4 ms·

You're not giving that a remotely fair reading. He literally calls for people to be treated as individuals while acknowledging and calling attention to traits t

• AnotXOR 9y ago
  I think everyone is looking for the offense in the wrong places. The reason he got so many angry responses is because he didn't explicitly celebrate the left wing tenants of equity. He questioned the tenants in very reasonable places and that was all that it took. Scary times, these.
  • mr_spothawk 9y ago
    > he didn't explicitly celebrate the left wing tenants of equity in fact he pointed directly to the flawed logic that supports them. poor guy had no idea what was coming.
    • AnotXOR 9y ago
      That leads to my point, questioning one is tantamount to questioning it all, which is unforgivable and intolerable. You can see this by how many have hallucinated stances that the writer didn't even make.
    • rtx 9y ago
      Maybe he did.
    • peoplewindow 9y ago
      That guy seems smart. I bet he did know. He probably decided that he could either quit quietly or get himself fired. The latter opens up the possibility of lawsuits (and unemployment benefits, which he is unlikely to need, but if he finds it hard to get hired again quickly it may be helpful).
  • smt88 9y ago
    I think that you meant "tenets" instead of "tenants".
• nerflad 9y ago
  I think he's being fired more for the severe PR fallout that resulted in the way he tried to start the conversation, than for the content of the manifesto.
  • mr_spothawk 9y ago
    this is almost certainly the reason. he'd have been better off if he said > "we should expect to see people with certain characteristics in tech, in the same way we see people with certain characteristics in race-car driving. that's no reason to discriminate positively or negatively against race car driver candidates." I think he did make a point similar to that. Unfortunately he stirred the hornets nest (most, I think) by pointing to the gender-wage relationship.
    • nerflad 9y ago
      And you just (mostly) summarized it with a single sentence. The fact that such a screed was written at all is a problem. These kinds of arguments require very precise language in order to minimize misunderstandings and deflections.
  • engi_nerd 9y ago
    Interesting. I had not thought of that. You're likely right.
  • curun1r 9y ago
    I'd go one step further and say that he's being fired for completely misunderstanding the nature of Google's diversity efforts. He's responding to an attempt to create an equitable work environment. Google is more interested in creating a PR narrative. These are complex issues that will take decades to fix starting with programs at the elementary school level and fundamental shifts in the messaging and feedback our society gives to children, young adults and all the way up to college students. And yet people are expecting Google to make significant progress on the issue within a couple of years. It's not really a realistic expectation to have of Google, but there are real market consequences for Google if they're seen not to care enough. Google can make it look like they truly care about it and are solving it, but only if people don't look too closely or start pointing out flaws. This manifesto is an exercise in looking too closely and pointing out flaws. Whether his points, themselves, are flawed or whether they have merit is entirely beside the point.
• etchalon 9y ago
  The problem with the argument that "people should be treated equally regardless of other factors" is that we have a long. deep history of that not being the case. We have numerous studies which how simple biasing factors, such as a person's name, can dramatically decrease interview rates. Arguing against diversity policies can be coached in the language of equality, but the objective results show that the outcomes would not be. The outrage, fairly or unfairly (it is impossible to know what's in a person's heart) comes from many readers believing that the person is not arguing for equality, but coaching an argument against it's outcome in language that assumes that goal. For many people, they see a cheap rhetorical trick made in bad faith.
  • engi_nerd 9y ago
    What do you mean by a cheap rhetorical trick? It didn't seem that way to me at all. Did I miss something?
    • etchalon 9y ago
      The trick is using the language of equality to argue in favor of an approach which will decrease it. It's a fairly common tactic inside of the RedPill community, and within White Power/Pride groups. Arguing that by fighting sexism/racism you are being sexist/racist.
      • Zarath 9y ago
        Arguing that unproven methods of fighting sexism/racism aren't as effective as everyone claims they are and that said methods are potentially harmful isn't the same as being sexist/racist. I feel like the author is attempting to make the point that such practices aren't really in anyone's interest except the outward appearance of the company.
        • etchalon 9y ago
          No, the author is attempting to argue that the practices are irrelevant or ineffective because the default state, without them, is the natural one. He very explicitly is arguing that policies designed to correct the natural state are sexist/racist on their own, and have to be discarded. He then hints at having a strong bias towards believing sexist/racist conclusions from a limited reading of a limited amount of information.