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For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

bloomberg.com

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Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#21

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

I thought this was a great article. One of the most interesting things to me was how the embarrassment/defensiveness of the white people involved was one of the biggest blocks to the black CEOs in their advancement, e.g. the VCs who "just wanted to get the hell out of there" after mistaking a white subordinate for the CEO.

I've recently been reading/watching some videos and writings by Robin Diangelo on systemic racism - here's a great starting point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7mzj0cVL0Q. She also wrote the book "White Fragility".

Thinking about that, I'm just wondering how different it would be if one of those people who mistook the employee for the CEO instead turned to the CEO and said "I'm sorry, please excuse me for the instance of racism I just perpetrated against you, I promise it won't happen again." I realize how outlandish that may sound writing that out, but I'd propose that the fact that it does sound outlandish is the main problem. Everyone in the US was raised in an environment that inculcated certain racial ideas, subconsciously or not. We can't address them if we're so embarrassed by their existence as to pretend they don't exist.

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#22

Post by olivermarks »

wbronitsky wrote: post #16
luckylion wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is an interesting and in-depth article that was inappropriately flagged. I've switched off the flags. Consider that people are not flagging it because "it's a follow up article", but because a) it's Bloomberg, ergo hard to believe b) it's the seven billionth "minorities in tech" story in the past month c) it's not going to create an interesting comment section d) they don't find it as interesting as you do. It…

> b) it's the seven billionth "minorities in tech" story in the past month I would urge people to stop and question that if they are tired of the "billion"s of stories about BIPOC, what must BIPOC be feeling about their systemic erasure from many facets of our society, including journalism and entrepreneurship. This article allows us to think about and discuss those issues. The article is not hard to believe, is one…

What's BIPOC?

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#23

Post by rvz »

luckylion wrote: post #17
dang wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think any of these arguments works in this case. (a) HN has had many good submissions from bloomberg.com ( https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... ). We go by article quality, not site quality ( https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu... ). There's nothing hard to believe about this article. If there were, the solution would be to provide correct information or spe…

You'll probably see that the Bloomberg articles you reference are news reports, not original research/opinion. Don't forget that Bloomberg regularly and knowingly spreads literal fake news, for example the whole "Huawei bugged Vodafone's equipment" debacle.

Also don't forget the 'fake news' reported by Bloomberg on Apple and Amazon server spy chips: https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/4/17936968/apple-amazon-den...

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#24

Post by [deleted] »

luckylion wrote: post #20
wbronitsky wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> b) it's the seven billionth "minorities in tech" story in the past month I would urge people to stop and question that if they are tired of the "billion"s of stories about BIPOC, what must BIPOC be feeling about their systemic erasure from many facets of our society, including journalism and entrepreneurship. This article allows us to think about and discuss those issues. The article is not hard to believe, is one…

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#25

Post by dang »

anewdirection wrote: post #15
dang wrote: post #5

This is an interesting and in-depth article that was inappropriately flagged. I've turned off the flags. I understand the impulse to flag follow-up stories [1], especially on the hottest controversies of the moment, which always produce a flood of articles, most of which aren't very good. Curiosity and repetition don't go together [2]. But it's important to recognize the articles that are higher than median quality a…

I flagged it because it is an article written to promote further bias, while under the guise of 'exposing racism'. If you think promoting race politics is the goal of HN, I will find a different forum. My time in SV could not have been more different than what this boased article proports. Fuck identity politics and fuck bloomberg, and fuck you for promoting this drivel.

This pairs nicely with https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23431559.

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#26

Post by olivermarks »

olivermarks wrote: post #22
wbronitsky wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> b) it's the seven billionth "minorities in tech" story in the past month I would urge people to stop and question that if they are tired of the "billion"s of stories about BIPOC, what must BIPOC be feeling about their systemic erasure from many facets of our society, including journalism and entrepreneurship. This article allows us to think about and discuss those issues. The article is not hard to believe, is one…

What's BIPOC?

I looked it up - according to the NYT 'black, indigenous people of color'. Based on this shouldn't the correct wording for 'black lives matter' be 'BIPOC lives matter'? Surely people of color and indigenous people are taking offense at this?

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#27

Post by notadog »

olivermarks wrote: post #22
wbronitsky wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> b) it's the seven billionth "minorities in tech" story in the past month I would urge people to stop and question that if they are tired of the "billion"s of stories about BIPOC, what must BIPOC be feeling about their systemic erasure from many facets of our society, including journalism and entrepreneurship. This article allows us to think about and discuss those issues. The article is not hard to believe, is one…

What's BIPOC?

An acronym for “Black, Indigenous, and People of Color".

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#28

Post by ChuckMcM »

dang wrote: post #5

This is an interesting and in-depth article that was inappropriately flagged. I've turned off the flags. I understand the impulse to flag follow-up stories [1], especially on the hottest controversies of the moment, which always produce a flood of articles, most of which aren't very good. Curiosity and repetition don't go together [2]. But it's important to recognize the articles that are higher than median quality a…

For me, the discussion of your action here confirms, even more strongly, that not only is the bias real, but also it is sometimes completely opaque to people who hold that bias.

Thanks for unflagging it, otherwise I would have missed it I'm sure.

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#29

Post by quadrifoliate »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #21

I thought this was a great article. One of the most interesting things to me was how the embarrassment/defensiveness of the white people involved was one of the biggest blocks to the black CEOs in their advancement, e.g. the VCs who "just wanted to get the hell out of there" after mistaking a white subordinate for the CEO. I've recently been reading/watching some videos and writings by Robin Diangelo on systemic raci…

> I realize how outlandish that may sound writing that out, but I'd propose that the fact that it does sound outlandish is the main problem.

That doesn't sound outlandish to me at all. For what it's worth, it doesn't have to phrased in a stilted manner like that. A quiet "That was racist and I have no excuse. I am sorry, and will do better in the future." is fine.

I suspect that most people who want to "get the hell out" rather than apologize for racism have little to no experience with making sincere apologies and trying to genuinely mend fences in general. This probably has a significant overlap with people who claim that you should immediately leave your employer rather than speak out about any of their policies that you disagree with.

Re: For black CEOs in Silicon Valley, humiliation is a part of doing business

#30

Post by gamblor956 »

anewdirection wrote: post #15
dang wrote: post #5

This is an interesting and in-depth article that was inappropriately flagged. I've turned off the flags. I understand the impulse to flag follow-up stories [1], especially on the hottest controversies of the moment, which always produce a flood of articles, most of which aren't very good. Curiosity and repetition don't go together [2]. But it's important to recognize the articles that are higher than median quality a…

I flagged it because it is an article written to promote further bias, while under the guise of 'exposing racism'. If you think promoting race politics is the goal of HN, I will find a different forum. My time in SV could not have been more different than what this boased article proports. Fuck identity politics and fuck bloomberg, and fuck you for promoting this drivel.

Bye.

This article discusses a real issue that black CEOs face in Silicon Valley. It's similar to the problem that female CEOs also face almost daily.

It's not race politics or gender politics. It's simply a fact of life for people who aren't white males.

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