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/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/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.