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Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

cnbc.com

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Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#81

Post by wwweston »

Israel is an inherently inequitable and therefore likely terminally conflict-ridden ethnostate. Israel is a reasonable reaction to a long and terrible history of ethnic persecution. What's going on in Gaza is an unacceptable humanitarian tragedy that is a reaction to an unacceptable attack. There are players on both "sides" of this conflict that are driving it because they actually want the conflict, people who never wanted it and desperately want it to stop, and most are caught like bits of air in this conflict hurricane that even the head of state in a world hegemonic power can do scarcely more to dictate terms to than an actual hurricane.

I don't know what the answer is, and I appreciate the urgency of feeling that causes people to protest, but at this point I'm pretty sure most protest gestures do little other than feed the tribal vortex at the heart of the hurricane, especially the farther away from any actual leverage points on the dynamic that they are. And an Israeli tech exec existing and doing tech exec things is probably not close to a leverage point, nor is protesting them doing tech exec things doing anything worth levering.

Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#82

Post by gretch »

rvz wrote: post #36

This just shows that employees have 0 power and companies like Google are more than ready to fire you if you get in their way. Businesses that live and breathe billions do not care and any attempt to cave into employee demands, then the investors will move in and force it through their changes. (Especially public companies)

The employees collectively have a lot of power.

A single employee has almost no power at all, which is rightful.

Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#83

Post by duxup »

blueflow wrote: post #5

Why is employee dissent such a problem in google and not a problem in other companies?

I don't have a good answer although I will say that in past such stories discussions about internal forums of various types, some employees came to say that the more "advocacy" (I don't know of a good word here) type forums were dominated by a few voices and had relatively low participating rate compared to say ... everyone who could participate. They indicated that many employees had / wanted nothing to do with those forums.

In this example we have one person, that might be telling.

So while it might be a problem, I'm not sure how widespread it is.

Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#84

Post by bluefishinit »

fny wrote: post #61
bluefishinit wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would a big tech company be hosting an event with a state committing genocide? That (and working with said regime) is the problem, not people protesting. It's not possible to be a consumer brand and support Israel. The world is too divided and it's not getting any less so.

[flagged]

The ICJ didn't rule on whether or not Israel was committing genocide. It said Israel needed to take the steps to not commit genocide.

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/key-takeaways-worl...

Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#86

Post by fny »

siva7 wrote: post #2

> Google fired an employee who disrupted an Israel executive’s conference keynote this week, CNBC has learned. Rightfully so. Name me the big tech company who wouldn't fire such an employee instantly.

The employee clearly wanted to be fired, wanted to vilify the company, and wanted the news to broadcast the matter.

Who in their right mind who says “I refuse to build technology that ____” wouldn’t already be planning to quit barring outrageous hypocrisy? Who in their right mind screams it out in the middle of a presentation without expecting to be dragged out?

Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#87

Post by ameister14 »

segasaturn wrote: post #64

Unfortunately lost in the debate over free speech & how private companies have a "right" to suppress people with certain viewpoints is the amount of power these tech companies have over us - I would argue that Google has more power over us now than King George III had over his subjects in 1773, and certainly has more power in stifling information and suppressing speech. Americans can tut-tut Russia and China for supp…

>I would argue that Google has more power over us now than King George III had over his subjects in 1773

This is not the first time I have seen bizarre hyperbole like this - it's quite strange. Russia, China, and King George III all have and had people killed for dissent. Google didn't murder this engineer, imprison him, or anything of the sort. They just stopped paying his salary.

Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#88

Post by rs_rs_rs_rs_rs »

duxup wrote: post #34

I'm all for some good old civil disobedience as far as every day choices go in the outside world. However, I also think if you're employed somewhere there are reasonable expectations as far as workplace behavior goes that would prohibit the same "protest" or "civil disobedience" type behavior. It is interesting that the protestor immediately declares that they don't wan to work for such a company. It sorta begs the q…

[flagged]

Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#89

Post by happytoexplain »

godelski wrote: post #66
siva7 wrote: post #2

> Google fired an employee who disrupted an Israel executive’s conference keynote this week, CNBC has learned. Rightfully so. Name me the big tech company who wouldn't fire such an employee instantly.

Lotta people reading this comment as if it is taking a moral stance (siding with Google). I didn't read it that way but rather as a comment on the state of the current environment. Did I misread?

The wording and tone are common for broad agreement, both practical and moral (curtness, appeal to popularity, etc). Otherwise, one would normally use a wording that expresses the scope of one's tone, e.g. "Regardless of the issue, I think it's the right call to resort to firing to enforce this rule."

(It's hard to come up with a good example that demonstrates exactly what I'm talking about, because the topic is highly subjective, highly emotional, and has a few different angles. There are a million different things the parent could have said to communicate an attitude that doesn't imply an emotional, moral, or political distaste for the context of the protest itself. My example isn't necessarily "correct" for the parent.)

Re: Google fires employee who protested Israel tech event, shuts forum

#90

Post by rdtsc »

blueflow wrote: post #5

Why is employee dissent such a problem in google and not a problem in other companies?

Because it encouraged people "to bring your whole self to work", and during previous years it supported and encouraged employee being vocal and protecting about certain issues. They like to "amplify" certain voices and suppress others, so to speak. It's in their DNA both as a company culture as well as their main business - moderating social sites.

What some employees haven't quite learned yet is how to read between the lines. They are certain topics which are ok to protest and be vocal about, but others, are not, like unions or this case. To be safe, it's better to think of "bring your whole self to work" as a gullibility trap. It may not be that, but effectively it will function as such. It catches the naive troublemakers so later on they can be filtered out.

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