[blck]

I don't think it can be understated how much saying 'no politics' is a political statement. Supporting the status quo is a political statement. And supporting the status quo in this political climate is a strange hill to plant your flag on.

[twmahna]

> I don't think it can be understated how much saying 'no politics' is a political statement.

I disagree, and I think you're grossly overstating it.

I can see how you could characterize their stance as "supporting the status quo". But, there are varying degrees of "support", and this is pretty much the lowest degree of "support" imaginable.

Put another way, you're painting this as "with us or against us" when in reality there's a spectrum of support. Coinbase is standing just SLIGHTLY off center in one direction.

> And supporting the status quo in this political climate is a strange hill to plant your flag on.

Why do you think it's strange? The vast majority of employees prefer a work environment that is stripped of political conversation. And, such an environment is more conducive to focus and productivity.

[Pils]

> The vast majority of employees prefer a work environment that is stripped of political conversation

While I generally agree, I think there is a tacit assumption that Armstrong's actions will work exactly as intended. 5-8% of workforce is...honestly I don't know if it's high or low, but is certainly non-trivial. These weren't strategic layoffs or restructurings, so certain business-critical projects might be delayed due to headcount issues/loss of senior staff. If we hear about another walkout at Coinbase 6 months from now, this might just look like a catastrophic management blunder.

Literally firing the walkout organizers would probably have led to a worse media cycle, but likely fewer staff quitting in protest (Google firing the walkout organizers seemed to have little to no effect).

[devtul]

This idea of "everything is political" is why the discourse went to shit, now nobody can catch a break from politics, and if you had enough and don't want to take part then you instantly gets attacked for "supporting the status quo".

I prefer to not be lectured on political issues by my orange juice brand. Their mission should be to sell high quality orange juice and make a profit.

[blck]

I think in prior times when we didn't have all the information we have available at hand: sure that's fine.

But what if your orange juice brand of choice was actively contributing to the destruction of the environment, lobbying politicians to make them exempt from environmental regulations, and destroying competition in nefarious ways?

That's an extreme but if that's information you have and you still support that orange juice brand then you are supporting everything that is public knowledge about that brand.

[defen]

If 95% of the people at the company don't care, but you're the person who won't stop bringing up the need to change orange juice vendors, to the point that it's disruptive and annoying to the 95%, maybe they don't want to work with you any more. And maybe it's not the right company for you, either. Why would you want to work with a bunch of people who are indifferent to environmental destruction when there are literally thousands of companies out there who actively embrace your orange juice opinions?

[lazyasciiart]

If 95% of the company doesn't care then you should change orange juice vendors. Making it turn into an ongoing issue would be a very strong sign that people at the company care very strongly about keeping the current vendor. Which means that perhaps you should leave, but you should leave because people are actively opposing your politics and not because that 95% is not political.

[defen]

By "don't care" I mean they don't perceive the current situation as a problem, and they view the cost of switching vendors to be too high. But either way, yes.

I think one problem with the concept of "everything is political (including supporting the status quo)" is that it provides no principled mechanism for determining what counts as "too far" (costly) for any given political cause. The nice thing about having a dictator (CEO) in this regard is that it provides a fixed point.

[gnusty_gnurc]

It’s precisely the type of messaging that happened after 9/11 too.

“You’re either with us or against us.”

Leave it to the woke crowd to take a page out of the Karl Rove handbook.

[asdff]

Why stop at Karl Rove? Tribalism is an inherent primal instinct in our species. We are all directly descended from brutal tribes at odds with other tribes over competition for limited resources. It's rooted in nearly all of our thinking, and you have to take active steps in your thought processes to avoid being biased by this inherent biological preference you have for the success of your kin versus the kin of others.

[gnusty_gnurc]

For sure, this is definitely an element.

[remarkEon]

Who took it out of Lenin's handbook, ironically.

Time is a flat circle and all that.

[JoeAltmaier]

Is it really an attack though? Supporting the status quo (by objecting to discussions about changing it) is the perceived state. Is it an attack, to observe this?

I understand folks feel uncomfortable talking about systemic bias. Especially if they don't suffer from it. But that's exactly the issue of status quo vs change - getting folks to notice/discuss it. So there can be change, which requires the comfortable to change too.

[SpicyLemonZest]

I think it's intended as an attack, but even if it's not it's just a terribly unfair characterization. If you host a meeting to review a design document, and I start talking about the Syrian Civil War in the middle, are you really supporting the status quo when you ask me to stay on topic?

[JoeAltmaier]

Maybe that's a strawman...but I see your point.

[RangerScience]

Great! Because it's totally non-political to influence international trade policy to give yourself an advantage in buying your oranges and labor in waaaaaait it totally is.

IMO Coinbase is "doing it pretty well", not by saying "we'll be apolitical", but by saying, "we're going to be political ONLY about X & Y".

My read is that they're not discouraging their employees from being political (unclear to me ATM if they're still doing donation matching regardless), and they're not stopping work-place diversity programs... they're just limiting their lobbying to, you know, their own issues.

[danaris]

Your life may not be political.

My life may not be political.

But the life of a black trans woman? That's political by its very nature, in today's climate. One party doesn't want her to be allowed to exist, the other does.

Believing it's possible to be "apolitical" in any time of polarization is a privilege of those who benefit from the status quo.

[ponker]

I think there are definitely people who don’t want her to exist but there are also ones like me, who get called Nazis for it, but whose perspective is largely 1) OK 2) please pay for your own costs related to your choices and 3) I’m not being an asshole to you because you’re a black trans woman, I’m being an asshole to you because I am an asshole and my white male friends say “oh Xxx is such as asshole.” So don’t take it personally

[webmaven]

> whose perspective is largely 1) OK 2) please pay for your own costs related to your choices

In your example, the black trans woman has no choice about being black and no choice about their cisgender.

Technically, they have a choice about whether they transition, but the alternative is living with the emotional pain of extreme gender dysphoria.

Would you deny someone medical care for a physically painful but not life threatening medical condition (say arthritis, or psoriasis), or tell them that treating it is their choice and responsibility?

How about mental conditions such as clinical depression, or bipolar disorder?

Would you relax the requirements on businesses to provide reasonable accommodation for wheelchair access to parking and restrooms? After all, it is their choice to go out in public.

Would you allow discrimination for employment or a mortgage based on these conditions?

This isn't really that complicated. Gender dysphoria is a real thing, and while the choice to transition (with or without gender reassignment surgery) is a personal one, and likely never an easy one to make, it should be an option that society supports and simply does not allow discrimination against.

[ponker]

You’ve pretty much done what almost never happens on the Internet: genuinely changed my view.

[webmaven]

Thank you very much for saying that. I'm glad to have been of service.

Making arguments in good faith sometimes feels like pointlessly shouting into the void.

Obligatory xkcd: https:// xkcd.com/386/

[webmaven]

> 3) I’m not being an asshole to you because you’re a black trans woman, I’m being an asshole to you because I am an asshole and my white male friends say “oh Xxx is such as asshole.” So don’t take it personally

I thought this deserved to be broken out to a separate reply.

I actually used to be in that camp. In my case I used to say some extremely heteronormative patriarchal objectifying bullshit ironically (typical examples would be "barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen" or "get me a beer, bitch". This started pretty darn early, like 10 years old. My mom's friends all thought it was hilarious when I was asked what piece of chicken I wanted and I answered with a deadpan "well, I'm usually a leg man, but..."). In other words, I was pretending to be a misogynist asshole for purposes of humor.

It turns out that as an adult, many of the people closest to me couldn't always tell I was being ironic, despite the obvious (to me) extreme contrast between these statements and my everyday persona.

And that's entirely aside from the fact that this sort of humor is painful to people who regularly encounter the real thing when it is meant to hurt them, even if they completely understand that I don't mean it that way. I was essentially using their pain as a prop for my humor.

So, I could have responded with some variant of "fuck 'em if they can't take a joke", but that would have left me associating only with people who a) got my sense of humor and put up with it, as well as b) people who didn't but approved of the literal interpretation and were encouraged by it. That wouldn't have been a good outcome for me.

To give a less pointed example of my sense of humor, I once horrified a co-worker who brought to my attention a severe defect that would have caused a user security issue if it had been deployed to production by responding "Well, we certainly couldn't allow that!" with heavy sarcasm. I was using sarcasm ironically. Since I immediately escalated the issue I would have thought that it was obvious that I was taking the issue very seriously, but I had misjudged my audience.

It is incumbent on me to communicate clearly, even or especially when using humor. And my sort of weapons-grade irony and sarcasm can't be handled too carefully.

Now, what you're talking about isn't quite the same thing (since I actually try to not be an asshole), but in your case it really is incumbent on you to communicate clearly as well when you're being an asshole that you are not being an asshole to a black trans woman because they are a black trans woman, and also that you aren't being an asshole to them as a black trans woman. And you have to somehow do it without a bunch of "I'm not a racist etc., but..." qualifiers. The latter point is so subtle, you're never going to be able to get it right, except perhaps one-on-one with someone you know very well (eg. my spouse thinks a "get me a fuckin' beer, woman" demand from me is hilarious, but that's in part because she knows I don't like beer, and rarely swear. Even with her I would be pretty careful about asking for anything else that way). You certainly won't get it right while still using racist and transphobic rhetoric.

So, you have a stark choice similar to mine: stop being an asshole to black trans women, or end up associating only with people who think doing that is excusable, normal, or even desirable, behavior.

[ponker]

No idea what you’re talking about. Someone comes to me with a dumb idea. I tell them it’s a dumb idea and am not nice about it. If they are a minority group they could feel that I am acting this way to them because I’m a x-ist. But it’s actually because I’m an asshole.

[webmaven]

I'll spell it out a bit more.

Since, as a member of a minority group, they probably get more negative feedback than average, and since probably most of that negative feedback is due to x-ism, why shouldn't they assume you're an x-ist?

And that's completely leaving aside whether there exists any sort of stereotype that members of group x aren't as smart or capable as non-x folks that you may be playing into.

It's really on your shoulders to indicate or demonstrate that you're just an asshole and not an x-ist asshole. Because, as far as the various x-folk are concerned, isn't it simpler to assume that a non-x is being an asshole to them because of x-ism? Odds are that they're right.

[damnyou]

In other words, given the rates of poverty among Black trans women, you don't want her to be allowed to exist.

Your view is not above regular politics. It is a view that's firmly embedded within the right wing of regular politics. I personally wouldn't consider it "Nazi" but would definitely consider it deeply transphobic, and exclude you from my friend circle. If I met someone with your view at work, I would avoid any interactions with them other than the minimum necessary to perform my job.

[ponker]

Yep — this is Exhibit A as to why this is something I say only anonymously. Any other forum and she’s stunning and brave.

[damnyou]

Good. People experiencing the social consequences of expressing bigoted views, and being a little more afraid as a result, is how the world moves forward. A term sometimes used for it is the "democratization of discomfort".

The First Amendment cuts both ways.

[potta_coffee]

Not using your business as a political platform is not the same as supporting the status quo. The "if you're not with us, you're against us" stance is definitely polarizing and is not making things better.

[heavyset_go]

But Coinbase is using their business as a political platform[1].

[1] https://www.fec.gov/data/receipts/individual-contributions/?...

[newbie789]

This is very interesting. The CEO said in his initial letter that Coinbase should only engage in politics that are relevant to their "core mission", but it's kind of interesting to reduce a candidate to "What can this candidate or party do specifically for our business?" and ignore other policies that a candidate or party may seek to enact.

Pretending that you're unaware of or completely ambivalent about the consequences of shifts in political power (so long as it benefits you financially) doesn't really qualify you as "apolitical." You're still involved in the political process even if you stick your fingers in your ears and chant "nananana I can't hear you."

I hate to sound incisive, but it kind of seems like the position that Coinbase's leadership has taken is "The board and CEO will decide what qualifies as 'apolitical' and as such will dictate the ongoing political activity of the company, which they have no desire to stop being involved in."

[dmurray]

Or just "the board and CEO will decide what political activism is relevant to the core business of the company, and the political positions the company should take". Which seems exactly within the remit of the board and CEO.

[newbie789]

This is absolutely true, and appears to be the stated policy in no uncertain terms.

The issue that I intended to address is the interesting usage of language to sidestep making political contributions and supporting candidates and parties as being political acts.

[JPKab]

Companies aren't democracies. When you sign up to work for somebody else, the board and the executives have every right to make these decisions. Upset that you can't lobby for the rights of pink haired people in the office? Go start your own company and put murals featuring oppressed pink-haired people all over the walls. Until then, recognize that companies aren't set up as democracies, because no investor would be dumb enough to throw their money down a toilet where any muppet who can run a QA job or write a few lines of JS has equal input with someone who co-founded the enterprise.

[webmaven]

> Companies aren't democracies.

I think that's too strong a statement in support of the current default, which is the largely feudal corporation.

First, company structures are pretty clearly being pushed in a more democratic direction, and have been for quite a while. Silicon Valley is the poster child for flatter organizational structures, "good ideas can come from anywhere", increased freedom of movement for workers between companies, as well as sharing the financial gains more broadly (at least, that is the ideal that SV represents to the outside world).

You look at a typical SV corporation and see a rigid hierarchy. Most of the rest of the world sees an insanely freewheeling mess that can't possibly work.

There are also today already companies that are explicitly structured as democracies (in some cases a bit more like constitutional monarchies, and in other cases more like minarchist collectives). Not all of these experiments are successful, nor should we expect them to be.

But I certainly don't expect this overall trend to reverse, stop, or even slow down. If anything, I expect it to accelerate, as existing companies continue to try to pick out and graft on the parts and tools that seem to be working for other organizations. Even when these grafting attempts are unsuccessful (which is often), they just draw attention to the orgs that are succeeding (inspiring attempts at analysis of what is different), which leads to more such experiments.

[kmonsen]

They appear to mostly support one candidate that is very pro bitcoin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brianforde

"In recognition of his work, Brian was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum and one of the ten most influential people in bitcoin and blockchain"

[beervirus]

No, probably not. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24722941

[stronglikedan]

Or they're just bribing, er lobbying, politicians to achieve the company's goals, regardless of the affiliation of said politicians.

[slaymaker1907]

I hope they get a lawsuit over this if they continue giving to candidates.

[cltby]

Logically, it is. Just not in a way that's meaningful or interesting.

[rjldev]

That’s a very paranoid way of looking at things. Signalling support for the status quo would involve something more active, eg “wooo, go status quo!!” on a banner.

Maybe they have different priorities than you and just want to make money. Not everything is political.

[tehjoker]

Just wanting to make money is political because it means the environment has been configured in such a way that you can do so. If you make money in the position of a manager or boss, it is even more strongly political as you are using the configuration of the political system to direct societal resources at your whim to make money.

[cltby]

Just playing the bongos is political because it means the environment has been configured in such a way that you can do so. If you play the bongos in the position of a manager or boss, it is even more strongly political as you are using the configuration of the political system to direct societal resources at your whim to play the bongos.

You might be proving too much here.

[tehjoker]

Not at all. While there is a tiny bit of truth to your bongo example, money in particular is highly political though it has been rhetorically stripped in order to make it appear as though it is not so the wealthy can make money in peace. Controlling the distribution of resources in society is a highly political question.

Who makes more money at work for example? The low level employee or the boss? Who controls what, why, and how things are produced? What the schedules are? These are smaller questions than national policy, but they are political in nature. Of course, the socialist movement sees all workplaces' workers united together as a national political project. When you swim in water all your life, you can't see it easily unless someone points it out.

Another reason "just making money" is political is because so many people can't. In a society with levels of inequality that approximate ancient kingdoms, the lowest people in society have little opportunity to "just make money" and their invisibility is a political artifice.

Put another way, what is political is the ability to _not care_ when others are suffering. People are being deported, attacked in the streets, dying of disease, etc. so keeping your head down _and make money_ during such a time is something won by virtue of class. Other people can't ignore it because politics is life and death. While exhaustion is a valid excuse to rest (I'm super tired myself), what is being asked is for solidarity and to exhibit positive humanity towards other people. A primary site of conflict and domination is the workplace -- it's just that so many of us are used to losing or out competing each other that we don't band together to win.

[aksss]

"you must become a member of the Party" is a horrible situation for any country to be in. Full stop. There are too many examples in history of where that leads to claim naiveté or propose that their consistent outcomes won't apply here.

[manfredo]

No, it's possible to support changes to the status quo while simultaneously maintaining an apolitical workplace. I most certainly support changes to the status quo, and I would simultaneously take the same stance as Coinbase with regards to politics in the workplace. I've never seen a workplace embrace political activism without creating a hostile workplace environment for a significant segment of workers.

This is kind of the same kind of fallacy as people who try to say that atheism is a religion. No, it's the absence of religion. In the same vein, an apolitical workplace isn't support for the status quo. It's the absence of any political, either for or against the status quo.

[Negitivefrags]

I really dislike this argument.

Anyone using it is just saying “If you are not with us, your against us”.

It’s simply a way to force a divide of the world into black and white and that sucks.

[tofuahdude]

There is a difference between explicitly supporting the status quo and simply saying we aren't going to actively work to change the status quo within this organization.

[stronglikedan]

It's no so strange. A lot of people are perfectly happy with the status quo, while recognizing that there's always room for improvement.

[zepto]

Is it necessarily?

Social media has amplified polarization.

Is it really the case that everyone must support one or other of the poles?

[RangerScience]

IMO that's due more to first-past-the-post voting.

[zepto]

That’s another contributing factor, but social media is amplifying the extremes.

[joshuamorton]

Something being a political statement doesn't necessarily mean it is directly in support of one pole or the other. It's still political.

Saying "my business supports whatever the current US government's stated opinion is on all issues" is a political stance. It may not be partisan, but it absolutely is political. Those aren't synonymous.

[zepto]

Saying ‘we don’t want to be an activist organization beyond our business goals, therefore we want to keep political discussions out of the workplace’ is not the same thing as saying ‘my business supports whatever the US government’s stated opinion is’.

Nobody supports the status quo.

[joshuamorton]

Correct, but both are political statements. "We don't want to be involved in the political discussion" is just as political as "we want to be involved in the political discussion".

[zepto]

True, but your two statements in this comment aren’t really representative of anything being discussed here.

The statements we were talking about upthread don’t reduce to these ones.

[cltby]

You are correct in your "understatement" claim, though I suspect unintentionally so. Yes, "avoiding politics" cuts into time you could be spending advancing progressive politics. So does writing software. So does watching a movie with your spouse. So does sleeping. So does every single thing that isn't literally "advancing progressive politics."

"No politics = politics" is an utterly vacuous statement.

[blck]

He's not passively stating no politics he's actively discouraging any politics. There is a slight difference.

If you become friendly with a person in the workplace you'll eventually learn their politics, right? Either through how they act or what they say. How do you limit how much a person reveals about themselves at work?

The CEO is saying Coinbase won't take political stances. That's fine in theory but in practice it's not. The whole idea of cryptocurrency itself is political.

There is a difference in being passively apolitical and actively apolitical for sure.

[SpicyLemonZest]

The rules aren't as strict as you're thinking. As the article describes, Armstrong's made it clear that there's no rule requiring employees to just pretend politics don't exist, and employees are still free to discuss politics with each other or create political discussion Slack channels.

[Spivak]

The stance "I am now and forever apolitical regardless of the state of the world or how political decisions affect me or others" is true no politics.

The stance "I am avoiding politics because there's nothing worth my time to be an activist about but I would if that changed and political decisions started seriously affecting me, my family, or my friends" is "the status quo is fine."

The stance "I'm avoiding politics because it's bad for my metal health or $any_criticism" is an act of protest! Super political.

I have genuinely never met someone in the first camp.

[cltby]

There are lots of reasons, good and bad, to avoid politics. But to claim that doing so is inherently political... isn't saying anything. To the extent it's true, it's trivially so. And to the extent it's non-trivial, it's completely false.

[Spivak]

The reason that you can't require people to vote in the US is because the act of not voting is considered protected political speech. Why is not participating in politics any different?

Hell, refusing to engage with certain types of politics isn't just political, it's an act of protest!

[SpicyLemonZest]

Have the people you've met specifically told you this is their stance? I'm worried you may be misunderstanding. I and almost all apolitical people I know fall in the first camp; I don't think the status quo is fine, but I also don't think that engaging in politics all the time improves it.

[heimatau]

All businesses that want to survive are political. Whether they admit it or not.

How many defense contractors are there? These people do have a vested interest to vote for candidates that increase govt contracts with the private sector. This is a massive industry.

Now that govt is getting more involved in health care, we're seeing that too.

These are trillions of dollars we're talking about.

This is also valid for small businesses too. How taxes are done in a given community. Etc.

I can't emphasize enough the vested interest a business has to be selfish. I'm indifferent on if this is a drawback.

I just wish there was more competition/choices for everyone and like you, I wish people would be more upfront (or self aware) of what they're doing.

P.S. When it comes to Coinbase. What stops them from backing a racist KKK member whom backs Bitcoin/crypto? What stops them from backing an anarchist whom backs Bitcoin/crypto? Etc...etc... This silencing of discussion...it a bit disgusting.

[BurningFrog]

> I don't think it can be understated ...

I'm sure you meant "overstated".

[SpicyLemonZest]

Coinbase didn't say "no politics" or "we support the status quo". They just said that the company is focused on cryptocurrency, and won't engage in political causes other than supporting cryptocurrency.

[slaymaker1907]

As someone else pointed out, they seem to have no problem in donating to political candidates as a corporation so this is the height of hypocrisy. Individual employees don't get to have a say in the direction of the company's politics.

[SpicyLemonZest]

I don't see the hypocrisy. Like I said, the company's been quite open about the fact that they will continue to engage in cryptocurrency-related politics.

[CarelessExpert]

Cryptocurrency is an explicitly political cause.

[cltby]

Bob grows chickens and Alice grows corn. They trade via barter. We'd probably agree this isn't political in any meaningful sense.

One day, Alice has a clever idea: she can create a digital representation of money. Both Alice and Bob agree to accept these "tokens" in lieu of barter.

Big mistake. CarelessExpert announces to Alice and Bob that their creation obligates them to join in bitter arguments about abortion, climate change, and LGBT rights.

[CarelessExpert]

So do you normally spend a lot of your time online standing up straw men and knocking them down? Or is today a special case?

My point, since apparently I need to clarify it, is that Coinbase claiming to have an "apolitical" workplace while a) operating in a business that's driven by libertarian and anarchist philosophy and b) spending time and money lobbying politicians in Washington in support of said values is, at best demonstrative of a total lack of self-awareness, and at worst represents rank hypocrisy.

I tend to suspect it's the latter.

[anm89]

You are the one with the strawman. The company never claimed to be apolitical. In fact they explicitly state they are.

[cltby]

If the Coinbase guys were lobbying for "libertarian and anarchist philosophy," broadly construed, you'd have a point. But they're not. They're pushing for narrow financial regulation. There's no principled reason to think they're doing this in furtherance of their personal politics, as opposed to, say, making their customers' lives easier.

As such, I don't see the hypocrisy. Now, I'd be more inclined to agree if the "politics ban" covered activism around crypto policy issues. But of course, then management's position is very easy to see. They hired developers to implement their vision, not to fight it.

[gambler]

>I don't think it can be understated how much saying 'no politics' is a political statement.

This is often presented as obvious self-contradiction, but in fact the definition of "politics" here changes from first use to the second. In other words, this is a cheap rhetorical trick to make something sound irrational and self-contradictory, while int fact it isn't.

[fullshark]

My cynical take on this is Coinbase is preparing for Democrats to take control of the US gov't in a few months and sees Republicans suddenly becoming very concerned about gov't / central bank failures and buying cryptocurrency as a hedge. Don't want to be seen a leftist company when your user growth will come from the right.

[blck]

That is definitely an interesting take but I think any right-winger that goes that far is more likely to be caught up in a grift than going to Coinbase where they have to send in their government-issue ID and link their account to a US bank that reports to government if they notice suspicious activity.

[ccleve]

If by "status quo" you mean "Donald Trump is President", does your view change if Biden wins? Will the status quo be ok, and will it therefore be ok to ban political activity in the workplace?

The problem with the view that activism is ok if the current administration is objectionable is that the "status quo" changes from cycle to cycle.

Presidential politics is only a very small part of political activity in the US (though it is the most visible). What if your frame of reference is state and local politics? Is political activism in the workplace ok if you don't like the local school board?