[pacarvalho]

Tricky. Politics/societal/economic/etc issues such as this one are very important to be discussed. However, companies are a place for work.

Talking to co-workers can be quite fulfilling and exciting when conversing about engineering, marketing, or other work related subjects you are passionate about. However, anytime politics, etc are brought up I (for one) leave the conversation feeling in a worse state of mind than when I first got into it. That is very unproductive.

For this reason, I believe that the workplace should be left to work related things (including conversations) and anything else should ideally be done out of work. Even if involving the same group of people.

[015a]

I'm not sorry for taking the opposite opinion, and its strictly for the reason that: these megacorps will, at the drop of a hat, spend millions in donations and lobbying for whatever causes their executives believe furthers the goals of the business [1]. "We the executives" are allowed to talk about it, and pay for what we believe is right, but "you the line workers", shut up, if you don't like it go work somewhere else.

If they want to stay out of politics, then do that. But its extremely difficult for modern businesses to not have a hand in politics. That's fine; and to some degree I respect the line companies like Coinbase walk, where they push agendas that are fairly directly related to their business. Meta goes far beyond that, into financing for (great and important!) issues like voter suppression & minority representation. If they're going to open the floodgates, they can't be uncomfortable when some murky water comes flooding in.

[1] https://about.facebook.com/facebook-political-engagement/

[duckmysick]

> I'm not sorry for taking the opposite opinion, and its strictly for the reason that: these megacorps will, at the drop of a hat, spend millions in donations and lobbying for whatever causes their executives believe furthers the goals of the business [1].

How would this apply in small businesses or businesses that don't engage in lobbying?

[bogantech]

> "We the executives" are allowed to talk about it, and pay for what we believe is right, but "you the line workers", shut up, if you don't like it go work somewhere else.

Yes because the line workers don't just discuss it they fight over it and make everyone angry / depressed and destroy productivity

[Volundr]

And the executives don't make people depressed and angry and destroy productivity?

[bogantech]

Not as much as people who don't stop screaming about <latest outrage> in slack all day every day. There's always something and it never stops

[Volundr]

I can't agree with this. I've never found disagreement between co-workers to have near the effect on moral as having some executive take the opportunity to lecture people about it in an all hands or make their personal opinion the official position of the company.

[in_cahoots]

Companies proudly proclaim that employees should bring their ‘whole selves’ to work. They sponsor resource groups for parents, women, minorities, gay/lesbian/trans, Christian/Muslim/Jewish, and vet employees. But when employees want to actually talk about the issues rather than watch ‘empowering’ motivational speakers, then bringing your whole self to work is suddenly a distraction.

They can’t have it both ways.

[collegeburner]

Just as importantly they are very toxic to a set of political viewpoints. In some industries (O&G) that is liberal ones. In some industries (tech) that is conservative ones. In some industries (finance) that is most things outside centrist (Romney Republican, Manchin Democrat).

When the "activist" types push politics into workplaces they are not doing it so they can talk about what they feel. They are doing it so they can find the people who disagree and damage their careers. Maybe I am cynical here but I have seen careers be seriously damaged this way.

[ungamedplayer]

> They are doing it so they can find the people who disagree and damage their careers.

This leads to some people actively avoiding working with and for any kind of activist, or anyone related to activists. If you can see middle ground in any non extreme argument, one must be a bigot.

[zer01]

> When the "activist" types push politics into workplaces they are not doing it so they can talk about what they feel. They are doing it so they can find the people who disagree and damage their careers.

This sounds like your position is that anyone who advocates for anything (esp. when it's directly impacting them, but unrelated to work) only has one singular goal of weeding out disagreement and getting rid of it, which I think is ridiculous.

Humans are social creatures and we largely shape our perspectives by iterating with new data and communication. People can be (and IMO largely are) advocates for things that are important to them, have opinions on things, and don't have a singular focus of destroying anyone with different viewpoints.

On the other side, all humans have their limits to cooperation. As you have social interactions with anyone your viewpoint of them change, and realistically if I find out something about a co-worker through discussion like they believe that the 2020 election was stolen because Trump told them so it does inevitably make me scrutinize this person harder. What if you found out that a co-worker thought black people were genetically inferior or that women don't deserve to vote? At that point it's hard to work with someone with such a fundamentally different view of the world.

Is it "cancel culture" to say "we don't want nazis to work here"?

[panaceaeaea]

> Is it "cancel culture" to say "we don't want nazis to work here"?

I find people throwing around the word "nazi" in this way incredibly offensive. Every time I hear a non-Jewish person throw this word around as a political accusation it makes me sick to my stomach

and why does it make me sick to my stomach? Because it shows how people have become so detached from the atrocities of the 20th century that they have the audacity to throw around that word and use it as a political tool. Please find a different word to describe people you disagree with

[zer01]

This I think is where a lot of the "leave your politics at home" falls apart. People's identities are basically a collection of the things they believe in and advocate for.

People work much better when they're happy and can be themselves with like-minded individuals. Companies like Google realized this in the 90s and ensured that they proactively have what they need to be happy (feeding employees, paying for healthcare premiums, etc) to great success. You see this continue with things like this https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31871581 IMO.

It's really easy to say that you as a business care about gay rights in order to have gay employees come work for you, but if you then contribute political donations to a politician who sees gay people as an abomination you can't seriously be surprise when people go "hey what the fuck".

[landemva]

>> Companies proudly proclaim that employees should bring their ‘whole selves’ to work.

I have never encountered that with an employer. Is that a California thing?

[tbrownaw]

It's a DEI thing.

[jimbob45]

Managers cited a policy that put "strong guardrails around social, political and sensitive conversations" in the workplace, according to company insiders, the newspaper reported.

While I fully agree with what you’re saying, I’m wondering if Facebook actually agrees with you and that this is simply an application of existing policy or if this is a one-off experiment for them. The article seems a bit unclear.

[zeronine]

better keep my mouth shut then, can't have the productivity police issuing me a conversation penalty or i might end up in the stop-being-human prison

[gruez]

>can't have the productivity police issuing me a conversation penalty or i might end up in the stop-being-human prison

Alright, it's clear that you're against this, but what's the argument for allowing this? In other words, why should the company tolerate using its channels as a soapbox to advance your political agendas, especially if it's a drain on productivity? I want to shitpost on company time/equipment/networks as much as the other guy, but let's not pretend it's some sort of right, or that being denied the ability to do that is some sort of moral tragedy.

[z3phyr]

In the past, the power to set policy was in the hands of the few aristocrats, whose full time job was to discuss and fight over policy, while the lay people worked their fields. We fought hard to take that power from them.

Now a company asks its employees to forgo that power and liberty. Why did we take the power of policy from the aristocrats in the first place? We can of course go back to shut up, work the field peasant model and let them enjoy discussing policy for us while we produce goods.

What comes first? Your employer or your rights?

[drewcoo]

> In the past, the power to set policy was in the hands of the few aristocrats, whose full time job was to discuss and fight over policy, while the lay people worked their fields.

I don't think the French, for example, applied guillotines to solve the problem of "aristocrats talking too much policy."

[Hydraulix989]

You're at work doing a job, you aren't getting paid to converse about non work matters. If working at say Coinbase or any other apolitical tech company isn't your cup of tea, then there are plenty of politically charged places you can work instead that also need software engineers such as the CTO office of the President, Defense tech, think tanks, Congressional offices, Twitter, Planned Parenthood, PETA, and any other activist group really. It depends on what you're looking for. I can certainly understand why some companies may wish to be politically neutral, as choosing sides can be bad for business and against shareholder interests.

[drewcoo]

If I'm at work doing a job, then I'm paid to get the job done. And how I manage my time and what I'm allowed to think or discuss are my concern.

There is no such monster as "politically neutral." That is synonymous with "supporting the status quo," which is a political stance. It's the trolley problem - not deciding is still opting into a bad option.

[fatherzine]

It's not the trolley problem. There are plenty of avenues for political activism /outside/ the workplace. Adults should be capable of not conflating the workplace with their entire existence. The only acceptable activism is unionization, understood as narrowly focused on workplace issues.

For a sample size of one, while I am very guilty of having many politically charged conversations with coworkers, I have always kept them physically /outside/ the workplace. At work we confine conversations strictly about business and customers.

[paulryanrogers]

With healthcare tied to employment I don't think this issue can be considered strictly unrelated to work.

[claytongulick]

Working for an employer is selling your time and effort to them.

During the time that the employer is purchasing from you, your duty is to your employer, fulfilling their legal requests.

If you don't fulfill this duty, they will no longer have a desire to buy your time.

It's really not any more complicated than that.

[Kinrany]

Fortunately the reverse also works*: if the employer doesn't follow the rules the employees agreed on, they will no longer want to sell their time.

*but less often because it's harder for employees to coordinate

[klyrs]

Funny how HN is chock full of diehard libertarian free speech absolutists, but if you've got a job, check your personhood at the door.

[hestefisk]

It’s hard to segregate politics from other things in life. Politics influences most things in life - our work, our school, what we can and can’t do. If I follow your claim, then corporations shouldn’t take a stance on climate change either. Is that really right?

[andrew_]

Only for people who accept that as fact, or who openly invite into every aspect of their lives. Before the internet it was not so common to air one's bullshit, if you will.

[drewcoo]

Were you alive before the Internet?

Life used to be, if anything, more political.

Earlier in the 20th century, there were a lot more (local) newspapers and they all had very pointed points of view. Radio stations tended to be independent and if they had news broadcasts, it would be hyper-local and often political. Hell, thriving union membership gave us the greatest prosperity this country has seen and unions are very political.

In the first half of the 20th century we even had such a healthy, political society that more than two parties were often deemed viable.

In the 19th century the arguments for papers still hold. And voter turnout was much higher[1], albeit more male and more white.

[1] https://historyincharts.com/the-history-of-voter-turnout-in-...

[andrew_]

Approximately half of my life has been pre-broadband (which for me defines the arrival of the modern, very-online Internet). I find your points to be heavily biased and unrelatable. You're also conflating the media with the individual. My own experience before the arrival of very-online-internet does not match what you describe. Sure, there were media outlets and those outlets spoke about politics. However, individuals had no easily accessible soap boxes to speed vitriol and hurl accusations at others anonymously as they do now. Individuals didn't announce their preferences and every opinion to the neighborhood.

[CalChris]

> However, companies are a place for work.

That is a fine rule if work expects nothing of you when you clock out at 5 pm.

[drewcoo]

Actually, it's not fine then either.

People have rights. And they have needs and desires. And companies that are driven primarily to make profit will ignore those things.

[anothernewdude]

You'd love the show Severance.

[spacexsucks]

Policy affects daily life. A stable daily life leads to a productive worker. Wanting stable work but not doing anything to support the workers life is the biggest most capitalistic thing too. Heartless and inhumane

[nso95]

Arguing about it on Slack isn't going to fix any of it though

[JKCalhoun]

It's venting. It's bonding with coworkers who also feel their world is collapsing.

Hard to focus on work, talk about the preso when, for example, people are storming our Capitol.

[yabatopia]

Venting doesn't work: https://slate.com/technology/2022/03/venting-makes-you-feel-... .

HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30601594 .

[stormcode]

It sure works for me.

[spoils19]

Did you even read the article? It doesn't work.

[Thorrez]

I don't think the venting will be beneficial if it ends up in a debate.

Talking about abortion will be more likely to stir up a debate than talking about the storming of the Capitol.

[drewcoo]

It depends on what "fix" means. It could get people more informed, involved, etc.

Banning political speech is a great step toward convincing employees to unionize, so I applaud Meta for this, though.

[snidane]

The company doesn't have the power to change politics like that, so there is no point in getting the company involved or pick sides. The only neutral solution is to ban political discussions in the workplace, same as it should be in schools. Any other way leads to a psychologically unsafe environment to work at, which definitely doesn't lead to a stable daily life and thus a productive worker.

[genocidicbunny]

A company like Meta absolutely has the power to weigh in on the politics. It wouldn't be pretty and would get a lot of blowback, but they can absolutely affect the politics. They could ban any anti-abortion messaging, they could promote pro-choice viewpoints, they could block proponents of the recent decision. They could change their algorithms to manipulate people's feeds in any which way -- for example, show a pro-lifer only pro-choice topics. They could do the complete opposite of that too. If they wanted to, they could absolutely shut down one side of the debate to the benefit of the other.

[woodruffw]

Meta doesn’t have the power to change politics? Hasn’t the last two years of Section 230 handwringing focused squarely on their outsized influence over political discourse?

[jen20]

Companies absolutely have the power to change this: with their donations. There is a reason that “Citizens United” is such a drag on humanity.

[stormcode]

You're saying Meta doesn't have the power to change politics? Where have you been since 2016.

[drewcoo]

> The company doesn't have the power to change politics like that,

Then tell them to stop lobbying. Period.

[panaceaeaea]

> Wanting stable work but not doing anything to support the workers life is the biggest most capitalistic thing too.

I think that companies can fight the recent decision without allowing employees to get in arguments with one another and be at each others throats over such a polarizing issue.

Not allowing people to proselytize at work would likely make it more stable. It's sort of like in ancient Persia where they didn't allow missionaries: because they cause unnecessary friction