GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract • Hacker News Board

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#61

Post by olah_1 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:53 PM UTC

pm90 wrote: post #42

creaghpatr wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ICE is not a partisan organization, it's a government agency. If you pay taxes, you support ICE, and are their customer, period.

> ICE is not a partisan organization, Only if you have your head deliberately under the sand in the face of all the reporting that has been done so far about wanton cruelty inflicted on human beings by this agency, including but not limited to: * separation of toddlers from their parents * horrific conditions in detention facilities * detaining immigrants for as long as they possibly can * arresting and trying to dep…

People that deliberately commit crimes typically suffer all of these things, yes.

If you believe that illegally crossing a border is not a crime, then that's a different discussion that could be had.

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#62

Post by zozbot234 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:53 PM UTC

CydeWeys wrote: post #30

ratsmack wrote: post #2

It seems that these kinds of demands are becoming more common. Is it because conflict resolution is becoming a dying art, is it because people don't rise to the level of maturity of past times? I just find it to be confusing. Non PW link: https://archive.ph/IkYQ3

That's very weird to conflate employees of tech companies caring more about other people's rights with a loss of "the maturity of past times". It wasn't the maturity of past times, it was the status quo of not really caring about anyone else's rights at all. The civil rights movement was only half a century ago!

> caring more about other people's rights

Except when those rights involve things like freedom of speech. Or even privacy.

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#63

Post by btgeekboy » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:53 PM UTC

pm90 wrote: post #42

creaghpatr wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ICE is not a partisan organization, it's a government agency. If you pay taxes, you support ICE, and are their customer, period.

> ICE is not a partisan organization, Only if you have your head deliberately under the sand in the face of all the reporting that has been done so far about wanton cruelty inflicted on human beings by this agency, including but not limited to: * separation of toddlers from their parents * horrific conditions in detention facilities * detaining immigrants for as long as they possibly can * arresting and trying to dep…

The agency will live on past the current administration. The main function of ICE is needed. The policies imposed upon them from above are the root of the problem and need to be removed. But they will be gone in time, hopefully sooner rather than later.

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#64

Post by _bfhp » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:53 PM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #44

Miner49er wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is very much a political decision.

No it’s a neutral position not taking a stance for or against a particular business because of politics. So while it may look to someone like it’s “for” something, they’d also take business from an “ICE-alert” system, so from some PoV that would look like it’s “against”, but it’s not. It’s staying neutral.

Non-rhetorical-or-sarcastic question: What human rights violations would ICE have to commit to make it political for you? e.g. above or below Abu Ghraib prison level?

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#65

Post by ilikehurdles » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:53 PM UTC

creaghpatr wrote: post #24

geofft wrote: post #14

> With the issue refusing to go away, GitHub executives have changed their internal messaging, including a memo to employees saying barring ICE from “access to GitHub could actually hurt the very people we all want to help,” in the words of Chief Operating Officer Erica Brescia. > “We have learned from a number of nonprofits and refugee advocates that one of the greatest challenges facing immigrants is a lack of tech…

ICE is not a partisan organization, it's a government agency. If you pay taxes, you support ICE, and are their customer, period.

Whether it’s the by-the-book definition of partisan, it is still reasonable for people to have strong moral or ethical objections to working for this client.

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#66

Post by jcampbell1 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:54 PM UTC

nrook wrote: post #9

There is a well-known strategy by which employees can exert influence over their employer and change the decisions it makes. It is called a union. Unionization has been slow for various reasons in the tech sector; when it comes to rich, well-known companies, people don't want to go through the effort to unionize and get more money when they already are being paid a lot. But if workers want to influence decisions like…

Unions are majority rule democratic. When I worked at a plant for one of the big 3, the candidates the union submitted for trades promotions were universally white men. The union didn’t look out for women or minorities particularly well because the majority rules. People assume a tech union will lead to things being somehow more just, but be careful for what you wish for. James Damore might just have the votes.

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#67

Post by doctorpangloss » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:54 PM UTC

blt wrote: post #52

whalesalad wrote: post #31

A lot of these companies need to start sticking to their guns and simply letting people go for conflicts like this. If you’re not gonna be a team player there are a billion other tech companies you can go be a part of. I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with the core issue here – but at some point the message needs to be sent that you don’t deserve a job and aren’t owed anything. You work in exchange for cash, plain and…

Or, recognize that the company is worthless without its laborers, and that the laborers can use collective bargaining to change the company mission.

Ah yes, nothing says collective bargaining by labor like "Worker leaves company where most value is generated by automation."

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#68

Post by kevincrane » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:54 PM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #44

Miner49er wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is very much a political decision.

No it’s a neutral position not taking a stance for or against a particular business because of politics. So while it may look to someone like it’s “for” something, they’d also take business from an “ICE-alert” system, so from some PoV that would look like it’s “against”, but it’s not. It’s staying neutral.

Doing nothing and accepting money from an organization like ICE is 100% a political choice.

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#69

Post by maximente » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:54 PM UTC

pm90 wrote: post #42

creaghpatr wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ICE is not a partisan organization, it's a government agency. If you pay taxes, you support ICE, and are their customer, period.

> ICE is not a partisan organization, Only if you have your head deliberately under the sand in the face of all the reporting that has been done so far about wanton cruelty inflicted on human beings by this agency, including but not limited to: * separation of toddlers from their parents * horrific conditions in detention facilities * detaining immigrants for as long as they possibly can * arresting and trying to dep…

you are making a convincing argument that the organization is extreme, but you haven't addressed the issue of whether or not it is partisan.

to do so you'd need to compare and contrast its behavior across administrations under different political parties. as one data point, roughly same # of people were deported under bush/obama (the definitions changed, so not quite apples to apples data wise).

Re: GitHub tries to quell employee anger over its ICE contract

#70

Post by shadowgovt » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 7:54 PM UTC

thereare5lights wrote: post #41

whalesalad wrote: post #31

A lot of these companies need to start sticking to their guns and simply letting people go for conflicts like this. If you’re not gonna be a team player there are a billion other tech companies you can go be a part of. I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with the core issue here – but at some point the message needs to be sent that you don’t deserve a job and aren’t owed anything. You work in exchange for cash, plain and…

Nah, turn tail and leave when you could fight to change the company? Not gonna happen.

It depends. At a small company? Sure. But no individual employee, or even small collective of employees that aren't VP or key contributor in an irreplaceable knowledge-base, have the clout to turn a Microsoft or a Google.

At a major company? The only thing you can do as an individual is take the wind out of their sales or refrain from working for them. Which these companies do notice; Google hiring keeps tabs on candidates who tell them "I won't work for you for ethical reason X."