4 ms·

What's the context?

mdeeks 5y ago
https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22433437/apple-hire-antonio-garcia-martinez-out-petition-investigation https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22433437/apple-hire-anton...
- infogulch 5y ago
  This one has excerpts from the book: https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22432909/apple-petition-hiring-antonio-garcia-martinez-chaos-monkeys-facebook https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22432909/apple-petition-h...
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
gamblor956 5y ago
He's made a number of inappropriate (including some incredibly misogynistic) comments in his writings and online. A lot of Apple employees complained, and so he was fired before he even started. Both sides are at fault here: AGM said some nasty things, and Apple failed to do its due diligence before recruiting him.
- gruez 5y ago
  >and Apple failed to do its due diligence before recruiting him. Seems to be contradicted by the tweet? >3. Apple was well aware of my writing before hiring me. My references were questioned extensively about my bestselling book and my real professional persona (rather than literary one).
  - compscistd 5y ago
    By "references" does he mean "cherry-picked people from my life who will say only good things about me"? No one I provide as a reference to a job at Apple is going to say something mean about me or a book they may or may not have even read. The only "due diligence" that seems to be demanded here is reading candidates' books (imagine a recruiter actually going through the effort of picking up a book and combing through all of it for just a single candidate) or looking through public social media posts (but the problematic ones may have likely only been shared in a private network). I do think AGM's comments should disqualify him as a candidate to work in a diverse work environment. But I don't want hiring to be more exhausting than it already is on either side, so aren't situations like this the reason we have work at-will arrangements anyway? What could Apple really have done here to prevent this? "Sign here attesting that you haven't ever said anything that could point to you being a prejudiced person in the work environment". If it turns out you did say something pretty bad, then too bad you had to relocate for this job because the offer is withdrawn. I'm sympathetic, I _know_ I've posted really stupid "edgy" things on social media some time between the ages of 12-15 that's likely buried in a set of redundant servers somewhere in the world. Stuff that would get me fired immediately if I said and believed them today. How do you convincingly demonstrate to an employer _and_ to your coworkers that the person from then isn't you anymore?
    - st-august 5y ago
      There's a difference between edgy social media comments from early adolescence -- which shouldn't be used to "cancel" anyone -- and passages from a book that this guy wrote and published when he was an adult (especially since he still hasn't retracted or apologized for anything that I'm aware of). You make a good point about hiring, though. They could probably read reviews of his book, but I don't know whether the reviews would mention its sexist elements -- probably depends on when it was written.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  > Both sides are at fault here: AGM said some nasty things, and Apple failed to do its due diligence before recruiting him. Since he wrote that ages before being hired, the only one at fault here is Apple. This is just a knee jerk reaction because of the backlash they got.
baby 5y ago
There was a public outcry against Apple hiring him, as he wrote misogynistic things as part of some book. I only read the excerpt, which wasn’t great towards women. No idea if it was serious or what the whole book was about.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
echo419 5y ago
From: https://www.axios.com/apple-severs-ties-with-antonio-garcia-martinez-c099fc67-de5d-4a2d-8b46-d29448dcab84.html https://www.axios.com/apple-severs-ties-with-antonio-garcia-... *Snip* Context: News broke earlier this week that Apple had hired García Martínez for an unspecified role. Apple did not say what exactly García Martínez' position was, but sources said he was hired for a lower-level engineering role and started last week. In the petition, first reported by the Verge, employees write: "We demand an investigation into how his published views on women and people of color were missed or ignored, along with a clear plan of action to prevent this from happening again." In one passage from "Chaos Monkeys," García Martínez describes women in the Bay Area as "soft and weak, cosseted and naive despite their claims of worldliness, and generally full of shit.” This passage was also cited online when García Martínez started writing for Wired magazine. *Snip*
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- barbazoo 5y ago
  > García Martínez describes women in the Bay Area as "soft and weak, cosseted and naive despite their claims of worldliness, and generally full of shit.” Why on earth would anyone put something like that in a book?!
  - spoonjim 5y ago
    Cause it makes the book sell.
  - manicdee 5y ago
    Because there is an audience who will buy that book.
  - azinman2 5y ago
    Because he was comparing the woman he was dating to his general experience. You can look at the larger passage as important context. It’s easy to dismiss him still as a jerk, but what bothers me is the idea that one cannot have an authentic experience that isn’t totally whitewashed and ready to be used for an ad for a multinational. Reading all of the selected quotes in that petition came off to me as thoughts he probably shouldn’t have published, but ones that many ordinary people have that aren’t total monsters. Yes he’s probably got a lot of toxic masculinity hold ups.. but so do millions and millions of people. If you read the minds of most employees at large companies and then put it into words, probably people would be fired left and right. At some point we need to acknowledge personal thoughts aren’t always the same thing as professional interactions, and that people can also grow, learn and change. He might not be the one for this, but I think the public response feels very snap for someone’s life. Probably almost no one signing that petition actually read his book or learned much about him in order to put things into context and perspective, yet they were easily wanting to ruin a man’s life. NB Perhaps he deserves it, I don’t know. But I’m wanting to withhold judgement, and I don’t have enough time or cares to actually investigate him.
NovemberWhiskey 5y ago
Latest storm in a teacup over a minor celebrity engineer getting let go from Apple after other employees discover his book has some misogynistic / ill-advised / heartfelt / probably-true (pick according to your convictions) opinions about SV women.
- slenk 5y ago
  SV sure sounds like a hell hole to work in
bsder 5y ago
People willing to work on ad-tech are skeevy creeps. Apple hired skeevy creep to work on ad-tech. People got upset that Apple hired skeevy creep. Apple fired/rescinded offer to skeevy creep. Apple is likely about to pay a bunch of money to skeevy creep.
- philosopher1234 5y ago
  why would they pay a bunch of money?
  - SpicyLemonZest 5y ago
    There's a legal theory known as "promissory estoppel" or "detrimental reliance" that probably applies if Martinez's story is accurate. Apple promised him a job, he made some major life changes based on that promise, and now they've withdrawn their promise without any relevant new information or new bad conduct on Martinez's part.
    - manicdee 5y ago
      Apple can claim the information was new to them, such as for example believing the book was a work of satire only to find (based on post-hire discussion with AGM) it was actually a manifesto.
      - SpicyLemonZest 5y ago
        They can. I'm skeptical whether that'd be true - although I guess it's really academic, because high-profile employment disputes like this are almost always settled out of court.
  - bsder 5y ago
    Employment is a contract. Apple broke that contract without reason from the individual. If he resigned from another job and relocated, there are damages here that are quite easy to document. Yes, employees are nominally "at-will", but employers don't get to just do anything they want without consequence--especially in California. I'm surprised Apple did actually say anything beyond "We have terminated his employment. No further comment." as they're on terrible ground here. Finally, unlike most small fry, he's not going to have any trouble finding a lawyer for this. Lawyers will happily take this obvious a case on retainer. And, he's got lots of "wokeness crusade" lawyers who will be salivating over this case.
Cyberdog 5y ago
A take biased in favor of Garcia-Martinez which argues he's not the monster he's being made out to be: https://taibbi.substack.com/p/on-the-hypocrites-at-apple-who-canceled https://taibbi.substack.com/p/on-the-hypocrites-at-apple-who...
- mcguire 5y ago
  If that's biased in his favor....
- alvah 5y ago
  That read like a reasonable summary to me. What makes you say it’s biased towards AGM?
  - bingbingbong 5y ago
    The authour tends to write about this topic a lot. I found it more or less reasonable, but they no doubt have a bias.
  - Cyberdog 5y ago
    > What makes you say it’s biased towards AGM? Well, partly because the author begins with: > I’m biased, because I know Antonio Garcia-Martinez and something like the same thing once happened to me…
    - alvah 5y ago
      He acknowledges this, but the article is hardly a hagiography.

What's the context?

https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22433437/apple-hire-antonio-garcia-martinez-out-petition-investigation https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22433437/apple-hire-anton...

infogulch 5y ago
This one has excerpts from the book: https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22432909/apple-petition-hiring-antonio-garcia-martinez-chaos-monkeys-facebook https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/12/22432909/apple-petition-h...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

gamblor956 5y ago

He's made a number of inappropriate (including some incredibly misogynistic) comments in his writings and online. A lot of Apple employees complained, and so he was fired before he even started. Both sides are at fault here: AGM said some nasty things, and Apple failed to do its due diligence before recruiting him.

gruez 5y ago
>and Apple failed to do its due diligence before recruiting him. Seems to be contradicted by the tweet? >3. Apple was well aware of my writing before hiring me. My references were questioned extensively about my bestselling book and my real professional persona (rather than literary one).
- compscistd 5y ago
  By "references" does he mean "cherry-picked people from my life who will say only good things about me"? No one I provide as a reference to a job at Apple is going to say something mean about me or a book they may or may not have even read. The only "due diligence" that seems to be demanded here is reading candidates' books (imagine a recruiter actually going through the effort of picking up a book and combing through all of it for just a single candidate) or looking through public social media posts (but the problematic ones may have likely only been shared in a private network). I do think AGM's comments should disqualify him as a candidate to work in a diverse work environment. But I don't want hiring to be more exhausting than it already is on either side, so aren't situations like this the reason we have work at-will arrangements anyway? What could Apple really have done here to prevent this? "Sign here attesting that you haven't ever said anything that could point to you being a prejudiced person in the work environment". If it turns out you did say something pretty bad, then too bad you had to relocate for this job because the offer is withdrawn. I'm sympathetic, I _know_ I've posted really stupid "edgy" things on social media some time between the ages of 12-15 that's likely buried in a set of redundant servers somewhere in the world. Stuff that would get me fired immediately if I said and believed them today. How do you convincingly demonstrate to an employer _and_ to your coworkers that the person from then isn't you anymore?
  - st-august 5y ago
    There's a difference between edgy social media comments from early adolescence -- which shouldn't be used to "cancel" anyone -- and passages from a book that this guy wrote and published when he was an adult (especially since he still hasn't retracted or apologized for anything that I'm aware of). You make a good point about hiring, though. They could probably read reviews of his book, but I don't know whether the reviews would mention its sexist elements -- probably depends on when it was written.
Aeolun 5y ago
> Both sides are at fault here: AGM said some nasty things, and Apple failed to do its due diligence before recruiting him. Since he wrote that ages before being hired, the only one at fault here is Apple. This is just a knee jerk reaction because of the backlash they got.

baby 5y ago

There was a public outcry against Apple hiring him, as he wrote misogynistic things as part of some book. I only read the excerpt, which wasn’t great towards women. No idea if it was serious or what the whole book was about.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

echo419 5y ago

From: https://www.axios.com/apple-severs-ties-with-antonio-garcia-martinez-c099fc67-de5d-4a2d-8b46-d29448dcab84.html https://www.axios.com/apple-severs-ties-with-antonio-garcia-... *Snip* Context: News broke earlier this week that Apple had hired García Martínez for an unspecified role. Apple did not say what exactly García Martínez' position was, but sources said he was hired for a lower-level engineering role and started last week. In the petition, first reported by the Verge, employees write: "We demand an investigation into how his published views on women and people of color were missed or ignored, along with a clear plan of action to prevent this from happening again." In one passage from "Chaos Monkeys," García Martínez describes women in the Bay Area as "soft and weak, cosseted and naive despite their claims of worldliness, and generally full of shit.” This passage was also cited online when García Martínez started writing for Wired magazine. *Snip*

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
barbazoo 5y ago
> García Martínez describes women in the Bay Area as "soft and weak, cosseted and naive despite their claims of worldliness, and generally full of shit.” Why on earth would anyone put something like that in a book?!
- spoonjim 5y ago
  Cause it makes the book sell.
- manicdee 5y ago
  Because there is an audience who will buy that book.
- azinman2 5y ago
  Because he was comparing the woman he was dating to his general experience. You can look at the larger passage as important context. It’s easy to dismiss him still as a jerk, but what bothers me is the idea that one cannot have an authentic experience that isn’t totally whitewashed and ready to be used for an ad for a multinational. Reading all of the selected quotes in that petition came off to me as thoughts he probably shouldn’t have published, but ones that many ordinary people have that aren’t total monsters. Yes he’s probably got a lot of toxic masculinity hold ups.. but so do millions and millions of people. If you read the minds of most employees at large companies and then put it into words, probably people would be fired left and right. At some point we need to acknowledge personal thoughts aren’t always the same thing as professional interactions, and that people can also grow, learn and change. He might not be the one for this, but I think the public response feels very snap for someone’s life. Probably almost no one signing that petition actually read his book or learned much about him in order to put things into context and perspective, yet they were easily wanting to ruin a man’s life. NB Perhaps he deserves it, I don’t know. But I’m wanting to withhold judgement, and I don’t have enough time or cares to actually investigate him.

NovemberWhiskey 5y ago

Latest storm in a teacup over a minor celebrity engineer getting let go from Apple after other employees discover his book has some misogynistic / ill-advised / heartfelt / probably-true (pick according to your convictions) opinions about SV women.

slenk 5y ago
SV sure sounds like a hell hole to work in

bsder 5y ago

People willing to work on ad-tech are skeevy creeps. Apple hired skeevy creep to work on ad-tech. People got upset that Apple hired skeevy creep. Apple fired/rescinded offer to skeevy creep. Apple is likely about to pay a bunch of money to skeevy creep.

philosopher1234 5y ago
why would they pay a bunch of money?
- SpicyLemonZest 5y ago
  There's a legal theory known as "promissory estoppel" or "detrimental reliance" that probably applies if Martinez's story is accurate. Apple promised him a job, he made some major life changes based on that promise, and now they've withdrawn their promise without any relevant new information or new bad conduct on Martinez's part.
  - manicdee 5y ago
    Apple can claim the information was new to them, such as for example believing the book was a work of satire only to find (based on post-hire discussion with AGM) it was actually a manifesto.
    - SpicyLemonZest 5y ago
      They can. I'm skeptical whether that'd be true - although I guess it's really academic, because high-profile employment disputes like this are almost always settled out of court.
- bsder 5y ago
  Employment is a contract. Apple broke that contract without reason from the individual. If he resigned from another job and relocated, there are damages here that are quite easy to document. Yes, employees are nominally "at-will", but employers don't get to just do anything they want without consequence--especially in California. I'm surprised Apple did actually say anything beyond "We have terminated his employment. No further comment." as they're on terrible ground here. Finally, unlike most small fry, he's not going to have any trouble finding a lawyer for this. Lawyers will happily take this obvious a case on retainer. And, he's got lots of "wokeness crusade" lawyers who will be salivating over this case.

Cyberdog 5y ago

A take biased in favor of Garcia-Martinez which argues he's not the monster he's being made out to be: https://taibbi.substack.com/p/on-the-hypocrites-at-apple-who-canceled https://taibbi.substack.com/p/on-the-hypocrites-at-apple-who...

mcguire 5y ago
If that's biased in his favor....
alvah 5y ago
That read like a reasonable summary to me. What makes you say it’s biased towards AGM?
- bingbingbong 5y ago
  The authour tends to write about this topic a lot. I found it more or less reasonable, but they no doubt have a bias.
- Cyberdog 5y ago
  > What makes you say it’s biased towards AGM? Well, partly because the author begins with: > I’m biased, because I know Antonio Garcia-Martinez and something like the same thing once happened to me…
  - alvah 5y ago
    He acknowledges this, but the article is hardly a hagiography.