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by ALittleLight 1648 days ago
I don't know why you are saying "everyone involved agrees that Google doesn't match broad population trends". Are the men at Google taller than the women at Google? Google employees are probably unusual in variables that relate to their work with computers, but it's not at all obvious that they would be unusual on other traits, like height, for example, or assertiveness, cooperativeness, etc.

Regarding Damore sharing his memo - he shared it in places where the topic was being discussed. He wasn't mailing this to all workers, but posting it in groups that were discussing diversity and asking for feedback. If Damore's memo had reached different conclusions - like say that Google had fewer women because of sexism in education and implicit biases among hiring committees, and he had shared it in the same places, would he have been fired? I think we both know the answer to that.
1 comments
joshuamorton 1648 days ago
> I don't know why you are saying "everyone involved agrees that Google doesn't match broad population trends".

The gender balance at Google is not representative of the broad population. Presumably there are axes on which Google's demographics match population demographics, but we're talking about one axis where everyone involved agrees that they don't.

> Regarding Damore sharing his memo - he shared it in places where the topic was being discussed. He wasn't mailing this to all workers, but posting it in groups that were discussing diversity and asking for feedback.

Right, and it got basically no response, until he finally posted it in a very large group that wasn't related to diversity. As I understand it, there were months between when he initially wrote and shared it with D&I people and and when he posted it in the big group where it went viral.

> If Damore's memo had reached different conclusions - like say that Google had fewer women because of sexism in education and implicit biases among hiring committees

I'm not clear what your point is. You seem to be arguing that "because one view is acceptable to express in the workplace, we must be allowed to express the opposite view in the workplace" or something. But that doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

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ALittleLight 1647 days ago
While people agree that the genders are imbalanced at Google that doesn't mean there is any reason to think that traits that typically differ within genders differ in different ways within Google. The example I gave previously is of height, I still think that's relevant. Just because Google is X% female and Y% male and X << Y that doesn't mean that we should necessarily expect females at Google are as tall or taller than males. They might be, but we have no reason to expect that. Why should we default to other expectations for different traits that are unrelated to their work? e.g. cooperativeness or assertiveness?

My earlier point, which you seemed confused about, is that Damore was fired for disagreeing with the orthodoxy. You seemed and seem to be implying that he shared his opinion in an incorrect. You write that he "finally posted it in a very large group" as if this were some crime. And yet, if he were expressing Google dogma, it wouldn't have been a problem. This illustrates that the problem is not where he posted his feedback but simply what he posted.

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RangerScience 1647 days ago
> what not where

Strong disagree that those are the only two possibilities. I hold that most of the issue was how he presented his thoughts.

Regardless, you'd have to prove, first, that "what" and "where" are the only possibilities before your deduction can be solid.

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