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Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

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Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#621

Post by insane_dreamer »

JohnMakin wrote: post #3

I'm a PoC, and stuff like this reads extremely bizarre to me. On the one hand, you're acknowledging rolling back DEI initiatives in part because of the "political landscape," and that you were already committed to diversity on your teams. That's all well and good, but then, why the initiative in the first place? It seems to me you're doing at least 1 thing here, and acknowledging that such DEI program was performativ…

> acknowledging that such DEI program was performative in the first place

Right. And being open about it is by design, so that the new Overlords (Trump and Musk) know that Zuck's heart was never in that DEI stuff anyway, that he just had to do it because of the political climate, and they can count on his whole-hearted support for the next 4 years.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#622

Post by jmyeet »

firefoxd wrote: post #184

I wrote about my experience working as a software developer and being black in the industry and I was lucky to have it published on BBC [1]. What immediately followed, every large company reached out to have me work as a consultant for their diversity program. I found it fascinating that they had a team of DEI experts in place already. Like what makes one an expert? In addition to my job, I spent nights developing pr…

Every single socially progressive initiative every company engages in is purely performative. If those initiatives potentially hurt their bottom line or hurt them politically, they will be dropped so fast your head will spin.

Years ago, tech companies would promote such moves to improve their image, play intot heir role as being "outsiders" or "disruptors" and to attract staff, who tended to skew towards socially progressive issues. There was genuine belief in the missions of those companies. Google once touted its mission "to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful".

But now we're talking about trillion dollar companies that move in lockstep with US policy.

I tend to believe that every US company eventually becomes a bank, a defense contractor or both.

The biggest heel turn politically is probably Mark Zuckerberg, who now makes frequent donations to Republican candidates (and some Democrats, for the record) but we also have Meta donating $1M to Trump's inauguration (by comparison, there was no contribution to Biden's inauguration). Efforts of fighting misinformation are out. DEO is out.

If you work for Meta, you're now really no different to Tiwtter. Your employer now actively pushes right-wing propaganda and the right-wing agenda. There is no real support for minorities. But the sad truth is, every other big tech company is on the same path.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#623

Post by insane_dreamer »

slg wrote: post #143
JohnMakin wrote: post #3

I'm a PoC, and stuff like this reads extremely bizarre to me. On the one hand, you're acknowledging rolling back DEI initiatives in part because of the "political landscape," and that you were already committed to diversity on your teams. That's all well and good, but then, why the initiative in the first place? It seems to me you're doing at least 1 thing here, and acknowledging that such DEI program was performativ…

> in part because of the "political landscape," People really should be more explicit about this. The "political landscape" here is the desire to pay fealty to an incoming administration in hopes of currying favor. American culture didn't drastically change. Trump got 3 million more votes in 2024 than he got in 2020 which is largely in line with overall population growth. That 3 million also amounts to less than 1% o…

It's not just that Trump is in power now. It's that Trump, unlike any US President before him (at least in the modern era) is highly and publicly vindictive.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#624

Post by insane_dreamer »

curtisblaine wrote: post #346
slg wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> in part because of the "political landscape," People really should be more explicit about this. The "political landscape" here is the desire to pay fealty to an incoming administration in hopes of currying favor. American culture didn't drastically change. Trump got 3 million more votes in 2024 than he got in 2020 which is largely in line with overall population growth. That 3 million also amounts to less than 1% o…

> The "political landscape" here is the desire to pay fealty to an incoming administration in hopes of currying favor. Exactly as it was when DEI practices were introduced.

Actually, these practices were mostly introduced under Trump, and ramped up with the Floyd protests, which also took place under Trump.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#625

Post by svieira »

typon wrote: post #365
bko wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people say DEI programs were purely performative and just for political points. But these policies did change the corporate landscape and affect hiring decisions. Of 323,092 new jobs added in 2021 by S&P 100 companies, 302,570 (94%) went to people of color This data came from workforce demographic reports submitted to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission by 88 S&P 100 companies Hispanic individua…

In my entire career working for US companies, I have yet to work with a black software engineer. Not a auxiliary role like PM, DevOps, IT but a straight SDE role. I have worked with literally hundreds of software engineers in my life.

While I can think of at least five people I have worked with who were SDEs and black (two from Africa, three from I-don't-know-where-but-I-presume-American-born).

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#626

Post by lugu »

Coming from another continent, it feels the discourse in the US is poisoned by the word RACE. Back home, no one uses it. The best proxy for inequality is poverty. Make poor people richer with basic support like free education and health care. Tax the richer. That should solve the problem. If you wonder about woman, create support for working mum with after school program and free baby care. Sorry to state the obvious.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#627

Post by imgabe »

mmooss wrote: post #117

The problem isn't evil, but the lack of any leader standing up for good (using simplistic terms). The evil is always there, in our souls and in our society, as is the good; we just need to choose and use the latter to check the former. Who of any serious stature is standing up to Zuckerberg, Musk, Trump, etc.? The absence - the empty stage - is shocking. It is one of Biden's great responsibilities, but he has long ab…

> As a simple example, who is standing up for the LA fire chief?

Why should anyone stand up for her? She is doing an objectively bad job. If you’re the fire chief and your entire city burns down, you will rightly catch flak for it. You had one job.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#628

Post by insane_dreamer »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #145
gorgoiler wrote: post #124

Diversity in tech hiring never felt like the right end of the funnel. It’s why I went into teaching and I’m proud to say after what seems like a ridiculously short amount of time (“they grow up so fast” etc.) the girls from my classes are now entering the work force as SWE and ML interns. Not many, but more than none. When we focus diversity efforts on high school kids then we get a turnaround at the funnel entrypoin…

This is just common sense, or should be. Unfortunately common sense is as uncommon as people tend to joke about. So you get a lot of focus on business hiring practices, even though it's literally impossible to hire candidates that don't exist. Sometimes this gets taken to absolutely farcical levels. I recall reading a blog from an Irish writer about how activists were trying to demand that companies there hire black…

> What matters is that the fields are open to anyone with an interest

except that it's not, which is the problem that DEI initiatives tried to compensate for

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#629

Post by ARandomerDude »

firefoxd wrote: post #184

I wrote about my experience working as a software developer and being black in the industry and I was lucky to have it published on BBC [1]. What immediately followed, every large company reached out to have me work as a consultant for their diversity program. I found it fascinating that they had a team of DEI experts in place already. Like what makes one an expert? In addition to my job, I spent nights developing pr…

Yawn. Focus on being a great dev and not what your skin color is. I couldn’t care less where your ancestors were from or whether you have a penis or a vagina. If the code is good, let’s merge it. If it sucks, delete it.

Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs

#630

Post by IcyWindows »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #460
specialp wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The start of the funnel is also the most racist and class discriminatory. Almost every school in the USA takes pupils from districts where the property owners pay the taxes for the schools. Rich areas get much more resources and support. Poor students get put into less funded schools and suffer from not having mentorship or peers to look up to. I live on Long Island and we have a majority white population. Despite th…

Washington state pools property tax money and then redistributed it equitably across the state to pay for education on a per pupil basis. This mainly means poorer eastern Washington districts are subsidized by richer western Washington districts, and districts that lose students to private schools take a direct hit in their funding.

It doesn't help when the Seattle school superintendent told parents that if they didn't like their school policies, they could leave.
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