8 ms·

Inside the all-hands meeting that led to a third of Basecamp employees quitting

87 points by minimaxir 6y ago

cratermoon 6y ago
“I strongly disagree we live in a white supremacist culture,” [Ryan] Singer said. “I don’t believe in a lot of the framing around implicit bias. I think a lot of this is actually racist.” He continued: “Very often, if you express a dissenting view, you get called a Nazi. … I have not felt this is open territory for discussion. If we were to try to get into it as a group discussion it would be very painful and divisive.” Ooof. I predict Singer's next public pronouncements will be about "the evils of cancel culture" and he'll end up on Fox News or OANN.
- SamBam 6y ago
  > If we were to try to get into it as a group discussion it would be very painful and divisive. This really sounded to me as "if I were allowed to tell you my true feelings about all this, a lot of you would be angry," or "oh, if it's open-season on white men, let me tell you I can dish it on the rest of you... lucky for you I'm not allowed to."
  - chubbyish 6y ago
    “This sounded to me like” is the problem. Everyone hears what they want to hear for their narrative. Then it becomes a juicy internet drama rather than some mundane thing.
    - SamBam 6y ago
      "If we were to try to get into it as a group discussion it would be very painful and divisive." This sounds more like a threat than a promise. A promise he chose to carry out. Why should it be divisive, if you're actually going to listen? Is it because you'd end up saying things like "white supremacy is a myth" and denying the notion of institutional racism? It sounds a lot to me like the continual "predictions" (threats) from some Republicans that there's going to be a "race war" or other war with liberals, if the left keeps doing what they're doing. They make it sound like it's something inevitable that they're predicting, but in reality they're simply saying what they want to do.
      - anon7725 6y ago
        > Why should it be divisive, if you're actually going to listen? Why should it be divisive, indeed. “America is not a racist country” was just the position expressed by Sen. Tim Scott in a national prime time address, yet it’s enough to force an employee from a company?
        SamBam 6y ago
        There is actually quite a bit of difference between the statements "America is a racist country" and "institutional racism exists" or even "there exists a belief of white supremacy." And even between "America isn't a racist country" and "the people who talk about implicit biases are the real racists," which is closer to what he actually said (allegedly). (And if we want to have this discussion, I bet we could do it in a way that wasn't "painful and divisive," because I have no desire to be those things, so I'm not going to predict/threaten it.)
      - factsaresacred 6y ago
        > This sounds more like a threat than a promise Rather it sounds like a person afraid to share his views for fear they would be misconstrued or met with emotional outbursts. Employees were claiming Basecamp has a white supremacist culture, an indictment against anybody working there. The idea that you can't reject such preposterous accusations without being "complicit", or without the denial somehow serving as further evidence, is insane.
        falcor84 6y ago
        Let me ask this in a more general way: If a member of a weaker minority group tells a member of a powerful majority group that they feel they've experienced a supremacist culture, is that on its own a `preposterous accusation`? What would be a valid thought and fact-gathering process for that member of the majority group to decide whether to take the concern seriously or dismiss it?
        factsaresacred 6y ago
  - extra88 6y ago
    People did get angry at what he did say so there's no need to concoct thoughts in his head. If the reporting is accurate, his words were twisted. He said "I strongly disagree we live in a white supremacist culture" (meaning American culture) which another employee changes to "white supremacy doesn’t exist." Based on what was reported, I don't know why Singer was suspended. I do understand why he resigned, given the reaction of many employees. He's not an avowed white supremacist. Singer is very wrong, he needs more education, but it seems like many of the employees can't handle the idea of working at a place where someone so wrong works. At a large workplace, there was another worker who I saw coming in to work had a large sign on his bag making clear he was a 9/11 Truther. I saw he also sat at lunchtime with his bag prominently displayed (not at the workplace, in public). It made me really angry but I'd never do anything to threaten his employment or avoid all contact.
    - SamBam 6y ago
      Because of what he chose to say. There was no need to go from "if we're going to talk about race" to "I will deliberately say things that will make everybody mad." That was exactly my point.
- throwawayboise 6y ago
  So if someone disagrees that we live in a white supremacist culture, they should just sit mute and not challenge that claim?
  - IAmEveryone 6y ago
    Yes. If you believe the earth is flat, it’s best to avoid the subject.
    - spacemanmatt 6y ago
      Alternatively, they could use one of their beloved bleach cures for whatever ails them.
  - toiletfuneral 6y ago
    well you're using a throwaway, so please, lets hear your challenge
  - cratermoon 6y ago
    Is a yes/no question about speaking or not really the best possible question to ask here? When we are lacking metacognition on the subject, we can be at the point where we don't even know how to ask the right questions. This is because we can't assess how our beliefs and expectations constrain the range of questions we even know to ask. If you've ever chuckled over the hoary old tale of someone asking tech support, "where is the 'any' key?", you know how lack of understanding can lead to wildly incorrect mental models of a subject. There are decades - nay, centuries - of writing about race relations, racial bias, and systemic discrimination. Before we ask a question, perhaps we'd be well-served to have at least a survey course level of familiarity with the issues, so that we might ask good questions.
  - tdfx 6y ago
    That's the problem with extreme leftist arguments in general. If you don't have the same opinion, or even hold an opinion that falls short of the furthest left possible on the spectrum, you are either bulldozed into submission or, if you refuse to submit, "canceled" as racist or xenophobe. It's incredibly toxic behavior. Nothing is considered an acceptable response except full submission to one side of the argument. Any alternate response is racist, abandoning the argument is white fragility, and silence is complicity in genocide.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
conroy 6y ago
"Fried ... began the meeting by apologizing for announcing the policy changes by a public blog post rather than first telling all employees" The fact that no one internally was given a heads up about the post shows you how much respect the leadership team has for their employees.
- tantalor 6y ago
  Top-down decrees aren't normally proceeded by "heads up", that would be counter-productive
  - ryanbrunner 6y ago
    They're often presented as part of an all hands meeting where you can take questions and address concerns though, not blasted to the public at the same time that internal employees have heard them. I've been involved in relaying 'big news' more than a few times, and the most common way to address it is to inform people directly affected first (if applicable), then the company at large, then the public. You never do any of those steps simultaneously or out of order.
JeremyBanks 6y ago
Were they entirely unprepared for this meeting? "I condemn white supremacy" should not have been difficult words to say. It does not require careful phrasing. Particularly right now, so shortly after famously Trump refused to say it in the debate, and then weeks later we had the attack on the capitol.
- sfreiberg 6y ago
  Wallace asked President Trump whether he was willing to denounce “white supremacists and militia groups,” and Trump answered, "Sure, I'm willing to do that," Not sure how any sane person can claim that isn't denouncing white supremacy but hey don't let facts get in the way of your narrative.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - chubbyish 6y ago
    But why didn’t Trump come out to condemn genocide? And I haven’t heard Biden condemn pedaphilia either... /s
  - JeremyBanks 6y ago
    "Sure, I'm willing to do it." "So do it!" "Proud boys, stand by."
    - sfreiberg 6y ago
      Trump did this at least 20 times. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tug8PoAa7Bg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tug8PoAa7Bg
    - sfreiberg 6y ago
      The Proud Boys were led by a Latino so not sure how they could be a white supremacist group. Also Trump told them to stand down not just stand by. And a more charitable reading could say the stand by was just a slip in a heated debate but either way he clearly told them to stand down.
IAmEveryone 6y ago
Such a great example showing how useless the idea of “banning politics at work” is. If the employee groups’ request to delete the list of “funny” names was political, then creating and updating that list in the first place must also have been political. I guess it’s “politics” only when the founders disagree with it.
- chubbyish 6y ago
  DHH agreed to delete it immediately. The politics was when one Asian employee wouldn’t let the issue die and posted the path to genocide pyramid about how laughing at funny names was just a step on the way to genocide. Talk about jumping to conclusions.
  - stefanmichael 6y ago
    It was bad faith of DHH to say that posting the pyramid was meant to compare the list of names to genocide. The good faith interpretation would make it extremely clear that the employee was comparing the list of names to the lowest rung in the pyramid AKA the farthest removed from genocide. That rung is simply called "biased attitudes" and includes a wide span of things, none of them remotely comparable to genocide and several of them could be used to accurately represent the list. Eg. "Fear of differences", "Stereotypes", "Justifying biases by seeking out like minded people" I don't really understand how or why DHH would construe that as "you're comparing a list of company names to genocide"
    - chubbyish 6y ago
      > The Pyramid shows biased behaviors, growing in complexity from the bottom to the top. Although the behaviors at each level negatively impact individuals and groups, as one moves up the pyramid, the behaviors have more life-threatening consequences. Like a pyramid, the upper levels are supported by the lower levels. If people or institutions treat behaviors on the lower levels as being acceptable or “normal,” it results in the behaviors at the next level becoming more accepted. In response to the questions of the world community about where the hate of genocide comes from, the Pyramid of Hate demonstrates that the hate of genocide is built upon the acceptance of behaviors described in the lower levels of the pyramid. The point being made was that this is really bad because it’s a step on the way to genocide. That’s what DHH said I believe. And it would be in the context of trying to get the employee fired who made it. Also the other co-founder is Jewish. So having someone bring up something like that is probably insulting.
seriousquestion 6y ago
"Two employees told me that they had found themselves crying and screaming at the screen." What...
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- chubbyish 6y ago
  ...tell us about a time you showed vulnerability at work
- taytus 6y ago
  It seems excessive if you never experienced extreme stress. It sounded like a comedy sketch, until it happened to me. I wasn't at work, I was at home, but the reaction was the same.
chubbyish 6y ago
The problem with this and ALL arguments comes down to definitions. “I don’t think there is white supremacy....of course there is white supremacy etc.” What I would have done is get them to define what each means by white supremacy in detail...then debate on the detail. The chilling statement at the end was: “white supremacy is silence”. This kind of thing is straight out of the history books. You must say the right things and have said them at the right time or you are against us. This human behavior is such a copy-paste from other authoritarian regimes in the past such as Mao’s China and the USSR gestapo.
- DanBC 6y ago
  > What I would have done is get them to define what each means by white supremacy in detail...then debate on the detail. As a friendly piece of advice, this approach is going to get you fired from a few companies. If you're in a management position it could well get your company sued. When someone comes to you and says they were victimised because of racism or sexism it's a good idea to ask them what happened, and what they'd like to do to put it right. You can then decide whether those are reasonable, and whether or not you are going to do anything. But it's a terrible idea, once you've asked them what happened, to then say "but why is this racism?" and then to argue with them about whether it is or not.
  - chubbyish 6y ago
    I was referring to the part in the article where Singer and the black employee are discussing the existence of white supremacy at the company. But you make a good point though regarding HR complaints. Q: what would you say though if an employee presses you on whether you personally think it’s racism? Then if you don’t address it you are on the hook.
Havoc 6y ago
Well I guess they were right in a way. Political stuff did indeed not pan out well for the company
- falcor84 6y ago
  Yup that's the crux of the matter - saying that you don't want to talk politics is a political statement in favor of the status quo.
aphelion 6y ago
The most striking thing here has got to be that for some people being told they worked at a company riddled with white supremacy and racism would have been a relief. I know the stock response is that denying the existence of a problem is worse than admitting it, but if the gravamen of the issue is not whether or not the company is built on the most murderous ideology in history but whether or not the founders will affirm that it is publicly seems an excellent indicator the term 'white supremacy' has been hollowed out and is now just another target in woke language games.
- falcor84 6y ago
  > ... company riddled with white supremacy and racism You're taking it to the other extreme. As I understand it, the employee's issue is with Singer's statement “I strongly disagree we live in a white supremacist culture”. If Singer had just admitted that there is indeed some element of white supremacy, the discussion could have proceed about its extent and how to address it. But by denying it wholesale and trying to quash the discussion, he denied the experience of some of the other attendees, no longer making it comfortable for them to voice their concerns at a company forum.
micelwell000011 6y ago
https://www.aquinas.edu/sites/default/files/webform/macTools_download-now_for-free_2021.pdf https://www.aquinas.edu/sites/default/files/webform/macTools...

87 points by minimaxir 6y ago

“I strongly disagree we live in a white supremacist culture,” [Ryan] Singer said. “I don’t believe in a lot of the framing around implicit bias. I think a lot of this is actually racist.” He continued: “Very often, if you express a dissenting view, you get called a Nazi. … I have not felt this is open territory for discussion. If we were to try to get into it as a group discussion it would be very painful and divisive.” Ooof. I predict Singer's next public pronouncements will be about "the evils of cancel culture" and he'll end up on Fox News or OANN.

SamBam 6y ago
> If we were to try to get into it as a group discussion it would be very painful and divisive. This really sounded to me as "if I were allowed to tell you my true feelings about all this, a lot of you would be angry," or "oh, if it's open-season on white men, let me tell you I can dish it on the rest of you... lucky for you I'm not allowed to."
- chubbyish 6y ago
  “This sounded to me like” is the problem. Everyone hears what they want to hear for their narrative. Then it becomes a juicy internet drama rather than some mundane thing.
  - SamBam 6y ago
    "If we were to try to get into it as a group discussion it would be very painful and divisive." This sounds more like a threat than a promise. A promise he chose to carry out. Why should it be divisive, if you're actually going to listen? Is it because you'd end up saying things like "white supremacy is a myth" and denying the notion of institutional racism? It sounds a lot to me like the continual "predictions" (threats) from some Republicans that there's going to be a "race war" or other war with liberals, if the left keeps doing what they're doing. They make it sound like it's something inevitable that they're predicting, but in reality they're simply saying what they want to do.
    - anon7725 6y ago
      > Why should it be divisive, if you're actually going to listen? Why should it be divisive, indeed. “America is not a racist country” was just the position expressed by Sen. Tim Scott in a national prime time address, yet it’s enough to force an employee from a company?
      - SamBam 6y ago
        There is actually quite a bit of difference between the statements "America is a racist country" and "institutional racism exists" or even "there exists a belief of white supremacy." And even between "America isn't a racist country" and "the people who talk about implicit biases are the real racists," which is closer to what he actually said (allegedly). (And if we want to have this discussion, I bet we could do it in a way that wasn't "painful and divisive," because I have no desire to be those things, so I'm not going to predict/threaten it.)
    - factsaresacred 6y ago
      > This sounds more like a threat than a promise Rather it sounds like a person afraid to share his views for fear they would be misconstrued or met with emotional outbursts. Employees were claiming Basecamp has a white supremacist culture, an indictment against anybody working there. The idea that you can't reject such preposterous accusations without being "complicit", or without the denial somehow serving as further evidence, is insane.
      - falcor84 6y ago
        Let me ask this in a more general way: If a member of a weaker minority group tells a member of a powerful majority group that they feel they've experienced a supremacist culture, is that on its own a `preposterous accusation`? What would be a valid thought and fact-gathering process for that member of the majority group to decide whether to take the concern seriously or dismiss it?
        factsaresacred 6y ago
- extra88 6y ago
  People did get angry at what he did say so there's no need to concoct thoughts in his head. If the reporting is accurate, his words were twisted. He said "I strongly disagree we live in a white supremacist culture" (meaning American culture) which another employee changes to "white supremacy doesn’t exist." Based on what was reported, I don't know why Singer was suspended. I do understand why he resigned, given the reaction of many employees. He's not an avowed white supremacist. Singer is very wrong, he needs more education, but it seems like many of the employees can't handle the idea of working at a place where someone so wrong works. At a large workplace, there was another worker who I saw coming in to work had a large sign on his bag making clear he was a 9/11 Truther. I saw he also sat at lunchtime with his bag prominently displayed (not at the workplace, in public). It made me really angry but I'd never do anything to threaten his employment or avoid all contact.
  - SamBam 6y ago
    Because of what he chose to say. There was no need to go from "if we're going to talk about race" to "I will deliberately say things that will make everybody mad." That was exactly my point.
throwawayboise 6y ago
So if someone disagrees that we live in a white supremacist culture, they should just sit mute and not challenge that claim?
- IAmEveryone 6y ago
  Yes. If you believe the earth is flat, it’s best to avoid the subject.
  - spacemanmatt 6y ago
    Alternatively, they could use one of their beloved bleach cures for whatever ails them.
- toiletfuneral 6y ago
  well you're using a throwaway, so please, lets hear your challenge
- cratermoon 6y ago
  Is a yes/no question about speaking or not really the best possible question to ask here? When we are lacking metacognition on the subject, we can be at the point where we don't even know how to ask the right questions. This is because we can't assess how our beliefs and expectations constrain the range of questions we even know to ask. If you've ever chuckled over the hoary old tale of someone asking tech support, "where is the 'any' key?", you know how lack of understanding can lead to wildly incorrect mental models of a subject. There are decades - nay, centuries - of writing about race relations, racial bias, and systemic discrimination. Before we ask a question, perhaps we'd be well-served to have at least a survey course level of familiarity with the issues, so that we might ask good questions.
- tdfx 6y ago
  That's the problem with extreme leftist arguments in general. If you don't have the same opinion, or even hold an opinion that falls short of the furthest left possible on the spectrum, you are either bulldozed into submission or, if you refuse to submit, "canceled" as racist or xenophobe. It's incredibly toxic behavior. Nothing is considered an acceptable response except full submission to one side of the argument. Any alternate response is racist, abandoning the argument is white fragility, and silence is complicity in genocide.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

conroy 6y ago

"Fried ... began the meeting by apologizing for announcing the policy changes by a public blog post rather than first telling all employees" The fact that no one internally was given a heads up about the post shows you how much respect the leadership team has for their employees.

tantalor 6y ago
Top-down decrees aren't normally proceeded by "heads up", that would be counter-productive
- ryanbrunner 6y ago
  They're often presented as part of an all hands meeting where you can take questions and address concerns though, not blasted to the public at the same time that internal employees have heard them. I've been involved in relaying 'big news' more than a few times, and the most common way to address it is to inform people directly affected first (if applicable), then the company at large, then the public. You never do any of those steps simultaneously or out of order.

JeremyBanks 6y ago

Were they entirely unprepared for this meeting? "I condemn white supremacy" should not have been difficult words to say. It does not require careful phrasing. Particularly right now, so shortly after famously Trump refused to say it in the debate, and then weeks later we had the attack on the capitol.

sfreiberg 6y ago
Wallace asked President Trump whether he was willing to denounce “white supremacists and militia groups,” and Trump answered, "Sure, I'm willing to do that," Not sure how any sane person can claim that isn't denouncing white supremacy but hey don't let facts get in the way of your narrative.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- chubbyish 6y ago
  But why didn’t Trump come out to condemn genocide? And I haven’t heard Biden condemn pedaphilia either... /s
- JeremyBanks 6y ago
  "Sure, I'm willing to do it." "So do it!" "Proud boys, stand by."
  - sfreiberg 6y ago
    Trump did this at least 20 times. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tug8PoAa7Bg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tug8PoAa7Bg
  - sfreiberg 6y ago
    The Proud Boys were led by a Latino so not sure how they could be a white supremacist group. Also Trump told them to stand down not just stand by. And a more charitable reading could say the stand by was just a slip in a heated debate but either way he clearly told them to stand down.

IAmEveryone 6y ago

Such a great example showing how useless the idea of “banning politics at work” is. If the employee groups’ request to delete the list of “funny” names was political, then creating and updating that list in the first place must also have been political. I guess it’s “politics” only when the founders disagree with it.

chubbyish 6y ago
DHH agreed to delete it immediately. The politics was when one Asian employee wouldn’t let the issue die and posted the path to genocide pyramid about how laughing at funny names was just a step on the way to genocide. Talk about jumping to conclusions.
- stefanmichael 6y ago
  It was bad faith of DHH to say that posting the pyramid was meant to compare the list of names to genocide. The good faith interpretation would make it extremely clear that the employee was comparing the list of names to the lowest rung in the pyramid AKA the farthest removed from genocide. That rung is simply called "biased attitudes" and includes a wide span of things, none of them remotely comparable to genocide and several of them could be used to accurately represent the list. Eg. "Fear of differences", "Stereotypes", "Justifying biases by seeking out like minded people" I don't really understand how or why DHH would construe that as "you're comparing a list of company names to genocide"
  - chubbyish 6y ago
    > The Pyramid shows biased behaviors, growing in complexity from the bottom to the top. Although the behaviors at each level negatively impact individuals and groups, as one moves up the pyramid, the behaviors have more life-threatening consequences. Like a pyramid, the upper levels are supported by the lower levels. If people or institutions treat behaviors on the lower levels as being acceptable or “normal,” it results in the behaviors at the next level becoming more accepted. In response to the questions of the world community about where the hate of genocide comes from, the Pyramid of Hate demonstrates that the hate of genocide is built upon the acceptance of behaviors described in the lower levels of the pyramid. The point being made was that this is really bad because it’s a step on the way to genocide. That’s what DHH said I believe. And it would be in the context of trying to get the employee fired who made it. Also the other co-founder is Jewish. So having someone bring up something like that is probably insulting.

seriousquestion 6y ago

"Two employees told me that they had found themselves crying and screaming at the screen." What...

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
chubbyish 6y ago
...tell us about a time you showed vulnerability at work
taytus 6y ago
It seems excessive if you never experienced extreme stress. It sounded like a comedy sketch, until it happened to me. I wasn't at work, I was at home, but the reaction was the same.

chubbyish 6y ago

The problem with this and ALL arguments comes down to definitions. “I don’t think there is white supremacy....of course there is white supremacy etc.” What I would have done is get them to define what each means by white supremacy in detail...then debate on the detail. The chilling statement at the end was: “white supremacy is silence”. This kind of thing is straight out of the history books. You must say the right things and have said them at the right time or you are against us. This human behavior is such a copy-paste from other authoritarian regimes in the past such as Mao’s China and the USSR gestapo.

DanBC 6y ago
> What I would have done is get them to define what each means by white supremacy in detail...then debate on the detail. As a friendly piece of advice, this approach is going to get you fired from a few companies. If you're in a management position it could well get your company sued. When someone comes to you and says they were victimised because of racism or sexism it's a good idea to ask them what happened, and what they'd like to do to put it right. You can then decide whether those are reasonable, and whether or not you are going to do anything. But it's a terrible idea, once you've asked them what happened, to then say "but why is this racism?" and then to argue with them about whether it is or not.
- chubbyish 6y ago
  I was referring to the part in the article where Singer and the black employee are discussing the existence of white supremacy at the company. But you make a good point though regarding HR complaints. Q: what would you say though if an employee presses you on whether you personally think it’s racism? Then if you don’t address it you are on the hook.

Havoc 6y ago

Well I guess they were right in a way. Political stuff did indeed not pan out well for the company

falcor84 6y ago
Yup that's the crux of the matter - saying that you don't want to talk politics is a political statement in favor of the status quo.

aphelion 6y ago

The most striking thing here has got to be that for some people being told they worked at a company riddled with white supremacy and racism would have been a relief. I know the stock response is that denying the existence of a problem is worse than admitting it, but if the gravamen of the issue is not whether or not the company is built on the most murderous ideology in history but whether or not the founders will affirm that it is publicly seems an excellent indicator the term 'white supremacy' has been hollowed out and is now just another target in woke language games.

falcor84 6y ago
> ... company riddled with white supremacy and racism You're taking it to the other extreme. As I understand it, the employee's issue is with Singer's statement “I strongly disagree we live in a white supremacist culture”. If Singer had just admitted that there is indeed some element of white supremacy, the discussion could have proceed about its extent and how to address it. But by denying it wholesale and trying to quash the discussion, he denied the experience of some of the other attendees, no longer making it comfortable for them to voice their concerns at a company forum.

micelwell000011 6y ago

https://www.aquinas.edu/sites/default/files/webform/macTools_download-now_for-free_2021.pdf https://www.aquinas.edu/sites/default/files/webform/macTools...