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In this article, the author doesn't provide any concrete example of the religious discrimination that he's allegedly experienced, or how it's impacted him in an

In this article, the author doesn't provide any concrete example of the religious discrimination that he's allegedly experienced, or how it's impacted him in any way. It seems that he's very eager to play the victim. A good example of his rush to victimhood is when he tells how he confronted leadership about why Google hasn't opened an engineering office in Louisiana. He seems to take the fact that Google doesn't have a office there as proof of their anti-Southern, anti-Christian bias. It's all very far-fetched.

concerned_4u 4y ago
TulliusCicero 4y ago
Yeah. I'm open to believing there's more religious discrimination at Google -- and I have no trouble believing that being very Christian could make you a bit of a social pariah within the company -- but the lack of concrete examples is concerning. In the US, it's very common for right-wing Christians to exaggerate claims of religious discrimination. For example, many consider not allowing public school teachers/coaches to lead prayer in schools to be religious discrimination.
- beebmam 4y ago
  I'm open to believing anything, with appropriate evidence. The author makes specific claims about being judged by their manager for their religious beliefs. I'm not sure that's going to be enough to win a discrimination suit, but I wish them the best of luck. Religious discrimination at a workplace is (and should be) against the law. I hope they find the appropriate lawyer who can navigate this for them! (For what it's worth, I'm an atheist, and I don't think anyone should be discriminated for their religious beliefs, no matter what they are. We're all atheists of some religions.)
  - verve_rat 4y ago
    That's... not how atheism works.
    - tialaramex 4y ago
      It's usually phrased as "I just believe in one fewer God than you". Christians don't on the whole believe in Thor and Zeus and so on, and neither do Atheists. But the Christians seem very hung up on approximately one God, especially those who have the most superficial beliefs. Thus it can be seen as a small difference. I say approximately because, well... Trinitarian Christianity. Most modern Christians claim to believe in "One God" who is somehow also "Three persons". If you don't regard the New Testament as the Holy word of God, but just some stories then this Holy Trinity sure looks like the explanation for the Kessel Run in Star Wars, or that thing where Klingons changed appearance radically in Star Trek, or a dozen other places in fiction where holes in the story were patched clumsily and fans pretend to look the other way.
    - em-bee 4y ago
      but that's how being open minded works. regardless of what each of us believes, there are beliefs that we would reject. how we treat people that share those beliefs is what matters.
UberFly 4y ago
Let me replace the word religious with racial: "In this article, the author doesn't provide any concrete example of the racial discrimination that he's allegedly experienced, or how it's impacted him in any way. It seems that he's very eager to play the victim." Sounds familiar now doesn't it? Claims like that have been dismissed for decades. Don't be so quick to get on the dismissal train.
- hackyhacky 4y ago
  On the contrary, victims of racial discrimination often have no problem giving concrete examples.
- KaiserPro 4y ago
  if you compare and contrast what Tanuja Gupta wrote, it starts off with a CV, then a detailed list of clear incidents from not just her, but others. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/06/02/google-caste-equality-labs-tanuja-gupta/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/06/02/google-... crucially they are incidents that occurred because of who they are rather than actions they willingly took.
- orwin 4y ago
  Exactly. That's why published articles about racial discrimination at the workplace do contain evidence. Hell, the last on i read contained transcripts of recorded discussions, transcripts of Whatsapp discussions, and still commenters were like 'its not a proof that the police is racist'.
kukx 4y ago
If you were to replace the religious belief with gender in his story would your assessment stay the same? You can use this method for example in this quote: "...VPs of research laughing in my face to HR representatives questioning my sanity based on my sincerely held religious beliefs...".
- hackyhacky 4y ago
  My criticism of the article is not based on a false assumption that religious discrimination is impossible, but rather that the author fails to offer a plausible, evidence-based case that such discrimination is actually happening to him. Failing to open an office in Louisiana is not evidence of religious discrimination. Obviously we can't know exactly how his conversation with the VP actually went, but I find the lack of detail to be conspicuous.
  - kukx 4y ago
    Are you not moving the bar higher, from just an example, to now evidence? I am for high standards, it is just dangerous that, in the current culture, they are not the same for all.
    - yunohn 4y ago
      Why can’t we demand evidence for such strong claims by the author? I don’t get your point.
- keithnz 4y ago
  its not a simple matter of substituting gender though, this is about beliefs and it depends, if he's saying the chat bots have a soul, then I can imagine he is getting some diverse reactions ( from other thread ). But since this one doesn't give us concrete examples, hard to judge, but it sounds like maybe he is overlaying his religious beliefs on the work and perhaps thinking he is discriminated against for doing that? Generally in a professional environment there is just no mention of religion, but somehow its become a topic, not sure how.... and the details matter here.
- 4y ago
lultimouomo 4y ago
I concur. I submitted this link because it made me wonder what constitutes religious discrimination. If there is a non-work-related chat with colleagues, and someone thinks your opinion is wrong, I think they should be allowed to politely tell you. I think the author is not OK with this, if it's about religion (at least if many many people inside the company think he's wrong). I get the reasons (both historical and present) that make religious disagreements a sensitive subject, and I can see how one would like to give some explicit protection to religious beliefs, but still I cannot ignore the fact we are talking about factual(ish) beliefs that one should be able to criticize. Whatever you think that it's not relevant to your job (and it's not illegal) should affect your career; I don't know if that happened in this case but the author doesn't provide any example. But if you share your opinions, your colleagues are allowed to say you're wrong.
dodgerdan 4y ago
He claims not opening an office in Louisiana is religious bias. Protecting your company and employees from legislators in southern/bible belt is just good business. They’ve a long history of passing and enforcement of unconstitutional religiously inspired laws that impact businesses.
- the_only_law 4y ago
  This guy can't be serious. They have offices in GA and NC and FL. All of those are "southern bible belt" states. Additionally, out of all the southern states, I'd probably have to put Louisiana as the least "holy".
QuadmasterXLII 4y ago
I agree. Some christians consider themselves oppressed if you say “I think everyone who believes in god is wrong,” and interpret the statement “I don’t believe in god” as “I think everyone who believes in god is wrong.” Therefore, they are oppressed until every atheist is completely silenced. Of course, forbidding Christians from talking about their beliefs is also verboten.
slightwinder 4y ago
My impression is, they are very careful to not break any law. They are also giving some examples on personal level, but people here don't accept them, because it plays in their prejudice of the justified behavior against the religious. I don't think it's up to us to decide how true or false the accusations are. People from Google reading this should reflect on their own behavior and environment, and whether they match this or not. Everyone else can only do the same for their own life and company. But the important thing here is, people here seems to not understand such problems, if they are not delivered in concrete wording and explanation. Empathy(?) here is too low to understand and evaluate a situation from just vague explanations. And that is a serious problem in itself, leading to such problems.
Tomte 4y ago
He goes even further. "My superiors said clearly discriminatory things, but I won't tell you what. I will tell you some other words which I believe they truly wanted to say — but didn't — and look how awful those invented utterances are. No, I really won't tell what they actually said."
- 0xy 4y ago
  - Tomte 4y ago
    Your reply has nothing to do with the point I made. I wrote nothing about the "believe" stuff, I wrote about his willful paraphrasing of what others said where he outright admits that it's his interpretation of what they meant but never really said. Please wage your generic outrage war somewhere else.
    - 0xy 4y ago
  - hoop_the_loop 4y ago
  - dang 4y ago
    Please don't take HN thread on ideological flamewar tangents. We've had to ask you this kind of thing several times before. We eventually ban accounts that keep doing this. I don't want to ban you, so please stop doing this. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

concerned_4u 4y ago

TulliusCicero 4y ago

Yeah. I'm open to believing there's more religious discrimination at Google -- and I have no trouble believing that being very Christian could make you a bit of a social pariah within the company -- but the lack of concrete examples is concerning. In the US, it's very common for right-wing Christians to exaggerate claims of religious discrimination. For example, many consider not allowing public school teachers/coaches to lead prayer in schools to be religious discrimination.

beebmam 4y ago
I'm open to believing anything, with appropriate evidence. The author makes specific claims about being judged by their manager for their religious beliefs. I'm not sure that's going to be enough to win a discrimination suit, but I wish them the best of luck. Religious discrimination at a workplace is (and should be) against the law. I hope they find the appropriate lawyer who can navigate this for them! (For what it's worth, I'm an atheist, and I don't think anyone should be discriminated for their religious beliefs, no matter what they are. We're all atheists of some religions.)
- verve_rat 4y ago
  That's... not how atheism works.
  - tialaramex 4y ago
    It's usually phrased as "I just believe in one fewer God than you". Christians don't on the whole believe in Thor and Zeus and so on, and neither do Atheists. But the Christians seem very hung up on approximately one God, especially those who have the most superficial beliefs. Thus it can be seen as a small difference. I say approximately because, well... Trinitarian Christianity. Most modern Christians claim to believe in "One God" who is somehow also "Three persons". If you don't regard the New Testament as the Holy word of God, but just some stories then this Holy Trinity sure looks like the explanation for the Kessel Run in Star Wars, or that thing where Klingons changed appearance radically in Star Trek, or a dozen other places in fiction where holes in the story were patched clumsily and fans pretend to look the other way.
  - em-bee 4y ago
    but that's how being open minded works. regardless of what each of us believes, there are beliefs that we would reject. how we treat people that share those beliefs is what matters.

UberFly 4y ago

Let me replace the word religious with racial: "In this article, the author doesn't provide any concrete example of the racial discrimination that he's allegedly experienced, or how it's impacted him in any way. It seems that he's very eager to play the victim." Sounds familiar now doesn't it? Claims like that have been dismissed for decades. Don't be so quick to get on the dismissal train.

hackyhacky 4y ago
On the contrary, victims of racial discrimination often have no problem giving concrete examples.
KaiserPro 4y ago
if you compare and contrast what Tanuja Gupta wrote, it starts off with a CV, then a detailed list of clear incidents from not just her, but others. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/06/02/google-caste-equality-labs-tanuja-gupta/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/06/02/google-... crucially they are incidents that occurred because of who they are rather than actions they willingly took.
orwin 4y ago
Exactly. That's why published articles about racial discrimination at the workplace do contain evidence. Hell, the last on i read contained transcripts of recorded discussions, transcripts of Whatsapp discussions, and still commenters were like 'its not a proof that the police is racist'.

kukx 4y ago

If you were to replace the religious belief with gender in his story would your assessment stay the same? You can use this method for example in this quote: "...VPs of research laughing in my face to HR representatives questioning my sanity based on my sincerely held religious beliefs...".

hackyhacky 4y ago
My criticism of the article is not based on a false assumption that religious discrimination is impossible, but rather that the author fails to offer a plausible, evidence-based case that such discrimination is actually happening to him. Failing to open an office in Louisiana is not evidence of religious discrimination. Obviously we can't know exactly how his conversation with the VP actually went, but I find the lack of detail to be conspicuous.
- kukx 4y ago
  Are you not moving the bar higher, from just an example, to now evidence? I am for high standards, it is just dangerous that, in the current culture, they are not the same for all.
  - yunohn 4y ago
    Why can’t we demand evidence for such strong claims by the author? I don’t get your point.
keithnz 4y ago
its not a simple matter of substituting gender though, this is about beliefs and it depends, if he's saying the chat bots have a soul, then I can imagine he is getting some diverse reactions ( from other thread ). But since this one doesn't give us concrete examples, hard to judge, but it sounds like maybe he is overlaying his religious beliefs on the work and perhaps thinking he is discriminated against for doing that? Generally in a professional environment there is just no mention of religion, but somehow its become a topic, not sure how.... and the details matter here.
4y ago

lultimouomo 4y ago

I concur. I submitted this link because it made me wonder what constitutes religious discrimination. If there is a non-work-related chat with colleagues, and someone thinks your opinion is wrong, I think they should be allowed to politely tell you. I think the author is not OK with this, if it's about religion (at least if many many people inside the company think he's wrong). I get the reasons (both historical and present) that make religious disagreements a sensitive subject, and I can see how one would like to give some explicit protection to religious beliefs, but still I cannot ignore the fact we are talking about factual(ish) beliefs that one should be able to criticize. Whatever you think that it's not relevant to your job (and it's not illegal) should affect your career; I don't know if that happened in this case but the author doesn't provide any example. But if you share your opinions, your colleagues are allowed to say you're wrong.

dodgerdan 4y ago

He claims not opening an office in Louisiana is religious bias. Protecting your company and employees from legislators in southern/bible belt is just good business. They’ve a long history of passing and enforcement of unconstitutional religiously inspired laws that impact businesses.

the_only_law 4y ago
This guy can't be serious. They have offices in GA and NC and FL. All of those are "southern bible belt" states. Additionally, out of all the southern states, I'd probably have to put Louisiana as the least "holy".

QuadmasterXLII 4y ago

I agree. Some christians consider themselves oppressed if you say “I think everyone who believes in god is wrong,” and interpret the statement “I don’t believe in god” as “I think everyone who believes in god is wrong.” Therefore, they are oppressed until every atheist is completely silenced. Of course, forbidding Christians from talking about their beliefs is also verboten.

slightwinder 4y ago

My impression is, they are very careful to not break any law. They are also giving some examples on personal level, but people here don't accept them, because it plays in their prejudice of the justified behavior against the religious. I don't think it's up to us to decide how true or false the accusations are. People from Google reading this should reflect on their own behavior and environment, and whether they match this or not. Everyone else can only do the same for their own life and company. But the important thing here is, people here seems to not understand such problems, if they are not delivered in concrete wording and explanation. Empathy(?) here is too low to understand and evaluate a situation from just vague explanations. And that is a serious problem in itself, leading to such problems.

Tomte 4y ago

He goes even further. "My superiors said clearly discriminatory things, but I won't tell you what. I will tell you some other words which I believe they truly wanted to say — but didn't — and look how awful those invented utterances are. No, I really won't tell what they actually said."

0xy 4y ago
- Tomte 4y ago
  Your reply has nothing to do with the point I made. I wrote nothing about the "believe" stuff, I wrote about his willful paraphrasing of what others said where he outright admits that it's his interpretation of what they meant but never really said. Please wage your generic outrage war somewhere else.
  - 0xy 4y ago
- hoop_the_loop 4y ago
- dang 4y ago
  Please don't take HN thread on ideological flamewar tangents. We've had to ask you this kind of thing several times before. We eventually ban accounts that keep doing this. I don't want to ban you, so please stop doing this. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html