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> I value political neutrality in the workplace If you're doing meaningful work, you're changing things in the world. Changing things in the world is necessar

> I value political neutrality in the workplace If you're doing meaningful work, you're changing things in the world. Changing things in the world is necessarily and inevitably political. If the workplace appears politically neutral, then one of two things must be true. Either what you're doing doesn't affect the outside world, or there are hidden, unstated political motives at work. I would much prefer my company's leadership to acknowledge the politics inherent in our work and openly state their motives and point of view. Doing otherwise is either meaningless or dishonest.

roenxi 8y ago
> If you're doing meaningful work, you're changing things in the world. I don't accept that as a truism; most work is maintaining the historically unprecedented comfort that we enjoy as a society and I think that is meaningful. Providing food is meaningful, providing shelter is meaningful, extracting raw resources is meaningful, taxation and welfare are meaningful, taxation and government services are meaningful. I could go io but that covers the basic point. And since we are talking about a specific company, I don't even necessarily accept that the folk at Google are changing the world more than anyone else. I don't know anyone personally who's commented that 'wow Google has really changed my life' since the introduction of Gmail about 15 years ago. So, whatever they are doing it isn't very visible. Most of the improvement in the technological world is startups and the work of the circuit people.
- thwy12321 8y ago
  the open source technologies they have created, Map/Reduce, Tensorflow... they essentially invented large scale cheap computing. This has had massive effect on the technology industry and the world.
  - roenxi 8y ago
    Do you feel that Map/Reduce or Tensorflow are somehow tools of some sort of convoluted leftist, rightist or centerist agenda? Do the communists have an ideological position on large scale cheap computing? Those technologies do not require Google to be politically active in any way. Saying they are inherently political is like saying a supermarket is inherently political. Might be true in some technical sense, but practically most people are happy to call it a public good.
    - panarky 8y ago
      > like saying a supermarket is inherently political > happy to call it a public good Some supermarkets cut prices in half in advance of Hurricane Florence that is expected to make landfall today. Other supermarkets maximize profitability and eliminated sale prices and discounts in advance of the hurricane. Some supermarkets have large, prominent displays of unhealthy foods. Others emphasize healthy alternatives. Sometimes merchandising decisions are purely profit-maximizing, other times they're trying to do good for their community while simultaneously making a profit. If even a supermarket is political, how do you expect internet giants to be somehow non-political? Virtually everything that they do involves tradeoffs that some people like and others don't.
- whytaka 8y ago
  > Providing food is meaningful, providing shelter is meaningful, extracting raw resources is meaningful, taxation and welfare are meaningful, taxation and government services are meaningful. I could go io but that covers the basic point. I'm amazed to read that you don't think these things don't change the world. And more so that you don't think these things are political! Agriculture is political. Land development is political. Resource extraction is political. Taxation is political. As GP said: > there are hidden, unstated political motives at work.
  - malandrew 8y ago
    The problem is when they become involved in political issues that are unrelated to their economic activity.
    - whytaka 8y ago
      Yes, but to Google, the proper representation of facts is related to their economic activity.
  - michaelt 8y ago
    Presumably what roenxi means is you can't detect your butcher or plumber or garbage man's political affiliation by looking at their meaningful output; and neither when hiring such a person would you need to filter on political affiliation.
davemp 8y ago
This is a blatant false dichotomy. You can do meaningful work that will generate value/change that is largely unaffected by the political landscape (within reason). Sure every company would love tax breaks and subsidies but let's be realistic here. > I would much prefer my company's leadership to acknowledge the politics inherent in our work and openly state their motives and point of view. Most do. Companies just tend to avoid aligning themselves with a party and strictly speak of only specific issues and how said issue should be addressed to benefit their interests.
- jayd16 8y ago
  Choosing to ignore politics and your ability to change it is itself a political stance.
  - iosDrone 8y ago
    You sound like you're really fun at parties.
  - Pimpus 8y ago
    I wasn't aware that cats were political. What a silly argument.
quotemstr 8y ago
You are part of the problem. Is antibiotics development changing the world? I should hope so. Do bacteria care about which presidential candidate won? Absolutely not. Most fields, in fact, do not involve the acrimonious political issues of the day. The idea that "everything is political" is a lame excuse that activists use to hack politics into spaces where it doesn't belong. Even if a field has some tenuous connection to some political principle somewhere, bringing the political aspect to the fore only creates distractions and sows division. Workplaces can and should be non-political and denying that political neutrality is possible is a particularly annoying strain of political activism.
- fzeroracer 8y ago
  Let's discuss climate change then, because despite that being a field reinforced by science it is also one that is considered highly political in today's environment. Can you claim you're politically neutral if you are not willing to listen to people who deny climate change? The problem with attempting to force a politically neutral stance is that it allows politics to invade where it shouldn't. Your logic is fundamentally flawed.
  - axlprose 8y ago
    > Can you claim you're politically neutral if you are not willing to listen to people who deny climate change? If you're literally not willing to listen to any arguments for/against a hypothesis at all, then sure, you're likely more invested in the political aspect than the science itself. But if you're just arguing in favor of what the majority of the established literature suggests, then no, because being pro-science is orthogonal to politics, and arguing in favor of research doesn't make one political. Just because one particular subset of science gets latched onto by politicians, doesn't make it an inherently political subject any more than people who argue that the moon landing is fake make video/image editing an inherently conspiratorial subject. I also wouldn't be accusing others of flawed logic when making an argument that relies on guilt-by-association.
    - fzeroracer 8y ago
tomohawk 8y ago
Everything is political. This was partisan, though. There's a big difference between being political and being partisan. Additionally, advocating for policy changes is far different than acting out like this about specific candidates. Finally, the fear on display here is mostly the fear that comes from ignorance. It is astounding that a company that prides itself in knowing things would be so ignorant of such a large part of the US population, and would apply such unsavory labels to them and their intentions.

roenxi 8y ago

> If you're doing meaningful work, you're changing things in the world. I don't accept that as a truism; most work is maintaining the historically unprecedented comfort that we enjoy as a society and I think that is meaningful. Providing food is meaningful, providing shelter is meaningful, extracting raw resources is meaningful, taxation and welfare are meaningful, taxation and government services are meaningful. I could go io but that covers the basic point. And since we are talking about a specific company, I don't even necessarily accept that the folk at Google are changing the world more than anyone else. I don't know anyone personally who's commented that 'wow Google has really changed my life' since the introduction of Gmail about 15 years ago. So, whatever they are doing it isn't very visible. Most of the improvement in the technological world is startups and the work of the circuit people.

thwy12321 8y ago
the open source technologies they have created, Map/Reduce, Tensorflow... they essentially invented large scale cheap computing. This has had massive effect on the technology industry and the world.
- roenxi 8y ago
  Do you feel that Map/Reduce or Tensorflow are somehow tools of some sort of convoluted leftist, rightist or centerist agenda? Do the communists have an ideological position on large scale cheap computing? Those technologies do not require Google to be politically active in any way. Saying they are inherently political is like saying a supermarket is inherently political. Might be true in some technical sense, but practically most people are happy to call it a public good.
  - panarky 8y ago
    > like saying a supermarket is inherently political > happy to call it a public good Some supermarkets cut prices in half in advance of Hurricane Florence that is expected to make landfall today. Other supermarkets maximize profitability and eliminated sale prices and discounts in advance of the hurricane. Some supermarkets have large, prominent displays of unhealthy foods. Others emphasize healthy alternatives. Sometimes merchandising decisions are purely profit-maximizing, other times they're trying to do good for their community while simultaneously making a profit. If even a supermarket is political, how do you expect internet giants to be somehow non-political? Virtually everything that they do involves tradeoffs that some people like and others don't.
whytaka 8y ago
> Providing food is meaningful, providing shelter is meaningful, extracting raw resources is meaningful, taxation and welfare are meaningful, taxation and government services are meaningful. I could go io but that covers the basic point. I'm amazed to read that you don't think these things don't change the world. And more so that you don't think these things are political! Agriculture is political. Land development is political. Resource extraction is political. Taxation is political. As GP said: > there are hidden, unstated political motives at work.
- malandrew 8y ago
  The problem is when they become involved in political issues that are unrelated to their economic activity.
  - whytaka 8y ago
    Yes, but to Google, the proper representation of facts is related to their economic activity.
- michaelt 8y ago
  Presumably what roenxi means is you can't detect your butcher or plumber or garbage man's political affiliation by looking at their meaningful output; and neither when hiring such a person would you need to filter on political affiliation.

davemp 8y ago

This is a blatant false dichotomy. You can do meaningful work that will generate value/change that is largely unaffected by the political landscape (within reason). Sure every company would love tax breaks and subsidies but let's be realistic here. > I would much prefer my company's leadership to acknowledge the politics inherent in our work and openly state their motives and point of view. Most do. Companies just tend to avoid aligning themselves with a party and strictly speak of only specific issues and how said issue should be addressed to benefit their interests.

jayd16 8y ago
Choosing to ignore politics and your ability to change it is itself a political stance.
- iosDrone 8y ago
  You sound like you're really fun at parties.
- Pimpus 8y ago
  I wasn't aware that cats were political. What a silly argument.

quotemstr 8y ago

You are part of the problem. Is antibiotics development changing the world? I should hope so. Do bacteria care about which presidential candidate won? Absolutely not. Most fields, in fact, do not involve the acrimonious political issues of the day. The idea that "everything is political" is a lame excuse that activists use to hack politics into spaces where it doesn't belong. Even if a field has some tenuous connection to some political principle somewhere, bringing the political aspect to the fore only creates distractions and sows division. Workplaces can and should be non-political and denying that political neutrality is possible is a particularly annoying strain of political activism.

fzeroracer 8y ago
Let's discuss climate change then, because despite that being a field reinforced by science it is also one that is considered highly political in today's environment. Can you claim you're politically neutral if you are not willing to listen to people who deny climate change? The problem with attempting to force a politically neutral stance is that it allows politics to invade where it shouldn't. Your logic is fundamentally flawed.
- axlprose 8y ago
  > Can you claim you're politically neutral if you are not willing to listen to people who deny climate change? If you're literally not willing to listen to any arguments for/against a hypothesis at all, then sure, you're likely more invested in the political aspect than the science itself. But if you're just arguing in favor of what the majority of the established literature suggests, then no, because being pro-science is orthogonal to politics, and arguing in favor of research doesn't make one political. Just because one particular subset of science gets latched onto by politicians, doesn't make it an inherently political subject any more than people who argue that the moon landing is fake make video/image editing an inherently conspiratorial subject. I also wouldn't be accusing others of flawed logic when making an argument that relies on guilt-by-association.
  - fzeroracer 8y ago

tomohawk 8y ago

Everything is political. This was partisan, though. There's a big difference between being political and being partisan. Additionally, advocating for policy changes is far different than acting out like this about specific candidates. Finally, the fear on display here is mostly the fear that comes from ignorance. It is astounding that a company that prides itself in knowing things would be so ignorant of such a large part of the US population, and would apply such unsavory labels to them and their intentions.