Earlier quoted context omitted.
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Why would racism affect the family structure of non-white families?
The industrial prison complex and war on drugs affect the family structure by removing members of the family.
What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
801–810 of 972 posts
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#802I work at a different FAANG and it seems like more and more the only news that we get from corporate is related to DEI. Also a lot of hiring details are now hidden from ICs. It used to be that you would be apart of the interview panel as an interviewer and then you would get together with your team afterwards and everyone on the team would vote yes/no and that would pretty much be it. Now it’s made by a manager elsew…
> Now we’ve had the rug swapped from underneath us.
Some state authorities and companies like Microsoft are racist. You have to call them that even if there are people behind these programs that just mean well. But you cannot compromise on that accusation. If you do, you will lose that discussion. Simple politics and management 101 and this is just a dirty political game.
Yes, Microsoft is a racist company. Exposé 1 is that they hire people by skin color. It cannot be more direct than that. Again, you cannot compromise on that accusation. It is rational and formally correct. Most people are too nice to defend against this management pressure Microsoft tries to put forward.
Not that there are many young people that would want to work at MS these days. But again, Microsoft employs racist hiring schemes and the people in support behind this are real racists and this is always how real racial discrimination starts. Microsoft as a company is a fascist authoritarian organisation that collaborates with the state against citizens.
You might think that is a bit too much, but you have to start with this if your opponent in a discussion opens with accusations of systemic issues that require racial quotas. Otherwise you will lose. Just repeat it and the situation should again normalize and Microsoft hopefully has to pay the price for their little racist adventure.
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#803According to the Microsoft 2021 Annual Diversity And Inclusion report, 34.9% of employees identified as Asian in the US, far exceeding their overall representation in the US population. Why are Asians doing so well? Why can't we replicate this for other groups? And doesn't trying to hire more of other races imply that mathematically speaking, fewer Asians must be hired and promoted to achieve greater equality? Please…
> Why are Asians doing so well?
What is the average household income of the parents of these Asian people that comprise those data points?
Did they grow up in apartments or homes?
What quality was their elementary and high schools?
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#804Earlier quoted context omitted.
I hate to have to say something this obvious but here it goes: Discriminating against a group of human beings for an arbitrary detail such as the color of the skin is indeed racist. No matter if that human being is a freaking north-europe-blonde-arian-white or whatever. No matter if that human being is or not opressed or whatever. Judging people by the color of the skin is WRONG. This ideological bullshit that US is…
It is racist, but it's not the same kind of racist backed by 200 plus years of systematic oppression.
Ok, so we distinguish between "good racism" and "bad racism" then? Absurd. Sorry but I do not make that distinction: racism is bad no matter what your ancestor did and it's despicable. Also, *stop* assuming that the whole world has the same historical context as the US.
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#805Earlier quoted context omitted.
I myself have to mark a checkbox saying "Hispanic OR Latino". I'm Latino, but NOT Hispanic. But I can also check "white". One is a skin color, another is ancestry, and yet another is geographical location...
My (least?) favorite anecdote on this was when we were running stats demographics and found there was one more African American than Black. Turns out it’s a rich white kid who was born in South Africa. He’s not wrong…
Elon Musk and Charlize Theron are African Americans too.
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#806Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is racist, but it's not the same kind of racist backed by 200 plus years of systematic oppression.
Ok, so we distinguish between "good racism" and "bad racism" then? Absurd. Sorry but I do not make that distinction: racism is bad no matter what your ancestor did and it's despicable. Also, *stop* assuming that the whole world has the same historical context as the US.
> Ok, so we distinguish between "good racism" and "bad racism" then?
How uncharitable. I never said either racism was bad, just that one has less weight behind it.
> Also, stop assuming that the whole world has the same historical context as the US.
This is a thread about a US based company so assuming the historical context of the US matters is fair.
Also anti-black racism exists across the world.
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#807Earlier quoted context omitted.
> given participation in a set (1, 1, 2) When the set is of 12, that's 4 of 12, which is exactly one third, assuming independent participation (which obviously is what makes the number optimistic/ a ceiling). > Given a sample size of one pipeline Fair! If the OP only ever hires one person, you are correct. At Microsoft's scale, they are more like "the house" at a casino, and so their ratios should more closely approx…
> When the set is of 12, that's 4 of 12, which is exactly one third, assuming independent participation (which obviously is what makes the number optimistic/ a ceiling). I think this misunderstanding of statistics may be at the core of our disagreement. Yes, 4 is one-third of 12. No, you cannot expect overlapping, non-mutually-exclusive sub-populations of 9% and 18% to equal 27% of a total population. If you're inter…
> No, you cannot expect overlapping, non-mutually-exclusive sub-populations of 9% and 18% to equal 27% of a total population.
Obviously, this is true. I don't know why you continue to exclude the Latino population, but again Latino CS grads (to focus on that narrow slice of tech jobs) are also ~7%.
> I hope that helps explain why your expectation of the gender & racial diversity of CS graduates is inaccurate.
But (as you have pointed out) we do know more about the sub-populations that let us infer that the populations are less overlapping than we might prefer. If you're interested, there are published demographic data that go into more detail than I have time to do here. But yes, I understand the concept that a Black Latina fits into three categories.
> you'll extrapolate (incorrectly) that 2/3rds of this population meets your criteria.
The basic idea here is simple: at Microsoft scale, their pipelines broadly should look like the collegiate exit pipeline. If you think that No matter what assumptions you make around the numbers, my core point still holds. Which is that if your pipeline is routinely missing X% of qualified applicants, your sourcing is not good enough to know whether you're even seeing the best candidates. That is as true if X% is 15% or 30%.
Using an analogy: if your company isn't seeing any applicants from states representing 15% of the population (say: Texas and New York), that says more about your sourcing than the talent available.
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#808Earlier quoted context omitted.
I currently work in a lingerie store after having spent a fair amount of time in 'professional' environments. I'm less tired coming home from 8 hours on my feet dealing with the public than I was in professional settings. I don't have to hide everything about myself and my background (I'm a first-generation college student with a poorish upbringing) or constantly worry about what all my interactions with colleagues m…
Sorry to hear that. I get it. I've been there. I reached a point where I was in a big company and got promoted to a level where there were no LGBTQIA+ people above my level - and this was at a FAANG company. All meetings were all straight cis guys that were overly aggressive. It was so incredible exhausting to function in that environment. The only reason I lasted as long as I did was because I had a very good female…
Yeah, I'm also gay and disabled (MS). So that's fun. Being female is less of an issue now that I'm old enough that men don't harass me as often, but tech spaces between the ages of 11 and ~25 SUCKED. The thing that stuck out to me was that there was no way to 'win' and the boys (because it was mostly adolescents and males in their 20s) projected their dating issues onto me HARD. And I know for a fact that I never 'led anyone on' since I've been out since I was 12 and very open about it. The gatekeeping was ridiculous (I'm a 2nd generation programmer and my grandfather was playing with electronics in the 1920s), and I also put up with rape threats and rampant homophobia (nothing quite like worrying about corrective rape if you want to go to a LAN party!)
The cultural homophobia and misogyny is one of the two major reasons I didn't opt for a CS degree (the other being I had too much pride to take intro classes to prove myself when I'd been coding since I was 5 because 17 year old me was arrogant as hell). This WAS 10-20 years ago, but experiences like mine do have impacts on the candidate pipeline for midlevel and senior positions.
And on the other hand, taking my tech skills into non-tech spaces is very well received. Libraries are always happy to have tech-literate people, and even in my current job, I've had 2 freelance dev projects dropped into my lap in the space of a month simply because I'm easier to work with and very familiar with the very feminine subject domain.
I'm very skeptical of DEI, ironically, because I've seen too much of it turn into grifts for upper-class and upper-middle class POC and gay people while ignoring non-visible differences or differences that might actually require behavior changes (disability and class, mostly). But there's definitely a cultural problem. And I say this as a woman who greatly prefers 'male' communication styles and was raised by a warehouse worker. I'm not pearl clutching - I've lived in a couple of the most dangerous cities in the US, I'm no shrinking violet.
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#809Earlier quoted context omitted.
Optically maybe, if that’s what you’re aiming for. Just assuming that the “group of white men” are “all the same” is not very deep. The truth is that they’re all individuals with individual stories strangers who judge them by their looks know nothing about. It used to be understood as a good thing to not judge people based on their gender or skin color, including the nowadays declared “evil” white men.
> Optically maybe, if that’s what you’re aiming for. Just assuming that the “group of white men” are “all the same” is not very deep. Not just optically. Even slightly different cultures can result in novel ways of thinking or world views that bring something new.
That's what the parent is saying. The aforementioned black woman may have more in common with the white men on the team than other white men. If you were striving for true diversity, it is quite possible that yet another white man with a different background would provide the greatest diversity, but if you are only optimizing for optical diversity then those considerations go out the window.
Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft
#810Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m not sure what a “diverse” parent is or how you would know their mind. I expect that all parents, regardless of demographic factors, worry about their kid getting a good job and going to school.
This seems to be forbidden to say, but for all intents and purposes, “diverse” means “not white”.
Every not white parent I’ve met is concerned with their kid’s future- what job, what education, what marriage, etc.
I’ve met a lot of people from different backgrounds and one thing I notice is how much we have in common. I worked with people who make less than a few dollars a day in developing nations and it was interesting how the parent stories are almost the same. Pictures of kids and grandkids. Stories about successful kids. Plans for kids to have education and jobs. The scale varies but the concerns are very similar.