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James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

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Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#601
post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it felt like James was pretty disingenuous and lacked a general understanding of how to behave in a workplace To be fair, it can be difficult for some people on the autism spectrum to work in environments where you have to run objective reality through various "politically correct" adjustment filters before reacting to it.

It's not about being politically correct, it's about not implying that your female coworkers don't deserve their jobs. before someone says "He didn't do that, you obviously never read it", I did and I still believe it's a conclusion that he leads the reader to. Not sure it was intentional. Also the whole "too neurotic for leadership" bit. WTF was he thinking with that.

Totally agree. How in the world could you have Damore on a team with women after the memo is out and people know he wrote it?

I have never bought into this is some social political thing but rather just basic human decency. Never understood how the right wing got a hold of this and my only guess it was Damore or someone from the right wing that wanted this rather obvious HR issue as some social political issue. It is not in reality. Any company would have diciplined Damore including firing. A manager is responsible for everyone including the women.

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#602

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the "preferences" part carries more weight. More men want to be engineers than women.

And if all Damore said was that he would still be at Google.

I don't know why you are being downvoted.

I think if he had made a better written argument that focused more clearly on the idea that part of the gender gap is due to a lack of interest by women, that he probably still would be employed.

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#603
post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is true. If the memo wasn't enough, him immediately going to right wing YouTubers like Stefan Molyneux, Jordan Peterson, Mike cernovich, Joe Rogan, Dave Rubin, Steven Crowder, etc. is suspicious. [1] Generally I wouldn't have minded if he went to right wing outlets, as long as he had also gone to left wing outlets. I was willing to listen to his reasoning. But it became clear after the memo came out that he didn…

If people "on the left" won't allow him to speak, where exactly do you expect him to go? It's like the people on the right saying Edward Snowden is obviously a traitor/spy because he went to Russia. Uhhh... something very obvious is being ignored there. Also, come on ... Joe Rogan is definitely not right-wing. Jordan Peterson and Dave Rubin do not self-identify as right-wing. And your [1] just seems a little extreme.…

This has nothing to do with being right or left. It is simply a human decency thing. A manager and company is responsible for everyone and after he shared such views with his name you could never keep him and have him working along side women. Google did exactly what they had to do. It is not complicated.

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#604

As with prior posts on this topic, the comments from all sides are mostly cantankerous, polarised, and entirely unedifying. Suggest you don't waste your time & energy reading, let alone posting an opinion. Flagged.

Please resist the temptation to place yourself above everyone else. It doesn't improve the discussion.

> When you flag something, please don't also comment that you did.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#605
post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When the majority of people coming to your defense are right wing extremists[0][1] and neo-nazis you are doing something wrong. You can also read his twitter account, he went full on alt-right. I am happy he got his ass fired. [0]: http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2017/08/18/james-damore-like-g... [1]: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/450202/google-employees...

> When the majority of people coming to your defense are right wing extremists[0][1] and neo-nazis you are doing something wrong. When the majority of people are too afraid to come to someone's defense (publicly) because they're afraid that the internet pitchfork mobs will come and destroy their lives too, a large part of society is doing something wrong. And that large part of society that attempts to do the silenci…

> we saw proof of that in the last US election.

When Clinton got millions more votes?

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? He actually does say that... > I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership. [...] > This is all part of a politically driven agenda that destroys everyone trying to question the unique, politically-correct acceptable way o…

No, he didn't say that. He speaks about the `distribution of preferences and abilities`. Going from a distribution to state that `women are worse then men at engineering` is a false narrative and COMPLETELY different. You probably didn't realize that because you already made your own politically-correct version of the truth on that subject, and refuse any discussion about those topics. For example, what he said doesn…

Except his point was indefensible, because it was (at best) poorly written.

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#607
post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a former Googler (left before the memo) and I was upset by the memo because, in implying that the hiring bar was lower for women, it contained the thinly veiled corolloary that my female colleagues were less capable than my male colleagues. That did not match my experience at all.

Affirmative action is the policy of favoring members of a disadvantaged group who suffer or have suffered from discrimination within a culture[1]. Google is an affirmative action employer[2]. If women are favored over men, then wouldn't it make sense that a less skilled woman has the potential of being selected over a more skilled man? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_action [2] https://careers.google.co…

No. They could just be spending 3 times as much to recruit women, for example. They could have recruiters dedicated to finding women. They could be funding women in tech programs at many levels. etc...

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#608
post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> diversity of what exactly is the target? Life experience? Clearly not when every company recruits from the same 10 schools.

Surely you can agree that every student is an individual and just because they go to the same college does not mean they all have the same background?

No, but I would argue it makes them less diverse than their physical traits. Especially considering that college is a formative time for most people.

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#609
post #107

I never really saw too much issue with what he wrote. It seemed a lot of people were mad at him for things he never said. It's been awhile since I read his document, but I remember expecting it to be so bad from all the uproar I was hearing, but after reading it I couldn't find much to be angry about. Can someone enlighten me - i'll admit, this may be a highly ignorant topic of mine.

The document went through multiple layers of abstraction. Very few people actually read it. Instead, some news outfit reported on it relatively accurately, then a less scrupulous outfit wanted clicks so they sensationalize it, then a third party reads both of those articles and averages their opinion on it somewhere in the middle. Repeat. As the information becomes more popular, we get sponsored snap stories and Face…

> Very few people actually read it.

You need to learn that people can have a different opinion then you, having read the same document.

> Damore was fired because of the outrage, not because of the article, but the outrage was manufactured by a sensationalist click machine and information overload culture literally championed by the company he was fired from.

Correct, and that's why his lawsuit is BS. He caused outrage both externally and internally. You had an employee that others would refuse to work with.

Of course he was fired.

Re: James Damore has filed a class action lawsuit against Google

#610
post #522
post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you go on the Young Turks if you were him? It'd be like walking before a firing squad.

Okay, but running to Molyneux is instant confirmation of the things people thought about him. and actually yes, do some prep work and go on a show that will be hostile. Not crazy, but potentially hostile. Someone who will reject the ideas and force you to defend and/or clarify them.

Uhh, he had The Entire Internet doing that at him 24/7, why do you think there needs to be more?
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