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That’s the beauty of modern discrimination. You never come out and say you’re discriminating. Rather you just apply the rules selectively. An inconsistent pro

That’s the beauty of modern discrimination. You never come out and say you’re discriminating. Rather you just apply the rules selectively. An inconsistent process is the best best way to discriminate. My prediction is you will see some people leave Google due to this. Likely those who worked closest to her. Apple is already extending interest.

tinyhouse 6y ago
There is no evidence they applied rules selectively. What I meant by inconsistent process is that it's subjective. These process usually say something like "Two L6+ need to approve...". Then it's assigned to someone and that person can spend 2 minutes or 2 hours on it. Paper reviews are esp prone to that. How likely your paper being accepted is often more of a factor of who reviews it than how good the paper is. The main thing for me is that it was clear the paper would have been published eventually. I've seen it many times - reviewers ask for some changes. Authors make the changes, Reviews are happy. Paper is published. The reviewers didn't ask for anything that would make the paper weaker, nor did they ask to remove any content. I'm guessing she was so mad because they were external people on the paper and pulling the paper out would make her look bad.
- kenjackson 6y ago
  Other Google researchers have stated that they’ve never had their papers internally reviewed based on the criteria she did (lit review for example). Just for things like corporate sensitive information. If no one else in Google history has had the same criteria used, that seems selective to me.
JamesBarney 6y ago
Maybe I'm not understanding the argument. But why do people think she was let go? My understanding is she wrote a paper critical of certain aspects of Google's business. They asked her to retract it for revisions because they didn't think it was fair to Google which believed it had made advancements relevant to her critiques. She thought this review was unfair so she wrote an unprofessional message to an internal group and submitted an ultimatum/resignation. Which google accepted. Do you believe that corporations generally accept ultimatums? Do you believe the message she sent out would never be a fireable offense? Do you believe she was let go because she was black or female?
- kenjackson 6y ago
  > Do you believe she was let go because she was black or female? Possibly. I do think it is likely that she isn't fired if she was a white male. In my experience, people have more patience with people who are in their "in-group". This goes beyond race/gender -- just look at sports fandom for an example. Isn't it odd that players for the team you cheer for can do no wrong, but as soon as they're traded then they start doing a bunch of bad stuff, even the stuff they did while on your team actually now looks kind of bad. In the tech industry role/team/company/race/gender are probably the biggest in-group delineations. > Do you believe that corporations generally accept ultimatums? Yes they do. The most common ultimatum is given before employment, where candidates will often give a minimum salary/benefits they will take for the job. I've seen and even been involved in these negotiations where a candidate states that they will not go below this offer, period. And then we counter with a number below that but provide some other incentive we think may counter it. There are other ultimatums I've seen in the workplace. For example, "I can't work with XYZ or I'm leaving the team". I don't think I've ever seen the response come back as, "good luck finding a new team". It's always been to dive deeper into the relationship. In fact I issued an ultimatum many years ago where I said I couldn't travel any more due to a personal issue or I'd have to find new employment. I guess you could say they yielded to my threat. I like to think that I was just being honest and they helped find a way that I could still help the team, especially since I only traveled a couple of times per year. > Do you believe the message she sent out would never be a fireable offense? I can imagine it being listed as a firing offense in some handbook. I can also imagine that others who have written damning emails have gotten away with no more than a slap on the wrist (or less).
  - JamesBarney 6y ago
    > Possibly. I do think it is likely that she isn't fired if she was a white male. In my experience, people have more patience with people who are in their "in-group". This goes beyond race/gender -- just look at sports fandom for an example. Isn't it odd that players for the team you cheer for can do no wrong, but as soon as they're traded then they start doing a bunch of bad stuff, even the stuff they did while on your team actually now looks kind of bad. In the tech industry role/team/company/race/gender are probably the biggest in-group delineations. I think you're right about her not being in the in-group. But the in-group had nothing to do with race or gender but instead was about whether or not she played ball with Google executives. It seems like she was a team player with regards to people she worked with directly in AI ethics research, but definitely was not a corporate team player. I think in this specific circumstance a white male would have been easier to fire. It's a much worse look to fire a woman of color investigating AI ethics (A lot of which is revolves around racial and gender bias) than a white male. > Yes they do. The most common ultimatum is given before employment, where candidates will often give a minimum salary/benefits they will take for the job. I've seen and even been involved in these negotiations where a candidate states that they will not go below this offer, period. And then we counter with a number below that but provide some other incentive we think may counter it. When I used the word ultimatum I wasn't referring to pre-employment salary negotiations, which this most certainly wasn't. > There are other ultimatums I've seen in the workplace. For example, "I can't work with XYZ or I'm leaving the team". I don't think I've ever seen the response come back as, "good luck finding a new team". It's always been to dive deeper into the relationship. I think there is a subtle difference between delivering an ultimatum and communicating the minimum needs for a job. "You need to stop requiring me to travel or I quit" will be treated very differently by most employers than "I talked with my wife, and due to us having a new born, I don't I think I can fit travel into my life any longer. Is there any way to continue this job without travel?". Judging by her generally assertive nature (which is a valuable asset in a researcher and activist, but can be a liability when navigating corporate America) and the other message she sent out to her co-workers I imagine her email was phrased more like the former than the latter. > I can imagine it being listed as a firing offense in some handbook. I can also imagine that others who have written damning emails have gotten away with no more than a slap on the wrist (or less). Even without an employee handbook, this is incredibly unprofessional behavior. Telling co-workers to stop doing certain types of work and apply external pressure to your employer seems unfathomable to me? If I was really angry or drunk and sent out a message like that I would be afraid of losing my job. If I also submitted my resignation at the same time I would just assume they would accept it unless they had a very important reason they couldn't let me go. I think if she had just submitted her resignation/ultimatum letter or just sent out that withering letter she'd still be employed at Google. I've seen two people act that unprofessional and one was immediately fired and the other was told "This is you're first and second strike. You think we can't replace you. We can, and if you do this again we will." And those unprofessional outbursts weren't in writing, they were just people being unprofessional because they were stressed and frustrated.
ioctrl 6y ago
That's another beauty of modern discrimination: it's unfalsifiable. From everything made public, her behavior constitutes a fireable offense at any company I've ever worked at, regardless of skin color. And there is precedent for non-PoCs being fired for posting unprofessional messages to internal message boards. So why would you consider her actions permissible?
- kenjackson 6y ago
  I’ve seen similar emails and never anyone fired from them. People have tried to claim equivalence with Damore and they are so night and day different that I struggle to believe the comparison is in good faith. The main difference is that the most egregious emails are often from technical leaders attacking those much lower in the pecking order. Regarding the beauty of modern discrimination that you note. Plaintiffs in these cases almost always lose, because it is almost unprovable and the bar is high (being called the n-word for example isn’t sufficient). Being unfalsifiable provides little solace if there is no consequence to the discrimination.
  - deleted 6y ago
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  - ioctrl 6y ago
    You've seen an employee send out an email to colleagues instructing people of color to stop their efforts to improve the company, claiming the internal review process was an act of racist discrimination and dehumanization, and essentially calling their work a lost cause? You've seen this followed up by threats to resign from the company if the anonymous reviewers' identities aren't revealed? And all this following prior threats of litigation against the company within the past year? And you saw this from men or non-persons of color who were not fired? Obviously not, but if you do have examples that are sufficiently comparable in your mind, feel free to describe them and make a case. As it is, you're again falling back on unfalsifiable claims. And I'm still curious to know why you'd expect a company not to fire someone in this scenario?
    - 6y ago
int_19h 6y ago
Modern? It's a trick that's probably as old as discrimination itself. Here's a rare case of an American judge speaking openly about this - the quote is from a 1941 Florida Supreme Court opinion (Watson v. Stone): "I know something of the history of this legislation. The original Act of 1893 was passed when there was a great influx of negro laborers in this State drawn here for the purpose of working in turpentine and lumber camps. ... It is a safe guess to assume that more than 80% of the white men living in the rural sections of Florida have violated this statute. ... There has never been, within my knowledge, any effort to enforce the provisions of this statute as to white people, because it has been generally conceded to be in contravention of the Constitution and non-enforceable if contested." Note, by the way, that this also references the other common trick - you can also make rules that are seemingly not arbitrary, but are easy enough to challenge for those with the right knowledge and/or means.

tinyhouse 6y ago

There is no evidence they applied rules selectively. What I meant by inconsistent process is that it's subjective. These process usually say something like "Two L6+ need to approve...". Then it's assigned to someone and that person can spend 2 minutes or 2 hours on it. Paper reviews are esp prone to that. How likely your paper being accepted is often more of a factor of who reviews it than how good the paper is. The main thing for me is that it was clear the paper would have been published eventually. I've seen it many times - reviewers ask for some changes. Authors make the changes, Reviews are happy. Paper is published. The reviewers didn't ask for anything that would make the paper weaker, nor did they ask to remove any content. I'm guessing she was so mad because they were external people on the paper and pulling the paper out would make her look bad.

kenjackson 6y ago
Other Google researchers have stated that they’ve never had their papers internally reviewed based on the criteria she did (lit review for example). Just for things like corporate sensitive information. If no one else in Google history has had the same criteria used, that seems selective to me.

JamesBarney 6y ago

Maybe I'm not understanding the argument. But why do people think she was let go? My understanding is she wrote a paper critical of certain aspects of Google's business. They asked her to retract it for revisions because they didn't think it was fair to Google which believed it had made advancements relevant to her critiques. She thought this review was unfair so she wrote an unprofessional message to an internal group and submitted an ultimatum/resignation. Which google accepted. Do you believe that corporations generally accept ultimatums? Do you believe the message she sent out would never be a fireable offense? Do you believe she was let go because she was black or female?

kenjackson 6y ago
> Do you believe she was let go because she was black or female? Possibly. I do think it is likely that she isn't fired if she was a white male. In my experience, people have more patience with people who are in their "in-group". This goes beyond race/gender -- just look at sports fandom for an example. Isn't it odd that players for the team you cheer for can do no wrong, but as soon as they're traded then they start doing a bunch of bad stuff, even the stuff they did while on your team actually now looks kind of bad. In the tech industry role/team/company/race/gender are probably the biggest in-group delineations. > Do you believe that corporations generally accept ultimatums? Yes they do. The most common ultimatum is given before employment, where candidates will often give a minimum salary/benefits they will take for the job. I've seen and even been involved in these negotiations where a candidate states that they will not go below this offer, period. And then we counter with a number below that but provide some other incentive we think may counter it. There are other ultimatums I've seen in the workplace. For example, "I can't work with XYZ or I'm leaving the team". I don't think I've ever seen the response come back as, "good luck finding a new team". It's always been to dive deeper into the relationship. In fact I issued an ultimatum many years ago where I said I couldn't travel any more due to a personal issue or I'd have to find new employment. I guess you could say they yielded to my threat. I like to think that I was just being honest and they helped find a way that I could still help the team, especially since I only traveled a couple of times per year. > Do you believe the message she sent out would never be a fireable offense? I can imagine it being listed as a firing offense in some handbook. I can also imagine that others who have written damning emails have gotten away with no more than a slap on the wrist (or less).
- JamesBarney 6y ago
  > Possibly. I do think it is likely that she isn't fired if she was a white male. In my experience, people have more patience with people who are in their "in-group". This goes beyond race/gender -- just look at sports fandom for an example. Isn't it odd that players for the team you cheer for can do no wrong, but as soon as they're traded then they start doing a bunch of bad stuff, even the stuff they did while on your team actually now looks kind of bad. In the tech industry role/team/company/race/gender are probably the biggest in-group delineations. I think you're right about her not being in the in-group. But the in-group had nothing to do with race or gender but instead was about whether or not she played ball with Google executives. It seems like she was a team player with regards to people she worked with directly in AI ethics research, but definitely was not a corporate team player. I think in this specific circumstance a white male would have been easier to fire. It's a much worse look to fire a woman of color investigating AI ethics (A lot of which is revolves around racial and gender bias) than a white male. > Yes they do. The most common ultimatum is given before employment, where candidates will often give a minimum salary/benefits they will take for the job. I've seen and even been involved in these negotiations where a candidate states that they will not go below this offer, period. And then we counter with a number below that but provide some other incentive we think may counter it. When I used the word ultimatum I wasn't referring to pre-employment salary negotiations, which this most certainly wasn't. > There are other ultimatums I've seen in the workplace. For example, "I can't work with XYZ or I'm leaving the team". I don't think I've ever seen the response come back as, "good luck finding a new team". It's always been to dive deeper into the relationship. I think there is a subtle difference between delivering an ultimatum and communicating the minimum needs for a job. "You need to stop requiring me to travel or I quit" will be treated very differently by most employers than "I talked with my wife, and due to us having a new born, I don't I think I can fit travel into my life any longer. Is there any way to continue this job without travel?". Judging by her generally assertive nature (which is a valuable asset in a researcher and activist, but can be a liability when navigating corporate America) and the other message she sent out to her co-workers I imagine her email was phrased more like the former than the latter. > I can imagine it being listed as a firing offense in some handbook. I can also imagine that others who have written damning emails have gotten away with no more than a slap on the wrist (or less). Even without an employee handbook, this is incredibly unprofessional behavior. Telling co-workers to stop doing certain types of work and apply external pressure to your employer seems unfathomable to me? If I was really angry or drunk and sent out a message like that I would be afraid of losing my job. If I also submitted my resignation at the same time I would just assume they would accept it unless they had a very important reason they couldn't let me go. I think if she had just submitted her resignation/ultimatum letter or just sent out that withering letter she'd still be employed at Google. I've seen two people act that unprofessional and one was immediately fired and the other was told "This is you're first and second strike. You think we can't replace you. We can, and if you do this again we will." And those unprofessional outbursts weren't in writing, they were just people being unprofessional because they were stressed and frustrated.

ioctrl 6y ago

That's another beauty of modern discrimination: it's unfalsifiable. From everything made public, her behavior constitutes a fireable offense at any company I've ever worked at, regardless of skin color. And there is precedent for non-PoCs being fired for posting unprofessional messages to internal message boards. So why would you consider her actions permissible?

kenjackson 6y ago
I’ve seen similar emails and never anyone fired from them. People have tried to claim equivalence with Damore and they are so night and day different that I struggle to believe the comparison is in good faith. The main difference is that the most egregious emails are often from technical leaders attacking those much lower in the pecking order. Regarding the beauty of modern discrimination that you note. Plaintiffs in these cases almost always lose, because it is almost unprovable and the bar is high (being called the n-word for example isn’t sufficient). Being unfalsifiable provides little solace if there is no consequence to the discrimination.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- ioctrl 6y ago
  You've seen an employee send out an email to colleagues instructing people of color to stop their efforts to improve the company, claiming the internal review process was an act of racist discrimination and dehumanization, and essentially calling their work a lost cause? You've seen this followed up by threats to resign from the company if the anonymous reviewers' identities aren't revealed? And all this following prior threats of litigation against the company within the past year? And you saw this from men or non-persons of color who were not fired? Obviously not, but if you do have examples that are sufficiently comparable in your mind, feel free to describe them and make a case. As it is, you're again falling back on unfalsifiable claims. And I'm still curious to know why you'd expect a company not to fire someone in this scenario?
  - 6y ago

int_19h 6y ago

Modern? It's a trick that's probably as old as discrimination itself. Here's a rare case of an American judge speaking openly about this - the quote is from a 1941 Florida Supreme Court opinion (Watson v. Stone): "I know something of the history of this legislation. The original Act of 1893 was passed when there was a great influx of negro laborers in this State drawn here for the purpose of working in turpentine and lumber camps. ... It is a safe guess to assume that more than 80% of the white men living in the rural sections of Florida have violated this statute. ... There has never been, within my knowledge, any effort to enforce the provisions of this statute as to white people, because it has been generally conceded to be in contravention of the Constitution and non-enforceable if contested." Note, by the way, that this also references the other common trick - you can also make rules that are seemingly not arbitrary, but are easy enough to challenge for those with the right knowledge and/or means.