FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord • Hacker News Board

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#191

Post by s1artibartfast » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:06 PM UTC

dahart wrote: post #161

davidivadavid wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. He's implying that the fact something is a law doesn't mean your employer should lecture you about it.

Why? Isn't making people aware of laws how you abide by them? The risk of not educating people and being caught ignoring abuses is fairly serious. Broadly speaking, some of the laws we're talking about are laws that specifically require making employees aware of their existence.

I think they are talking about meetings at work which do not focus on the law or workplace etiquette, but serve to raise awareness of for diversity/minority/social justice issues outside the workplace.

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#192

Post by acrobatsunfish » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:07 PM UTC

ideals wrote: post #164

paganel wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is it, then? Later edit: To add to my comment, what do you call sleeping in the same bed, eating from the same plate and having direct physical contact with a person who gets the virus and ends up in IC or dead while the other person tests negative for the virus? Let's not forget that ever since February we've all known that this virus is particularly easy to transmit/get, so you cannot say "that person got real…

You have no scientific evidence to support your claims. Take your L and stop spreading misinformation.

If you're going to ask him to share sources, please show some of your own with the level of rigor you would like to see to the contrary. I'm tired of this trend of people shouting Sauce! Sauce! At each other. Collaboration is key.

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#193

Post by chmaynard » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:11 PM UTC

throwitawayfb wrote: post #168

I've just been given an offer from Facebook and I have a few days to decide to take the job or not. The ethical implications of what I'm doing are intense. On one hand, a near 400k total comp package is very nice, but on the other hand I don't want to make the world worse off. I think if I could make that kind of money working from home for another company it'd be an easier decision. Unfortunately, I have to play the…

Consult a lawyer for advice on the legal implications of being directed to work on projects that either violate the law or your own ethical principles. The lawyer can help you draft an employment contract that protects you from retaliation if you object. If Facebook refuses to sign the contract, walk away.

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#194

Post by eli » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:14 PM UTC

mehrdadn wrote: post #176

t-writescode wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Phone companies and ISPs facilitate communication between people, but that doesn't necessitate they take political stances on what communication to allow Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. It just so happens that, I believe in those cases, it's also a legally mandated stance; but, if it weren't a legally mandated stance, it would absolutely be a political stance…

> Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. Then in your model of the world, how would one not take a political stance? If everyone takes a political stance in your model by definition no matter what their intents or actions are then it's a rather useless definition.

Indeed! We all take political stances every day and it is certainly not possible to run an apolitical social network. The word is probably not very useful. But being able to reflect on “sensitive” issues is extremely useful and, I would argue, necessary.

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#195

Post by gabereiser » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:15 PM UTC

FB by its nature is political, as it supports its ad network. To say to employees you can’t be is really them admitting they aren’t equipped to deal with this crisis they themselves created.

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#196

Post by jessaustin » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:16 PM UTC

skj wrote: post #167

cltby wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How exactly do you avoid political discussion when you're asking what constitutes hate speech, whether a US president should be allowed to violate Facebook's content guidelines, or to what extent governments can spread misinformation in other countries? These issues are not part of your job description. You were hired to write Javascript, not to set corporate strategy. Sit in your seat, content yourself with the $5…

Betters, haha

Some commentators have not worked in the sector.

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#197

Post by bhupy » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:16 PM UTC

kurthr wrote: post #6

AlexandrB wrote: post #4

Weird that an outspoken free speech advocate like Mark Zuckerberg would want to limit the speech of his employees.

Especially since they presumably use FB for internal discussions... Why not use the same (weak) moderation mechanisms everyone else has? Not like you can avoid politics on your regular feed. I guess he realizes they don't work.

> Why not use the same (weak) moderation mechanisms everyone else has? Not like you can avoid politics on your regular feed.

Because people don't typically use Facebook at work? It's a recreational tool. The issue is that for Facebook employees, they are working on building that recreational tool, and that hampers productivity and professionalism.

> I guess he realizes they don't work.

Or he realizes that they work for a service that's typically consumed during one's free time, and not as a direct component of one's employment.

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#198

Post by eli » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:16 PM UTC

hartator wrote: post #148

DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if it wasn’t a Fox News talking head, but an incendiary video built on falsehoods being spread to incite violence - or what if it’s 2011 again and ISIS beheading videos are being shared and supposing the evidence showed they were causing ISIS recruitment to increase?

I would still have a proper judge made a decision than Facebook. I can easily block people that share BS on Facebook but I don't want Facebook to make that decision for me. That overrides my own choice to follow them in the first place.

What is a “proper judge”? You mean you want the courts to moderate your social platform?

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#199

Post by patorjk » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:17 PM UTC

lacker wrote: post #104

patorjk wrote: post #5

At 3 paragraphs (131 words), that was a really short article. However, I agree with the subheading: "Mark Zuckerberg says employees shouldn’t have to confront social issues in their day-to-day work unless they want to" That sounds good to me. I've never had to talk about these kind of things at work. Are there work places where this is unavoidable?

I was working at Facebook during the 2016 election and it was pretty unavoidable. A big part of the problem was just that everyone was using Facebook for work all the time. So quite often, there would be some enormous thread arguing about whether X or Y was the right policy, was Trump violating the rules and should be kicked off Facebook, or was Facebook's anti-Trump policies violating freedom of speech, or was it ra…

Thank you for this insight!

> was it racist for an employee to say they supported Trump during a meeting

This is sort of what I was thinking about in my original comment. I would hate to have to discuss political affiliation, or make public judgements on other people/issues.

> And you use the same interface for important things like, announcing hey this database service team is launching a new API next week,

I miss so much in my news feed already, using it for work would make me nuts.

Re: FB to curb internal debate over sensitive issues amid employee discord

#200

Post by shard » Thu, Sep 17, 2020, 11:17 PM UTC

mehrdadn wrote: post #176

t-writescode wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Phone companies and ISPs facilitate communication between people, but that doesn't necessitate they take political stances on what communication to allow Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. It just so happens that, I believe in those cases, it's also a legally mandated stance; but, if it weren't a legally mandated stance, it would absolutely be a political stance…

> Taking a stance to not control what communication is allowed is a very political stance. Then in your model of the world, how would one not take a political stance? If everyone takes a political stance in your model by definition no matter what their intents or actions are then it's a rather useless definition.

It's like Rush says in Free Will, "If you choose not to decide, You still have made a choice".