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On Resigning from Google

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Re: On Resigning from Google

#61

Post by aaomidi »

JimboOmega wrote: post #21

The post talks about Google supposedly persecuting LGBTQ employees for speaking up. But the linked articles only talk about them (possibly) getting retaliated against for protesting other issues, like border security or sexual harassment. As an LGBT person (who does her fair share of activism), I'm not clear what the LGBTQ angle is here other than if the people involved happened to be LGBTQ. It seems like even if the…

LGBTQ+ activism doesn't just involve fighting for rights for people who fall within those labels.

It has evolved onto fighting for rights of EVERYONE who is currently being harrassed, targetted, and discriminate against. It's activism for human rights for everyone.

Not every LGBTQ+ activist agrees with this evolution, but a large group do. I'm personally in that group.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#62

Post by scardycat »

aaomidi wrote: post #52
scardycat wrote: post #42

I currently work at Google, but I am a newbie, i.e less than 5 years at Google. I frequently run in to people who are: 1) always been at Google and enjoyed the fruits of its rise or at another similar environment 2) never had to deal with frugality or lack of funding for anything 3) see themselves are superior to everyone else - in terms of how enlightened they are, how they know whats best for everyone 4) feel that…

Hiding behind "it's a business" isn't an argument acceptable to most people. Sure "it's a business" but does that give it a green card to act how it pleases? We're getting into the philosophy of what we want businesses to be in our society. More and more people are realizing that the inhumane structure a business operates in isn't acceptable to them, and would like to have a say in what they're doing. This person lef…

> Sure "it's a business" but does that give it a green card to act how it pleases?

of course, yes! As long as it stays within the boundaries set by the law. Do you not act as you please? Do you not eat a $40 meal while a homeless person is lying outside in the cold? DO you not send your kid to a private school at $100k/year while the kid down the street (down the highway) struggles for school supplies?

> So please, stop telling people how to behave and act and protest. We're not putting in 100 hour weeks because someone before you had the audacity to go say the current system is inhumane.

I am not tell you how to behave, I am tell you to not tell the company how to behave. You are free to leave and go do what you think is right.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#63

Post by replyguy912 »

shadowgovt wrote: post #20
rboyd wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"hey, why are you leaving?" "imo the company makes its money in some really shady ways." "what's next for you?" "oh, I'm retiring.. made a lot of money here." ???

There's no doubt that working at Google + frugal living can give a rank-and-file engineer enough "fuck-you money" to make their own calls. I don't see that as a bad thing though. Just because it's not a liberty everyone has to stop working for a firm they find morally repugnant doesn't imply one shouldn't take the liberty if one has it.

Except they were there for 14 years. Unless it became instantly diametrically opposed to their belief system in the past couple of months, the author has put up with the changing environment for a long time. They're not some skill-less laborer; after all, they worked at google! they could get another job pretty easily, no, one with a company that shared their personal values?

Re: On Resigning from Google

#65

Post by [deleted] »

scardycat wrote: post #42

I currently work at Google, but I am a newbie, i.e less than 5 years at Google. I frequently run in to people who are: 1) always been at Google and enjoyed the fruits of its rise or at another similar environment 2) never had to deal with frugality or lack of funding for anything 3) see themselves are superior to everyone else - in terms of how enlightened they are, how they know whats best for everyone 4) feel that…

[deleted]

Re: On Resigning from Google

#66

Post by dionidium »

dionidium wrote: post #48
gnicholas wrote: post #22

> Attacks like this were an attack on people’s jobs and physical security: if you can strip a reform-oriented pastor of their PCUSA ordination, you also strip them of their employment and their health insurance If I'm understanding correctly, the argument with regard to "physical security" is that if you try to get someone fired, which would result in them losing their employer-provided health insurance, that they wo…

The irony, of course, is that it's a defining feature of some political cohorts to rejoice in getting people fired for things they've said online. I think it's clearly the case that an attempt on one's livelihood is a far more credible violation of "safety" than is, say, public speech on a topic with which you strongly disagree, but it's the latter that's described as such, while the former is often celebrated.

By the way, as with so many things, this is something for which there is a pronounced class divide. Upwardly-mobile, highly-educated Hacker Newsers may see a firing as a bump in the road, a legitimate slap on the wrist for bad behavior, but I assure you that working-class people with working-class prospects interpret an attack on their job in the real world as a seriously disproportionate response.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#67

Post by aaomidi »

scardycat wrote: post #62
aaomidi wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hiding behind "it's a business" isn't an argument acceptable to most people. Sure "it's a business" but does that give it a green card to act how it pleases? We're getting into the philosophy of what we want businesses to be in our society. More and more people are realizing that the inhumane structure a business operates in isn't acceptable to them, and would like to have a say in what they're doing. This person lef…

> Sure "it's a business" but does that give it a green card to act how it pleases? of course, yes! As long as it stays within the boundaries set by the law. Do you not act as you please? Do you not eat a $40 meal while a homeless person is lying outside in the cold? DO you not send your kid to a private school at $100k/year while the kid down the street (down the highway) struggles for school supplies? > So please, s…

You're telling me to accept the status quo and be fine with it.

That's telling me how to behave. The company is just an entity that needs to follow the set of guidelines set by people living in that society.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#68

Post by ocdtrekkie »

JimboOmega wrote: post #21

The post talks about Google supposedly persecuting LGBTQ employees for speaking up. But the linked articles only talk about them (possibly) getting retaliated against for protesting other issues, like border security or sexual harassment. As an LGBT person (who does her fair share of activism), I'm not clear what the LGBTQ angle is here other than if the people involved happened to be LGBTQ. It seems like even if the…

I think the claim is that Google is more willing to dismiss LGBTQ employees for these issues than others. However, it's also plausible that LGBTQ employees are more accustomed to having to fight for their rights and hence have trended to be amongst the "loudest" complainants?

Re: On Resigning from Google

#69

Post by baddox »

paxys wrote: post #26

Random thoughts: 1. I applaud the fact that they are actually quitting the company to voice their disapproval of these policies. In my mind all the "internal activism" happening at Google and others is massively hypocritical. One cannot publicly criticize a company while enjoying cushy paychecks fueled by those very activities they despise. 2. If they think Google is discriminatory towards LGBT employees and minoriti…

Consider what happens if everyone who has a moral complaint about their employer immediately quits rather than staying around and attempting to chase the complaint up the management hierarchy and/or educate and organize other employees to voice the complaint.

I think utilizing one's power as a worker and aligning other workers to increase workers' power is far from hypocritical. It's a great way (perhaps the only reliable way) to hold companies accountable for their actions and improve companies' treatment of workers and society.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#70

Post by shadowgovt »

shaan1 wrote: post #41

He has made enough money to retire. For engineers still looking for work, GOOGLE is the best place to work. If you don't want to work at google, don't work there. Why do people keep blaming the company. This is not a dictatorship.

That depends on what one wants to do with one's labor.

They'll certainly compensate you well, and they have flexible hours and treat software engineers and SREs like royalty.

But Googlers who joined up 10 years ago really didn't have to also ask the question of whether their work was directly benefiting military AI projects (or merely providing an agnostic service that everyone was using; search is certainly something that benefited good and bad use alike, but partnering with the military and submitting contract proposals for drone targeting operations is a moderately different can of worms).

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