Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy • Hacker News Board

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#11

Post by beachstartup » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:08 PM UTC

Kurtz79 wrote: post #7

beachstartup wrote: post #6

> But if the tech scene is really a meritocracy, why are so many of its key players, from Mark Zuckerberg to Steve Jobs, white men? a jewish guy and a half arab guy aren't exactly the best examples of the point this guy's trying to make. there's also no shortage of asian and indian "key players" so ... i think this guy is trying to make one point, but accidentally making another point altogether, and then failing at…

In what ways a jewish white man is not a white man ? It's a serious question, are people of jewish faith not considered "white" in the US ?

it depends on who you ask.

and what decade you ask it in.

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#12

Post by ritchiea » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:12 PM UTC

beachstartup wrote: post #6

> But if the tech scene is really a meritocracy, why are so many of its key players, from Mark Zuckerberg to Steve Jobs, white men? a jewish guy and a half arab guy aren't exactly the best examples of the point this guy's trying to make. there's also no shortage of asian and indian "key players" so ... i think this guy is trying to make one point, but accidentally making another point altogether, and then failing at…

I think the author's greater point is correct but you're right, those two are terrible choices. I also think most people would not stop and question whether Jobs & Zuck are "white" and that says something about how we pick and choose who is "white." I'm black and I remember a time in high school where I was planning a trip to a baseball game with my friends (who were white) and one friends' father told us "I don't like the idea of you three white kids in that neighborhood late at night." Which was funny because, as I said, I'm black but he certainly didn't see me as so in that context. People use race to describe how they think of another person as much as they use race to describe skin colors.

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#13

Post by temuze » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:12 PM UTC

beachstartup wrote: post #6

> But if the tech scene is really a meritocracy, why are so many of its key players, from Mark Zuckerberg to Steve Jobs, white men? a jewish guy and a half arab guy aren't exactly the best examples of the point this guy's trying to make. there's also no shortage of asian and indian "key players" so ... i think this guy is trying to make one point, but accidentally making another point altogether, and then failing at…

Also, this statement isn't proof of anything! Assuming white males have the same probability of being successful as any other demographic and there also happen to be more white male engineers, then it makes sense that the majority of "key players" in the computer industry will be white males!

It would be much more convincing if the author said X% in the industry are white males and Y% of CEOs/founders are white males.

It's important to separate the argument that society is failing in encouraging/promoting engineers outside of certain demographics and the argument that Silicon Valley is unfairly supporting one demographic over another.

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#14

Post by Anechoic » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:13 PM UTC

beachstartup wrote: post #6

> But if the tech scene is really a meritocracy, why are so many of its key players, from Mark Zuckerberg to Steve Jobs, white men? a jewish guy and a half arab guy aren't exactly the best examples of the point this guy's trying to make. there's also no shortage of asian and indian "key players" so ... i think this guy is trying to make one point, but accidentally making another point altogether, and then failing at…

of the point this guy's trying to make

i think this guy

I think this post makes the article's point nicely.

(take another look at the article byline, and lookup the author on Google)

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#15

Post by ritchiea » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:14 PM UTC

jpeg_hero wrote: post #2

Pretty vapid. Author doesn't seem to be that knowledgable on the valley.

I'm really interested in this kind of sentiment. Why do you feel so certain SV is a meritocracy?

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#16

Post by yummyfajitas » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:14 PM UTC

The article, like most following this formula, assume that because rewards are not distributed among a sufficiently racially/sexually diverse group, meritocracy must therefore be absent. They fail to account for the possibility that merit might not be distributed in the manner that they think.

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#17

Post by ceejayoz » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:17 PM UTC

beachstartup wrote: post #11

Kurtz79 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what ways a jewish white man is not a white man ? It's a serious question, are people of jewish faith not considered "white" in the US ?

it depends on who you ask. and what decade you ask it in.

You know full well what decade we're in, and virtually everyone today outside an Aryan Nations get-together is going to call Zuckerberg a white guy.

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#18

Post by mrcactu5 » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:18 PM UTC

beachstartup wrote: post #6

> But if the tech scene is really a meritocracy, why are so many of its key players, from Mark Zuckerberg to Steve Jobs, white men? a jewish guy and a half arab guy aren't exactly the best examples of the point this guy's trying to make. there's also no shortage of asian and indian "key players" so ... i think this guy is trying to make one point, but accidentally making another point altogether, and then failing at…

She might be referring to the 36M African-Americans & 50M Hispanich-Americans in this country. So American still has a White majority at around 60% of the population.

In the year 2010, only 36 million African-Americans in the US, is that right? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_Stat...

Anyway, these groups are under-represented in the Technology field. I heard one response that maybe these groups "don't value education" - I don't know how to respond to that one actually.

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#19

Post by freefrancisco » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:21 PM UTC

' Helene Ahl found that in business discourse 70 percent of words used to describe entrepreneurs were male-gendered — these included “self-reliant”, “assertive”, “forceful”, “risk-taking”, “self-sufficient”, “leader”, “competitive”, and “ambitious”.'

I don't see anything male about any of these words, I know many women who can be accurately described by these words, as well as many men who cannot. Why is the author conflating being male with these descriptions? I find the assertion that those words are indeed "male-gendered" very disturbing.

Re: Silicon Valley Isn’t a Meritocracy

#20

Post by beachstartup » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 5:22 PM UTC

Anechoic wrote: post #14

beachstartup wrote: post #6

> But if the tech scene is really a meritocracy, why are so many of its key players, from Mark Zuckerberg to Steve Jobs, white men? a jewish guy and a half arab guy aren't exactly the best examples of the point this guy's trying to make. there's also no shortage of asian and indian "key players" so ... i think this guy is trying to make one point, but accidentally making another point altogether, and then failing at…

of the point this guy's trying to make i think this guy I think this post makes the article's point nicely. (take another look at the article byline, and lookup the author on Google)

well the point specifically said white men. not men, white men. i was reacting to the content - what does it matter who wrote it? aren't we discussing ideas here?