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

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

#621

Post by edem » Sat, May 22, 2021, 6:55 AM UTC

asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: post #411

ThinkBeat wrote: post #371

One part of the article: This is about a guy who wrote a book on his own time, published it outside of work. Someone did not like some parts of the book and the guy had to quit his job? There is nothing to suggest the man acted improperly at work. I write fictional stories in my spare time (never at work), I enjoy doing it. Some people enjoy reading them (I can't figure out why) It is a sad day for a Democracy when I…

> There is nothing to suggest the man acted improperly at work. We've had this discussion already, but claiming sexist views is going to be a problem for you whether you do it at work or elsewhere because of how laws around hostile work environments and notice work. Particularly, if you go on to actually create a hostile work environment (as one might reasonably suppose you will, having publicly espoused the relevant…

You are one of those fascist wokes I hope I never have to work with.

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

#622

Post by noisy_boy » Sat, May 22, 2021, 6:56 AM UTC

ggggtez wrote: post #160

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…

Yes, you're naive. Maybe if your a worker on a factory line and only being paid to turn a wrench, then sure. But at tech firms, you're being paid to think.

Yeah - you are being paid to think to solve the problem specifically related to your work, not being lost in thoughts about your personal political beliefs.

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

#623

Post by imgabe » Sat, May 22, 2021, 6:57 AM UTC

ayyy wrote: post #605

imgabe wrote: post #586

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is, your first paragraph appears to be arguing that it's only OK to fire an employee for "hostile work environment" if that employee does something hostile at work, and never OK to fire based on stuff an employee has written before being hired. What do you think a hostile work environment is? How do writings outside of work affect the work environment? The work environment is...things that happen at work. In o…

> I don't see how that is hard to understand. For a growing percentage of the workplace, knowing that a coworker has a socially unacceptable opinion is creating a hostile work environment. I completely understand where you're coming from, but you're literally wrong. If you don't want to be shunned from society, don't be identified as someone who does socially unacceptable things. I'm not super keen on how this is all…

I understand that a growing number of people are confused about what hostile work environment means. That still does not change the meaning as the law defines it, nor should we change it to accommodate those people.

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

#624

Post by Huggernaut » Sat, May 22, 2021, 6:57 AM UTC

refurb wrote: post #595

hn_user82179 wrote: post #509

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You'd need to convince workers to not believe that someone who says sexist stuff in a book is going to cause a problem for them. This resonated with me. Anecdotally, I sometimes wonder if small, unpleasant interactions (e.g. getting talked over multiple times in a meeting) have anything to do with my gender (I'm the only woman on my team) or are accidental/benign. I usually assume they're benign because I like my c…

Your statements come across as paranoia and looking for a problem where one likely doesn’t exist. As a white guy should I examine every interaction to see if there are racial or gender undertones? If my African American boss tells me not to be late, is it because I’m white? Or my female boss says my work is subpar, is it because I’m a man? No, that’s silly without evidence. And Martinez’s statement was: 1) fiction, 2…

It might be silly without evidence. The threshold for silliness would become a lot lower if there were a history of systemic problems and extensive evidence of similar scenarios in the present.

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

#625

Post by exporectomy » Sat, May 22, 2021, 6:58 AM UTC

hn_user82179 wrote: post #509

asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is nothing to suggest the man acted improperly at work. We've had this discussion already, but claiming sexist views is going to be a problem for you whether you do it at work or elsewhere because of how laws around hostile work environments and notice work. Particularly, if you go on to actually create a hostile work environment (as one might reasonably suppose you will, having publicly espoused the relevant…

> You'd need to convince workers to not believe that someone who says sexist stuff in a book is going to cause a problem for them. This resonated with me. Anecdotally, I sometimes wonder if small, unpleasant interactions (e.g. getting talked over multiple times in a meeting) have anything to do with my gender (I'm the only woman on my team) or are accidental/benign. I usually assume they're benign because I like my c…

What if he said that privately and you somehow found out. Would it be OK? Because a huge amount of people say similar things privately among their friends and the world keeps turning.

What you describe sounds more like being the victim of gossip, which is probably a far more common and serious problem in workplaces. Should gossip be banned?

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

#626

Post by inglor_cz » Sat, May 22, 2021, 7:00 AM UTC

bsanr2 wrote: post #85

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…

Unfortunately, in the never-ending struggle to force employees to conform to some platonic ideal of efficient production, companies have spent a lot of time and energy - not just in their own policy, but also in lobbying to the government and the public at large - trying to make work the center of the average American's life. Think of all the things you have to pass by your boss before making decisions about your own…

Americans tend to idealize European countries. We generally have a more accessible healthcare, but otherwise, well... European cities are chock-full of beggars and homeless people. Welfare structures are often hidden behind a high wall of bureaucratic compliance that pretty much locks some people out.

And even if you can manage those, your simple existence won't be on a level of a person with a normal job. Especially a single young person or a childless family cannot expect living beyond a very, very basic level from welfare money. Low enough that you won't be very happy.

Also, work does not end on the dot in Europe either. There are some countries that enshrined the right to do so into laws, but most have not. If you compete in a global economy, there tends to be a race to the bottom.

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

#627

Post by anigbrowl » Sat, May 22, 2021, 7:00 AM UTC

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #410

rantwasp wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you do have tolerance. you just don’t know it. a lot of things are “political”. You cannot share virtually anything about you or your life without some political subtext. Try sharing something, anything and I’ll make it political in 2 easy steps. Unless you’re a machine, there is politics at work. does everything have to be a woke political discussion? prolly not

A lot of things are "political", but not that many are political . > Try sharing something, anything and I’ll make it political in 2 easy steps. Yeah, see, that's the problem. The problem isn't that everything is in some way political. It's people who are looking to make things political . (In fact, that could be a functional definition of woke-ness.) You don't want that at work. Eventually, the woke people will find…

The problem isn't that everything is in some way political. It's people who are looking to make things political.

But often they are political and people are simply pointing it out, which makes other people uncomfortable. 'That's just how X is' or 'things have always been that way, what's the big deal' are very often the product of past political decisions whose results have become the default.

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

#628

Post by inglor_cz » Sat, May 22, 2021, 7:03 AM UTC

refurb wrote: post #589

ThinkBeat wrote: post #371

One part of the article: This is about a guy who wrote a book on his own time, published it outside of work. Someone did not like some parts of the book and the guy had to quit his job? There is nothing to suggest the man acted improperly at work. I write fictional stories in my spare time (never at work), I enjoy doing it. Some people enjoy reading them (I can't figure out why) It is a sad day for a Democracy when I…

You joke about struggle sessions but that seems to be the direction we’re headed in, just using different words. I’ve been in HR sessions where “self-criticism” is a core part of the training. All we need to do now is start throwing around terms like “counter-revolutionary ideas”. We’ve already started to label ideas as “dangerous” because they “foment discord”. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-criticism_(Marxism…

I think the word is going to be "harmful". Harmful ideas, harmful expressions, harmful thoughts.

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

#629

Post by anigbrowl » Sat, May 22, 2021, 7:05 AM UTC

baryphonic wrote: post #435

thrownaway564 wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Antonio García Martínez: "Most women in the Bay Area are soft and weak, cosseted and naive despite their claims of worldliness, and generally full of shit. They have their self-regarding entitlement feminism, and ceaselessly vaunt their independence, but the reality is, come the epidemic plague or foreign invasion, they’d become precisely the sort of useless baggage you’d trade for a box of shotgun shells or a jerry…

If you quoted him in context, you'd show that he regarded this particular lady friend of his as a "strong woman" in both body and mind. Why didn't you do that?

Most likely because we don't all know his individual lady friend, but we definitely know people who are 'women in the bay area'. If a person makes a broad sweeping statement then qualifying it with an individual exception is no more significant than some tiny disclaimer int he corner of a billboard.

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

#630

Post by xenihn » Sat, May 22, 2021, 7:10 AM UTC

didibus wrote: post #610

imgabe wrote: post #586

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is, your first paragraph appears to be arguing that it's only OK to fire an employee for "hostile work environment" if that employee does something hostile at work, and never OK to fire based on stuff an employee has written before being hired. What do you think a hostile work environment is? How do writings outside of work affect the work environment? The work environment is...things that happen at work. In o…

So, I haven't read the linked article, I'm just going off from what you say here. Hypothetically, say someone hates you, think you're a low life, that you're not as smart, and have bad habits, a trash culture, despise the way you dress and talk, and find your life choice repulsive, might even think you're tainted and doomed to eternal condemnation. Now say you work with this person, but at work they pretend like none…

Why are you using an outdated example (blogs), instead of extremely relevant & modern ones like Twitter and TikTok?

Your scenario is basically describing a guy demanding that his coworker be fired because 90% of the content on her social media channels consist of some variation of "men are trash".