It was all a trick in the first place, capitalism does what it feels is in its best interest, some days it's inclusion, some days it's world wars, every day it's self serving
Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
871–880 of 1001 posts
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#872I started a new account on Twitter just to see what it's like. It's completely unusable. The place is filled with shit content that a I don't want to see and bots. Not sure what competitive advantage you are talking about.
As someone that uses Twitter quite a lot for consumption, I actually think it's great. I've learned so much on Twitter (and yes, I'm aware there is plenty of disinformation), and it's also extremely entertaining. Maybe I've just used it long enough so I my feed is quite curated.
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#873Why does the skin color or gender matter if in the end they pick candidates that all went to the same top schools or have previously worked at the same top companies? Diversity in training, education and work history vastly outweighs diversity in superficial physical features.
A very obvious answer is that, for example, film was toned to white tones, which meant that film was not as good at capturing people with black skin on film or in lighting. Another example is of course facial sensors seeing white people but not seeing black people (which informs one of the funniest episodes of the defunct show Better Off Ted).
You say these are superficial features and yet the reality is that skin color drastically impacts one’s experience of life in this world.
Therefore if one is designing products, why would you exclude the perspective of people who would ultimately use your product?
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#874Earlier quoted context omitted.
The start of the funnel is also the most racist and class discriminatory. Almost every school in the USA takes pupils from districts where the property owners pay the taxes for the schools. Rich areas get much more resources and support. Poor students get put into less funded schools and suffer from not having mentorship or peers to look up to. I live on Long Island and we have a majority white population. Despite th…
In California funding is based upon attendance. The main place wealthy neighborhoods get extra money here is through PTAs rather than property taxes. This is in addition to what the other commenter said. I'm not very well informed about how other states fund their schools, but even if this blanket generalization is true in some places, there's enough evidence out there that funding isn't the only or maybe even the ma…
US ranks very high in the world in gov spending on education at 6% of GDP. Higher than Canada, France, Germany, UK, etc.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_spending_...
The EU as a whole for example is around 4.7% https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#875I just hired two women into an all male team. It wasn't because of DEI, it was because the code bootcamp we recruited from had equal representation. I was delighted to increase diversity, because diverse teams do better work. But the fix was farther back in the pipeline.
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#876I 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…
> Over the course of a year and hundreds of candidates I presented, I've managed to place just one developer in a company
I work at pseudo government organization where we take seminars every few months about dei, gender issues, etc... and it has made 0 difference when it comes to hiring. Ultimately my org is trying to reach out more, get to dei events, but that's as far as the effort goes. Once a job application is posted, it's the same old process. Maybe that's fair, but it felt disingenuous, and unnecessary, especially since we weren't great at hiring anyways.
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#877Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe you got better at your profession. Maybe they are discriminating non whites now. Or a position just opened that’s great for someone like you.
Or maybe they're discriminating against no one now?
My man, Meta is full of middle aged white men. Do you think they’ve been discriminating the OP specifically for 10 years?
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#878I 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…
I can only speak from personal experience, but since about 4 years ago, every candidate I’ve been asked to interview for a software engineering position has been Black, Hispanic, South Asian or East Asian. Not a single white American. Are there no white people studying CS anymore or looking for jobs? Did they all stop applying? Again, it’s only from personal experience. I never asked any of my coworkers a “hey, do yo…
Your experience is very different from mine. I rarely interviewed white candidates, but they were still more common than Hispanic and Black ones. The majority of the candidates were Asian.
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#879Every time you try to right a wrong like this (DEI), it just makes things worse for everyone involved. Just find the best person for the job, no matter their skin color, sex, age, etc.
It's not that simple. Without DEI you end up with products created by white men for white men. DEI means you end up employing some people who potentially aren't as technically qualified, but bring a different viewpoint to the team. Until I spent a long time living with Blacks (as a white) I never knew all the things they go through growing up, I never knew how their communities and families were organized, I never kn…
> employing some people who potentially aren't as technically qualified, but bring a different viewpoint to the team
I would be pretty pissed off if I couldn't hire a the best qualified person in favor of someone with a different viewpoint that's not materially relevant to the position.
> My life experience was a bubble that was cut off from a significant portion of the population.
No offense, but nothing is stopping you from expanding your horizons, in this day and age it doesn't require you to live with other kinds of people. Nor is expanding your horizons particularly beneficial for many/most domains we work in. I can speak 3 languages, have lived in the US/Europe, grew up in a poor US black/hispanic neighborhood, etc. Knowing how other people live has never given me any particular insight that was helpful at my software development job.
My highly-skilled coworker (and friend) is black/hispanic, he hates this DEI stuff. He didn't get his job from any DEI initiatives (we've worked together at previous employers, his connections/reputation got him here), but that won't stop people who don't know him from wondering if he's actually competent, or is just here because of some DEI quota.
Re: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
#880I am Wasq'u (a tribe in the PNW), I am connected to my tribe, and I am one of a handful of remaining speakers of the language. I am really tired of being caught in the maw of people fighting about my identity, what I am owed, and to some extent what place my identity has in society. To the pro-DEI crowd: I have some hard truths for you. Actual change requires commitment and focus over an extremely long period of time…
> "The problems that afflict my community are running water, drug addiction, lack of educational resources, and secular trends have have made our traditional industries obsolete" So in my rural, predominantly white "Non DEI target" part of the country, this is the problem too except when these people apply to hundreds of jobs in software engineering they get crickets.
but you do see the problem here. Its not the "DEI targets" that are at fault, its the systematic roll back of any protection for any poor community.
The same people that are saying "a new way forward" or "make america great again" failed to put any money to help. Your community doesn't produce anything that those funding congress care about, means that you get nothing.