Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits • Hacker News Board

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#51

Post by muuh-gnu » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:30 PM UTC

ksenzee wrote: post #36

theuttick wrote: post #24

The one thing that he never explains is exactly what "diversity" he is looking for at Twitter. It seems that the only thing that matters to him is the color of the person's skin. In other words, an African-American MIT CS grad that grew up in Iowa is somehow going to come at problems differently than a white guy from the same town and school and with the same background. I wouldn't really call that diversity, that's…

In point of fact, an African-American guy and a white guy from the same neighborhood and school will have had different experiences growing up. For example, the white guy probably never had the cops called on him for wandering down a dark street wearing a hoodie. He probably also got more job interviews, if his name sounds white and his friend's doesn't. These experiences will have shaped the two men differently. Tha…

> These experiences will have shaped the two men differently.

You are implying that those negative experiences are a product of racism and not of simple statistics.

Maybe, only maybe, people _dont have_ as many problems with white guys wandering down a dark street wearing a hoodie as they have with black guys wandering down a dark street wearing a hoodie, so they dont call the cops on the former and call the cops on the latter.

Youre implicitely ruling out the mere _possibility_ that there maybe, only maybe, _might_ be a problem with blacks, that isnt a problem with whites, asians, indians or hispanics.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#52

Post by yummyfajitas » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:30 PM UTC

mazerackham wrote: post #34

yummyfajitas wrote: post #29

This guy sort of sort of undermines the standard case for diversity: "Twitter as a platform has empowered underserved and underrepresented people. It has fomented social movements and..." Sounds like twitter is killing it for people of all ethnic groups. It's as if a bunch of White/Asian dudes can actually design algorithms that work for everyone. So, um, why do we need a non-Asian engineer? It's also worth questioni…

You honestly think it's "worth questioning how a black person would think differently"? Different experiences yield different points of view yield different ideas

Ok, so what's the black perspective on eliminating the fail whale? What's the black idea about how to filter my feed?

Lets be concrete here, rather than appealing to vague platitudes.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#53

Post by MBCook » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:31 PM UTC

jbob2000 wrote: post #30

theuttick wrote: post #24

The one thing that he never explains is exactly what "diversity" he is looking for at Twitter. It seems that the only thing that matters to him is the color of the person's skin. In other words, an African-American MIT CS grad that grew up in Iowa is somehow going to come at problems differently than a white guy from the same town and school and with the same background. I wouldn't really call that diversity, that's…

Yes. This. My company makes a point to hire out-of-field engineers. I'm a self-taught developer with a philosophy degree. My coworker has a degree in astrophysics. We have a linguist, a theater major, some people with diplomas, and a "dropout". Shooting for Diversity with a capital D is misguided.

At one point the author talks about the issue that the majority of Twitter hires come from just a handful of schools.

I assume he (or she, don't remember the name) is looking for any kind of diversity, although their experience (and the chart posted) clearly talk about ethnic diversity, which may be what they have the most direct experience with.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#54

Post by volaski » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:33 PM UTC

What is wrong with the statement "We won't lower the bar"? Some people criticize that that statement is racist, but they aren't thinking about the context. When people ask companies to do something about diversity, they're normally asking to carve out more quota for certain minority group, just like how universities carve out certain portion of their student quota for people who donate large amount of money to get in. I guess it works for universities, but a company like Twitter which desperately needs focused group of talented employees, why would/should they do this? It's stupid that someone saying what's right gets taken out of context and is criticized by all the idiots on the internet. Also, isn't asking for this kind of treatment racist/sexist/whatever in itself? I am appalled by this idea as much as I am appalled by the idea of universities accepting students from rich families via donation.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#55

Post by muuh-gnu » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:33 PM UTC

mazerackham wrote: post #39

theuttick wrote: post #24

The one thing that he never explains is exactly what "diversity" he is looking for at Twitter. It seems that the only thing that matters to him is the color of the person's skin. In other words, an African-American MIT CS grad that grew up in Iowa is somehow going to come at problems differently than a white guy from the same town and school and with the same background. I wouldn't really call that diversity, that's…

Wow, trying to redefine racial diversity as racism. Having a different skin color makes a HUGE impact on the way you experience life, especially in America. Holding all other things equal, that alone will give you a different outlook on life, and likely different ideas too.

> Wow, trying to redefine racial diversity as racism.

If a diversity quota decides about you gettnig a job or not getting a job, then it is indistinguishable from a race quota, i.e. racism.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#56

Post by MBCook » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:33 PM UTC

protomyth wrote: post #19

imglorp wrote: post #7

> in 2013, 4.5% of CS graduates from the top 25 schools were African-American, and 6.5% were Hispanic/Latino. That's a problem. Hiring corps not only need to screen more applicants in order to find more applicants above their quality bar, but they also need to engage the community to get more kids interested in their fields and encouraged through school. It's the long view, the generation long kind. Public corp cost…

Fix the demographics and STEM interest in elementary and pre-K, then we might get a more diverse tech field. Until people start looking at the start of the problem, fixes at the end are limited.

You're right there are problems earlier, but things can still be improved now while the rest of the pipe is fixed.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#57

Post by Lawtonfogle » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:35 PM UTC

ksenzee wrote: post #36

theuttick wrote: post #24

The one thing that he never explains is exactly what "diversity" he is looking for at Twitter. It seems that the only thing that matters to him is the color of the person's skin. In other words, an African-American MIT CS grad that grew up in Iowa is somehow going to come at problems differently than a white guy from the same town and school and with the same background. I wouldn't really call that diversity, that's…

In point of fact, an African-American guy and a white guy from the same neighborhood and school will have had different experiences growing up. For example, the white guy probably never had the cops called on him for wandering down a dark street wearing a hoodie. He probably also got more job interviews, if his name sounds white and his friend's doesn't. These experiences will have shaped the two men differently. Tha…

>In point of fact, an African-American guy and a white guy from the same neighborhood and school will have had different experiences growing up.

The differences between their experiences is smaller than the differences between that black individual (sidenote: I was recently told by a black guy that African American is worse than black when used as an identifier) and someone of the same race who grew up in a significantly different socioeconomic class. If we want to increase diversity, the best would be to do so by class first, gender second, and race third.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#58

Post by MBCook » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:36 PM UTC

volaski wrote: post #54

What is wrong with the statement "We won't lower the bar"? Some people criticize that that statement is racist, but they aren't thinking about the context. When people ask companies to do something about diversity, they're normally asking to carve out more quota for certain minority group, just like how universities carve out certain portion of their student quota for people who donate large amount of money to get in…

The only problem I see with a statement like 'we won't lower the bar' is you might accidentally set the bar at a very difficult to achieve level. If it's based on the number of startups you've worked at or which ivy league school you went to etc. then candidates who are technically just a qualified (or could learn to be in very short order) may get passed.

Unintentional sampling bias, I guess.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#59

Post by mazerackham » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:36 PM UTC

unit91 wrote: post #20

Kiro wrote: post #8

I don't understand. Sure, the name idea wasn't perfect but the VP had good intentions. Is this really that upsetting?

Agreed. It seems like this particular idea could have been abandoned, without aborting the entire endeavor (or quitting the company). The words "feasibility study" come to mind... As an aside, I ran the names Miles Davis, Ray Charles, Morgan Freeman, Ben Carson, and Charlie Rangel against one the tools the author mentioned [1] and also got no correct answers. 1. http://www.textmap.com/ethnicity/

Ya, the idea sounds terrible if you just think about it for a split second:

Most Black Americans are descended from slaves. And their slave owners forced their family name on them. Slave owners were white. So these names will register as white names.

Completely destroys any accuracy concerning Black people.

Re: Twitter's only black engineer in leadership quits

#60

Post by jarfil » Wed, Nov 04, 2015, 8:36 PM UTC

I think this article reads a lot like "we need equal rights, so give us special treatment because we're different".

All that lobbying for people who did not meet the technical criteria, that getting upset at the idea of someone not noticing his differentiating blackness.

He might have a point in the part about how many minorities are using the service, but I don't see how the tech department should be concerned at all with that. Community relations, marketing, sure. Not tech.