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Some significant percentage of Google's employees are gay. Helping those employees achieve equal rights to everyone else improves those employee's lives not j

Some significant percentage of Google's employees are gay. Helping those employees achieve equal rights to everyone else improves those employee's lives not just in the feel good sense but it also makes a lot of practical things like health insurance benefit sharing much more straight-forward. By lobbying to improve the lives of its employees, Google is improving Google. So as another heterosexual gay marriage hipster I disagree with you. I also disagree with you that Google shareholders opposed to gay marriage shouldn't be forced to choose. They are just as wrong in their beliefs as those who supported segregation were or those who were against women's suffrage were. Marginalizing these people for their ridiculously antiquated beliefs is fair game, IMO.

smsm42 14y ago
Does Google regularly hold campaigns to help other kinds of employees to improve their lives? E.g., I imagine (random example), Google has a number of Jewish employees. Does Google engage in public campaign agains antisemitism, which is a real problem in some countries? Are there public Google campaigns for other equality issues, such as woman rights, religious minority rights, dissident rights, etc.? Frankly, this is the first such campaign I hear about, and if indeed it is the only one - I tend to view it as cynical marketing exploitation of the political hot topic of the day rather than genuine attempt to improve lives of Google employees. However, if I am wrong and Google is regularly engaging in public political campaigns for the human rights causes and this is just another example - all power to them. However, it would be interesting to see the list of such campaigns - anybody knows one?
- altano 14y ago
  > Does Google engage in public campaign agains antisemitism, which is a real problem in some countries? Hmmm, anti-semetism is one thing, but it isn't illegal to be Jewish in Singapore.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - einhverfr 14y ago
    Why the difference? Jews can't get legally married in Indonesia. Marriage in Indonesia is effectively limited to Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, Buddhists, and Hindus. If you are Jewish, or Orthodox Christian, or pagan, or atheist, tough luck.... Also it may be practically illegal to be Jewish in Saudi Arabia (I don't know about Sabbateans, which is a sort of weird crypto-Jewish Islamic hybrid that resulted after some forced conversions).
    - Tichy 14y ago
      Who says that they won't run a campaign for that? That line of reasoning seems really strange to me. How do you ever manage to do anything, if all the time you think "but why not do x instead"? You have to start with something. Were they to run a campaign against antisemitism, you would be the first to cry out "why don't they run a campaign for gay marriage instead".
      - einhverfr 14y ago
        Sure, why not. I am sure they could campaign for acceptance for eating cheeseburgers among the Jews too while they are at it. But that wasn't the point I was replying to. Also in Indonesia, allowing same-sex marriage by law but keeping all the other marriage laws would change... exactly nothing. All marriages in Indonesia are required to be officiated by clergy of approved religions, and the approved religions are, iirc, fixed in the Constitution.
    - altano 14y ago
      Google doesn't have an office in Saudi Arabia.
- cabalamat 14y ago
  > Does Google engage in public campaign agains antisemitism Well, regarding some of the search results for "Jew", they did put up this explanation: http://www.google.com/explanation.html http://www.google.com/explanation.html
  - smsm42 14y ago
    That's not a campaign though. It's just an explanation why some search results are displaying offensive things - which is completely alright, but not what I was talking about, not even close.
    - Semaphor 14y ago
      "Google has shown great responsiveness to this issue and a willingness to consider changes to better identify extremist Web sites, so that users can still have the benefit of Google's unique search technology while being alerted when they are about to enter into a hate zone." Still a big deal to mark results as offensive and hate speech.
      - einhverfr 14y ago
        Indeed. That moves them from merely allowing people to search for messages to forming the message and framing other peoples messages. This also makes me uncomfortable. When so much of the information that so many people get from the internet is through gatekeepers like Google and Facebook, I think any distortion to this is deeply dangerous and hard to separate from the sorts of distortions the Egyptian state-owned media engaged in when covering the Tahrir Square protests.....
  - ufo 14y ago
    Is it OK for me to be irked that they reserved the /explanation URL only for the Judaism thing, apparently precluding it from being used in similar warning in the future?
    - cheap 14y ago
- vibrunazo 14y ago
  What about the Google Summer of Code? [1] Google invests millions of dollars every year, both in direct money and in man-hours + infrastructure in random OSS projects. Many of the invested projects are even direct competitors to Google products, most are completely unrelated to Google. But they invest in them anyway and don't make a huge PR deal about it. What about their Solar energy investments? [2] Google Lunar X Prize? [3] Both are just examples off of the top of my head, of investments that are not directly obvious help to Google. They don't make huge PR fuss about them. (Which I suppose is why you didn't hear about them) But instead they are indirect longer term benefits to Google, in the same way that fighting for gay rights is. So this is certainly not a first time thing. They've been doing this kind of thing for years. Unfortunately you cannot help everything in the world at the same time. So you cannot rule out what they done before just because they're not helping solve specific problems. [1] http://code.google.com/soc/ http://code.google.com/soc/ [2] http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/12/google-invests-94-million-in-solar-power.html http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/12/google-in... [3] http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/ http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/
  - smsm42 14y ago
    Summer of Code is an awesome program, but absolutely not political. I was talking about political campaigns of course.
    - georgemcbay 14y ago
      Supporting FOSS is political. It is not a hot button issue to the extent of gay rights or abortion, but it is certainly political... it only seems like it isn't because it already passed the threshold of general acceptability in our culture (it wasn't this way in the 80s and early 90s! It was a real dividing issue for the software industry). By that same token, someday in the not too distant future support for gay rights will seem no more overtly "political" than supporting the rights of blacks or women to vote, it'll just seem like common sense. And if Google or any other company has to be "political" today to help achieve that goal, they have my full support.
- saraid216 14y ago
  > Does Google engage in public campaign agains antisemitism, which is a real problem in some countries? I'm unfamiliar with the issue; is it a real problem in countries where Google has an office and is employing Jews at? I'm not saying anti-Semitism shouldn't be campaigned against, but if we're arguing that Google's push is based on the interests of its employees, then that's something of a precondition.
- ChuckMcM 14y ago
  I've not worked there for a while, but while I was there they did support employees who were campaigning to help folks. Basically it would work by some employee wanting to help some group that they cared about and the company would generally help them do that. So to use your example a jewish employee who might be trying to do outreach in an antisemtic environment (or country) would get support in the form of time off or use of company resources to help their program or use of a conference room to hold meetings with an outreach group Etc. However, there were pretty clear boundaries. I did not see any White Supremacists activities or holocaust denial outreach sorts of things either being supported or tolerated. My feeling was they try to support the employee caveat the fine line between supporting an employee who has a cause and supporting the cause itself. Recall that there were Google employees participating in the Arab Spring uprisings, and while Google didn't come out and say "we support overthrowing corrupt regimes" they also didn't immediately fire any employee who was working to that end. Of course when the press reports anything its less nuanced than what actually goes on inside the Google Plex. Sometimes that is for the best, sometimes not.
vibrunazo 14y ago
In other words, Google is part of the world -> improve the world -> Google improves. The same argument is valid for any effort to improve the world. The argument that shareholders shouldn't care, would only have some weight if it was a insignificantly small improvement, not likely to positively the company visibly. So it comes down to how big gay marriage is. And I believe many people take it for granted. Gay marriage is not just a small detail, it's huge. It'd improve the livinghood of a huge percentage of people, Google included, enormously. It's not about just a fancy ceremony, or legal rights to inheritance. It's an important door to better tolerance. And tolerance is huge.
- redthrowaway 14y ago
  More than "improve the world", it's "improve the part of the world that matters to Google". They've done the same thing with advocating for a free and open Internet for over a decade--a better internet makes a better Google. Let's look at what this might mean for Google, in practical terms. Some 10-15% of people are LGBT. It stands to reason that the same holds true of engineers. Now, it's well-established that the well is running dry in SV; talent needs to be imported. So if I'm a gay engineer thinking of moving to SV, how does this change my thoughts about where I want to work? It stands to reason that a significant number of LGBT engineers would be motivated to work for Google by this announcement. Let's look at non-gay immigrants. Outside of places like China and India, most of the countries Google is looking to recruit from are way ahead of the US on gay rights. So much so that the mere fact that gay marriage is an "issue" in the US serves to perpetuate the bible-thumping moron stereotype of Americans. So even for non-LGBT engineers from Europe, Canada, Australia, etc, this would be viewed by the majority as a reason to work for Google. Now, how would this hurt them? The argument can be made that, among more conservative (read: Indian and Chinese) societies, where gay rights are not accepted as human rights, that some percentage of potential hires would be put off by such a move. Perhaps, but I think that there are a number of mitigating factors, here. First, gay rights aren't nearly as big a political issue in those countries as in the US. It's frowned upon, but you don't have presidential nominees from one of the two parties proving how much they deserve the candidacy by falling over themselves to say who thinks gays are worse. Secondly and generally speaking, "culture" is simply nowhere near as big an attraction for people from those countries as status and income. So while it may deter some people, it likely wouldn't be many. Now for advertisers: will anyone really drop Google for online advertising because of this? Somehow I doubt it. There may be some of the Walmarts and whatnot who drop them, but I find the prospect unlikely. To sum it up: advantages for Google include easier, more effective recruitment. Disadvantages include potential loss of customers. I think Google wins this solely on the bottom line, let alone the fact that it's just a good thing to do.
edanm 14y ago
If we're discussing whether it makes business sense, IMO you're only looking at the upside for Google. Some employees of theirs are against Gay Marriage. Some contractors are against Gay Marriage. Some future employees are against Gay Marriage. Some potential business partners are against Gay Marriage. Some politicians, which Google is trying to lobby, will now no longer be receptive to them because their constituents are anti-Gay Marriage. Is the overall effect positive or negative? I'm not sure. But try to separate the issue at hand from whether it is smart for Google to support it. Is it possible you're just rationalizing because you want them to support Gay Marriage? P.S. An easy test to see if it's the issue itself clouding our judgement - what if Google had come out, say, against Medicare in the U.S., on the basis that it would be better for them in the long-term, and economists as a whole agree that it is better for the economy? What if they had come out on the other side of some issue that you care about. Would you still argue it makes business sense to do so?
- Tichy 14y ago
  This really is a huge argument against the concept of shareholders. So basically any publicly traded company really is forced to be immoral? Apart from the fact that it is impossible to enforce (how do you decide, as a judge, what is better for the company in the long run - not pissing off the anti-gay people, or not pissing off the pro-gay people?), it makes such companies very unattractive as employers. Think about yourself, if you are a programmer: would you take on the task to develop a new web site for holocaust deniers? It's just business, after all... If you lose the freedom to pick your jobs, what is the point, really? I'd rather close down my company (but I think you can't do that as a publicly traded company, either).
  - edanm 14y ago
    Not really. Someone said "This makes business sense for Google". I said "Well, it might, but you forgot to take into account the downsides, e.g. X, Y, and Z". This has nothing to do with whether Google should or shouldn't do it.
    - Tichy 14y ago
beedogs 14y ago
> I also disagree with you that Google shareholders opposed to gay marriage shouldn't be forced to choose. They are just as wrong in their beliefs as those who supported segregation were or those who were against women's suffrage were. Marginalizing these people for their ridiculously antiquated beliefs is fair game, IMO. A thousand times this. Some opinions need to be taken out back and shot, and being against gay marriage is one of those opinions. Shitty beliefs like that aren't something that needs protection, and adults who hold those opinions should not be coddled or kowtowed to anymore. In programming terms, showing deference to these kinds of opinions is like being forced to support Windows 3.1.
- nhangen 14y ago
  I'm not sure I agree with this. In many ways, this fight mirrors that against racism, and in many of this similarities I find issues that could negatively affect progress. For example, saying that anti-gay people shouldn't be coddled is fine, but trying to pretend those beliefs are just going to go away is ignorant. What Google is missing here is the 'why' and instead it comes across as pushy. People are still, and will always be racist, just as they will be pro or anti gay. That doesn't make it right, but it's certainly something Google should be prepared to deal with. I get wary of public companies taking political stances in the same way i do with actors and musicians. That said, Google is probably in a fine position to do this, as the majority of the Internet world is dependent upon them.
rsheridan6 14y ago
>Some significant percentage of Google's employees are gay...vBy lobbying to improve the lives of its employees, Google is improving Google. Does that mean that if a company has a significant percentage of homophobes working for it, it should lobby against gay marriage? I work at a company that employed an obviously trans woman, and some of the cis women complained about sharing a bathroom with her. Since their lives would be improved by not having to share a bathroom with her, by your logic the company should lobby against TG rights.

smsm42 14y ago

Does Google regularly hold campaigns to help other kinds of employees to improve their lives? E.g., I imagine (random example), Google has a number of Jewish employees. Does Google engage in public campaign agains antisemitism, which is a real problem in some countries? Are there public Google campaigns for other equality issues, such as woman rights, religious minority rights, dissident rights, etc.? Frankly, this is the first such campaign I hear about, and if indeed it is the only one - I tend to view it as cynical marketing exploitation of the political hot topic of the day rather than genuine attempt to improve lives of Google employees. However, if I am wrong and Google is regularly engaging in public political campaigns for the human rights causes and this is just another example - all power to them. However, it would be interesting to see the list of such campaigns - anybody knows one?

altano 14y ago
> Does Google engage in public campaign agains antisemitism, which is a real problem in some countries? Hmmm, anti-semetism is one thing, but it isn't illegal to be Jewish in Singapore.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- einhverfr 14y ago
  Why the difference? Jews can't get legally married in Indonesia. Marriage in Indonesia is effectively limited to Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, Buddhists, and Hindus. If you are Jewish, or Orthodox Christian, or pagan, or atheist, tough luck.... Also it may be practically illegal to be Jewish in Saudi Arabia (I don't know about Sabbateans, which is a sort of weird crypto-Jewish Islamic hybrid that resulted after some forced conversions).
  - Tichy 14y ago
    Who says that they won't run a campaign for that? That line of reasoning seems really strange to me. How do you ever manage to do anything, if all the time you think "but why not do x instead"? You have to start with something. Were they to run a campaign against antisemitism, you would be the first to cry out "why don't they run a campaign for gay marriage instead".
    - einhverfr 14y ago
      Sure, why not. I am sure they could campaign for acceptance for eating cheeseburgers among the Jews too while they are at it. But that wasn't the point I was replying to. Also in Indonesia, allowing same-sex marriage by law but keeping all the other marriage laws would change... exactly nothing. All marriages in Indonesia are required to be officiated by clergy of approved religions, and the approved religions are, iirc, fixed in the Constitution.
  - altano 14y ago
    Google doesn't have an office in Saudi Arabia.
cabalamat 14y ago
> Does Google engage in public campaign agains antisemitism Well, regarding some of the search results for "Jew", they did put up this explanation: http://www.google.com/explanation.html http://www.google.com/explanation.html
- smsm42 14y ago
  That's not a campaign though. It's just an explanation why some search results are displaying offensive things - which is completely alright, but not what I was talking about, not even close.
  - Semaphor 14y ago
    "Google has shown great responsiveness to this issue and a willingness to consider changes to better identify extremist Web sites, so that users can still have the benefit of Google's unique search technology while being alerted when they are about to enter into a hate zone." Still a big deal to mark results as offensive and hate speech.
    - einhverfr 14y ago
      Indeed. That moves them from merely allowing people to search for messages to forming the message and framing other peoples messages. This also makes me uncomfortable. When so much of the information that so many people get from the internet is through gatekeepers like Google and Facebook, I think any distortion to this is deeply dangerous and hard to separate from the sorts of distortions the Egyptian state-owned media engaged in when covering the Tahrir Square protests.....
- ufo 14y ago
  Is it OK for me to be irked that they reserved the /explanation URL only for the Judaism thing, apparently precluding it from being used in similar warning in the future?
  - cheap 14y ago
vibrunazo 14y ago
What about the Google Summer of Code? [1] Google invests millions of dollars every year, both in direct money and in man-hours + infrastructure in random OSS projects. Many of the invested projects are even direct competitors to Google products, most are completely unrelated to Google. But they invest in them anyway and don't make a huge PR deal about it. What about their Solar energy investments? [2] Google Lunar X Prize? [3] Both are just examples off of the top of my head, of investments that are not directly obvious help to Google. They don't make huge PR fuss about them. (Which I suppose is why you didn't hear about them) But instead they are indirect longer term benefits to Google, in the same way that fighting for gay rights is. So this is certainly not a first time thing. They've been doing this kind of thing for years. Unfortunately you cannot help everything in the world at the same time. So you cannot rule out what they done before just because they're not helping solve specific problems. [1] http://code.google.com/soc/ http://code.google.com/soc/ [2] http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/12/google-invests-94-million-in-solar-power.html http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/12/google-in... [3] http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/ http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/
- smsm42 14y ago
  Summer of Code is an awesome program, but absolutely not political. I was talking about political campaigns of course.
  - georgemcbay 14y ago
    Supporting FOSS is political. It is not a hot button issue to the extent of gay rights or abortion, but it is certainly political... it only seems like it isn't because it already passed the threshold of general acceptability in our culture (it wasn't this way in the 80s and early 90s! It was a real dividing issue for the software industry). By that same token, someday in the not too distant future support for gay rights will seem no more overtly "political" than supporting the rights of blacks or women to vote, it'll just seem like common sense. And if Google or any other company has to be "political" today to help achieve that goal, they have my full support.
saraid216 14y ago
> Does Google engage in public campaign agains antisemitism, which is a real problem in some countries? I'm unfamiliar with the issue; is it a real problem in countries where Google has an office and is employing Jews at? I'm not saying anti-Semitism shouldn't be campaigned against, but if we're arguing that Google's push is based on the interests of its employees, then that's something of a precondition.
ChuckMcM 14y ago
I've not worked there for a while, but while I was there they did support employees who were campaigning to help folks. Basically it would work by some employee wanting to help some group that they cared about and the company would generally help them do that. So to use your example a jewish employee who might be trying to do outreach in an antisemtic environment (or country) would get support in the form of time off or use of company resources to help their program or use of a conference room to hold meetings with an outreach group Etc. However, there were pretty clear boundaries. I did not see any White Supremacists activities or holocaust denial outreach sorts of things either being supported or tolerated. My feeling was they try to support the employee caveat the fine line between supporting an employee who has a cause and supporting the cause itself. Recall that there were Google employees participating in the Arab Spring uprisings, and while Google didn't come out and say "we support overthrowing corrupt regimes" they also didn't immediately fire any employee who was working to that end. Of course when the press reports anything its less nuanced than what actually goes on inside the Google Plex. Sometimes that is for the best, sometimes not.

vibrunazo 14y ago

In other words, Google is part of the world -> improve the world -> Google improves. The same argument is valid for any effort to improve the world. The argument that shareholders shouldn't care, would only have some weight if it was a insignificantly small improvement, not likely to positively the company visibly. So it comes down to how big gay marriage is. And I believe many people take it for granted. Gay marriage is not just a small detail, it's huge. It'd improve the livinghood of a huge percentage of people, Google included, enormously. It's not about just a fancy ceremony, or legal rights to inheritance. It's an important door to better tolerance. And tolerance is huge.

redthrowaway 14y ago
More than "improve the world", it's "improve the part of the world that matters to Google". They've done the same thing with advocating for a free and open Internet for over a decade--a better internet makes a better Google. Let's look at what this might mean for Google, in practical terms. Some 10-15% of people are LGBT. It stands to reason that the same holds true of engineers. Now, it's well-established that the well is running dry in SV; talent needs to be imported. So if I'm a gay engineer thinking of moving to SV, how does this change my thoughts about where I want to work? It stands to reason that a significant number of LGBT engineers would be motivated to work for Google by this announcement. Let's look at non-gay immigrants. Outside of places like China and India, most of the countries Google is looking to recruit from are way ahead of the US on gay rights. So much so that the mere fact that gay marriage is an "issue" in the US serves to perpetuate the bible-thumping moron stereotype of Americans. So even for non-LGBT engineers from Europe, Canada, Australia, etc, this would be viewed by the majority as a reason to work for Google. Now, how would this hurt them? The argument can be made that, among more conservative (read: Indian and Chinese) societies, where gay rights are not accepted as human rights, that some percentage of potential hires would be put off by such a move. Perhaps, but I think that there are a number of mitigating factors, here. First, gay rights aren't nearly as big a political issue in those countries as in the US. It's frowned upon, but you don't have presidential nominees from one of the two parties proving how much they deserve the candidacy by falling over themselves to say who thinks gays are worse. Secondly and generally speaking, "culture" is simply nowhere near as big an attraction for people from those countries as status and income. So while it may deter some people, it likely wouldn't be many. Now for advertisers: will anyone really drop Google for online advertising because of this? Somehow I doubt it. There may be some of the Walmarts and whatnot who drop them, but I find the prospect unlikely. To sum it up: advantages for Google include easier, more effective recruitment. Disadvantages include potential loss of customers. I think Google wins this solely on the bottom line, let alone the fact that it's just a good thing to do.

edanm 14y ago

If we're discussing whether it makes business sense, IMO you're only looking at the upside for Google. Some employees of theirs are against Gay Marriage. Some contractors are against Gay Marriage. Some future employees are against Gay Marriage. Some potential business partners are against Gay Marriage. Some politicians, which Google is trying to lobby, will now no longer be receptive to them because their constituents are anti-Gay Marriage. Is the overall effect positive or negative? I'm not sure. But try to separate the issue at hand from whether it is smart for Google to support it. Is it possible you're just rationalizing because you want them to support Gay Marriage? P.S. An easy test to see if it's the issue itself clouding our judgement - what if Google had come out, say, against Medicare in the U.S., on the basis that it would be better for them in the long-term, and economists as a whole agree that it is better for the economy? What if they had come out on the other side of some issue that you care about. Would you still argue it makes business sense to do so?

Tichy 14y ago
This really is a huge argument against the concept of shareholders. So basically any publicly traded company really is forced to be immoral? Apart from the fact that it is impossible to enforce (how do you decide, as a judge, what is better for the company in the long run - not pissing off the anti-gay people, or not pissing off the pro-gay people?), it makes such companies very unattractive as employers. Think about yourself, if you are a programmer: would you take on the task to develop a new web site for holocaust deniers? It's just business, after all... If you lose the freedom to pick your jobs, what is the point, really? I'd rather close down my company (but I think you can't do that as a publicly traded company, either).
- edanm 14y ago
  Not really. Someone said "This makes business sense for Google". I said "Well, it might, but you forgot to take into account the downsides, e.g. X, Y, and Z". This has nothing to do with whether Google should or shouldn't do it.
  - Tichy 14y ago

beedogs 14y ago

> I also disagree with you that Google shareholders opposed to gay marriage shouldn't be forced to choose. They are just as wrong in their beliefs as those who supported segregation were or those who were against women's suffrage were. Marginalizing these people for their ridiculously antiquated beliefs is fair game, IMO. A thousand times this. Some opinions need to be taken out back and shot, and being against gay marriage is one of those opinions. Shitty beliefs like that aren't something that needs protection, and adults who hold those opinions should not be coddled or kowtowed to anymore. In programming terms, showing deference to these kinds of opinions is like being forced to support Windows 3.1.

nhangen 14y ago
I'm not sure I agree with this. In many ways, this fight mirrors that against racism, and in many of this similarities I find issues that could negatively affect progress. For example, saying that anti-gay people shouldn't be coddled is fine, but trying to pretend those beliefs are just going to go away is ignorant. What Google is missing here is the 'why' and instead it comes across as pushy. People are still, and will always be racist, just as they will be pro or anti gay. That doesn't make it right, but it's certainly something Google should be prepared to deal with. I get wary of public companies taking political stances in the same way i do with actors and musicians. That said, Google is probably in a fine position to do this, as the majority of the Internet world is dependent upon them.

rsheridan6 14y ago

>Some significant percentage of Google's employees are gay...vBy lobbying to improve the lives of its employees, Google is improving Google. Does that mean that if a company has a significant percentage of homophobes working for it, it should lobby against gay marriage? I work at a company that employed an obviously trans woman, and some of the cis women complained about sharing a bathroom with her. Since their lives would be improved by not having to share a bathroom with her, by your logic the company should lobby against TG rights.