[JimboOmega]

The post talks about Google supposedly persecuting LGBTQ employees for speaking up. But the linked articles only talk about them (possibly) getting retaliated against for protesting other issues, like border security or sexual harassment.

As an LGBT person (who does her fair share of activism), I'm not clear what the LGBTQ angle is here other than if the people involved happened to be LGBTQ. It seems like even if they are being retaliated against for their activism, it's not LGBTQ activism.

Did I miss something?

[kinkrtyavimoodh]

You didn't miss anything. These people were fired for independent troublemaking. The fact that they were LGBTQ is a confounding variable that correlates with / causes activist tendencies.

[hnewsshadowbans]

The angle is virtue signaling and potstirring. Its low hanging fruit to earn plaudits and make it seem like you're doing something. In reality like you said there is nothing to indicate the employees were fired for being gay or trans or whatever. The later reference to 'concentration camps' drives home the kind of person this guy is. Gay and trans people should be disgusted this person is using them in such a dishonest way to score points.

[kinkrtyavimoodh]

That is the unfortunate reality of a lot of activism today. I wonder if this behavior only serves to cause general resentment in the community against LGBTQ folks because the biggest loudmouths drag down the discourse.

[ocdtrekkie]

I think the claim is that Google is more willing to dismiss LGBTQ employees for these issues than others. However, it's also plausible that LGBTQ employees are more accustomed to having to fight for their rights and hence have trended to be amongst the "loudest" complainants?

[ardit33]

I don't know about google, and can't say about direct experience, but almost every tech company I have worked, LGBTQ people were treated well, and in no way discriminated against, or at least in a visible way at least....

even amazon, was pretty equal about minorities and LGBTQ folks as they treated everyone equally crap....

[cbanek]

> LGBTQ people were treated well, and in no way discriminated against, or at least in a visible way at least....

As a minority LGBTQ person, let me say it's almost never in a visible way, but trust me, it is there.

It's usually called something different, or dressed up as something else, just like how it is treated in political discourse.

The fact that it's not obvious only makes it worse and more unnerving for the gaslit target.

[ci5er]

As a sometimes engineering manager (I generally prefer to be a staffy, you know, doing analyst functions for the CEO, etc.), this is interesting to me. Can you give me any ideas on what I should be on the look-out for, in terms of behavior, among the team-mates?

I "get" that it's not visible (sort of), but I don't get how to be on guard for it, prevent it or deal with it if we can't see it. How does a manager see the signs of it, somehow, well enough, to deal with it?

[cbanek]

Yeah, it's tricky to see for sure. I don't pretend to have all or even some of the answers here, but since you asked, and it's a great question, I'll take a stab at it.

First, I'd just make sure that people are happy. If people are honestly happy and enjoying their job, they probably aren't having a problem. Talk to them and figure it out is the most direct way. Indirect ways I would say include:

Social dynamics: Does a team try to exclude a person from meetings, social discussions at work, social activities, etc? Is one person always alone? This is a bit fuzzier since it's about association, and you can't force people to be friends, but it can show a lot about team cohesion.

Work dynamics: I've worked with people who I was almost sure had it out for me, and they would purposefully drag their feet doing work or responding to issues. While this should reflect poorly on the person sandbagging, it's more common that the recipient is blamed for "not getting enough done." Especially with ramping up or helping out, by excluding certain members of the team, coworkers can basically set that person up to fail, while technically doing nothing wrong.

Reviews: Also look out for when people are punished or otherwise told they aren't doing good enough. The measuring stick for this can change based on the person being measured.

Opportunity. Are minority team members given the same opportunities for leadership and growth? Or does a team always give the best work to one or two people that the boss likes, leaving everyone else to clean up the mess? It's hard to prove that you can do the job if they won't let you. This seems to happen a lot in my experience.

[ci5er]

Thanks for that.

I guess I've been fortunate in that, all of the people being excluded were truly not pulling their own (traditional) weight because they were going through family trauma and on anti-depressants or something. (Divorce, loss of a child, etc.). People were pretty forgiving, but definitely didn't want them in critical path.

The handful (let me say, 5 G, 2L and 2T across 10 small teams over 5 years that I am going to use as a sample, circa 1995~2000) of alphabet people (is that phrase offensive?), were objectively AWESOME in terms of personality and group engagement and work performance. It really was never a problem. Maybe we hired well. Maybe we were lucky. I guess I haven't seen the passive-aggressive exclusionary thing you are talking about, but I will keep an eye out for it in the future.

Again: Thank you.

[Xavdidtheshadow]

> LGBTQ people were treated well, and in no way discriminated against

I know don't know where you've worked, but I would maybe reach out to some current or former LGBTQ coworkers and ask them if that's in line with their evaluation. In my experience, that discrimination _isn't_ very visible