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Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

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Re: Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

#481

Post by e12e »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #390
postnihilism wrote: post #275

This feels like the blue and black (white and gold) dress. It boggles my mind that people don't see the fundamental and toxic misogyny in this 'manifesto'. Please have a woman you care about in your life, preferably one in tech, read this and then ask their opinion of the piece. The "treat people as individuals, not as just another member of their group" sentiment of the author is fine except that we have hundreds of…

> Diversity programs are not about lowering the bar, they are about outreach and working against institutionalized racism and sexism which has created the distribution of wealth and education and work culture that we have today. I guess the one challenge I would put to this is that I find it difficult to believe that East Asians or Indians have been on the receiving end of any less discrimination than, say, Hispanics…

One difference is that Indians got their independence, while the US still occupies California...

Re: Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

#482

Post by losteverything »

Rule #1:writing dumb things gets you fired.

Rule #2: if you are inclined to write dumb things, bounce it off a buddy before you press Enter/send

Rule #3; pretend you want to be on the Supreme Court. When you write an opinion, even at a young age, do not write controversial things. Keep low to the ground

Re: Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

#483

Post by axaxs »

mikeash wrote: post #125
wildmusings wrote: post #35

The author's arguments have been completely misrepresented. He pointed out widely-believed and sometimes scientifically-established differences in the DISTRIBUTION OF traits in men and women. He said that those differences make attempts to achieve numerical parity misguided, discriminatory, and harmful. What is his conclusion about how we should behave? "Treat people as individuals, not as just another member of thei…

That's one way to read it. Another way would be, "Stop trying to promote diversity, it alienates the racists and sexists who work here." I don't think this is an unfair reading. One of the bullet points in the conclusion is literally that the company's diversity programs are problematic because they alienate non-progressives.

I cannot believe what I'm reading in this thread, especially from usernames I recognize and respect. If this is really what is ascertained from this, our two sides' differences are too large to be reconciled. Consider maybe some people truly want to work with the best of the best, ignoring race or gender. Let the cards fall where they may based on merit.

Re: Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

#484

Post by deevolution »

wildmusings wrote: post #35

The author's arguments have been completely misrepresented. He pointed out widely-believed and sometimes scientifically-established differences in the DISTRIBUTION OF traits in men and women. He said that those differences make attempts to achieve numerical parity misguided, discriminatory, and harmful. What is his conclusion about how we should behave? "Treat people as individuals, not as just another member of thei…

I think you might just be afraid of women.

Re: Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

#488

Post by siliconc0w »

The author is right in that there is some evidence there are, on average, trait differences between biological sexes but it's dangerous to make the claim that some traits are better for certain types of work or that these differences can satisfactory explain a gender gap. Those conclusions aren't justified by his evidence.

Engineering can absolutely benefit from 'people' minded individuals as much as 'thing' minded. It's just it usually takes a few tours of 'thing' focused jr. engineering before you can get into the 'people' related challenges seen when doing large scale software engineering.

If you follow contemporary conservatives like Jordan Peterson you can find a lot of the same themes of social construction vs biology or 'institutional liberalism' he finds in academia.

Re: Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

#489

Post by postnihilism »

Banthum wrote: post #442
postnihilism wrote: post #275

This feels like the blue and black (white and gold) dress. It boggles my mind that people don't see the fundamental and toxic misogyny in this 'manifesto'. Please have a woman you care about in your life, preferably one in tech, read this and then ask their opinion of the piece. The "treat people as individuals, not as just another member of their group" sentiment of the author is fine except that we have hundreds of…

"The "treat people as individuals, not as just another member of their group" sentiment of the author is fine except that we have hundreds of years of doing just this in order to oppress and disenfranchise groups of people." Just the opposite as far as I can tell. Every great evil in history came from grouping people and punishing based on collective guilt (whether the guilt was real or imagined). This includes the c…

We had racial policy in the form of slavery, then segregation and Jim Crow, to discriminatory housing policies, to inequitable application of drug laws but now, let's just ignore race and all of its historical context when it comes to outreach and public policy.

That is how it is possible to logically disenfranchise a group of individuals by ignoring their group characteristics. The disenfranchisement already happened.

Diversity programs are not about punishment it is about recognizing the historical context in which we are acting.

Re: Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

#490

Post by Iv »

wildmusings wrote: post #35

The author's arguments have been completely misrepresented. He pointed out widely-believed and sometimes scientifically-established differences in the DISTRIBUTION OF traits in men and women. He said that those differences make attempts to achieve numerical parity misguided, discriminatory, and harmful. What is his conclusion about how we should behave? "Treat people as individuals, not as just another member of thei…

Honestly I knew where this was going when I saw him mention biological differences. Which is a shame because many of his arguments are actually interesting. The tl;dr is actually chilling in the light of this firing.

His points were that some diversity policies were misguided and may even cause harm but are impossible to correct because they are taboo.

His memo was well-argumented and he was open to contradiction, which on several points could have been brought.

It was not aggressive, not dismissive, not sexist. I personally view his firing as totally excessive and downright anti-intellectual.

Critics, we are not yet in a post-sexist society. We have to improve many things for women and minorities, we have many efforts to make to reach true equality. Shutting down debate on your tactics will not help.

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