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‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

nytimes.com

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Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#611

Post by [deleted] »

tptacek wrote: post #264
cbthrow91 wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Ms. Milosevich said the white employee lived in Philadelphia and was allowed to commute to and work from the company’s New York office" Unless I am missing something seems pretty clear the employee switched from WFH in Philadelphia to commuting to NYC to work at that office.

Even if that's the case, the treatment is still obviously disparate: * The PHL employee has been given their choice of office to work from. * The Black employees were required to relocate, not just show up at a particular office on a schedule. Were the Black employees offered the opportunity to work out of the NYC office?

[deleted]

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#612

Post by danShumway »

RestlessMind wrote: post #33

From Coinbase's preemptive rebuttal[1]: "we hired an external consultant in August of this year who specializes in data science and diversity and inclusion to cull through all of our historic data related to diversity ... and conduct a high volume of interviews with employees representing all background, functions, and tenures to understand the employee experience. The independent investigation concluded that there w…

> So external investigators didn't find anything wrong

This feels like a trap that we don't fall into in other areas. This is an external consultant is paid by the company, whos reviews and future job prospects are based on being an attractive hire for other companies accused of racist action. There's obviously a huge conflict of interest there.

At HN we would recognize that conflict of interest if we were talking about binding arbitration. We would recognize that conflict of interest if we were talking about a security consultant that was dismissing security disclosures from 3rd-parties. It's a little disappointing to me to see unequal standards applied here.

The question is, is what the NYT is saying plausible, is there evidence of this going on? And yeah, the story sites specific examples, interviews specific employees, and cites complaints from managers. It seems completely plausible to me.

I don't get why people are suddenly so eager to buy into corporate narratives about structural racism and bias, when they would never buy into those same corporate narratives about issues like privacy and security. Every time an Apple or a Google thread comes up, our comment section is filled with people calling them out as disingenuous; it's filled with people who are willing to read between the lines on their policies and press releases. We have no shortage of people in those threads who are willing to extrapolate or judge those companies based on the past actions of the industry. But when it comes to representation, suddenly all of that goes out the window?

Representation and bigotry even just as general topics are a huge blind spot for HN that we need to get better at talking about. We need to be less dismissive of these claims. We need to take racial discrimination more seriously, because it is a serious problem in tech.

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#613

Post by arolihas »

jollofricepeas wrote: post #519
tptacek wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are, due respect, basically just making this up. Companies publish investigator reports of bias and discrimination somewhat regularly. It's possible that Coinbase contractually can't disclose the reports they've already commissioned --- in which case they probably ought not to have tried to refute the article with them --- but they can certainly commission a new one that they can disclose. It's a 600+ employee co…

The amount of speculation with regards to this topic among “engineers” and “innovators” is kind of amazing. The HN community appears to be no more rational or evidence-based finders of fact than those found in the comments section of Fox News or the New York Times. What hope do we have if the creators and maintainers are prone to the same proclivities as the users?

It’s always amusing to me that people are shocked HN isn’t actually that much smarter than any other internet community. The relative level of pretentiousness though is off the charts

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#614

Post by the_only_law »

arolihas wrote: post #613
jollofricepeas wrote: post #519

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The amount of speculation with regards to this topic among “engineers” and “innovators” is kind of amazing. The HN community appears to be no more rational or evidence-based finders of fact than those found in the comments section of Fox News or the New York Times. What hope do we have if the creators and maintainers are prone to the same proclivities as the users?

It’s always amusing to me that people are shocked HN isn’t actually that much smarter than any other internet community. The relative level of pretentiousness though is off the charts

Eh, I think it’s a bit hyperbolic to compare it to the commenters on the aforementioned sites, but yeah I mostly agree. Given the site’s founders and general audience it’s not really shocking though. I still prefer it over say Reddit, mostly because the more focused nature makes it easier to find the actual smart comments.

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#615

Post by arolihas »

tomjen3 wrote: post #493
klyrs wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't be saying that the country is completely unified over this issue... what do you mean by this?

Because everyone from the left to the Heritage Foundation condemned the murder. What most don't condone is burning down buildings and attacking and harassing diners. BLM is the ultimate motte and bailey.

Do most condone the lack of consequences for the police?

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#616

Post by arolihas »

roenxi wrote: post #523
enumjorge wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You took one example and ignored the rest. It’s not like NYT wrote this article simply because Russ left. What about the employees who were asked to be present for photo shoots to show workplace diversity but who felt ignored and talked down to during meetings? That sounds problematic. If it were a couple of employees it’s one thing but when most of your black employees leave because of what they feel is racism in th…

> What about the employees who were asked to be present for photo shoots to show workplace diversity but who felt ignored and talked down to during meetings? That is extremely vague. Is it a red flag? Yes. Does it imply racism? No. It doesn't even guarantee there is a problem or a systemic trend for that matter. If there are 3 red flags and some actual evidence of racism then that is one thing. But there isn't. Even…

How is it not racist to showcase your black employees for appearances and then turn around and condescend them?

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#617

Post by arolihas »

the_only_law wrote: post #614
arolihas wrote: post #613

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s always amusing to me that people are shocked HN isn’t actually that much smarter than any other internet community. The relative level of pretentiousness though is off the charts

Eh, I think it’s a bit hyperbolic to compare it to the commenters on the aforementioned sites, but yeah I mostly agree. Given the site’s founders and general audience it’s not really shocking though. I still prefer it over say Reddit, mostly because the more focused nature makes it easier to find the actual smart comments.

I agree there is some great content here, and there’s definitely a lot less nonsense compared to reddit. I do think some of the smaller subreddits are just as good as here though

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#618

Post by danShumway »

kortilla wrote: post #512
wpietri wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Racism is endemic in the US. It was founded with the notion that black people were basically livestock. We've slowly and fitfully moved away from that, but the problem is far from over. With any company we should assume that both personal and systemic bias are present. Which is why well-run companies work to counter that.

> Racism is endemic in the US. It was founded with the notion that black people were basically livestock. The existence of slavery in the past isn’t driving the current race issues in the US so much as fallout from much more recent segregation policies. Nobody alive today was a (or was born to) a slave and the majority of the states that make up the United States were not even part of the country during the civil war…

> so much as fallout from much more recent segregation policies.

The existence of slavery and the view that Black people could be treated as livestock are why we had segregation policies.

The existence of slavery fueled white anger towards the idea that the "livestock" were suddenly being allowed to go to the same places and use the same services as white people. The generations of people who owned slaves raised the generations of people that enforced segregation, and those generations raised the people today who enforce racial discrimination and oppose racial justice.

And like you said, this isn't far-back history, segregation in the US was recent. People have this flowery view that racism just went away and that slavery just suddenly stopped mattering. But the effects are still very much with us today. A few generations isn't enough to eliminate a culturally pervasive, harmful ideology.

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#619

Post by wpietri »

danShumway wrote: post #618
kortilla wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Racism is endemic in the US. It was founded with the notion that black people were basically livestock. The existence of slavery in the past isn’t driving the current race issues in the US so much as fallout from much more recent segregation policies. Nobody alive today was a (or was born to) a slave and the majority of the states that make up the United States were not even part of the country during the civil war…

> so much as fallout from much more recent segregation policies. The existence of slavery and the view that Black people could be treated as livestock are why we had segregation policies. The existence of slavery fueled white anger towards the idea that the "livestock" were suddenly being allowed to go to the same places and use the same services as white people. The generations of people who owned slaves raised the…

Agreed, with one caveat. It isn't "people" who think that racism just went away. It's white people.

Re: ‘Tokenized’: Black Workers’ Struggles at Coinbase

#620

Post by danShumway »

wpietri wrote: post #619
danShumway wrote: post #618

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> so much as fallout from much more recent segregation policies. The existence of slavery and the view that Black people could be treated as livestock are why we had segregation policies. The existence of slavery fueled white anger towards the idea that the "livestock" were suddenly being allowed to go to the same places and use the same services as white people. The generations of people who owned slaves raised the…

Agreed, with one caveat. It isn't "people" who think that racism just went away. It's white people.

Right, good catch.

It's important to keep in mind that Black communities (and a lot of other marginalized communities) as a group don't really have these debates as much, because it's completely obvious to them that they aren't being treated equally.

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