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> Resigning over a random employee refusing to say that "white supremacy exists" is absurd It's not a random employee though. It's someone who is part of the S

> Resigning over a random employee refusing to say that "white supremacy exists" is absurd It's not a random employee though. It's someone who is part of the Senior Leadership Team. If you deny that it exists then how can you be trusted to do something if an issue does comes up ?

prepend 6y ago
Refusing to say it isn’t denying it exists. Those are different things. If I’m trying to count to 100 and someone says “Prepend, please say that white supremacy exists.” And I respond “I’m busy counting to 100 and will not comply with your wishes.” That doesn’t mean I’m denying that white supremacy exists. It’s odd you would interpret it that way as it’s illogical.
- whymauri 6y ago
  But he wasn't counting to 100, he was at a company-wide all-hands specifically about political and social speech with tensions revolving race. You can't just erase the entire context of quote and meeting just to call someone's interpretation of that event 'illogical'.
- threeseed 6y ago
  You are just arguing semantics. If you do not acknowledge white supremacy exists and needs to be eliminated then you can't expect people to trust you on this issue. And trust is a critical part of being a leader.
  - prepend 6y ago
    I think we disagree on this. I have worked with and for many great leaders who never “acknowledged white supremacy” so it is definitely possible for me, and others to trust such people. I’m not arguing semantics as my point is that there are many things more important than acknowledging white supremacy exists. This may not be true for others as it seems it’s super important for some. But if I’m in the business of counting to 100 (or anything) I can be quite successful without including taking about eliminating white supremacy. Note, I think that systematic racial inequity is bad and must be eliminated. But I don’t think the most effective way to do that is by talking about it all the time. And I think that I can not have any portion of my workday talking about it. This doesn’t mean I am for white supremacy. I think, at it’s most basic, I don’t think silence is the same as endorsement. The world isn’t black and white (no pun intended) and everyone isn’t forced to choose sides. And it’s certainly not important to state one’s position over and over and over.
    - MattRix 6y ago
      There are certain issues (like this one) where silence has historically been used as a form of endorsement. It is certainly not irrational to perceive it as being an endorsement.
      - prepend 6y ago
        Perhaps not irrational, but incorrect. I’d like to see whatever evidence means silence is a form of endorsement. It’s hard to know, but I have one data point in my own self in that I really don’t talk much about anything and certainly don’t endorse white supremacy and I actively live my life fighting inequity. Someone saying that I endorse something because I don’t speak about it is incorrect as I know myself better than others do. Following this logic leads to absurdity. Should people spend their days speaking for or against everything? What about people’s right to privacy? I mean there’s so many example of how silence=support is illogical, I’m not sure how people can hold this opinion. This assumes that there’s a single set of priorities and white supremacy is near the top for everyone. It’s also fairly odd in that it assumes that the whole world is in America so that even people in remote countries must make statements against white supremacy lest they endorse it. That’s just silly. On any topic, only a few thousand or perhaps millions express a position. Does that mean everyone else is against or for? Does silence always equal endorsement? Does it mean opposition? You haven’t stopped this conversation to call out how you recognize murder is evil and are against it. Does that mean you endorse murder? Isn’t murder important enough to speak out against? I certainly think murder is terrible and am shocked that someone would endorse murder through their silence. Etc etc etc, there’s a million of these. Not everything has to be a conflict and not everyone owes me an answer. Sometimes I just don’t know and don’t get to know. I should only assume when necessary and using some evidence to support my assumption
        MattRix 6y ago
        I am not talking about silence at all times, but specifically silence at times when someone is given the opportunity to speak up about an issue and chooses not to.
moduspol 6y ago
The buck stops somewhere. I get that it's super easy to just claim white supremacy is everywhere, but implicitly the claim is that someone put it there and is perpetuating it. At a company of 58 people, you're pointing at a very small group of people as the ones responsible for all of this supposed white supremacy. Unless everyone swallows the Kool-Aid and apologizes for being so racist, someone in leadership will eventually have to say, "Actually, this isn't a white supremacist company." Otherwise you've essentially surrendered your company to the "woke" mob.
- throw394827 6y ago
  Our CEO had to do this last year. Due to rising costs, the company decided to outsource some production. The end product was just as good in quality and much cheaper, even after shipping and import taxes. A few employees were concerned about outsourcing to that specific country and started to discuss and petition the senior executives. The CEO clamped down hard and said it was a business decision and if anyone didn't like it, they could leave. No politics. In the end, those employees are still here, but the quality of their work has definitely suffered.
- mumblemumble 6y ago
  Alternatively, you exhibit the kind of people skills that should be a baseline qualification for a senior leader. You don't draw lines in the sand, you don't internally frame this as an them-vs-me thing, you certainly don't try to give your staff condescending mini-lectures about basic topics in social criticism such as how framing works. Brinksmanship isn't going to lead anywhere good, and someone has to take the first step toward de-escalation. While anyone can theoretically be that person, if you're the ostensible adult in the room, then it's your actual job to put aside your sense of honor and be that someone. So you take a deep breath, and get to work: try to be a mediator, understand where these frustrations came from, and figure out what you can do to alleviate them. Alternatively, if you can't feasibly mediate, because it's basically all your employees airing grievances at you, then you screwed your job up long ago, and it's time to cop to that. The longer you put off eating crow, the more crow you're eventually going to have to eat.
  - 6y ago
6AA4FD 6y ago
That's also not what Singer said. Singer said that he doesn't believe we live in a white supremacist culture. In a statement lower in the article he explicitly says it does exist, and I don't see that as necessarily contradictory with anything else he had said during the meeting in question.
arp242 6y ago
Essentially, the core disagreement is about what is or isn't white supremacy. There isn't one way to define this, but if you start asking for things like "disavow white supremacy!" in a conversation like this then you're essentially just chucking good faith out the window. The context here matters a lot. I wouldn't have "denounced" white supremacy either. If these are the base conditions under which you're prepared to talk to me then quite frankly, fuck you. There is nothing to gain for me, and you're clearly not prepared to take anything I say in good faith. Okay, I might have in a leadership role to keep the peace as a matter of professionalism, but I'd also have started looking for a new job as this is not a healthy atmosphere. I don't want to work with people who think I'm secretly a white supremacist. The problem is that I've seen many things being labelled as "white supremacy" that seem ... a bit of a stretch. For example people have argued that Alien (the film) is an example of white supremacy as the alien represents a stereotypical black women; "Black women have been portrayed in contemporary white social and political culture as super-fertile and indestructible breeders whose sexual reproduction must be controlled."[1] When I first read that, it took me quite a while to realize this was even referring to the alien itself, rather than some character that got infected. It seems it purely based on the fact that the alien is black. There are many, many examples of this, especially in the last year people have been going way to far in re-analysing everything through the lens of race, often with some very harsh words like "white supremacy". Sometimes this is a good thing, but often I find it's not. Either these are general problems that affect everyone (just black folks more, but that doesn't mean the core problem is racism), or it's outright nonsense like the above. Now, I don't know what argument that person made exactly in support of "White supremacy existing at Basecamp", but if you make such a strong claim – which is essentially calling your leadership/coworkers white supremacists – then you better have some good arguments. I'm skeptical they existed; they're certainly not present in this article beyond wishy-washy "creating a space where people do not feel welcome". And considering that this discussion left people "crying and screaming at the screen" it seems rather easy to make some people feel "not welcome". The entire thing stinks; perhaps the leadership could have handled things a bit better here and there, but if you're not willing to take a somewhat nuanced disagreement in good faith then there's nothing you can do except nod and smile on every sort of nonsense they bring up, and anything else will upset people. [1]: https://theconversation.com/how-hollywoods-alien-and-predator-movies-reinforce-anti-black-racism-127088 https://theconversation.com/how-hollywoods-alien-and-predato...
JPKab 6y ago
White supremacy is so baked into American culture that over 90% of immigrants to the US are non-white. The US is the least racist nation in the world according to Pew surveys. What we have an abundance in the US is people who, if racism disappeared tomorrow, would be out of work and have to find a new career. These same people are the ones who act as if the election, to 2 terms, of a black president translates to the US making no progress on race since the 60's. I grew up in a mostly black county in Virginia. I know what demagoguery looks like, and witnessed it with the GOP for decades. The Democratic party has embraced it, in a big way, since Hillary's loss. It works to win elections, but at the cost of elevating racial reductionism in POC. And the more POC embrace racial reductionism, the more moderate whites will do the same, creating more white supremacists. I've already witnessed colleagues who are moderate getting frustrated in meeting where they are demonized, and next thing you know they are googling and listening/reading conservative authors who mirror their frustration and amplify it. Singer didn't deny that white supremacy "exists". He simply stated, in my opinion correctly, that it's not embedded in American institutions. Because it's not, as evidenced by the fact that we actively import (to an extent unsurpassed by the vast majority of nations in the world) non-white immigrants to the tune of over a million a year. My next door neighbor is an Indian immigrant family. My neighbor across the street is from Vietnam. Both are naturalized citizens, and this ethos is going to try to say that the institution that naturalized them is white supremacist. It's patently absurd and irrational, and appeals to gullible college students and losers who desperately want to externalize blame for their failures.

prepend 6y ago

Refusing to say it isn’t denying it exists. Those are different things. If I’m trying to count to 100 and someone says “Prepend, please say that white supremacy exists.” And I respond “I’m busy counting to 100 and will not comply with your wishes.” That doesn’t mean I’m denying that white supremacy exists. It’s odd you would interpret it that way as it’s illogical.

whymauri 6y ago
But he wasn't counting to 100, he was at a company-wide all-hands specifically about political and social speech with tensions revolving race. You can't just erase the entire context of quote and meeting just to call someone's interpretation of that event 'illogical'.
threeseed 6y ago
You are just arguing semantics. If you do not acknowledge white supremacy exists and needs to be eliminated then you can't expect people to trust you on this issue. And trust is a critical part of being a leader.
- prepend 6y ago
  I think we disagree on this. I have worked with and for many great leaders who never “acknowledged white supremacy” so it is definitely possible for me, and others to trust such people. I’m not arguing semantics as my point is that there are many things more important than acknowledging white supremacy exists. This may not be true for others as it seems it’s super important for some. But if I’m in the business of counting to 100 (or anything) I can be quite successful without including taking about eliminating white supremacy. Note, I think that systematic racial inequity is bad and must be eliminated. But I don’t think the most effective way to do that is by talking about it all the time. And I think that I can not have any portion of my workday talking about it. This doesn’t mean I am for white supremacy. I think, at it’s most basic, I don’t think silence is the same as endorsement. The world isn’t black and white (no pun intended) and everyone isn’t forced to choose sides. And it’s certainly not important to state one’s position over and over and over.
  - MattRix 6y ago
    There are certain issues (like this one) where silence has historically been used as a form of endorsement. It is certainly not irrational to perceive it as being an endorsement.
    - prepend 6y ago
      Perhaps not irrational, but incorrect. I’d like to see whatever evidence means silence is a form of endorsement. It’s hard to know, but I have one data point in my own self in that I really don’t talk much about anything and certainly don’t endorse white supremacy and I actively live my life fighting inequity. Someone saying that I endorse something because I don’t speak about it is incorrect as I know myself better than others do. Following this logic leads to absurdity. Should people spend their days speaking for or against everything? What about people’s right to privacy? I mean there’s so many example of how silence=support is illogical, I’m not sure how people can hold this opinion. This assumes that there’s a single set of priorities and white supremacy is near the top for everyone. It’s also fairly odd in that it assumes that the whole world is in America so that even people in remote countries must make statements against white supremacy lest they endorse it. That’s just silly. On any topic, only a few thousand or perhaps millions express a position. Does that mean everyone else is against or for? Does silence always equal endorsement? Does it mean opposition? You haven’t stopped this conversation to call out how you recognize murder is evil and are against it. Does that mean you endorse murder? Isn’t murder important enough to speak out against? I certainly think murder is terrible and am shocked that someone would endorse murder through their silence. Etc etc etc, there’s a million of these. Not everything has to be a conflict and not everyone owes me an answer. Sometimes I just don’t know and don’t get to know. I should only assume when necessary and using some evidence to support my assumption
      - MattRix 6y ago
        I am not talking about silence at all times, but specifically silence at times when someone is given the opportunity to speak up about an issue and chooses not to.

moduspol 6y ago

The buck stops somewhere. I get that it's super easy to just claim white supremacy is everywhere, but implicitly the claim is that someone put it there and is perpetuating it. At a company of 58 people, you're pointing at a very small group of people as the ones responsible for all of this supposed white supremacy. Unless everyone swallows the Kool-Aid and apologizes for being so racist, someone in leadership will eventually have to say, "Actually, this isn't a white supremacist company." Otherwise you've essentially surrendered your company to the "woke" mob.

throw394827 6y ago
Our CEO had to do this last year. Due to rising costs, the company decided to outsource some production. The end product was just as good in quality and much cheaper, even after shipping and import taxes. A few employees were concerned about outsourcing to that specific country and started to discuss and petition the senior executives. The CEO clamped down hard and said it was a business decision and if anyone didn't like it, they could leave. No politics. In the end, those employees are still here, but the quality of their work has definitely suffered.
mumblemumble 6y ago
Alternatively, you exhibit the kind of people skills that should be a baseline qualification for a senior leader. You don't draw lines in the sand, you don't internally frame this as an them-vs-me thing, you certainly don't try to give your staff condescending mini-lectures about basic topics in social criticism such as how framing works. Brinksmanship isn't going to lead anywhere good, and someone has to take the first step toward de-escalation. While anyone can theoretically be that person, if you're the ostensible adult in the room, then it's your actual job to put aside your sense of honor and be that someone. So you take a deep breath, and get to work: try to be a mediator, understand where these frustrations came from, and figure out what you can do to alleviate them. Alternatively, if you can't feasibly mediate, because it's basically all your employees airing grievances at you, then you screwed your job up long ago, and it's time to cop to that. The longer you put off eating crow, the more crow you're eventually going to have to eat.
- 6y ago

6AA4FD 6y ago

That's also not what Singer said. Singer said that he doesn't believe we live in a white supremacist culture. In a statement lower in the article he explicitly says it does exist, and I don't see that as necessarily contradictory with anything else he had said during the meeting in question.

arp242 6y ago

Essentially, the core disagreement is about what is or isn't white supremacy. There isn't one way to define this, but if you start asking for things like "disavow white supremacy!" in a conversation like this then you're essentially just chucking good faith out the window. The context here matters a lot. I wouldn't have "denounced" white supremacy either. If these are the base conditions under which you're prepared to talk to me then quite frankly, fuck you. There is nothing to gain for me, and you're clearly not prepared to take anything I say in good faith. Okay, I might have in a leadership role to keep the peace as a matter of professionalism, but I'd also have started looking for a new job as this is not a healthy atmosphere. I don't want to work with people who think I'm secretly a white supremacist. The problem is that I've seen many things being labelled as "white supremacy" that seem ... a bit of a stretch. For example people have argued that Alien (the film) is an example of white supremacy as the alien represents a stereotypical black women; "Black women have been portrayed in contemporary white social and political culture as super-fertile and indestructible breeders whose sexual reproduction must be controlled."[1] When I first read that, it took me quite a while to realize this was even referring to the alien itself, rather than some character that got infected. It seems it purely based on the fact that the alien is black. There are many, many examples of this, especially in the last year people have been going way to far in re-analysing everything through the lens of race, often with some very harsh words like "white supremacy". Sometimes this is a good thing, but often I find it's not. Either these are general problems that affect everyone (just black folks more, but that doesn't mean the core problem is racism), or it's outright nonsense like the above. Now, I don't know what argument that person made exactly in support of "White supremacy existing at Basecamp", but if you make such a strong claim – which is essentially calling your leadership/coworkers white supremacists – then you better have some good arguments. I'm skeptical they existed; they're certainly not present in this article beyond wishy-washy "creating a space where people do not feel welcome". And considering that this discussion left people "crying and screaming at the screen" it seems rather easy to make some people feel "not welcome". The entire thing stinks; perhaps the leadership could have handled things a bit better here and there, but if you're not willing to take a somewhat nuanced disagreement in good faith then there's nothing you can do except nod and smile on every sort of nonsense they bring up, and anything else will upset people. [1]: https://theconversation.com/how-hollywoods-alien-and-predator-movies-reinforce-anti-black-racism-127088 https://theconversation.com/how-hollywoods-alien-and-predato...

JPKab 6y ago

White supremacy is so baked into American culture that over 90% of immigrants to the US are non-white. The US is the least racist nation in the world according to Pew surveys. What we have an abundance in the US is people who, if racism disappeared tomorrow, would be out of work and have to find a new career. These same people are the ones who act as if the election, to 2 terms, of a black president translates to the US making no progress on race since the 60's. I grew up in a mostly black county in Virginia. I know what demagoguery looks like, and witnessed it with the GOP for decades. The Democratic party has embraced it, in a big way, since Hillary's loss. It works to win elections, but at the cost of elevating racial reductionism in POC. And the more POC embrace racial reductionism, the more moderate whites will do the same, creating more white supremacists. I've already witnessed colleagues who are moderate getting frustrated in meeting where they are demonized, and next thing you know they are googling and listening/reading conservative authors who mirror their frustration and amplify it. Singer didn't deny that white supremacy "exists". He simply stated, in my opinion correctly, that it's not embedded in American institutions. Because it's not, as evidenced by the fact that we actively import (to an extent unsurpassed by the vast majority of nations in the world) non-white immigrants to the tune of over a million a year. My next door neighbor is an Indian immigrant family. My neighbor across the street is from Vietnam. Both are naturalized citizens, and this ethos is going to try to say that the institution that naturalized them is white supremacist. It's patently absurd and irrational, and appeals to gullible college students and losers who desperately want to externalize blame for their failures.