason: the aims of the entrepreneurs are to make money and reduce costs. My aim, in asking for raises, is to increase costs. Are you saying this is inappropriate? I am at work because the company and I came to a mutually beneficial arrangement. They need things done that are better…

> If the employer doesn't like my demands, they are free to try to find someone else, and the process works the same in both cases. That's not the problem though. The problem is that your political advocacy causes problems with your co-workers, not your employer. If you have political activism at the work place then you're possibly making the workplace hostile for people who disagree politically with you. You might n…

Sure, but it's not qualitatively different from many other situations where employees make incompatible demands, is what I'm saying. One employee can say, I want to be allowed to work from home; another can say, I have trouble interacting with people remotely and want to see them face to face. One employee can say, I want to bring my dog to the office; another can say, I'm allergic to dogs. One employee can say, I want a beer fridge at work; another can say, I'm a recovering alcoholic and free beer is too dangerous. One employee can say, I really want a strong management structure; another can say, I really want a flat structure. One employee can say, I wish to live in New York and work during the daytime; another can say, I wish to live in Tokyo and work during the daytime.

It's the employer's job (not the employees') to mediate between those, if possible (such as by having different teams with different offices/policies/etc.), and figure out which employees to make contracts with, if not.

Or, more directly, two employees can say, I want this much salary, and the company doesn't have budget for both. If they meet the demand of one employee, they are risking the other employee. But nobody would ever suggest (in good faith) that either of the employees needs to put the business first and not negotiate for a higher salary so that the company can retain the other employee. That's the company's problem to solve.

(Since you mentioned a hostile work environment - sure, there is a law in some jurisdictions that you cannot discriminate based on political affiliations. If one employee is trying to put the company in violation of the law, then the company has an easy answer for which employee not to make a contracts with. And, again, such a law binds companies and effectively obligates them not to hire people who will put them in violation of the law; it typically does not bind employees. In the absence of a law giving the company only one choice, it's up to the employer to figure out what benefits them more. Underpaying a hard-working employee is certainly "hostile" in a colloquial sense, but it is not illegal, and many companies manage to retain underpaid employees in practice.)

Re: Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

#178

Post by crooked-v »

tomp wrote: post #164
nailer wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me it seemed less racist when we all had yellow hands. Then again I think poc is a silly term - non Europeans have completely different experiences and cultures from each other even within the US.

Indeed. Yellow was race-neutral - nobody's skin color. Then the race-ist emojis started... and discrimination sky-rocketed (e.g. there's still no ginger emojis!).

Yellow is more neutral than specific light-to-tan skin tones, but it's certainly not neutral in regards to everyone.

Or, to put it another way - if the default for all emoji was a dark magenta skin tone, would you consider that "race-neutral"?

Re: Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

#179

Post by rootusrootus »

caymanjim wrote: post #135
Opt_Out_Fed_IRS wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your labor and skills are not owed because they got lucky, they are owed because that is what you are exchanging with the owner for money. But if everybody is woke (and that is the case given that we are talking about tech and California) then the company has no choice but to accept wokeness because the money becomes a non factor if it can't be offered to somebody who is not woke . The supply of non woke workers ju…

There is an enormous supply of workers who don't want social and political issues in the workplace, but silently acquiesce because saying anything gets you branded negatively and quickly canceled. It doesn't matter if you agree but prefer keeping it out of the workplace; you must either support the woke brigade or keep your mouth shut.

You don’t think conservatives do exactly the same thing? Cancelling isn’t unique to the left nor something that just recently started.

Re: Woke at Work: Why tech firms are trying to run away from politics and failing

#180

Post by tomp »

jdgoesmarching wrote: post #83
yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #3

> last week Alphabet, Google’s parent, had to deal with another internal petition circulating among employees, this one calling on the firm’s leadership to make a statement “recognising the violence in Palestine and Israel”. It's a special kind of hubris to believe that despite over a thousand years of conflict in the region, the right people to comprehensively understand and solve the problem are some people who mak…

Nobody is fighting over theological differences, they are fighting over land. Specifically, land that was conquered by the British who promised it to both parties, failed to manage a compromise, tossed the problem to the UN who drew up horrible borders, then allowed Israel to settle beyond those borders without consequence. The entire history of this issue is roughly 100 years old and almost entirely due to imperiali…

The belief that without Western / British "imperialism and mismanagement", Jews, Muslims (Shia and Suni) (and Christians) would just peacefully co-exist in Jerusalem is ... wishful thinking at best.
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