10 ms·
> I try really hard to ignore color One thing I was taught in anti-bias trainings at big tech companies was that trying to "ignore" color helps perpetuate bias
by joshribakoff 6y ago
> I try really hard to ignore color
One thing I was taught in anti-bias trainings at big tech companies was that trying to "ignore" color helps perpetuate biases. It is important that if an under represented co-worker speaks up, you pay extra attention, explicitly ensure their idea is credited to them, be vocal when you agree even if you otherwise would not, help others to understand their contributions, etc. Biases will never go away, we all have negative thoughts pop into our head, you cannot "ignore race", but we can all take steps to improve things.
- octaveguin 6y agoIsn't that horribly patronizing? I'd feel offended if someone treated me with kid gloves based on my skin color.
- komali2 6y agoTry asking some POC friends or colleagues! Get their perspective. Another user mentioned that it feels like kneeling on the ground and using "baby talk." That's not what's being said here. It's simply taking a moment to observe yourself and other colleagues potentially engaging in unconscious (or even conscious - you may have an avowed racist hiding it very well on the team!) bias. This is being an ally. It's not patronizing. The reality is that systemic racism against POC in America is real. Ignoring that only aids the status quo.
- numpad0 6y ago> POC It’s not like “white” people aren’t colored
- komali2 6y agoPOC means people of color means non white. You taking the anthropologic perspective isn't scientifically incorrect - race doesn't actually exist, after all, in any meaningful way. However it is sociologically incorrect to call white people "colored."
- numpad0 6y agoBLM has been creeping towards Asia where I am, and some of those activists are absurdly trying to redefine some Asian views of aesthetics as White admirations that the noble White must responsibly educate to eliminate. To me these ungrounded imaginations are clearly stemming from the idea that some people are objectively not colored and others are colored. I’ve never come across this “POC” term but if it’s not racist I don’t know what racism means by dictionary.
- bJGVygG7MQVF8c 6y agoIt's relatively new. If it's any consolation, it probably won't last.
- komali2 6y agoLol. The classic "no YOU'RE racist for pointing out race exists!" Deny that black Americans are terrorized by cops. Pretend that people of color is a non concept all you want. It won't change reality. You are aiding a racist status quo when you fight against ally causes like BLM.
- hardlianotion 6y agoThe situation we are living in at the moment is not a dichotomy.
- memling 6y agoit seems to me a rather dangerous precedent to argue that one must ally with blm. after all if you are not a social conservative you are perpetuating an immoral status quo. of course one might work to end qualified immunity for example or to equalize the education and economic gaps without being a Marxist. let's not confuse ends and means.
- komali2 6y agoDenying the existence of POC and their oppressed status in America is more than just "not supporting BLM," it's a denial of the foundation of their reason for existing.
- numpad0 6y agoThis came up to my feed elsewhere so I’ll leave it here. I don’t care if particular skin colors are similar or dis-similar from one another, but I naturally don’t value actively agreeing with supremacists. > East Asians were almost always called white, particularly during the period of first modern contact in the 16th century. And on a number of occasions, even more revealingly, the people were termed “as white as we are”. (...) > But by the 17th century, the Chinese and Japanese were “darkening” in published texts, gradually losing their erstwhile whiteness when it became clear they would remain unwilling to participate in European systems of trade, religion, and international relations. > Calling them white, in other words, was not based on simple perception either and had less to do with pigmentation than their presumed levels of civilisation, culture, literacy, and obedience (particularly if they should become Christianised). [0]: https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2184754/chinese-were-white-until-white-men-called-them-yellow https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2184754/chine...
- SpicyLemonZest 6y agoEvery POC I know thinks that these kinds of efforts are often, although not always, patronizing. (In some cases even beyond patronizing; I've heard a few people say it's actively hurting their career, because they spend so much time being voluntold into diversity discussions that it cuts into their bandwidth for their real job.)
- loopz 6y agoThen look at it as opportunity.
- komali2 6y agoIf it's patronizing, it's a shitty diversity and inclusion program. Your conversations are the opposite of the ones I've had.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y agoI agree, and I’m absolutely in favor of good diversity programs. It just seems to me that the attitude of “don’t strive to be race blind, always keep yourself aware” consistently leads to bad programs. By far the most bigoted thing I’ve heard at work was in a diversity seminar, where the instructor (a white man) told me (a Hispanic man) that we must make sure to call on Latinas in meetings because they’re not comfortable speaking up for themselves.
- komali2 6y agoThat does sound frustrating. That does sound like a shitty D&I program. That is something worth speaking against, I believe. Isn't there some way to act as an ally to a minority population that doesn't involve patronizing?
- SpicyLemonZest 6y agoAbsolutely. I don't tremendously like the framing of "allyship", but there are lots of good diversity-promoting measures that companies should take - one example, we're working on pushing my current company to do an AfroTech sponsorship.
- toochini 6y agohttps://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gFP4dJHJXoI https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gFP4dJHJXoI Couldn’t find the whole thing, but I agree it seems constantly talking about race leads to more racism and not less. Seems so opposed to the civil right movement stance against segregation.
- komali2 6y ago"constantly talking about race leads to more racism not less" Isn't an effective argument against diversity and inclusion efforts. Racism is real and POC Americans (to scope the discussion) are experiencing it. Maybe Morgan Freeman has the perspective that pretending it's not real will make it go away, but that doesn't change the fact that black programmers are underrepresented, or that police forces are staffed with avowed racists, or that... Etc.
- historyremade 6y agoOff-topic. The same for drugs..
- bJGVygG7MQVF8c 6y agoAnswering for myself / at the level of the individual: yes. I don't want to work with white colleagues who are biased against non-white people. I have been in this situation at a very small startup. I wasn't the only person to notice or complain about it, so I know it wasn't "in my head". So I left. But I also don't want to work someplace where white colleagues are overcorrecting for deep-seated cultural biases. Ideally they don't have to correct at all. I've been in that situation as well, at a large company with a extremely woke / "D&I" culture. So I left. Exit isn't a systemic solution — only an individual one, and only for market participants with options. It's also not cheap, but the psychological and emotional cost of being judged by group membership -- for me, at least, is greater. I think it's worth keeping in mind that the kind of pan-social "affirmative action" advocated by diversity consultants is a double-edged sword, and not without its own risks and costs. At best it's a stopgap measure of sorts. (The diversity consultant operates under perverse incentives, and doesn't have anything like a Hippocratic Oath constraining his/her advocacy.) I've been lucky and have found a few places where that pervasive sense of cultural bias wasn't present. It would be easier to find such places if startups, and engineering teams in particular, would try to hew to traditional standards of professionalism on the job.
- xfitm3 6y ago> I don't want to work with white colleagues who are biased against non-white people. I don't want to work with people who are biased against white people. I support equality and I genuinely want to see people treated fairly but I can't help but take offense to the notion that because I'm white I am less or should feel guilty.
- komali2 6y agoAllyship for POC doesn't imply bias against white people. Acknowledging and fighting against systemic racism doesn't imply that all white people should feel universal guilt for their very real privilege. Raising others up doesn't require pushing anyone down. Well, anyone that isn't in a white hood, anyway.
- 6y ago
- loopz 6y agoMaking sure everybody gets a fair chance and get heard, isn't really about color or gender. It's necessary in every human organization, no matter how fancy policies and human rights they claim to subscribe to.
- jjeaff 6y agoIt's only patronizing if it results in preferential treatment. But I think the experts who work on these programs have found that it is necessary to "over-correct" in order to override unconscious bias. Obviously, if it is coming across as patronizing, then you are doing it wrong. The point is to try to get to a happy medium. Like shooting for the stars in hopes of getting to the moon.
- joshribakoff 6y agoExactly. Inevitably some of my co-workers brought up the "points" in this thread too, that it feels patronizing & unfair. I'm not suggesting anyone be patronizing. I'm simply saying you should be aware of the fact a co-worker might be feeling a certain way, and then notice & speak up if you see, for example, their idea(s) being misattributed to others. The idea that being an ally would be patronizing is comparable to people responding to "black lives matter" with "all lives matter". Yes, all lives should matter, but all lives don't matter until black lives matter. If you work somewhere where white people are being systemically held back, you should speak up there as well, but I doubt that is the case.
- datavirtue 6y agoSo, the golden rule?
- tartoran 6y ago> Isn't that horribly patronizing? Not a racist but am torn between ignoring race - wr’re all people stance - and the behaviour described as patronizing. My conclusion is that nobody has a clue how to deal with this mess. We need to have some sort of clear guidelines on what is best tto do in these cases without offending nor patronizing. Im an Eastern European immigrant to the US and in my US education it has been drilled into me that there is no such thing as race, we’re all related and so on while emphasizing on different cultures. I took African American studies and did learn a great deal of injustice at the expense of blacks in America. But it seems I didn’t learn how to behave properly. What am I doing wrong? Should we set clear guidelines or leave them ambiguous?
- AlexTWithBeard 6y agoI think the idea is that you should ignore the race, but doing that requires effort and awareness.
- mcv 6y agoSeems like a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation. If the options are getting ignored, including for promotions; or getting extra attention because you're from an underrepresented group, I think option B is better in the long run, because at least it helps to address the underrepresentation. Once representation is more equal, I think the "ignore colour" option becomes more feasible. But we're not there yet.
- eframi 6y agoI agree that this is implausible within our lifetimes, but I hope one day it will be possible. There are all sorts of other physical characteristics we mostly ignore by default, and with enough time I'm hopeful we can one day live in a world where the mental biases associated with race will disappear too.
- staticautomatic 6y agoSo, it’s important to treat them...the way you should treat everyone. True statement. I think you’ll need to elaborate further on what the philosophical and semantic difference is between ignoring and noticing, because the outcome is the same in your example.
- networkimprov 6y agoIntending to overcompensate is an effective method to actually treat them the way you should treat everyone.
- hombre_fatal 6y agoEh, that only works if you have trouble treating people equally otherwise which is quite the character trait. That advice goes back to this idea that white people are born with the original sin of racism. I find it incredibly patronizing to actively pursue "okay, black guy is talking, let me me play everything up a little bit!" Yikes. Reminds me of kneeling to talk to a child in a baby voice when they're crying that borders on a weird manipulation. If you have such a hard time giving people of other races equal footing and need a roleplay minigame like this to do it, please speak for yourself and not everyone else. A good leadership + empathy trait is to recognize people who aren't able to get their word in, in general, and use some of your leverage to help them. This may be the one male substitute teacher on a team of professional women teachers, or the whitest kid in a Mexican school (my experience), or a woman in a male-dominated workplace, or a black guy on a team of east asians. I'd rather be teaching that. That's the actual moral bedrock that you're trying to get at here but in the wrong way. And once you realize this, you'll realize there are plenty of other people in meetings that don't have equal footing for all sorts of reasons, like the soft-spoken guy with low self-confidence, probably the most common in our field.
- komali2 6y ago> white people are born with the original sin of racism. No, it doesn't, but this is generally speaking a perfect encapsulation of the "all lives matter" perspective, which is morally incorrect, usually not because of raw KKK level hatred or racism but instead simple ignorance of what unconscious bias and racism is really like for POC in America. > I find it incredibly patronizing to actively pursue "okay, black guy is talking, let me me play everything up a little bit!" This is also a common trope I've encountered time and time again. Some call it "racism of low expectations." The important distinction to make is that being an ally isn't patronizing, it's an active recognition of the reality of racism and unconscious bias that POC face in the workplace. The fact that you jump all the way to comparing it to speaking to a child in a baby voice says more about your own lack of empathy than an effective rhetorical attack on the position that "seeing color" as an ally is good and helpful. I don't know you but your position is identical to a lot of people who think they aren't racist but I have observed act in a biased way, unconsciously. The playing field isn't level. Doing nothing aids the status quo, and the status quo is systemic racism against POC.
- RhysU 6y agoThe behavior you prescribe is itself a bias. Can we please treat individuals as individuals instead of narrowly viewing others through whatever lenses we carry?
- Klinky 6y agoThis sounds kind of like "all workers matter", which ignores the current and historical challenges gender/race minorities have experienced in certain fields of work. If you are the majority it can be very easy to be blind to the plight of the minority. "I see a black man or a woman got hired, so things must be fine." I don't think there is harm in making extra effort to ensure inclusion of minorities within the group, at least for the time being while we try to find better balance, and we see fewer reports of minorities being overlooked, outcasts or underpayed.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y agoIt's very important to ensure inclusion, and there's no harm in it when it's done well. But if you find yourself keeping mental notes of everyone's skin color to figure out how you should interact with them, that's not really inclusion.
- komali2 6y agoIt's more thinking, "did I forget to add {{somebody}} to the engineering help desk email group because they're black" than it is "lemme use my baby voice when talking to the black engineer." It's about working to catch your own unconscious bias in the act, and then fighting to correct any mistakes you made as a result. And then, you start making yourself aware of how your colleagues and company culture is treating POC, and working to correct mistakes there. If it sounds like exhaustive policing, I'd simply ask if code review is exhaustive policing. Is it rude to insist on code reviews? Of course not, because we're humans and make mistakes. The whole point of a team and company is to combine strenghts and look out for eachother.
- jjeaff 6y agoJust know that whether you are consciously making mental notes on skin color or not, your unconscious mind definitely is taking notes and affecting your behaviour accordingly. And this goes both ways. Racial bias exists in all human beings. It's just that when you are a member of the group that is overwhelmingly represented in all corners of power, that racial bias tends to help you while harming others.