On managing outrage in Silicon Valley • Hacker News Board

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#211

Post by Impossible » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:02 PM UTC

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #182

Likewise, are they different enough to justify the massive disparity in nursing? As of 2011, 90% of nurses in the US were women[0]. That's even more skewed than tech. Moreover, the average income of a nurse in Silicon Valley is $100k. To my knowledge, there is no outcry or movement to bring more men into the nursing profession. [0] https://www.census.gov/people/io/files/Men_in_Nursing_Occupa...

This is constantly brought up as a counterpoint to women in tech on HN and it seems like no one that uses this argument ever does any research. Trying to get more men in nursing has been a thing for a very long time, in many ways its like the inverse of tech. A quick Google of "men in nursing" would show you a ton of resources and opinion pieces that look like a mirror of women in tech initiatives. Just because you aren't aware of the struggles of a given field because you aren't close to it doesn't mean they don't exist.

With nursing it's very clearly a social issue. Nursing is seen as a women's job even though having more male nurses would improve the quality of health care.

There are also other female heavy professions where there it is seen as important to bring more men in to increase diversity. Generally anything that has to do with working with children (childcare, especially teaching). In education getting more male teachers, especially minority male teachers is seen as important to provide young men with role models.

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#212

Post by naiveattack » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:04 PM UTC

Meekro wrote: post #39

"If Galileo had said that people in Padua were ten feet tall, he would have been regarded as a harmless eccentric. Saying the earth orbited the sun was another matter. The church knew this would set people thinking." -- Paul Graham, What You Can't Say [1] "And worse than simply thinking these things or saying them in private, you’ve said them in a way that’s tried to legitimize this kind of thing across the company,…

I really like the "What You Can't Say" essay. Interestingly, what it says is not that speaking out is bad. It says that you must weight the benefit of speaking out to society, to the cost to yourself. It says you know what, sometimes it's ok to pick your fights, to be a coward, or to turn a blind eye to the destruction of the good in society. I agree that sometimes it's important to be selfish.

This means that I can avoid the short term cost to me, but what about the long term cost?

Every time you stay silent, you are complicit in the foolishness and irrationality in society. Every time a mob silences an individual and you ignore it, you lend power to the mob, and power to the idea of a mob in the mind of society.

You lend power to the idea that the louder you shout, the more correct your idea is.

And it's the ideas that make our society.

Here's an example of where this is going: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-nvNAcvUPE . The rabbit hole goes deep.

I am worried that even HN, a crowd that prizes itself on being intellectual, is so easily swayed by virtue signalling and shouting loudly (see comments here and on other similar threads). If these rational minds are so easily swayed, what about the larger crowd that thinks even less for itself? These centres must be held to a higher standard or we risk corruption of everything.

Your choices make a difference, choose wisely.

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#213

Post by blusterXY » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:04 PM UTC

blablabla123 wrote: post #145

EddieRingle wrote: post #43

One of my first exposures to this "manifesto" was on Twitter with someone starting a thread with "Google has a Nazi problem." The majority of the other responses I read either attacked the author, dismissed the entire text in whole, and/or refused to actually argue the paper's points because they saw them as so ridiculous or "obviously" wrong. I read the paper. I don't see at all how it relates to fascism, Trumpism,…

It's great that the person stated his opinion. I regard him much higher than hypocrites who think and act the same, but pretend to be 1000% pc. It's not necessary to tediously counter-argue every single argument the author made. I'm sure you don't expect people to counter-argue overly long badly written texts by various political ideologists from today or the past. I'm convinced it suffices to just argue why summary…

> tediously counter-argue every single argument

I haven't seen a single criticism of the paper that even recognizes the author is referencing large-scale incontrovertible research involving the Big-5 personality model (the giveaway is the use of terms "agreeability", "conscienciousness", "neuroticism"). Instead we get what you offer: off-hand casual assertions that there must exist research which runs against large-n and replicable science-driven studies using the only mainstream and empirically-supported model of personality that seems to work.

Basically, this makes criticisms like yours on-par with climate change denial in the sense that they either fail to grasp the point being made or offer personal observations on irrelevant points as rebuttal. It is bad news for Google either way, since the author is correct to point out among many other things that high levels of "agreeability" are demonstrably bad for anyone to have in corporate environments, and if this affects men in the same way it affects women then why are the solutions gender-excluding? Anyway, perhaps you should research the Big-5 model if you aren't familiar with it: very interesting new research coming out on it continually.

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#214

Post by naiveattack » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:10 PM UTC

s73ver wrote: post #19

pnathan wrote: post #12

What happens when the lone voice is in the right, and the mass of people are in the wrong, and all of the preponderance of current science and wisdom is against the lone voice? It's no great stretch to find examples through history of this in different social contexts.

If the preponderance of current science is against the lone voice, then it's highly likely that the lone voice is not in the right.

Yes, but what happens when the voice of science is underrepresented?

Now read the grandparent comment again.

Perhaps it's just that the people who actually have the useful-science-shit to do aren't in stupid discussion threads like this one? ;)

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#215

Post by vkou » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:11 PM UTC

rcoveson wrote: post #142

abhi3 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether there exist biological/psychological differences between sexes that affect career choices is a discussion that needs to be had in an academic setting rather than a political setting as the author sought to do (read the first section). Secondly, it does not belong in the work place where it is rightly perceived as an aggression by the female coworkers (Telling them the bar was lowered to recruit them, they are…

Was the bar lowered to recruit female or minority candidates? That's not a rhetorical question and I don't presume to have an answer to it. It was, however, the subject of the original memo, which suggests that some policies or proposed policies exist that lower standards for diversity candidates in the author's opinion. One example is, in the author's words: "Setting org level OKRs for increased representation." If…

> As to "aggressions", I would challenge anybody to find a quote from the memo that could be considered aggressive.

The entire premise of the manifesto is that one third of the company only has a job because of their gender. In what world is saying to thousands of people "We only hired you because you don't have male genitals" is not an aggression? Maybe it's not to people who don't give two shits about their work, or their accomplishments at it, or whether or not they'll have a job next week. Most people aren't in that category.

Has you ever been in that kind of situation? Where somebody reduces your entire justification for existence to the color of your skin, or which chromosomes you've got?

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#216

Post by peacetreefrog » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:12 PM UTC

asciicircum wrote: post #189

Could someone opposed to the arguments the manifesto makes explain to me what quotes caused them to strongly dislike it? Reading the reactions to the manifesto I'm left feeling like I'm taking crazy pills. I must have read a different manifesto. AFAICT the main idea of the manifesto is that biological differences between men and women account for part of the representation gap. This seems to be perfectly logical and…

The problem is bringing up biological differences (even just in terms of groups and allowing for lots of individual overlap, and even in this case, when the differences aren't nec better or worse, just differences). It's a non-starter to many people, particularly on the left (see the Bell Curve).

One the one hand, I sort of get it, given historically people have used biology/similar arguments to justify a lot of awful things. If Hitler was around now, it'd be sort of disgusting to ask people to engage his argument on its merits (this is where some of the Nazi language re: this manifesto comes in I think).

But, when it's presented like it is here, making clear that individual variation is much greater than differences between groups (e.g., he's not talking about existing female engineers at google or anyone else in particular), stressing that diversity/human dignity/worth etc are all paramount even if there are group level biological differences/trends. Then I think the lynch mob/monoculture/not engaging reaction is in the wrong, and the reaction to this very much proves one of the guy's main points. But that's my two cents.

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#217

Post by kinkrtyavimoodh » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:16 PM UTC

InclinedPlane wrote: post #208

artursapek wrote: post #45

Why are people so outraged at this guy? I read what he wrote and it honestly sounds like he's trying to be helpful. It's at least polite. The knee-jerk "SEXIST!" reactions to him come off extremely self-righteous and immature. There are a hundred other male-dominated careers and I never, ever hear women complain about not being equally represented in them. Why? Because they're not attractive careers.

Right, he's just asking questions, what's so harmful about that? He's "asking" whether or not an entire category of people deserve to be in his field. Which means he is actually questioning whether an entire gender deserves to be allowed to be engineers. That is on its face extremely offensive and damaging. Imagine showing up to work today in silicon valley as a female engineer. Imagine having spent years, decades ,…

> Which means he is actually questioning whether an entire gender deserves to be allowed to be engineers.

No, he is not, and your choice of words like 'deserve' and 'allowed' to add intent that wasn't present in the original is unfortunate.

It's NOT a question of 'permission', so it's not about who is allowed to be an engineer and who isn't. He is specifically questioning whether positive discrimination to ensure there are equal numbers of men and women engineers at Google makes sense, if there are innate differences in the degree to which men and women DESIRE to be engineers.

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#218

Post by currymj » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:18 PM UTC

EddieRingle wrote: post #43

One of my first exposures to this "manifesto" was on Twitter with someone starting a thread with "Google has a Nazi problem." The majority of the other responses I read either attacked the author, dismissed the entire text in whole, and/or refused to actually argue the paper's points because they saw them as so ridiculous or "obviously" wrong. I read the paper. I don't see at all how it relates to fascism, Trumpism,…

calling someone a Nazi is a strong accusation, but the guy did repeat some extreme-right talking points. one of the footnotes basically repeats the argument that "cultural Marxism" has taken over the left. This is a common right-wing talking point often connected to an antisemitic conspiracy theory involving the Frankfurt School.

I doubt the guy is an actual Nazi, but just like you I'm not specialized enough to evaluate his psychological and biological claims (although I'd guess they're overstated, given how many psychological experiments fail to replicate). Just, hearing talking points I've heard from actual literal Nazis made me a lot more inclined to dismiss his views, which I think is a safe heuristic.

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#219

Post by geggam » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:18 PM UTC

Impossible wrote: post #211

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #182

Likewise, are they different enough to justify the massive disparity in nursing? As of 2011, 90% of nurses in the US were women[0]. That's even more skewed than tech. Moreover, the average income of a nurse in Silicon Valley is $100k. To my knowledge, there is no outcry or movement to bring more men into the nursing profession. [0] https://www.census.gov/people/io/files/Men_in_Nursing_Occupa...

This is constantly brought up as a counterpoint to women in tech on HN and it seems like no one that uses this argument ever does any research. Trying to get more men in nursing has been a thing for a very long time, in many ways its like the inverse of tech. A quick Google of "men in nursing" would show you a ton of resources and opinion pieces that look like a mirror of women in tech initiatives. Just because you a…

Yet with constant and proactive pushes to increase women in tech and men in nursing it doesn't happen.

Ever think maybe men generally dont want to be a nurse and women generally dont want to be a nerd ?

Re: On managing outrage in Silicon Valley

#220

Post by sctb » Mon, Aug 07, 2017, 10:20 PM UTC

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #182

Likewise, are they different enough to justify the massive disparity in nursing? As of 2011, 90% of nurses in the US were women[0]. That's even more skewed than tech. Moreover, the average income of a nurse in Silicon Valley is $100k. To my knowledge, there is no outcry or movement to bring more men into the nursing profession. [0] https://www.census.gov/people/io/files/Men_in_Nursing_Occupa...

Let's please not re-ignite this one again (and again): https://hn.algolia.com/?query=by:dang%20nursing&sort=byPopul...

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14950209 and marked it off-topic.