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Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

(blog.ycombinator.com)
1080 points cbcowans | 19 comments | 15 Aug 17 19:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source | bottom
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hedgew ◴[15 Aug 17 19:57 UTC] No.15021772[source]▶
Many of the more reasonable criticisms of the memo say that it wasn't written well enough; it could've been more considerate, it should have used better language, or better presentation. In this particular link, Scott Alexander is used as an example of better writing, and he certainly is one of the best and most persuasive modern writers I've found. However, I can not imagine ever matching his talent and output, even if I practiced for years to try and catch up.

I do not think that anyone's ability to write should disbar them from discussion. We can not expect perfection from others. Instead we should try to understand them as human beings, and interpret them with generosity and kindness.

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ryanbrunner ◴[15 Aug 17 20:06 UTC] No.15021858[source]▶
I think one thing that struck me from the linked article was the point that the memo wasn't structured to invite discussion. It wasn't "let's have a chat", it was "here's an evidence bomb of how you're all wrong".

I think advancing points is fine, but if you're after productive discussion rather than an adversarial debate, you need to proactively invite discussion. And if an adversarial debate was what he was after, that does strike me as inappropriate work communication.

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nicolashahn ◴[15 Aug 17 20:25 UTC] No.15022073[source]▶
Then the correct way to handle it is to drop another refutational evidence bomb attacking his primary points instead of picking the low hanging fruit of claiming it's "too confrontational," "poorly written," "naive," or whatever other secondary problems exist (this is aside from wilfully misrepresenting his claims, which is definitely a bigger problem). Plenty of far more aggressive articles and essays have been written from the opposite side that have not been criticized in the same way.

And for the record, I did not get any aggressive tone from his paper. I thought he was as polite as he needed to be and made the necessary caveats. I think many people were just so unprepared to hear any argument from an opposing viewpoint that they read into it what they wanted to.

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Blackthorn ◴[15 Aug 17 20:32 UTC] No.15022166[source]▶
> Then the correct way to handle it is to drop another refutational evidence bomb attacking his primary points instead of picking the low hanging fruit of claiming it's "too confrontational," "poorly written," "naive," or whatever other secondary problems exist (this is aside from wilfully misrepresenting his claims, which is definitely a bigger problem).

This was addressed in the article. This burden has fallen on women since they were teenagers. To expect them to do it yet again, to have to defend themselves at work this time, is ridiculous.

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1. totalZero ◴[15 Aug 17 20:38 UTC] No.15022234[source]▶
The burden of responding to something that is (at the very least presented as) evidence? I don't think it's possible to have a discussion if you don't expect and allow pro-affirmative-action stakeholders to respond with their own evidence and reasoning, in turn.
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2. Blackthorn ◴[15 Aug 17 20:43 UTC] No.15022286[source]▶
He could have brought up his concerns to hiring authorities in the company, whose job it is to refute diversity myths. Not expect people who have had this burden placed on them for their entire adult life to do it yet again.
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3. lliamander ◴[15 Aug 17 20:48 UTC] No.15022336[source]▶
He did, a month or more before the fiasco.
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4. Blackthorn ◴[15 Aug 17 20:50 UTC] No.15022371{3}[source]▶
And that's exactly where he should have stopped. If he did not like the result, he should have resigned in a much less public manner.
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5. ◴[15 Aug 17 21:01 UTC] No.15022522[source]▶
6. lliamander ◴[15 Aug 17 21:04 UTC] No.15022554{4}[source]▶
The result from HR was silence. He never intended for the memo to go public, but he did want feedback from his colleagues. If HR didn't want the issue going further, they should have actually responded to him.
7. cityhall ◴[15 Aug 17 21:11 UTC] No.15022629{4}[source]▶
"Everyone who doesn't agree with me should shut up and go away."
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8. rakoo ◴[15 Aug 17 21:31 UTC] No.15022824{4}[source]▶
But he saw a problem and wanted to fix it. You're basically saying he should have left the problem where it is and pretend itsr not there, which is not what engineers typically do. Can you blame him for that?
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9. dang ◴[15 Aug 17 21:56 UTC] No.15023059{5}[source]▶
Please don't post snarky one-liners to HN, especially not in divisive discussions, where they make things significantly worse.

Also, please don't use quotation marks to make it look like you're quoting someone when you're not.

10. mejari ◴[15 Aug 17 22:14 UTC] No.15023196[source]▶
It's not just "pro-affirmative-action stakeholders" that are expected to respond. _As referenced in the article_, it's extending to expecting women to come up with responses just because they are women. You're talking about a situation where one side (the side of the manifesto) has dropped an "evidence bomb", some of which may be valid, some not, and is now complaining "why won't you have a discussion?" They weren't invited to a discussion, they weren't talked _to_, they were talked _at_, and are now being looked to as the defenders of their gender when they just want to do their damn job.
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11. nyolfen ◴[15 Aug 17 22:38 UTC] No.15023385[source]▶
this is textbook tone policing. it's an essay, not a spoken dialogue. you could say this about, say, a published study about climate change projections.
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12. mejari ◴[15 Aug 17 22:42 UTC] No.15023403{3}[source]▶
You can throw buzzwords designed to shut down discussion at me all you want, that's irrelevant. He claims his goal was to have a dialogue, the fact is that he chose a very poor way of doing that. Either his goals aren't what he claims or he misunderstood how to accomplish them.
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13. mcfunk ◴[15 Aug 17 22:59 UTC] No.15023508[source]▶
This is exactly it. Women in spaces (virtual, in-person, in their workplaces) are being forced into this conversation to defend ourselves, because this "bomb" was dropped/leaked, outside of all relevant context, and now hype and focusing illusions have made it our job to make evolutionary psych-based arguments against it. I don't know what Damore's intent was, but the effect was to put people who disagreed with him, and especially women who disagreed with him, at an immediate disadvantage, rather than to reach out to them for the sake of a conversation.
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14. smallnamespace ◴[16 Aug 17 00:08 UTC] No.15023917{3}[source]▶
It seems like the disadvantage fell squarely on Damore's shoulders here, considering he was the one who was actually fired.

It's definitely horrible for people to feel like they don't belong. But I would argue that feeling like your job is at risk is a lesser threat than actually losing your job, no?

15. smallnamespace ◴[16 Aug 17 00:10 UTC] No.15023929{4}[source]▶
In all fairness, we it did at least provoke an internal debate, e.g. this discussion.
16. totalZero ◴[16 Aug 17 01:16 UTC] No.15024234{3}[source]▶
> Women in spaces [...] are being forced into this conversation to defend ourselves

Shouldn't women inherently be part of a conversation about systematically augmenting their gender's presence in the workplace?

Or do you believe that beneficiaries of affirmative action should not be expected to comment on its existence and validity from time to time?

Not a rhetorical question. Either position is potentially defensible IMO. Just want to know where you stand.

17. matt_wulfeck ◴[16 Aug 17 04:08 UTC] No.15024877{4}[source]▶
Considering this is one of the most explosively discussed topics on HN and in the industry I would say he's been wildly successful at starting a discussion.
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18. fma ◴[16 Aug 17 05:09 UTC] No.15025081{5}[source]▶
Not just engineers...That kind of mentality does not advance society.

Imagine..."She thought black people should not have to sit at the back of the bus. She told authorities who just remained silent. She should have sucked it up and moved to the north!"

19. mejari ◴[18 Aug 17 00:43 UTC] No.15042471{5}[source]▶
I can start a discussion about racism in the US by going on TV and yelling the n-word, that doesn't mean that I did a good job of opening a constructive dialogue.