Google cancelled a talk on caste bias • Hacker News Board

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#211

Post by nemothekid » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:12 PM UTC

causi wrote: post #106

naravara wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Maybe, Google, instead of just giving up you should be asking why a speaker on Dalit rights and inclusion is causing "division and rancor" in your community? Or is that also a difficult conversation you'd rather not have? The same reason speakers on Palestinian rights often can. While they may be on the right side of the issue, it's also very easy for closed discussion spaces to rapidly devolve into pretty viciousl…

a specific point of view to talk about it while delegitimizing all other perspectives as inherently beneath consideration it's not gonna go well Why do we owe this degree of sensitivity to some types of bigot but not others? Why don't we need to be careful about "delegitimizing" the beliefs of people who think black people are inherently inferior or gay people are inherently immoral? The realpolitik answer is that Go…

>Why don't we need to be careful about "delegitimizing" the beliefs of people who think black people are inherently inferior or gay people are inherently immoral?

Who says there’s no need to be careful? Almost every discussion about “big tech censorship” has been people crying that they are no longer allowed to be bigots on the timeline.

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#212

Post by isolli » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:12 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #136

lolinder wrote: post #15

> “We also made the decision to not move forward with the proposed talk which — rather than bringing our community together and raising awareness — was creating division and rancor,” Newberry wrote. This doesn't surprise me one bit. Even on HN, every thread on this topic turns into a flame war with a bunch of people crying racism/religionism. How dare we discuss something we don't fully understand? How dare we critic…

> every thread on this topic turns into a flame war with a bunch of people crying racism/religionism Is there a term for shutting down a discussion by turning the belligerence to eleven? Such that people outside the discussion tune out not the views of those being belligerent, but the discussion itself?

Culture war?

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#213

Post by jjaaammmmy » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:12 PM UTC

Vaslo wrote: post #65

Question from a layman. How does one know that someone is from another caste? If I was someone from India, how would I know what caste my fellow Indian is from? Is there some kind of code? Or where you are from?

this NPR podcast was pretty insightful about this issue https://www.npr.org/transcripts/915299467

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#214

Post by aabceh » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:13 PM UTC

knorker wrote: post #137

zo1 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd posit that 99.999% of people agree racism is bad. It's mostly when the definition gets muddied and expanded that people start disagreeing and it becomes political and touchy.

I don't think it's a matter of definition. Unless you mean "it's not racism when I say it. When I say it it's just a fact". Whether they use the N word, or saying "being on time" is "whiteness", racism is always defined as "not what I'm doing". Actually the only real definition of racism I would say is "mentioning race in any way, except the way I do it". For your 99.999%, I would say that WAY more than one in a hund…

No post body was provided.

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#215

Post by the_only_law » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:13 PM UTC

isolli wrote: post #212

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> every thread on this topic turns into a flame war with a bunch of people crying racism/religionism Is there a term for shutting down a discussion by turning the belligerence to eleven? Such that people outside the discussion tune out not the views of those being belligerent, but the discussion itself?

Culture war?

It’s definitely an aspect of the culture war, but only a specific side effect.

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#216

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:13 PM UTC

lolinder wrote: post #15

> “We also made the decision to not move forward with the proposed talk which — rather than bringing our community together and raising awareness — was creating division and rancor,” Newberry wrote. This doesn't surprise me one bit. Even on HN, every thread on this topic turns into a flame war with a bunch of people crying racism/religionism. How dare we discuss something we don't fully understand? How dare we critic…

[deleted]

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#217

Post by tokai » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:14 PM UTC

baisq wrote: post #107

farmerstan wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

Quoted post unavailable.

That's literally how racism against Afro Americans is often excused towards Euros.

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#218

Post by truthwhisperer » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:14 PM UTC

lolinder wrote: post #15

> “We also made the decision to not move forward with the proposed talk which — rather than bringing our community together and raising awareness — was creating division and rancor,” Newberry wrote. This doesn't surprise me one bit. Even on HN, every thread on this topic turns into a flame war with a bunch of people crying racism/religionism. How dare we discuss something we don't fully understand? How dare we critic…

No post body was provided.

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#219

Post by unixhero » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:15 PM UTC

avensec wrote: post #163

sitkack wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not just caste discrimination, but also sexism. I have worked at least three companies where if there were Indian women, the vast majority were in QA.

I am a Director-Level in Engineering/QA/Quality Engineering. I currently lead a team where our ratio of Female Indian women is higher than any other engineering group at the company. Every Quality Engineering team I have been apart of has had a higher ratio of females, but not necessarily of any specific background. My N=1 experience is that this can be related, but not always directly about discrimination or sexism.…

I was test manager (never again) on a large enterprise system (never again) and half of our QA team offshore in India were all females; I didn't reflect on that at the time.

Re: Google cancelled a talk on caste bias

#220

Post by causi » Thu, Jun 02, 2022, 2:15 PM UTC

nemothekid wrote: post #211

causi wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a specific point of view to talk about it while delegitimizing all other perspectives as inherently beneath consideration it's not gonna go well Why do we owe this degree of sensitivity to some types of bigot but not others? Why don't we need to be careful about "delegitimizing" the beliefs of people who think black people are inherently inferior or gay people are inherently immoral? The realpolitik answer is that Go…

> Why don't we need to be careful about "delegitimizing" the beliefs of people who think black people are inherently inferior or gay people are inherently immoral? Who says there’s no need to be careful? Almost every discussion about “big tech censorship” has been people crying that they are no longer allowed to be bigots on the timeline.

Who says there’s no need to be careful? Almost every discussion about “big tech censorship” has been people crying that they are no longer allowed to be bigots on the timeline

Sure, but that's coming from the bigots, not the company executives.