Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

backreaction.blogspot.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

641–650 of 872 posts

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#641

Post by Sacho »

KirinDave wrote: post #570
2muchcoffeeman wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At this point I would like to see an itemised list of James Damore's points on gender and women's interpretations of them. This is the pair programming text in full: > Below I'll go over some of the differences in distribution of traits between men and women that I > outlined in the previous section and suggest ways to address them to increase women's > representation in tech without resorting to discrimination. Goog…

Pair Programming is not a technique to improve social contact in software. It's a technique to improve product reliability and give more practical mentorship opportunities. We might argue James says women are asking for good mentorship opportunities herr. So why do women benefit from this specifically (and that's okay) but other mentorship program are considered unfair in this rubric? You say "we need pair programmin…

That's a wholly uncharitable reading of what he's saying. A way more good faith interpretation would be the very simple equation of "working with just computer - more thing oriented, working with computer + partner - more people oriented".

This may be wrong(I don't have any evidence to back it up, and neither did Damore), but it is wholly different from the sinister undertones you are seeing.

(In fact, taking your "mentorship" interpretation, it is entirely possible that the women would be the one doing the mentoring, if their skill at engineering was hampered by a disinterest towards purely thing-oriented pursuits).

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#642

Post by michaelchisari »

tiogemini wrote: post #281
michaelchisari wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I absolutely agree that agreeing with the memo doesn't make someone a far right extremist, and I don't believe I ever stated or insinuated that. That's a bit of a non-sequitur, though. This is the exact point I was referring to: they won't change their position. If anything, their position will be radicalized. For example, from classical liberal to alt-right. This is been a common sort of mantra since Trump won the p…

Do you think the author will be radicalized? When I try to empathize with Damore the alt-right looks welcoming while liberals look very unwelcoming. I could see myself being drawn towards the group that accepts me (or doesn't attack me). That's the process that I assumed from the radicalization idea. Have I missed the mark?

> the alt-right looks welcoming

Superficially at most. When you go to some of the most popular alt-right facebook pages, and you see caricatures of Jews and whole racial groups consistently disparaged and stereotyped, and when you see just how many people posting in them have cross-interests with white supremacist and misogynist movements, you realize that "welcoming" is a very, very narrow term.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#643

Post by lawnchair_larry »

KirinDave wrote: post #544
ramblerman wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He didn't say it the fault of feminists, only that this was probably going to be the result. And It's exactly why public debate should be had. To come to a better solution in the middle, rather than create fringes on the sides. Your reaction here is just more of the 'Shock and Awe' and hurt feelings that doesn't really help push the agenda.

> He didn't say it the fault of feminists, only that this was probably going to be the result. So what we all should do is forgive these men their outrageously outdated and somewhat dehumanizing viewpoints and calmly explain to them that currently they are benefitting from a system called patriarchy that has normalized male dominance. We should then calmly suggest that btw, people who are not visually and immediately…

You should really read the article. It didn't say anything negative like you're suggesting.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#644

Post by lawnchair_larry »

_r_o_y_ wrote: post #499
ramblerman wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He didn't say it the fault of feminists, only that this was probably going to be the result. And It's exactly why public debate should be had. To come to a better solution in the middle, rather than create fringes on the sides. Your reaction here is just more of the 'Shock and Awe' and hurt feelings that doesn't really help push the agenda.

There can be no discussion when you start with a bad premise. What can you argue with someone that says the other sex is inferior?

There can be no discussion when people attack a straw man instead of read the article. Nobody said anyone is inferior, at all.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#645

Post by tchaffee »

humanrebar wrote: post #578
tchaffee wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that means that it's a topic that needs to be discussed instead of being censored and the author fired. Here is what CEO said on the about it in his response [1]: "many points raised in the memo—such as the portions criticizing Google’s trainings, questioning the role of ideology in the workplace, and debating whether programs for women and underserved groups are sufficiently open to all—are important topics. The a…

> If you intimidate enough employees via a widespread memo, you will get fired. Which part of the memo was intimidating, harassing, or illegal? Which part promoted biases? > As an example, would anyone expect to keep their job if they published a memo with "Blacks on average are [insert negative here]." No, but that's because of my low expectation of fairness from corporate leadership and middle management, not becau…

> Which part of the memo was intimidating, harassing,

"Women on average have more neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance)." is one example.

Just because something is true or a fact does not give some magical guarantee that people will not feel intimidated or harassed if that fact is presented in a certain way or in a certain context. And perhaps people who have lived an entire life of being discriminated against might not even care about the context.

In order to make sure people don't feel intimidated, you need to use people skills, not science skills. You need to listen, you need to empathize, and ask questions. You need to be able to feel what someone else is feeling. Almost always this means in person. The opposite of blasting out a memo (which happens to insert some scientific facts) from behind your computer screen.

Having good people skills often has little to do with science or even the truth.

> not because I think that opinion is harassing, intimidating,

If you can't see why a sweeping generalization about blacks (or any other group) can be harassing or intimidating, may I respectfully suggest you could use some education in the area of people skills? I'm saying that having come myself from a place where I had little respect for the soft skills involved in sales, marketing, diplomacy, charisma, leadership, and so on. You seem to have a great deal of respect for the truth and reality. Reality and truth also include feelings, and it's very rare that scientific truth helps anyone navigate how to make others feel like they are not being harassed or intimidated.

> my low expectation of fairness from corporate leadership and middle management

Why would you have any expectation of fairness from them? It's nowhere in their job description, and they don't get paid to be fair. At place like Google, very often they are being paid because they have a smidgen of people skills the tech folks below them are so sorely lacking in.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#646

Post by lawnchair_larry »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #549
kentrado wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Mad at someone for saying you're genetically predisposed to be less capable of individual action? He never said that. Could you cite the portion where he literally says women are less capable?

Do the last two bullet points of his tl;dr count?: * Differences in distributions of traits between men and women may in part explain why we don’t have 50% representation of women in tech and leadership. * Discrimination to reach equal representation is [...] bad for business. Which I read as, "woman aren't as good, that's why they don't already work here, if we hire more of them, they'll not be able to do the job as…

Very unreasonable. It doesn't say that at all. There are simply far fewer women in the candidate pool.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#647

Post by jl6 »

In the last month I have hired 4 people in specialist technical roles. I reviewed 15 CVs. All were from men. No women applied.

There is clearly something filtering women out. There is something deep in the supply chain of labor (by which I mean education) which results in women being siphoned off long before they hit my company's diversity and inclusion policies. I believe these policies are reasonably effective at tackling unconscious bias, but they are unable to affect the underlying talent pool.

My personal theory is that specialisms are risky (good pay if you can find employment, no pay if not), and men are more likely to take risks than women. There is research to support the latter point. Casual googling digs up this for example: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/James_Byrnes2/publicati...

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#648

Post by Bartweiss »

Brockenstein wrote: post #472
mnglkhn2 wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Talking assumes reasoning. Or, when you are in a power grab, reasoning is the last thing you want to do. The left does want the power not the talking.

And the people on the wrong side of history want to talk and talk and talk. They want to stall for time. And every individual who doesn't get a shot to talk and shape the culture feels like they've been robbed and their ideas and beliefs suppressed. They're just ignorant of the fact that these issues have been talked about, at length, ad nauseam, for decades, centuries even. And they don't understand that they don't…

> There's no particular reason to tolerate it forever.

> Rail against it all you want, it's a losing battle.

All moral argument aside, this is only true while you're winning. "I don't have to try to persuade you, so suck it up" can enforce ideas, but doesn't spread them. So if there ever comes a day where 51% and rising of people disagree with you, the reason to 'tolerate it' is that you don't have a choice and you've burned all the bridges that could have gotten you somewhere.

I'm not even saying that to condemn using the tactic. More than 99% of Americans accept that the Holocaust happened. I am fully content to leave the My point is only that it's incredibly common for people to find ideological bubbles where they mistake who is going to lose the battle. There were plenty of communists and Confederates and fascists who trusted that their opponents just had "a personal problem" and would lose in the end. If an idea has been discussed "for decades, centuries even", are you really so sure that the arc of history has finally settled matters in your favor right now? Are you convinced that you're guessing better than the people who considered the matter settled 50 years ago? 100?

Burning goodwill to root out dissent in your strongholds is a thing to do after you win the larger battle. After November 2016, it is absolutely baffling to me when people on the left say "they're history, they lose, the time for talking is past". That was not the result, that is not who is in power. And so I do not want the time for talking to be past! I think that might go very, very poorly for a lot of people I quite like!

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#649

Post by yorwba »

KirinDave wrote: post #615
yorwba wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Women are better at pair programming?

Evidence, please.

> He says women will benefit from making coding more social. Pair programming.

> What positive connotation could be drawn from it?

I'm not claiming that women are better at pair programming, but that is a positive connotation that can be drawn.

Re: Outraged about the Google diversity memo?

#650

Post by sever5 »

Lukasa wrote: post #539
TeMPOraL wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he cannot possibly implicitly mean "but clearly that does not apply to every woman currently employed at Google, who were all hired because they are the best in the world at their jobs" He clearly can , were it not for affirmative actions - if you assume perfect recruitment based on merit, you can expect everyone accepted to be suitable for the role. But in this case you'll also find, as the memo author explained q…

> I mean, come on, this is a pretty obvious point - and I'm starting to believe that it takes intent to misread it like you did. I...don't think I did misread it? I said "he cannot mean this", and you appear to agree with me: due to the facts on the ground, he cannot have intended to mean that. Therefore, I have to assume he did not mean that. So if he believes that Google employs discriminatory hiring practices, the…

How do you make any business decisions when taking things this personally?
Post reply on HN