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> Now everyone at Google (and everyone in large tech companies, and everyone in academy) knows that they can be fired for expressing opinions that dissent from

> Now everyone at Google (and everyone in large tech companies, and everyone in academy) knows that they can be fired for expressing opinions that dissent from the party line. This is an example of people taking exactly the wrong lesson from this situation. The guy wasn't fired for having a 'dissenting opinion'. He was fired because he basically said women are underrepresented in IT because they are biologically unsuited for it. If someone's 'opinion' is that phrenology explains why black people are underrepresented in tech they'd meet with a similar fate There are a lot of situations these days where people are expressing opinions at work that are insensitive to or outright disparage another group of people, then getting shocked when they're fired. The problem is that tolerance in the workplace of bigotry towards any group is rapidly eroding and some people don't know where the line of appropriateness is. They've never had to think much about the impact of their opinions on minorities and women so they're almost blind about what is over the line. The thing is that many people who get into these situations have at least some idea that what they're gonna say is offensive. They'll preface things with, "I'm not racist but..." but continue right on saying it. Like they know on some level it's offensive but they don't consider that 'hey, maybe I'm in the wrong and I shouldn't go there'. 'No, it must be that liberals are out to censor me and destroy free speech'. It's funny that some people point to a situation like this and say, "This is why we have Trump." If people voted for someone who routinely espoused racist and misogynist attitudes as a reaction to being criticized, that pretty much means they actually are bigots on some level. If you're not a bigot, the reasons to vote for him would be his policies, not his crude and prejudiced 'political incorrectness'

dx034 9y ago
> He was fired because he basically said women are underrepresented in IT because they are biologically unsuited for it. I don't understand why people keep repeating that statement. He said that biological differences explain the different ratios of men and women, NOT that women are not suited for tech jobs. He explicitely did not say (nor mean) that a woman can't be a good software engineer. Just that on average, more men than women will show the features needed for software engineers. That is a huge difference. It doesn't disqualify any woman working at Google. It just means that the goal to reach 50% women could lead to a worse outcome. Disclaimer: I don't necessarily support his claims, nor do I support his memo as such. I just think that it's worth thinking about and that there should be more scientific studies to explore this. Diversity campaigns should be based on science, not on populism.
- zimpenfish 9y ago
  > He explicitely did not say (nor mean) that a woman can't be a good software engineer. > Just that on average, more men than women will show the features needed for software engineers. Read those two sentences you wrote again. You'll be shocked when you see it.
  - throwaway257157 9y ago
    I'm not seeing it. Help me out? It's not a contradiction, if that's what you're implying. Have you ever taken a statistics class?
    - zimpenfish 9y ago
      Oh, throwaway257157, if I thought you were posting in good faith, I'd certainly engage with you but using a newly created account means you aren't.
      - anon_d 9y ago
        They are publically defending an argument that got someone fired, so using a throwaway account is totally reasonable here.
      - jshevek 9y ago
        No. Assuming someone is posting in bad faith for this reason is an act of bad faith. Your statement reveals hypocrisy.
        zimpenfish 9y ago
        A throwaway account created specifically to post one comment is a sign of bad faith. It's entirely possible that I am wrong but the lack of subsequent engagement suggests otherwise.
        jshevek 9y ago
maehwasu 9y ago
"You can say anything you want, unless you're saying something that I choose to define as unacceptable."
- GVIrish 9y ago
  When has that ever not been the case in the workplace? Every workplace has norms and values where someone who runs afoul of them may be fired. Norms change over time. There was a time when it would've been okay to use the 'n' word to insult black people in many work places, now it's not okay. There was a time when lewd and demeaning talk about women was ok in the workplace, now it's not. The people who sign the checks have always been able to define what is and is not acceptable in the workplace. Some people are feeling caught out because the line has moved, but it has always been there.
  - maehwasu 9y ago
    Completely agree. The point here is that the situation isn't static: many people don't like what is now ok in the workplace, and are trying to shift it back. Simply calling them "racist" or "sexist" as if that ends the discussion completely misses the point.
    - GVIrish 9y ago
      Yeah and maybe what needs to happen is people need to talk more about how 'the line' is moving so people can understand better where people are coming from. I agree that labeling people as racist or sexist for being caught out by shifting norms is not productive, but at the same time people need to put effort into empathizing with others and educating themselves. There are jokes I would've made 10 years ago I wouldn't make now. There are comments from others that might not have set off any alarms before, but now I know more about why they might be exclusionary or hurtful. Ultimately it's a process. Which is why maybe a guy like Damore shouldn't be made to run the internet pitchfork and torch gauntlet for what he did. Maybe it could've been a teachable moment instead of a firing. But the other side of that is that I don't know if there were other components to his firing that we haven't heard yet.
coldtea 9y ago
>This is an example of people taking exactly the wrong lesson from this situation. The guy wasn't fired for having a 'dissenting opinion'. He was fired because he basically said women are underrepresented in IT because they are biologically unsuited for it. He never said that women are "biologically unsuited" for IT. Here's what he sead in full: https://medium.com/@Cernovich/full-james-damore-memo-uncensored-memo-with-charts-and-cites-339f3d2d05f https://medium.com/@Cernovich/full-james-damore-memo-uncenso... In short, he said that biological differences (with citations) can explain in the aggregate (not in the total absolute of the population) different preferences, job options, etc., and even suggested ways to change the working environment to alleviate those issues and make it welcome to more personality traits associated statistically with women (as described in citations and statistics he gave). What kind of person misattributes another with straw-man arguments they didn't say and gloats on their misfortune of being fired? What he said might or might not be true, but in any case it's no basis for firing someone (as it's not related to their job performance), and it's something that absolutely should be allowed to be debated and studied. The assumption "all sexes/cultures etc are equally predisposed to everything or even if they are not they should be considered as such and nobody should talk about it again" is not a way to have any kind of dialogue. >There are a lot of situations these days where people are expressing opinions at work that are insensitive to or outright disparage another group of people, then getting shocked when they're fired. If the tide turns, or you live in a country where the reverse tenets are held (e.g. Saudi Arabia), don't be surprised and don't complain if you are fired for saying what you believe then... It's all par for the course and well as long as the majority or those in control of your job believe that you should have a specific sensitivity, right?
- GVIrish 9y ago
  > In short, he said that biological differences (with citations) can explain in the aggregate (not in the total absolute of the population) different preferences, job options, etc., and even suggested ways to change the working environment to alleviate those issues and make it welcome to more personality traits associated statistically with women (as described in citations and statistics he gave). He is extrapolating from a few pieces of evidence to form the basis of an entire argument about why women are underrepresented while devoting zero time to the role of culture or bias. I think he tried hard to be even-handed but then there's things like, 'Women have higher neuroticism'. He hedges his language a bit by saying biological differences "may in part" explain the gender gap, but then goes on to talk exclusively about biological differences as the cause. > What kind of person misattributes another with straw-man arguments they didn't say and gloats on their misfortune of being fired? Who's gloating? I am neither happy or unhappy he got fired. If Google chose not to fire him and instead used this as a teachable moment I wouldn't really have any criticism. > What he said might or might not be true, but in any case it's no basis for firing someone (as it's not related to their job performance), and it's something that absolutely should be allowed to be debated and studied. If you say or do something that contravenes the values of your company, it usually is a fireable offense, regardless of job performance. Some people may disagree with Google firing him but ultimately they decide what their culture is. Maybe in this case they've run afoul of California employment laws, but in most at-will employment states people can be fired for any reason or no reason at all. > The assumption "all sexes/cultures etc are equally predisposed to everything or even if they are not they should be considered as such and nobody should talk about it again" is not a way to have any kind of dialogue. Eh no. Predispositions is one thing, but when people extrapolate that to say, "This group's abilities or outcomes are different because of biological differences," you're always walking into a minefield. Most serious studies about that stuff stop faarrrr short of making conclusions about career/life outcomes based on genetic behavioral predispositions. It's not that people can't talk about this stuff, it's that it is very easy to get it wrong. And a lot of people have trouble recognizing that it is easy to get it wrong. > If the tide turns, or you live in a country where the reverse tenets are held (e.g. Saudi Arabia), don't be surprised and don't complain if you are fired for saying what you believe then... A. I choose not to live in a monarchy that has capital punishment for minor offenses. B. If what I believe doesn't match the values of a company, I'm either not going to join that company or I'm going to refrain from publishing manifestos on the corporate intranet. > It's all par for the course and well as long as the majority or those in control of your job believe that you should have a specific sensitivity, right? It's their company, they can do what they want with it. People are free to not work for them and customers are free to choose another search engine. Either way, Damore chose to publish this document internally, because he wanted his manifest to have impact. This is not a case of someone minding their own business and getting terminated for expressing an unpopular opinion. He created a real problem internally and Google chose to cut him lose for that. And we don't even know if there were other factors to his firing.
christophilus 9y ago
As I understand it, this is a misrepresentation. He did not say they were biologically unsuited for it. If I could rephrase in my own words, I'd say that the evidence shows that people who tend to be good at both language and the sciences will lean towards more social career paths. Women are unlike men in that they tend to be good at both where men tend to be lopsided: e.g. much better at math than English, say. This is not saying that women are unsuited for science. Quite the opposite. It is saying that women who are suited for STEM are more likely to also be well suited to more social endeavors, and thus less likely to choose STEM than the typical man who is well suited for STEM. The memo, I think, was essentially saying: "Thus if we want to attract more women to engineering, we need to appeal to the non-STEM side of the spectrum."

dx034 9y ago

> He was fired because he basically said women are underrepresented in IT because they are biologically unsuited for it. I don't understand why people keep repeating that statement. He said that biological differences explain the different ratios of men and women, NOT that women are not suited for tech jobs. He explicitely did not say (nor mean) that a woman can't be a good software engineer. Just that on average, more men than women will show the features needed for software engineers. That is a huge difference. It doesn't disqualify any woman working at Google. It just means that the goal to reach 50% women could lead to a worse outcome. Disclaimer: I don't necessarily support his claims, nor do I support his memo as such. I just think that it's worth thinking about and that there should be more scientific studies to explore this. Diversity campaigns should be based on science, not on populism.

zimpenfish 9y ago
> He explicitely did not say (nor mean) that a woman can't be a good software engineer. > Just that on average, more men than women will show the features needed for software engineers. Read those two sentences you wrote again. You'll be shocked when you see it.
- throwaway257157 9y ago
  I'm not seeing it. Help me out? It's not a contradiction, if that's what you're implying. Have you ever taken a statistics class?
  - zimpenfish 9y ago
    Oh, throwaway257157, if I thought you were posting in good faith, I'd certainly engage with you but using a newly created account means you aren't.
    - anon_d 9y ago
      They are publically defending an argument that got someone fired, so using a throwaway account is totally reasonable here.
    - jshevek 9y ago
      No. Assuming someone is posting in bad faith for this reason is an act of bad faith. Your statement reveals hypocrisy.
      - zimpenfish 9y ago
        A throwaway account created specifically to post one comment is a sign of bad faith. It's entirely possible that I am wrong but the lack of subsequent engagement suggests otherwise.
        jshevek 9y ago

maehwasu 9y ago

"You can say anything you want, unless you're saying something that I choose to define as unacceptable."

GVIrish 9y ago
When has that ever not been the case in the workplace? Every workplace has norms and values where someone who runs afoul of them may be fired. Norms change over time. There was a time when it would've been okay to use the 'n' word to insult black people in many work places, now it's not okay. There was a time when lewd and demeaning talk about women was ok in the workplace, now it's not. The people who sign the checks have always been able to define what is and is not acceptable in the workplace. Some people are feeling caught out because the line has moved, but it has always been there.
- maehwasu 9y ago
  Completely agree. The point here is that the situation isn't static: many people don't like what is now ok in the workplace, and are trying to shift it back. Simply calling them "racist" or "sexist" as if that ends the discussion completely misses the point.
  - GVIrish 9y ago
    Yeah and maybe what needs to happen is people need to talk more about how 'the line' is moving so people can understand better where people are coming from. I agree that labeling people as racist or sexist for being caught out by shifting norms is not productive, but at the same time people need to put effort into empathizing with others and educating themselves. There are jokes I would've made 10 years ago I wouldn't make now. There are comments from others that might not have set off any alarms before, but now I know more about why they might be exclusionary or hurtful. Ultimately it's a process. Which is why maybe a guy like Damore shouldn't be made to run the internet pitchfork and torch gauntlet for what he did. Maybe it could've been a teachable moment instead of a firing. But the other side of that is that I don't know if there were other components to his firing that we haven't heard yet.

coldtea 9y ago

>This is an example of people taking exactly the wrong lesson from this situation. The guy wasn't fired for having a 'dissenting opinion'. He was fired because he basically said women are underrepresented in IT because they are biologically unsuited for it. He never said that women are "biologically unsuited" for IT. Here's what he sead in full: https://medium.com/@Cernovich/full-james-damore-memo-uncensored-memo-with-charts-and-cites-339f3d2d05f https://medium.com/@Cernovich/full-james-damore-memo-uncenso... In short, he said that biological differences (with citations) can explain in the aggregate (not in the total absolute of the population) different preferences, job options, etc., and even suggested ways to change the working environment to alleviate those issues and make it welcome to more personality traits associated statistically with women (as described in citations and statistics he gave). What kind of person misattributes another with straw-man arguments they didn't say and gloats on their misfortune of being fired? What he said might or might not be true, but in any case it's no basis for firing someone (as it's not related to their job performance), and it's something that absolutely should be allowed to be debated and studied. The assumption "all sexes/cultures etc are equally predisposed to everything or even if they are not they should be considered as such and nobody should talk about it again" is not a way to have any kind of dialogue. >There are a lot of situations these days where people are expressing opinions at work that are insensitive to or outright disparage another group of people, then getting shocked when they're fired. If the tide turns, or you live in a country where the reverse tenets are held (e.g. Saudi Arabia), don't be surprised and don't complain if you are fired for saying what you believe then... It's all par for the course and well as long as the majority or those in control of your job believe that you should have a specific sensitivity, right?

GVIrish 9y ago
> In short, he said that biological differences (with citations) can explain in the aggregate (not in the total absolute of the population) different preferences, job options, etc., and even suggested ways to change the working environment to alleviate those issues and make it welcome to more personality traits associated statistically with women (as described in citations and statistics he gave). He is extrapolating from a few pieces of evidence to form the basis of an entire argument about why women are underrepresented while devoting zero time to the role of culture or bias. I think he tried hard to be even-handed but then there's things like, 'Women have higher neuroticism'. He hedges his language a bit by saying biological differences "may in part" explain the gender gap, but then goes on to talk exclusively about biological differences as the cause. > What kind of person misattributes another with straw-man arguments they didn't say and gloats on their misfortune of being fired? Who's gloating? I am neither happy or unhappy he got fired. If Google chose not to fire him and instead used this as a teachable moment I wouldn't really have any criticism. > What he said might or might not be true, but in any case it's no basis for firing someone (as it's not related to their job performance), and it's something that absolutely should be allowed to be debated and studied. If you say or do something that contravenes the values of your company, it usually is a fireable offense, regardless of job performance. Some people may disagree with Google firing him but ultimately they decide what their culture is. Maybe in this case they've run afoul of California employment laws, but in most at-will employment states people can be fired for any reason or no reason at all. > The assumption "all sexes/cultures etc are equally predisposed to everything or even if they are not they should be considered as such and nobody should talk about it again" is not a way to have any kind of dialogue. Eh no. Predispositions is one thing, but when people extrapolate that to say, "This group's abilities or outcomes are different because of biological differences," you're always walking into a minefield. Most serious studies about that stuff stop faarrrr short of making conclusions about career/life outcomes based on genetic behavioral predispositions. It's not that people can't talk about this stuff, it's that it is very easy to get it wrong. And a lot of people have trouble recognizing that it is easy to get it wrong. > If the tide turns, or you live in a country where the reverse tenets are held (e.g. Saudi Arabia), don't be surprised and don't complain if you are fired for saying what you believe then... A. I choose not to live in a monarchy that has capital punishment for minor offenses. B. If what I believe doesn't match the values of a company, I'm either not going to join that company or I'm going to refrain from publishing manifestos on the corporate intranet. > It's all par for the course and well as long as the majority or those in control of your job believe that you should have a specific sensitivity, right? It's their company, they can do what they want with it. People are free to not work for them and customers are free to choose another search engine. Either way, Damore chose to publish this document internally, because he wanted his manifest to have impact. This is not a case of someone minding their own business and getting terminated for expressing an unpopular opinion. He created a real problem internally and Google chose to cut him lose for that. And we don't even know if there were other factors to his firing.

christophilus 9y ago

As I understand it, this is a misrepresentation. He did not say they were biologically unsuited for it. If I could rephrase in my own words, I'd say that the evidence shows that people who tend to be good at both language and the sciences will lean towards more social career paths. Women are unlike men in that they tend to be good at both where men tend to be lopsided: e.g. much better at math than English, say. This is not saying that women are unsuited for science. Quite the opposite. It is saying that women who are suited for STEM are more likely to also be well suited to more social endeavors, and thus less likely to choose STEM than the typical man who is well suited for STEM. The memo, I think, was essentially saying: "Thus if we want to attract more women to engineering, we need to appeal to the non-STEM side of the spectrum."