Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday • Hacker News Board

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#411

Post by rdaystrom » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:43 PM UTC

yarg wrote: post #362

nineplay wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I want to make a point about "culture fit" "culture fit" is one of the biggest causes of workplace discrimination and I still see it pushed in 'hiring training' as perfectly valid criteria. Things I've seen teams consider "culture" - will the candidate go to our weekly study session at the micro-brewery? - will the candidate stay after work to play multi-player games with us? - is the candidate entertained by all t…

Culture fit doesn't have to stretch that far - it does not need to be pervasive and it does not need to be toxic. We had a guy from Gaza in our office - he complained about informal emails sent to invite people for drinks because it was sinful, he complained about a manikin that got dressed up at special occasions because it was immodest. I don't know what lines to draw here - but be careful when playing with double-…

Aren't all swords double-edged? I would think that a single-edged sword would simply be a knife. Or an axe.

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#412

Post by phoric » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:43 PM UTC

dec0dedab0de wrote: post #387

mhuffman wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There are plenty of people who like each other that have nothing in common. The idea that the reason people like people is because they are like them just feels ridiculous to me, but maybe I am an outlier. Personally, the more someone is like me, the less I like them. Yes, you are an outlier. There is a very large amount of studies that show that people like people that are like them. [1] https://journals.sagepub.co…

Yes, you are an outlier. Fair enough There is a very large amount of studies that show that people like people that are like them. The link you provide shows a coefficient of .47 for actual similarity, and .39 for perceived similarity. I'm not good at statistics, but that seems like a far cry from "the reason why people like other people is that they are like them." which is the line I was replying to. If I'm underst…

This is just my understanding, but I believe in social sciences r values are usually quite deflated and a coefficient of .47 is extremely high.

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#413

Post by AdrianB1 » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:43 PM UTC

"Staff are asking Activision Blizzard to adopt new recruiting, hiring and promotion policies to improve representation across all employee levels."

What exactly does this means? What is "representation across all employee levels" and why not competency?

In the US-based company I work for, we have a "diversity and inclusion" program that had resulted in promoting cafeteria managers to director level and hiring any (all) applicants of certain races in certain countries (varies by country) because targets had to be met. I have a friend in US that was told by all his mentors : "come on, you are a white male, you have no chance to be promoted". Is this what these people want?

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#414

Post by tpmx » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:43 PM UTC

ozarkerD wrote: post #219

FanaHOVA wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some extracts from the lawsuit: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-report/activision-...

Absolute degeneracy. I don’t understand how a professional workplace could devolve to this. I have trouble talking about non work matters for more than a few minutes, How do things get this far?

The money, and the kind of people it attracts.

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#415

Post by cletus » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:45 PM UTC

bennysomething wrote: post #344

nineplay wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I want to make a point about "culture fit" "culture fit" is one of the biggest causes of workplace discrimination and I still see it pushed in 'hiring training' as perfectly valid criteria. Things I've seen teams consider "culture" - will the candidate go to our weekly study session at the micro-brewery? - will the candidate stay after work to play multi-player games with us? - is the candidate entertained by all t…

So if I'm hiring someone at what point am I allowed to use my own personal discretion? Am I allowed to dislike someone? Am I allowed to say I don't like them so please don't hire them?

A lot of behaviour is obvious in aggregate but hard to identify in particular cases.

If you make a job posting, get 5 applicants, interview 3 of them and hire 1 it's hard to point a finger and say you did (or didn't) do anything wrong.

But let's say over the course of a year you receive 10,000 applications for various positions and 15% of those are African American. Now say that 10% of applicants get to the interview stage but none of the African American applicants made it to the interview stage then, in the very least, that looks bad. You would need to justify why that's the case.

Discrimination can be subtle. A lot of people who are discriminatory but don't think they are. In the US, for example, you have what are called "second syllable names". These are names that are traditionally AFrican American (eg Lakisha). I vaguely recall reading a study where someone took a bunch of resumes for assistant positions and for a bunch with "first syllable names" they replaced just the name with "second syllable names" and there was a statistically significant decrease in response rate.

So your personal discretion doesn't extend to unlawful hiring and firing practices.

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#416

Post by craftinator » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:46 PM UTC

arbitrage wrote: post #195

craftinator wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's also worth noting that the military is a toxic cesspit for sexual abuse. Comparing any sane workplace to the military is a joke. Nobody should want to be like the military, including the military. Can confirm true from experience. To be fair, the military (USMC experience only) is structured to intentionally harass all members below certain ranks continuously, with the idea being that it keeps them sharp and w…

> Sexual harassment was punished severely, but at the lowest levels possible, and wasn't often reported. So, not severely, then?

> So, not severely, then?

Probably could have phrased it better. The military culture is very different than civilian culture, jokes and turns of phrase that would be completely unacceptable in the civilian world are common, and the tolerance for them is higher. It's very much like the difference between working an office job, and going out to a seedy bar; different culture, different expectations and rules.

But as for what I said, there was a lot of borderline sexual harassment (and much of it that I witnessed not involving females at all) that went unreported. But when something was reported, it stayed at lower levels most times, and involved squad and platoon level justice, which is very, very severe. Like more severe than is allowed under the UCMJ.

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#417

Post by TMWNN » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:46 PM UTC

fleddr wrote: post #353

andrewzah wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How hard is it to not make inappropriate comments about someone or their body? It's -exceedingly- easy to not be a creepy dick to one's coworkers and fellow human beings. One only has to act like a robot if they have zero social awareness or tact.

I would agree that this is easy, but I did run into a weird edge case. First to be clear, I would never comment on anybody's body or clothes, especially not in the workplace. This is not to comply with some rule, I wouldn't have the urge to do that in the first place. It's weird and unneeded. Anyway, the edge case. My female coworker is very passionate about making custom dresses. One day, on the day before our count…

[...]

>But we all kept our mouth shut, and picked the safe side of things. She left defeated, perhaps humiliated.

Anti-sexual harassment training, and more broadly the discouraging of socialization between men and women, has also reduced the opportunity for men and women to marry. The flip side of the male executive no longer being able to chase his secretary around a desk to try to pinch her on the butt is another executive not being able to politely court the secretary he is in love with (and vice versa).

I don't have a good answer for how to get the one without the other, but both are consequences of modern sensibilities.

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#418

Post by hermannj314 » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:48 PM UTC

Kiro wrote: post #406

hermannj314 wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are in the US, federal discrimination laws only apply if you have a certain number of employees. Your state may have a specific and more restrictive law, but you are free to be as discriminatory as you want until you have at least 15 employees (under Federal law). https://www.eeoc.gov/employers/small-business/small-business...

The difference between 15 and 20 on just age discrimination seems very arbitrary. How did they even come up with that instead of just putting it together with the rest of the stuff?

I wish I knew.

I have never found any source remotely close to it but it would be nice if we had a revision history on laws so we could see who added what lines and why. I'm guessing it is out there in some official record.

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#419

Post by rustybelt » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:48 PM UTC

madamelic wrote: post #173

throwaway894345 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> considering women playing video games only became socially acceptable a few years ago. ... In Saudi Arabia? > It's still common for men to talk down to women on video games, to the point where the overwhelming majority of women do not use voice comms or make their gender known. It's common for men to talk down to men on video games too ("talk down to" is a very mild phrasing). Turns out there are a lot of jerks who…

> 'm not sure which game you're talking about, but I suspect you misunderstand the criticism. There have been thousands of female video game characters going back to the dawn of the industry. Many titles which prominently feature female characters have done very well (e.g.., Tomb Raider, Final Fantasy, etc). I'm guessing there has never been significant controversy because a video game featured a female character, th…

What is wrong with sexualized characters anyway? It's escapist entertainment. Are men now forbidden from enjoying attractive women in media? Absolutely don't harass people or discriminate, but this posture against sexualized characters is weirdly puritanical, especially considering the long history in games of non-sexualized, empowered female protagonists.

Re: Video game developers at Activision Blizzard say they'll walk out Wednesday

#420

Post by Apocryphon » Tue, Jul 27, 2021, 9:49 PM UTC

908B64B197 wrote: post #409

Apocryphon wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Singh was born on January 2, 1979, in Scarborough district of Toronto, Ontario > Bains was born in Toronto, Ontario on June 16, 1977

Not sure what's the point being made https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_nationality_law#Citizen...

Both politicians are of Indian extraction and descent but not only were born in Canada, but grew up there entirely. It's incorrect to claim that "their country" is India and not Canada. Second generation immigrants are not necessarily well-versed in nor even aware of the goings-on of their ancestral homelands.

Though technically you are correct on both counts. By dint of being born after 1950 but before 1992 to Indian fathers, they may be considered Indian citizens. And based on the ancestral comment in this subthread, it does seem like being an outsource destination is working out for Canada. But only technically correct.