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What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

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Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#811

Post by andrekandre »

hintymad wrote: post #516
Dig1t wrote: post #382

I 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…

I was wondering why the US is so obsessed with diversity alone the line of race and gender instead of social-economical status, education background, career background, and etc? If I'm developing a statistical model, wouldn't it make more sense if my diversity means having in my team people who have statistics background, people who study statistical physics, people who are great at maths, people who are great at bui…

  > I was wondering why the US is so obsessed with diversity alone the line of race and gender instead of social-economical status, education background, career background, and etc?
because its way easier to do that than fix the real socio-economic/education problems and distracts people from the real root issues that you are eluding to: class

Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#812

Post by prepend »

balls187 wrote: post #572
prepend wrote: post #470

Earlier 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.

How I know their mind is simple, I am not-white, and my kid's aren't white. And true, parents do want their kids to succeed in life. But I also worry about how the world will treat my kids, because historically black and brown kids don't get treated well.

So you know your mind. You don’t know the minds of all not-whites.

I’m pretty sure all parents worry about how the world will treat their kids.

There’s pros and cons to everything. If you’re in the US or Europe, you’re in a very privileged position compared to others in less privileged countries.

To imagine that someone who is not-white will know how all not-white parents think is silly. Even within a small demographic sliver, it seems weird to generalize my thoughts to all people who have my race or culture (eg, it’s lack of critical thinking to think “I’m Vietnamese and my kids are Vietnamese so I know the mind of all Vietnamese parents”)

There is a lot of racism toward black and brown kids and it’s the worst for poor black and brown kids. Hopefully, since you’re reading on HN you have a tech job and make some money. Historically, and presently, poor kids don’t get treated well.

Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#814

Post by philwelch »

nonethewiser wrote: post #414
Dig1t wrote: post #382

I 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…

> I do worry that my kids won’t be diverse enough to be able to get into a decent school or get a good job like I was able to when they’re older. 1. A single person cannot be diverse or not diverse. 2. There is nothing wrong with your kids being in a majority demographic. It sounds like you're more worried about the world discriminating based off race and other traits. I suspect you agree with all of this but it's a…

> A single person cannot be diverse or not diverse.

According to the plain old-fashioned definition, this is true. According to the modern political definition, “diverse” is approximately a synonym for “non-white”.

Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#815

Post by ParetoOptimal »

randomdata wrote: post #809
ParetoOptimal wrote: post #776

Earlier 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. 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.

> aforementioned black woman may have more in common with the white men on the team than other white men.

Diverse viewpoints are more likely to arise from introducing 3 black women to a group of 3 white men than if you introduced 3 more white men.

> it is quite possible that yet another white man with a different background would provide the greatest diversity,

Are you and the parent really arguing white men are even better than black women at diversity?

Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#816

Post by unconed »

juliendorra wrote: post #765
AussieWog93 wrote: post #646

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I continue to hear sexist comments from people who never would have said those sorts of things just five years ago. As a man in tech, I've been a part of countless hush-hush conversations that would never be repeated within earshot of a woman or untrusted man. It's as grim as you say, and worse. I'm really sorry that things have become like this.

What do you mean by "things have become like this"? I obviously don’t know your age but the software industry (and other fields) has been extremely sexist since decades (at least the 80s). The efforts to explicitly reign in the sexism in tech are quite recent (late 2000, early 2010, and even later in France where I live). My point is that what you perceive as a recent reaction might be the same old sexist culture con…

What evidence of this sexist culture do you have?

There seem to be a few classic stories that have been spun:

- that a gender imbalance in students or employees automatically implies sexism

- that being casual about sex is automatically sexist

- that not favoring a feminine, talkative, consensus-first working style is sexist

- that women deciding to leave tech means they are being "chased out"

I don't find any of these arguments particularly convincing. It seems like misogyny usually just means "something a woman hates" as opposed to actual overt discrimination and mistreatment.

What you may be referring to from the early 2010s is that a few activists of the Adria Richards type found that all they had to do was cry sexism, and a bunch of naive geeks stood ready to self flaggelate about how sexist all the other men were, but not them, no no no.

Which of course means that tech is not particularly sexist at all, certainly not compared to media or finance.

If there is one thing that is unabashedly sexist, it's western feminism, which has had 50 years to show its homework, and has revealed itself to not be interested in gender equality, but only in advancing female interests and positing women's rights, preferences and working styles as superior to those of men.

Strangely, despite this long track record, feminists still haven't realized that they are the status quo and they do everything they can to maintain a monopoly on gender discussions and issues. The use of words like "reactionary" is meant to emphasize this: that anyone who does not agree with them is trying to go backwards. But this is a lie, because despite their "gender studies" we understand men and women worse than ever before. Many of these same activists now even refuse to define what a woman actually is, but they are all sure that women have it worse. Funny that.

Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#817

Post by cscurmudgeon »

Dig1t wrote: post #382

I 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…

> worry that my kids won’t be diverse enough to be able to get into a decent school or get a good job like I was able to when they’re older

That is wildly optimistic.

Next they will come for your already taxed wealth and money if you aren’t “diverse” enough.

People in the US need to be more aware of similar trajectories in other countries in the past.

Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#818

Post by cscurmudgeon »

omginternets wrote: post #419
Dig1t wrote: post #382

I 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…

Relatedly: I cannot defend the kind of "diversity" that would rather hire a rich brahmin than an inner-city American kid in need of a leg-up, just to fulfill some backwards skin-color quota. It's obscene, and insulting to all parties involved. I also worry that this nonsense will erode support for the kind of diversity I do defend, or worse, prompt some kind of revanchist backlash against visible minorities in genera…

Nobody is preferring Indians in this diversity game.

Will you defend “diversity" that would rather hire a rich inner-city American kid versus a poor brahmin in need of a leg-up?

Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#819

Post by philwelch »

moistly wrote: post #587
tomp wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a nice way to excuse your racism. A lot of people use this perverted logic. But at the end of the day, it's still evil racism. Different "worlds" (neighbourhoods, schools, health care) doesn't happen because of skin color, it happens because of wealth/poverty. So if you apply a racist filter on top of the (implicit) wealth filter, you're just being racist against poor Asian & white people.

Quoted post unavailable.

No post body was provided.

Re: What “diversity and inclusion” means at Microsoft

#820

Post by randomdata »

ParetoOptimal wrote: post #815
randomdata wrote: post #809

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

> aforementioned black woman may have more in common with the white men on the team than other white men. Diverse viewpoints are more likely to arise from introducing 3 black women to a group of 3 white men than if you introduced 3 more white men. > it is quite possible that yet another white man with a different background would provide the greatest diversity, Are you and the parent really arguing white men are even…

> Are you and the parent really arguing white men are even better than black women at diversity?

People with different backgrounds are "better" at diversity than people with the same background who look dissimilar, for sure. The wealthy black woman who went to school at Stanford alongside all the other white men on your team does not bring any meaningful difference in viewpoint. The tribesman from Kenya, on the other hand, comes with a very different outlook.

Of course, something akin to "Must be a US Citizen" is attached to most jobs because we don't actually care about diversity, just optics.

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