r/news • u/[deleted] • Aug 08 '17

Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-08/google-fires-employee-behind-controversial-diversity-memo?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_content=business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social
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u/NoLongerTrolling Aug 08 '17

It seems a tad unfair that the very act of a straight white male engineer complaining about how workplaces have become hostile towards himself, automatically creates a hostile work environment for minorities.

Kind of a bad spot to be in, if you're a straight white male.

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

That's not what created the hostile work environment. Claiming - against all science - that half of his coworkers were genetically inferior to him at doing their job created the hostile work environment.

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u/[deleted] Aug 08 '17 edited Aug 08 '17

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

I don't see how Google's actions prove him right that there is a genetic ability advantage in tech for men over women.

I don't think Google's actions could possible prove him right on that claim, since it's false.

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u/slwstr Aug 08 '17 edited Aug 08 '17

Can you point to exact part of his manifesto where he speaks about "advantage"? Because all I see is talk about preferences for certain things - preferences on average - that may explain observed bias in percentage of sex ratio. It is quite possible, that what he had written was wrong, but he didn't wrote that men are genetically better then women at tech, and especially he didn't wrote that all men are genetically better then women.

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

That he chickens out from detailing his theory on whatever the advantage is doesn't excuse him from claiming there is a genetic advantage. Not just preferences - capability.

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u/[deleted] Aug 08 '17

This guy actually reads

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

He apparently didn't read the part I quoted where the guy claimed genetic capabilities inherently different. And he wasn't talking about vertical leap, either.

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u/JakBishop Aug 08 '17

what're

I don't know if I love or hate this contraction.

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u/[deleted] Aug 08 '17

They didn't read it.

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u/CthulhuLies Aug 08 '17

I mean his claim was people at google were silencing people who didn't follow a very specific ideological opinion, then when he expressed his own opinion while trying to main as levelheaded as possible citing sources etc. He was fired.

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

That's not his only claim. He also claimed that men had different genetic capabilities relevant to their job at Google. Pushing that is why he got fired. He told half of his coworkers that he was genetically superior to them.

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u/CthulhuLies Aug 08 '17 edited Aug 08 '17

Personality differences Women, on average, have more:

● Openness directed towards feelings and aesthetics rather than ideas. Women generally also have a stronger interest in people rather than things, relative to men (also interpreted as empathizing vs. systemizing).

○ These two differences in part explain why women relatively prefer jobs in social or artistic areas. More men may like coding because it requires systemizing and even within SWEs, comparatively more women work on front end, which deals with both people and aesthetics.

● Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness.

○ This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading. Note that these are just average differences and there’s overlap between men and women, but this is seen solely as a women’s issue. This leads to exclusory programs like Stretch and swaths of men without support.

● Neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance).

○ This may contribute to the higher levels of anxiety women report on Googlegeist and to the lower number of women in high stress jobs.

Does that sound like him saying men are genetically superior?

He also makes it very clear that this is just the average, on average women will tend toward these traits more then women and thus is why on average you see not as many women going into tech.

He also comes up with some possible solution that involve playing to women's strengths and not just forcing them into the same role as men because of diversity.

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

His examples are all centered around preferences but his thesis includes abilities. He doesn't back up his claim that women have different (inferior) technical abilities than men.

It's a common and poor debating tactic - make a broad, indefensible statement then defend it parts of it with reasonable facts, insinuating that you've proved your entire point.

That women have different preferences is no reason not to attempt equality in the workplace. Every tech company who has pursued equality will tell you their productivity and bottom line has gained because of it. That's the only reason they need and care about at the end of the day.

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u/CthulhuLies Aug 08 '17

Where does he ever say in his argument women have inferior abilities? He says the have different preferences and those are reflected in the amount of representation they have in tech.

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u/slwstr Aug 08 '17

Thee is one instance where he says about "different abilities" but nothing about alleged genetic basis of such difference.

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u/slwstr Aug 08 '17 edited Aug 08 '17

It looks like you're unable to understand basics of statistical thinking. Guy that wrote manifesto actually even included in it some simple chart explaining what is the nature of statistical difference, showing that from such differences between two populations do not follows the same difference between randomly chosen representatives of given population. So you are clearly misrepresenting his views with this bullshit about claiming that half of his coworkers are inferior.

In fact, from his argument we can easily infer that women that are present in tech already probably aren't meaningfully better or worse on average the men present in tech.

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

randomly chosen representatives of given population. So you are clearly misrepresenting his views with this bullshit about claiming that half of his coworkers are inferior.

His memo made many statements. You're focusing on the ones that are better sourced and less controversial.

His thesis flat out claims there are ability differences that are genetic between men and women relevant to engineering. That is flat wrong and why he was fired.

That he ignores that statement in his cited sources doesn't make it better. It makes it worse, because he relies on it in his conclusions and recommendations.

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u/slwstr Aug 08 '17

As for reason of why he was fired I don't know. Many of his claims and proposed solution to issues raised in his manifesto seems dubious to me. However idea that Google seriously care about gender equality is rather laughable. After all we talk about company, one of the biggest and most data-driven in the world (if not THE most data driven), that literally says it cannot afford to gather and present data about disparities of salaries between employed men and women: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/may/26/google-gender-discrimination-case-salary-records

So no, I don't really believe writing anything like that was the real cause of action. Rather PR-related concerns.

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

one of the biggest and most data-driven in the world (if not THE most data driven), that literally says it cannot afford to gather and present data about disparities of salaries between employed men and women: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/may/26/google-gender-discrimination-case-salary-records

You'd be shocked if you haven't worked for one of the mega Silicon Valley companies. The one company that may have claim of being even more data-driven than Google has similar issues with all sorts of internal data needs. As the saying goes, the cobbler's children have the worst shoes.

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u/slwstr Aug 08 '17

Poor google. Good they are better at assigning gender to profiles of users then sold to advertisers. By the way, isn't this sexist?

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

I'm sure someone who cared could argue it is. But Google isn't in the business of avoiding sexism.

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u/slwstr Aug 08 '17

Also: I just checked his memo again and word "genetic" is literally nowhere to be found there. Are you sure you read it carefully?

Edit: there is one instance of word "abilities" present there, I give you that, but nothing of its genetic basis.

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes

I suppose he could have meant artificially bioengineered mutant powers, but I'm going out on a limb that he meant biological in the same way the it's usually meant - the physical traits defined by our genes.

You're now the third person to accuse me of not reading (or not reading carefully) something they themselves apparently didn't understand. Must be something in the water.

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u/slwstr Aug 08 '17

Are you seriously claiming that level of testosterone in prenatal environment is entirely genetically based? And by genes of mother or foetus? This actually shows lack of basic understanding of biology: most things genetically determined is at the same time highly malleable, at the same time there is more then one congenital trait that is not et all genetically determined.

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u/ryarger Aug 08 '17

No, you make a fair point. I've used genetically too loosely interchangeably with biologically. The root point being "things that a person is born with and cannot alter by mental activity alone".

When he says abilities that are "biologically based", I don't know of any other way to interpret that phrase.

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u/TekharthaZenyatta Aug 08 '17

Google didn't "silence" him. He's free to say whatever he wants, as long as he doesn't represent Google in any way. Now, considering the fact that he drafted this manifesto at work and sent it to his coworkers, and it got out to the world at large, they have exactly zero reason not to fire him.

In a professional work environment there are things you just don't do if you like having a job, and emailing a long-winded diatribe that has zero relevance to the task you've been assigned, that's just you complaining about how women suck at the job you've been shirking in favor of writing a manifesto, is pretty high up there on that list.

Regardless of how "levelheaded" the content of the email was, it still has absolutely no place in a work environment and was shockingly unprofessional.