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I will explain it. Google wants personal identity attached to posts on Google+ people Google thinks that people will value what they say when they are not posti

by Tohhou 13y ago

I will explain it. Google wants personal identity attached to posts on Google+ people Google thinks that people will value what they say when they are not posting anonymously. Some engineer wrote a thing to try to catch obviously fake names, and some kinds of real names, which actually are attached to real identity, get caught in the filter. They didn't target specific groups of people because they hate them ffs. I agree that it's a stupid policy, but calling things which are not really racism racism only dilutes actual racism and victims of racism. "Google+ naming filter thinks American Native Indian style names are not real names"

chris_wot 13y ago
So in other words, it's incompetence then. Which was the alternative to racism. Which is what I said.
raverbashing 13y ago
A filter to catch "fake names" based on dictionary words I presume. If you do that for names of German origin (with a German word list) there will be hit after hit Google apparently doesn't know much about names.
calibraxis 13y ago
> calling things which are not really racism racism only dilutes actual racism and victims of racism. I don't know your racial category, but people of color frequently mention how white people aggressively like to redefine racism so it doesn't include their own racism. This particular argument is common among them. Because after all, racism is one of those -isms which are a fundamental part of many cultures (like the US).
- ebfe 13y ago
  That's really interesting, I'd never heard of this before. Can you give us an example you've heard of a redefinition of racism that would exclude whites from being racist?
  - TillE 13y ago
    Basically, people like to redefine racism to exclude everything less bad than the KKK and actual lynchings. A couple favorites from Reddit in particular: "It's just a joke." - In defense of the slew of racist jokes that appear every time a POC is mentioned or seen. "I don't hate black people, I hate black culture." - Every time a POC does something bad, or merely annoying. Mysteriously, nobody hates white culture.
    - ebfe 13y ago
      >Mysteriously, nobody hates white culture Man, that's been the exact opposite of my experience. Obviously unscientific, but it's interesting to compare the difference between https://twitter.com/search?q=white%20people&f=realtime https://twitter.com/search?q=white%20people&f=realtime and https://twitter.com/search?q=black%20people&f=realtime https://twitter.com/search?q=black%20people&f=realtime .
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > I don't know your racial category, but people of color frequently mention how white people aggressively like to redefine racism so it doesn't include their own racism. And white people do the same thing about people of color, pointing to the not-infrequently-made redefinition of racism that anyone who isn't in the currently-dominant race cannot, ipso facto, be "racist" [1]. The fact that people of all races can point to self-serving and ridiculous attempts from people of other races to redefine their own racism as "not racism" does not, however, make the very idea that the term must have some boundaries to be useful invalid. [1] for an example of this argument see, e.g., http://wwsword.blogspot.com/2008/03/why-black-people-cant-be-racist.html http://wwsword.blogspot.com/2008/03/why-black-people-cant-be...
wpietri 13y ago
It sounds like your understanding of racism is not very nuanced. Explicit statements of racial hatred are the most obvious kind of racism. But that's not where it ends. For example, consider the study "Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal?" [1] They found that resumes with black-sounding names were less employable than the same resumes with white-sounding names. Is that because a large number of hiring managers are also KKK members who put on their hoods before sorting applications? Probably not. A more likely explanation is that, as Harvard's Project Implicit [2] demonstrates, a lot of people are consciously anti-racist but still have racist attitudes and reactions. If you live in a segregated society, it need not even be a bias against blacks, so much as a bias for people who are more familiar to you. Is that effectively racism? If I were somebody not getting hired because of the color of my skin, I'd sure think so. So in the case of Google Plus, I doubt the mainly white, mainly male, mainly millionaires sitting in a suburban office park were consciously saying, "At last, our revenge for Custer!" But them saying, "Looks good to us!" and then enforcing it is effectively saying, "We believe our personal biases and local cultural norms are good enough for the entire world." That might not be explicitly racist in intention. But I don't think that's required to create a racist system. [1] http://www.nber.org/papers/w9873 http://www.nber.org/papers/w9873 [2] https://www.projectimplicit.net/index.html https://www.projectimplicit.net/index.html
- smm2000 13y ago
  Google employees (engineering) are mainly Asian and mainly non - millionaires
  - wpietri 13y ago
    I think the people senior enough and around long enough to be setting this policy are as described.
- Tohhou 13y ago
  When everything is racism nothing is. For example, assuming Google is mainly white, mainly male, mainly white male when it's not. They go out of their way to ensure diversity in their organization.

by Tohhou 13y ago

chris_wot 13y ago

So in other words, it's incompetence then. Which was the alternative to racism. Which is what I said.

raverbashing 13y ago

A filter to catch "fake names" based on dictionary words I presume. If you do that for names of German origin (with a German word list) there will be hit after hit Google apparently doesn't know much about names.

calibraxis 13y ago

> calling things which are not really racism racism only dilutes actual racism and victims of racism. I don't know your racial category, but people of color frequently mention how white people aggressively like to redefine racism so it doesn't include their own racism. This particular argument is common among them. Because after all, racism is one of those -isms which are a fundamental part of many cultures (like the US).

ebfe 13y ago
That's really interesting, I'd never heard of this before. Can you give us an example you've heard of a redefinition of racism that would exclude whites from being racist?
- TillE 13y ago
  Basically, people like to redefine racism to exclude everything less bad than the KKK and actual lynchings. A couple favorites from Reddit in particular: "It's just a joke." - In defense of the slew of racist jokes that appear every time a POC is mentioned or seen. "I don't hate black people, I hate black culture." - Every time a POC does something bad, or merely annoying. Mysteriously, nobody hates white culture.
  - ebfe 13y ago
    >Mysteriously, nobody hates white culture Man, that's been the exact opposite of my experience. Obviously unscientific, but it's interesting to compare the difference between https://twitter.com/search?q=white%20people&f=realtime https://twitter.com/search?q=white%20people&f=realtime and https://twitter.com/search?q=black%20people&f=realtime https://twitter.com/search?q=black%20people&f=realtime .
dragonwriter 13y ago
> I don't know your racial category, but people of color frequently mention how white people aggressively like to redefine racism so it doesn't include their own racism. And white people do the same thing about people of color, pointing to the not-infrequently-made redefinition of racism that anyone who isn't in the currently-dominant race cannot, ipso facto, be "racist" [1]. The fact that people of all races can point to self-serving and ridiculous attempts from people of other races to redefine their own racism as "not racism" does not, however, make the very idea that the term must have some boundaries to be useful invalid. [1] for an example of this argument see, e.g., http://wwsword.blogspot.com/2008/03/why-black-people-cant-be-racist.html http://wwsword.blogspot.com/2008/03/why-black-people-cant-be...

wpietri 13y ago

It sounds like your understanding of racism is not very nuanced. Explicit statements of racial hatred are the most obvious kind of racism. But that's not where it ends. For example, consider the study "Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal?" [1] They found that resumes with black-sounding names were less employable than the same resumes with white-sounding names. Is that because a large number of hiring managers are also KKK members who put on their hoods before sorting applications? Probably not. A more likely explanation is that, as Harvard's Project Implicit [2] demonstrates, a lot of people are consciously anti-racist but still have racist attitudes and reactions. If you live in a segregated society, it need not even be a bias against blacks, so much as a bias for people who are more familiar to you. Is that effectively racism? If I were somebody not getting hired because of the color of my skin, I'd sure think so. So in the case of Google Plus, I doubt the mainly white, mainly male, mainly millionaires sitting in a suburban office park were consciously saying, "At last, our revenge for Custer!" But them saying, "Looks good to us!" and then enforcing it is effectively saying, "We believe our personal biases and local cultural norms are good enough for the entire world." That might not be explicitly racist in intention. But I don't think that's required to create a racist system. [1] http://www.nber.org/papers/w9873 http://www.nber.org/papers/w9873 [2] https://www.projectimplicit.net/index.html https://www.projectimplicit.net/index.html

smm2000 13y ago
Google employees (engineering) are mainly Asian and mainly non - millionaires
- wpietri 13y ago
  I think the people senior enough and around long enough to be setting this policy are as described.
Tohhou 13y ago
When everything is racism nothing is. For example, assuming Google is mainly white, mainly male, mainly white male when it's not. They go out of their way to ensure diversity in their organization.