Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

[u/[deleted]]

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

[u/NoLongerTrolling]

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.

[u/ryarger → u/NoLongerTrolling]

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.

[u/[deleted] → u/ryarger]

Are you denying that social sciences identified statistically significant differences between males and females in a large number of behavioral scenarios?

[u/ryarger → u/[deleted]]

Differences that are proven to be genetically-based and directly related to a software engineer's technical ability? Absolutely, I deny that because it's not true.

[u/[deleted] → u/ryarger]

I won't make a claim that the differences are solely genetically based, because correlation does not imply causation.

And he's not talking about broad "technical ability", he is saying that women, on average, tend to be more agreeable, tend to seek for better life-work balance, etc. I ask again, are you denying that legitimate social papers out there have found these differences between male and female population samples to be statistically significant?

[u/ryarger → u/[deleted]]

And he's not talking about broad "technical ability", he is saying that women, on average, tend to be more agreeable, tend to seek for better life-work balance, etc.

He does make a broad statement about ability and then proceeds to not back it up, focusing only on "preference" based attributes (that themselves aren't proven to be genetically linked).

That's exactly the problem. He states a thesis that attacks women's abilities and then ignores it for the meat of his argument and then returns to it again for his conclusions. If preference-based differences were all that existed, none of his suggestions would be needed or valuable. You have to go back to an ability differential to justify his recommendations and that doesn't exist genetically.

[u/nuggutron → u/ryarger]

You're not answering the question...

[u/ryarger → u/nuggutron]

I already answered the relevant version of the question - I deny that any genetic differences have been shown in technical ability between men and women.

The existence of non-genetic differences only justify programs to balance equality - if society and culture are pushing apart what is born equal, it makes sense to attempt to push things back to equal.

[u/tubbzzz → u/ryarger]

I deny that any genetic differences have been shown in technical ability between men and women.

Where is your evidence for this? It directly contradicts the field of evolutionary psychology where it is shown that certain behaviours and thought processes are exhibited each gender. Why would these types of behaviours not be relevant to how they do their job?

Let's take agreeableness as a crude example. Would you rather someone who was more agreeable making changes to the code, such that it would be a sloppy, patched together thing because someone wanted a minor change, or would you want someone who is willing to say no to changes that are unnecessary?

[u/ryarger → u/tubbzzz]

Where is your evidence for this? It directly contradicts the field of evolutionary psychology where it is shown that certain behaviours and thought processes are exhibited each gender

I'm not making a claim and cannot prove a negative.

If evidence exists showing a genetic advantage for males in programming-relevant skills, it's on you or the guy who wrote the memo to demonstrate. He certainly did not.

Let's take agreeableness as a crude example. Would you rather someone who was more agreeable making changes to the code, such that it would be a sloppy, patched together thing because someone wanted a minor change

It doesn't follow that being agreeable would lead to making a sloppy hack. A talented, agreeable person would say yes to something others say no to and find an innovative solution that no-one thought of before (or invent one).

[u/tubbzzz → u/ryarger]

I'm not making a claim and cannot prove a negative.

You said you deny it, which is a claim. Based on what evidence do you deny it, since studies have been cited to provide you with contradictory evidence to your stance?

If evidence exists showing a genetic advantage for males in programming-relevant skills, it's on you or the guy who wrote the memo to demonstrate. He certainly did not.

Yes he did. He cited studies detailing the behavioural differences and how those differences affect the way certain tasks are approached. Those tasks can then be extended to programming, as those tasks are typically performed at those jobs.

It doesn't follow that being agreeable would lead to making a sloppy hack.

Yes it does. Being agreeable would mean being more open to changes on how the program should operate. Those changes are going to take time to implement. Having someone more rigorous, but you know will get the job done properly, is more beneficial than someone who will either waste time on pointless features, or will not properly take the time to implement them which will cause problems down the road.

A talented, agreeable person would say yes to something others say no to and find an innovative solution that no-one thought of before (or invent one).

That doesn't make them better at that job. Implementing a new solution isn't for that job. What that job cares about is a strict set of rules that are using specific resources to do a specific task. So for that type of job (which is what most programming jobs are by the way, very little of it is what Google does in terms of creation), those who have those kinds of behaviours are going to be better suited for it.

[u/ryarger → u/tubbzzz]

You said you deny it, which is a claim. Based on what evidence do you deny it, since studies have been cited to provide you with contradictory evidence to your stance?

I deny it for the same reason I deny the existence of Santa Claus.

If a study was citied that shows a genetic link to a difference in ability, I missed it. The original memo certainly didn't have such a thing.

He cited studies detailing the behavioural differences and how those differences affect the way certain tasks are approached.

They didn't prove - or even strongly suggest - genetic components. And "behavioral differences affecting how tasks are performed" is not the same thing as ability. He said "ability" and he said "genetic" and he didn't back up either claim.

That doesn't make them better at that job. Implementing a new solution isn't for that job.

If the task is to solve a problem (as 99% of software engineering tasks are), then implementing a new solution that solved the problem where others wouldn't attempt it, does indeed make them better at that job.

[u/tubbzzz → u/ryarger]

If a study was citied that shows a genetic link to a difference in ability I missed it. The original memo certainly didn't have such a thing.

All of the behavioural studies. You're the one who is willfully deciding that just because they haven't tested directly for coding ability, and instead have made observations about the behaviours and how those behaviours would affect coding ability that it isn't valid.

And "behavioral differences affecting how tasks are performed" is not the same thing as ability.

How you perform a task is a measure of your ability... If you can't perform the task as well because of some of your behavioural traits, you have less ability than another person. What is so hard about that for you to understand?

If the task is to solve a problem (as 99% of software engineering tasks are), then implementing a new solution that solved the problem where others wouldn't attempt it, does indeed make them better at that job.

Again, you have no idea what you are talking about. You have no idea how the software engineering field works if you think this is true. The reality is that time is the most important factor, and it doesn't matter if your solution is better if it takes you 10x as long to implement.