[throwawaygulf]

>Who would make an HR complaint over one ill-considered remark?

It's painfully obvious you haven't been exposed to Bay Area/West Coast start-up culture (I envy your lack of exposure).

I've seen people getting reported to HR for the following things:

- Using a photo of a Sherpa (an actual photo, not a character or drawing) in a presentation to describe the concept of guiding people and systems to their desired outcome and state. They were reported for using racist caricatures of marginalized minorities

- Discussing shooting sports in a thread about hobbies. They were reported for making people feel unsafe

- Someone posted a screen shot of a Tweet in support of BLM, but the screen shot was from Blacktivist, a Twitter account that was part of a Russian propaganda campaign. Someone replied to the screen shot that maybe it should be taken down since it was literally created and pushed from a propaganda account. They were reported for being insensitive to PoC employees

These are just a few out of the dozens upon dozens. I'm sure many others here on HN could provide examples.