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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

#791

Post by makeitdouble »

brutal_chaos_ wrote: post #573
lolinder wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. What too few people realized was that the rollout of DEI was driven by what was trending at the time, designed to win political points with the groups that were politically ascendant. These programs were never a victory for the principles or the people, they were marketing. So it should come as no shock whatsoever that now that another political group is politically ascendant the marketing that is valuable has c…

If DEI was only marketing, why has the number and proportion of women in tech been increasing over that time? I'm not trying to challenge you, I'm just curious if you have any insight. ETA: and do you think that number will increase, stagnate, or decrease with DEI gone, and why?

I wanted a wider view of the trend, and it looks to me like after the covid dip the US is still not back at the 2000s level of participation.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU01300026

In tech it might be a different story, but all I've seen where the stats decrease until 2020, and haven't seen much data covering the recent years. Was there any significant increase above what the other fields have seen ?

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

#794

Post by deanishe »

seadan83 wrote: post #413
lolinder wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. What too few people realized was that the rollout of DEI was driven by what was trending at the time, designed to win political points with the groups that were politically ascendant. These programs were never a victory for the principles or the people, they were marketing. So it should come as no shock whatsoever that now that another political group is politically ascendant the marketing that is valuable has c…

I agree with most of your points. Though with respect lasting change, where is your impression coming from that the gains are in the last 10 to 15 years? Or even that is a widespread belief? According to reporting at the guardian [1], FBs DEI program increased black and brown employees from 8% to 12%. Seems abysmal. My perspective, US society is still fighting for gains that _started_ 160 years ago. Still painstaking…

> According to reporting at the guardian [1], FBs DEI program increased black and brown employees from 8% to 12%. Seems abysmal.

Abysmal based on what? What % of CS graduates are brown/black to begin with?

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

#795

Post by KPGv2 »

rayiner wrote: post #742
seadan83 wrote: post #413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with most of your points. Though with respect lasting change, where is your impression coming from that the gains are in the last 10 to 15 years? Or even that is a widespread belief? According to reporting at the guardian [1], FBs DEI program increased black and brown employees from 8% to 12%. Seems abysmal. My perspective, US society is still fighting for gains that _started_ 160 years ago. Still painstaking…

America is a country where the majority even of “white” people belong to ethnic groups that never had anything to do with African American slavery (German, Italian, Irish, etc.) And the non-black non-white people (Asians, Hispanics) didn’t either. So nobody will do anything that costs themselves anything. The best you can hope for is color blindness and a very slow homogenization and equilibrium. There was a gambit t…

> America is a country where the majority even of “white” people belong to ethnic groups that never had anything to do with African American slavery

You're framing DEI as a punishment for slavery, which it's not. White people aren't being punished. That's not the correct framing. That's a self-centered misinterpretation of what's going on.

DEI programs are meant to correct for generations of injustice and to push for equity). But to the dominant group, this feels like oppression, in the same way that feminism feels like man-hatred to many men bc if you have 90% of the pie and there's a trend toward you only having 50% of the pie, you think that's oppression.

So I get why you view this as a punishment of your group (which I assume is one of those white groups who "didn't own slaves", never mind that they all benefited from, and still do, the systemic oppression of non-white people in the US).

I'm full German American to the extent I'm still the same religion as my ancestors, I still speak German in the home with my kids, etc. But it's plain to me how much I benefit from being white even though my ancestors didn't own slaves and were, in fact, opposed to slavery.

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

#796

Post by 4dregress »

seadan83 wrote: post #413
lolinder wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. What too few people realized was that the rollout of DEI was driven by what was trending at the time, designed to win political points with the groups that were politically ascendant. These programs were never a victory for the principles or the people, they were marketing. So it should come as no shock whatsoever that now that another political group is politically ascendant the marketing that is valuable has c…

I agree with most of your points. Though with respect lasting change, where is your impression coming from that the gains are in the last 10 to 15 years? Or even that is a widespread belief? According to reporting at the guardian [1], FBs DEI program increased black and brown employees from 8% to 12%. Seems abysmal. My perspective, US society is still fighting for gains that _started_ 160 years ago. Still painstaking…

[flagged]

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

#797

Post by makeitdouble »

lolinder wrote: post #371
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…

Yes. What too few people realized was that the rollout of DEI was driven by what was trending at the time, designed to win political points with the groups that were politically ascendant. These programs were never a victory for the principles or the people, they were marketing. So it should come as no shock whatsoever that now that another political group is politically ascendant the marketing that is valuable has c…

> Change that occurs through fear of your power can only last as long as your power. Lasting change is only possible by actually changing hearts and minds.

I'm trying to put in flat terms, but fundamentally power matters. This is the base of democracy: give people the power to change things, there needs to be a fear that these people will exercise their power.

Changing hearts and minds is beautiful, but one reason is that it usually doesn't happen, I think very few people will ever just stop being racists for instance. They might stop saying racists things, and might care more to not go against social rules and laws, but changing their deep believes will not happen, or it will take decades, if not a lifetime.

And also people are way more influenced by their everyday environments than nice speeches. Having a nation that values diversity helps more to also embrace these ideals, than living in a racist dictatorship and fighting at every corner to keep your minority voices in your heart.

> It's a slow, painful process

The trap is to see it as a one way ratchet, when in reality it comes and go, and the groups with the most power can revert decades of progress in a snap of finger. Women lost abortion rights over a few weeks (the leading to that was also long and slow, but when it finally happens it doesn't take much). Foreign people lost the right to return to their US home within days when the ban happened last time.

Power matters.

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

#798

Post by HideousKojima »

insane_dreamer wrote: post #617
Viliam1234 wrote: post #554

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> lack of educational resources Could you please explain this part? I am not sure how you meant it. Is the main problem that the resources are not in the language of your tribe? Or is that a lack of educational resources regardless of language (e.g. simply not enough textbooks to give to each child)? What kind of educational resources do you wish you had?

in the US, schools in poor counties have less resources and less high quality teachers, and the children have much less of an education-focused environment in which they can flourish because of the parent's lack of resources raise the economic level of the community, and education rises with it

Abbott districts in New Jersey are an obvious counterpoint to this. They are funded at levels equal to if not greater than the wealthiest districts in the state, despite being in some of the poorest parts of the state. I spite of this, over the four decades that Abbott districts have been in place, educational attainment gaps between them and the rest of the state have actually widened.

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

#799

Post by ArthurStacks »

cjohnson318 wrote: post #476
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…

To underscore your point, I've met 5 black engineers in 13 years as a software developer. To put this in perspective, my high school was 50% black, and my college was 30% black. Somehow I got where I am, but almost none of my classmates were able to do the same. I don't know what the solution is.

Why is a solution needed? Where is the problem?

I hire developers. They are all white because theres no black people around here. It isnt a problem.

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

#800

Post by KPGv2 »

seadan83 wrote: post #413
lolinder wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. What too few people realized was that the rollout of DEI was driven by what was trending at the time, designed to win political points with the groups that were politically ascendant. These programs were never a victory for the principles or the people, they were marketing. So it should come as no shock whatsoever that now that another political group is politically ascendant the marketing that is valuable has c…

I agree with most of your points. Though with respect lasting change, where is your impression coming from that the gains are in the last 10 to 15 years? Or even that is a widespread belief? According to reporting at the guardian [1], FBs DEI program increased black and brown employees from 8% to 12%. Seems abysmal. My perspective, US society is still fighting for gains that _started_ 160 years ago. Still painstaking…

> FBs DEI program increased black and brown employees from 8% to 12%. Seems abysmal.

That's a 50% increase.

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