This is a pretty bizarre and direct ripoff of pinboard's Tech Solidarity, except run by The Man and they'll "select" who's allowed to attend. Classless and tone-deaf would be charitable interpretation.
As someone who knows little about Tech Solidarity, other than what's shown on their site, it seems like they're a bit different. Sam's group is a little more pointed in the direction of promoting the broader tech community's values into a company, and Tech Solidarity seems to be more about connecting developers to their community and supporting that interaction.
That said, I'm happy to hear YC preaching from the same Bible. I would encourage Sam to coordinate with the many groups already working to what is apparently a shared goal.
I didn't mean to understate or downplay what Tech Solidarity was (I am just learning about it now), so I hope you don't take offence to my my questioning.
I have gotten the sense that Tech Solidarity has shifted a bit from "what can we as tech workers do directly to support the political change we want to see" to "how do we build for ourselves the society we want to see reflected in the world at large", which is closer to what Sam seems to be proposing here.
(I think this makes sense in a lot of ways, because there are already good people doing the former work, and usually when tech-focused groups try to help out we just get in the way.)
It's not "just" anything. It implies that the communication in question doesn't appear to be taking account of context or audience, as if it was a song sung by someone who was literally tone-deaf and didn't realise it (not availing of the feedback loop that keeps a voice in tune). It's not necessarily evidence of disrespect by the communicator, but it is applied when the message seems to be unintentionally inappropriate.
But hey, Friday flamebait I guess.