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Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

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Re: Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

#141

Post by lp0_on_fire »

michaelt wrote: post #85
oh_sigh wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If interviewing is considered a normal job function, isn't not allowing certain people to interview certain people a violation of EEO laws by discriminating based on a protected class(national origin)? Unless you have some specific knowledge that an employee just can't handle people of nationality X, I would be very hesitant to institute OP's advice, at least in the US.

Probably not? I know plenty of tech companies that make sure female applicants get interviewed by at least one female engineer during the hiring process. They have a good faith belief this reduces discrimination rather than increasing it. Of course, it could stray into discriminatory territory if you're doing something dumb - like sending all minority applicants to a hardass interviewer who rejects everyone; or givin…

Having a woman in the room when other women are getting interviewed isn't discriminatory. Telling a woman she can't interview someone because she is a woman (or other protected class) is.

Re: Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

#142

Post by fluster »

zarkov99 wrote: post #98
jmyeet wrote: post #51

It's crazy to me to see people saying "this doesn't exist because I've never seen it". Here's a good rule to live by: privilege is invisible to those who have it. Just think about that. I'm not Indian so can't speak to that experience but discrimination masquerading as "culture fit" is just as rampant in Silicon Valley as it is in the rest of the US. This includes racism, ageism, misogyny and classism. If you don't t…

> There is a tendency in the West to view all minorities as somehow being the same. Is unique to the West? Do people in Asia distinguish one European from another? How about in Africa?

I’m not sure if this is a legitimate question or an attempt to make some sort of “but also not-the-West is bad!” point; if the latter, this is a comment on an article about caste discrimination in California, which is probably why the its observation focuses on the West, instead of talking about parallels in other cultures.

Re: Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

#143

Post by oceanghost »

fdgsdfogijq wrote: post #47

In a well known big tech company (FAANG), I have seen many many examples of a whole layer of management from the same caste. So like under one director, every senior manager will have been from the same part of India. Sometimes this will extend to another layer of managers below them. Behind the scenes, there is a strong communication network that is often not caught or shown in org charts. This will include high ran…

I think it extends beyond Indian folks. I once worked at a company where, Manufacturing engineers were overwhelmingly Vietnamese. Safety staff was Chinese, Engineering was mostly white, and the machine shop was entirely Hispanic. In each case the manager of the department was of the aforementioned race.

There was also a son of a bitch who was an aggressive baptist. He though I was a baptist because I had dated a baptist once, and knew some of the lingo. I really liked him until I saw him treat a Chinese person like crap for no reason. He treated anyone who wasn't a Christian like garbage.v

Re: Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

#144

Post by ToxicMegacolon »

fdgsdfogijq wrote: post #47

In a well known big tech company (FAANG), I have seen many many examples of a whole layer of management from the same caste. So like under one director, every senior manager will have been from the same part of India. Sometimes this will extend to another layer of managers below them. Behind the scenes, there is a strong communication network that is often not caught or shown in org charts. This will include high ran…

> So like under one director, every senior manager will have been from the same part of India.

Just because people are from the same part of India doesn't mean they have the same caste.

Re: Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

#145

Post by jsnodlin »

throwaway_dcnt wrote: post #11

The reason for my current user name here at hn was this exact form of racism. It is the first post I made when I created this throwaway. I was assured that my experience was unique and not widespread. I am both sad and happy to see this, sad because it exists, happy because it is getting some attention here at HN. I would like to take this opportunity to point out that everyone of us needs to be vigilant about this t…

No post body was provided.

Re: Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

#146

Post by vmception »

bin_bash wrote: post #124
_jal wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Different 'good schools' are received differently, though. If you work in Bay Area tech, a Stanford degree is more equal than others. --Someone who went to a good non-Stanford school and works for a well-known company

Are you saying (for example) Stanford is ranked higher than Yale for tech companies in the Bay? I feel there is an implication this is somehow unfair which I find ridiculous. I mean, it is unfair I guess but it isn’t wrong. And this is coming from someone that went to a mid-sized state school.

> Are you saying (for example) Stanford is ranked higher than Yale for tech companies in the Bay? I feel there is an implication this is somehow unfair which I find ridiculous

Yes.

And yes it is ridiculous because the jobs don't require anything unique from Stanford from employees, and neither should it matter for potential members of the C-Suite or Board, or clients.

Re: Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

#147

Post by jsnodlin »

vmception wrote: post #57

One day it occurred to me that I can tell if someone is from India, but that I'd never considered to notice more nuances than that, for such a big country with so many groups of people. I have just begun to notice, but I have no idea about the identity politics. I recall in college that some of my friends from India would fawn over certain last names, and I felt it was something to do with the caste system, but I had…

No post body was provided.

Re: Trapped in Silicon Valley’s hidden caste system

#149

Post by lofatdairy »

zarkov99 wrote: post #98
jmyeet wrote: post #51

It's crazy to me to see people saying "this doesn't exist because I've never seen it". Here's a good rule to live by: privilege is invisible to those who have it. Just think about that. I'm not Indian so can't speak to that experience but discrimination masquerading as "culture fit" is just as rampant in Silicon Valley as it is in the rest of the US. This includes racism, ageism, misogyny and classism. If you don't t…

> There is a tendency in the West to view all minorities as somehow being the same. Is unique to the West? Do people in Asia distinguish one European from another? How about in Africa?

I imagine OP says its a tendency in the West as to avoid generalizations outside their personal experience, not because it's necessarily not the case outside the West. Anecdotally, I think there's at least some distinction between white people in Asia. For instance, there seems to be a distinction from white Americans from white Europeans.

That said, I don't think the claim quite holds that westerners view all minorities as the same. East Asians, while maybe initially assumed to be Chinese or Japanese, have generally unique stereotypes in the US. I also recall a story reported in This American Life[1] that describes a black American woman in Paris, and how her treatment depends on whether she's seen as an African or an American. I think it's perhaps a bit more accurate to say that the broad appearance of a minority group invokes certain stereotypes, but these stereotypes will become more specific with more information about the individual. There's obviously a limit to this, since a Chinese person from Shanghai and a Chinese person from some small city in Henan is a distinction that probably won't mean much to most non-Chinese, but I think people would realize there _is_ a difference, just not know where that difference manifests itself, and obviously cannot change their mental models without that knowledge.

[1] https://www.thisamericanlife.org/165/americans-in-paris/act-...

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