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> You may be surprised, but having a deversity of ideas really could improve a network protocol. So why are so many companies that are hiring for racial, gende

> You may be surprised, but having a deversity of ideas really could improve a network protocol. So why are so many companies that are hiring for racial, gender, sexual orientation etc. diversity, actively promoting a political monoculture? If it were really about diversity of ideas, political diversity would be a good place to start because people with different political alignments are much more likely (in my opinion) to have different ideas than a black and a white person from the same city who are politically aligned.

Retric 8y ago
Because they are doing it poorly? It's easy to measure a proxy for what you care about rather than what you actually want. That said, promoting diversity of backgrounds could under represent more homogeneous political groups. But, again you don't necessarily care about representing each group equally you care about having the maximum range of input while still functioning as a team.
- yourbandsucks 8y ago
  How about people who aren't from wealthy coastal suburbs? That's the monoculture in tech. Tech diversity stats basically mirror those suburbs with the exception of the east asian and south asian groups. (The suburbs are catching up as they raise families).
- beaconstudios 8y ago
  I think the kind of diversity initiative you are speaking about is fundamentally different from the one the startup industry is aiming for. Diversity metrics are fairly commonplace, as is political homogenisation and suppression of alternative views. This leads me to believe that these companies are not in fact pursuing the kind of diversity (that of ideas/perspectives) that you are championing. They instead seem to be pursuing a kind of demographic equality of outcome where for any % of the populace, that same % should be represented in technology jobs. I find your idea of diversity a lot more defensible than the industry one.
  - scarejunba 8y ago
    This hasn't been my experience, at least in SF. The so-called political monoculture is heavily reason-driven, inclusive, and expressive. This might mean that people whose views are exclusive are excluded from evangelizing those views. The reasons for those are better expressed by Karl Popper's essays on the tolerance of intolerance. So you can't be against gay marriage or sex before marriage, and be for the suppression of expression. But that's a good thing for the reasons that Karl Popper brings up.
    - beaconstudios 8y ago
      that's not the political monoculture I'm pointing out here. I'm strongly for maximising civil liberties, I support the idea that people should be able to do whatever they want as long as they aren't harming others. The monoculture I am pointing towards is the ideological striving for equality of outcome using affirmative action, condemning of people like James Damore who talk about differences between men and women and how that might affect the demographic underrepresentation of women in tech, that kind of thing. From what I understand there's little room for reasonable debate or discussion of these ideas.
rectang 8y ago
What we call "political diversity" at the moment (specifically, significant representation of outspoken conservatives) and diversity along other axes are often, sadly, at odds. If being welcoming to all is an important part of your culture, it undermines your efforts to have people on your team who speak out strongly and harshly against diversity policies. People who choose to keep their opinions to themselves can still thrive, but dissidents and activists have trouble. It was ever thus.
- beaconstudios 8y ago
  that depends on how far along the political spectrum you are. I'm a classical liberal (free market, free speech, pro-equality of opportunity etc) and I have read enough to believe that my political beliefs would not be welcome at many Silicon Valley companies. The particular politics of the California startup scene are pretty far left, to the point that people who would have been considered left wing less than 20 years ago would be seen as hardline conservative in that space. Christopher Hitchens, Stephen Fry or Sam Harris would likely have a hard time getting in. There is fundamentally a difference between criticising diversity policies (aka affirmative action) and being anti-diversity or one of the various -isms. > People who choose to keep their opinions to themselves can still thrive, but dissidents and activists have trouble. It was ever thus. from the comment I was replying to: > You may be surprised, but having a diversity of ideas and backgrounds really could improve a network protocol. These two positions are contradictory, and that was exactly my point. Retric was suggesting that the political policy of SV is one of promoting diversity of ideas, and I pointed out (and seemingly you agree) that it is actually about enforcing and advancing a singular political belief.
  - Retric 8y ago
    Silicon Valley startups cover a wide range. They are thousands of independent actors covering a huge range of political views. Even if you want to restrict things to well funded startups, Uber and Google for example started as very different places. So, I am really not talking about SV startups directly when I talk about the benefits of diversity. I am mostly focused on someone injecting a comment in a design meeting that saves the team weeks of work.
emodendroket 8y ago
That's not really true; two people from similar backgrounds and different party affiliations likely have a lot in common in their ways of thinking.
- beaconstudios 8y ago
  more so than people who are just a different race or gender, from the same background? I doubt it. People from different backgrounds and life experiences would obviously be more likely to have different perspectives, but that's not really what affirmative action hires for - it hires for immutable characteristics like race and gender.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - emodendroket 8y ago
    My expectation is the opposite of yours, and in point of fact people of a different race often are not from the same backgrounds since socioeconomic status is highly racialized in this country.
    - beaconstudios 8y ago
      Of course there's going to be a large difference between people of different races' outlook and perspective, especially in the US. My point is that I think people from different political perspectives have much more fundamentally different ideas, beliefs and philosophies. For an explicit example, a progressive might spot gendered language in a UI that could be exclusionary, where a libertarian might spot a community problem that can solved by market or distributed forces/algorithms. Those are kind of on-the-nose examples but they serve to show things that people from different political lines might not even look for.
      - emodendroket 8y ago
        You know who else might spot gendered, exclusionary language better than colleagues? A woman.

Retric 8y ago

Because they are doing it poorly? It's easy to measure a proxy for what you care about rather than what you actually want. That said, promoting diversity of backgrounds could under represent more homogeneous political groups. But, again you don't necessarily care about representing each group equally you care about having the maximum range of input while still functioning as a team.

yourbandsucks 8y ago
How about people who aren't from wealthy coastal suburbs? That's the monoculture in tech. Tech diversity stats basically mirror those suburbs with the exception of the east asian and south asian groups. (The suburbs are catching up as they raise families).
beaconstudios 8y ago
I think the kind of diversity initiative you are speaking about is fundamentally different from the one the startup industry is aiming for. Diversity metrics are fairly commonplace, as is political homogenisation and suppression of alternative views. This leads me to believe that these companies are not in fact pursuing the kind of diversity (that of ideas/perspectives) that you are championing. They instead seem to be pursuing a kind of demographic equality of outcome where for any % of the populace, that same % should be represented in technology jobs. I find your idea of diversity a lot more defensible than the industry one.
- scarejunba 8y ago
  This hasn't been my experience, at least in SF. The so-called political monoculture is heavily reason-driven, inclusive, and expressive. This might mean that people whose views are exclusive are excluded from evangelizing those views. The reasons for those are better expressed by Karl Popper's essays on the tolerance of intolerance. So you can't be against gay marriage or sex before marriage, and be for the suppression of expression. But that's a good thing for the reasons that Karl Popper brings up.
  - beaconstudios 8y ago
    that's not the political monoculture I'm pointing out here. I'm strongly for maximising civil liberties, I support the idea that people should be able to do whatever they want as long as they aren't harming others. The monoculture I am pointing towards is the ideological striving for equality of outcome using affirmative action, condemning of people like James Damore who talk about differences between men and women and how that might affect the demographic underrepresentation of women in tech, that kind of thing. From what I understand there's little room for reasonable debate or discussion of these ideas.

rectang 8y ago

What we call "political diversity" at the moment (specifically, significant representation of outspoken conservatives) and diversity along other axes are often, sadly, at odds. If being welcoming to all is an important part of your culture, it undermines your efforts to have people on your team who speak out strongly and harshly against diversity policies. People who choose to keep their opinions to themselves can still thrive, but dissidents and activists have trouble. It was ever thus.

beaconstudios 8y ago
that depends on how far along the political spectrum you are. I'm a classical liberal (free market, free speech, pro-equality of opportunity etc) and I have read enough to believe that my political beliefs would not be welcome at many Silicon Valley companies. The particular politics of the California startup scene are pretty far left, to the point that people who would have been considered left wing less than 20 years ago would be seen as hardline conservative in that space. Christopher Hitchens, Stephen Fry or Sam Harris would likely have a hard time getting in. There is fundamentally a difference between criticising diversity policies (aka affirmative action) and being anti-diversity or one of the various -isms. > People who choose to keep their opinions to themselves can still thrive, but dissidents and activists have trouble. It was ever thus. from the comment I was replying to: > You may be surprised, but having a diversity of ideas and backgrounds really could improve a network protocol. These two positions are contradictory, and that was exactly my point. Retric was suggesting that the political policy of SV is one of promoting diversity of ideas, and I pointed out (and seemingly you agree) that it is actually about enforcing and advancing a singular political belief.
- Retric 8y ago
  Silicon Valley startups cover a wide range. They are thousands of independent actors covering a huge range of political views. Even if you want to restrict things to well funded startups, Uber and Google for example started as very different places. So, I am really not talking about SV startups directly when I talk about the benefits of diversity. I am mostly focused on someone injecting a comment in a design meeting that saves the team weeks of work.

emodendroket 8y ago

That's not really true; two people from similar backgrounds and different party affiliations likely have a lot in common in their ways of thinking.

beaconstudios 8y ago
more so than people who are just a different race or gender, from the same background? I doubt it. People from different backgrounds and life experiences would obviously be more likely to have different perspectives, but that's not really what affirmative action hires for - it hires for immutable characteristics like race and gender.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- emodendroket 8y ago
  My expectation is the opposite of yours, and in point of fact people of a different race often are not from the same backgrounds since socioeconomic status is highly racialized in this country.
  - beaconstudios 8y ago
    Of course there's going to be a large difference between people of different races' outlook and perspective, especially in the US. My point is that I think people from different political perspectives have much more fundamentally different ideas, beliefs and philosophies. For an explicit example, a progressive might spot gendered language in a UI that could be exclusionary, where a libertarian might spot a community problem that can solved by market or distributed forces/algorithms. Those are kind of on-the-nose examples but they serve to show things that people from different political lines might not even look for.
    - emodendroket 8y ago
      You know who else might spot gendered, exclusionary language better than colleagues? A woman.