Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

This is addressed in TFA.

> [W]hen I go to work, I go to work, and not to a debate club. Some people at Google reacted by saying “well if he’s so wrong, then why not refute him,” but that requires spending a significant amount of time building an argument against the claims in his document. On the other hand, if I remain silent, that silence could be mistaken for agreement. I should not be forced into that kind of debate at work. (Ida)

> I’m just exhausted by having this same damn argument over and over again since I was a teenager and the amount of time and energy I keep having to spend to counter it. (Edith)

Also, none of the "quoted phrases" that you criticized appear in TFA or in any parent comment.

I sympathise with the woman saying she'd much rather just focus on code rather than social justice debates. But, as flippant as it is for a guy to say it, it's their cross to bear isnt it? Women in tech. Because, if they don't speak up, then what? Where does that leave us? Should the "other side" also not speak up? Just focus on code? Should they suppress real emotions that they're feeling?

I'm not flaming, just wondering what the best-case way forward would be that mollifies both sides.

> [W]hen I go to work, I go to work, and not to a debate club.

Sure. But people on the wrong side of the Google monoculture feel like they have to be closeted at work. They don't want to feel that way either. There has to be a way for everyone to be professional and honest here.

I don't care if the women I work with don't speak up. If I see sexism I will (and in fact have on more than one occasion) call it out. I use discussions with my wife and with women I've worked with in the past regarding how sexism in the workplace works to help me identify it in cases where it may be ambiguous or even something I'd never considered to be sexist.

It does help identify those cases when women do speak out, though. My view is we should listen more to them about what sexism is and how it works.

Good. People who think we don't need diversity efforts or that think studies of aggregates should be applied to determine efforts for smaller specialized populations or individuals should keep it to themselves. I wouldn't want a racist to feel comfortable quoting Bell Curve "research" or criminal population composition numbers at work,for many of the same reasons.

This seems roughly cognate to "There are people who want to do their jobs, and there are people who want to poke the people in Group A with sticks. Should an employer constrain Group B from poking the people in Group A altogether just because Group A doesn't want to participate?" I think most people would easily answer, "Yes, we should prevent people from going around poking unwilling coworkers with sticks, and they should also be prevented from getting around the rule by throwing sticks around and just 'happening' to hit those coworkers, because it's not useful to have people doing that in your workplace and it disrupts Group A." I don't think anybody would really say, "Getting poked with sticks is just Group A's cross to bear."

It seems like you're holding a significant double standard here, which is exactly why Damore feels his views are systemically quashed.

For example, that line of reasoning would go: Damore saw practices he feels are discriminatory based on the available evidence. His silence could be mistaken for agreement. He should not be forced into that kind of debate at work.

So you're saying that any research or argument that comes to a conclusion you disagree with should be equated with the research and arguments that Neo-Nazis use? How progressive, open-minded, and forward thinking. That this is a widely held viewpoint on these things ought to be more disturbing than the memo.

> People who think we don't need diversity efforts

The memo in question explicitly supported the goal of improving diversity and provided concrete suggestions on how to do so.

> a racist

i can't help but feel that this is more and more just a boo-word that doesn't actually mean much.

Ideally, the one whose views are the least congruent with reality in a harmful way should feel more pressure and less freedom to express their opinion (because people won't be interested in hearing nonsense).

Finding the approaches and views that are most coherently grounded in reality is obviously a continuously difficult task.

We shouldn't treat people poorly just for being wrong, unless their expressions of views is actively harmful. Making that determination can also be very difficult.

Lastly, as a slight tangent, no human knowledge is or ever will be 100% certain and robust (although in some specific domains we can attain incredibly high confidence). We should keep this uncertainty in mind when we act.

No, that's not at all what I wrote.

being closely followed by "nazi"

Fair points, and as I said, even I tend to fall in the camp of "work is for work" a lot of the times. On the other hand, to play devil's advocate, I think you're being uncharitable by comparing them to "stick pokers" as if they've nothing better to do. I tend to believe that the topic is important enough that, "just let me do my work" isn't an adequate answer, and trivialises the concerns of a sizeable swathe of even Google employees.

Am I correct in understanding that you think he's a conservative who is lying about supporting diversity? What led you to this conclusion? It seems odd to me to believe a conservative who doesn't support diversity would write a memo that ascribes negative consequences to right wing viewpoints and provides suggestions for improving diversity.

>There has to be a way for everyone to be professional and honest here.

I agree, but just because there has to be a way for everyone to be professional and honest, that doesn't mean that what Damore did was professional and honest.

I'm not prepared to fault him because I don't see how he could have been both professional and honest in discussing this issue. I think workplace norms need to evolve in one direction or another.

Except that people are just discussing ideas in a rational way, at least aspirationally. There aren't any physical sticks.

This is complex because people desire for fairness and respect in incompatible ways. If we analogize away one of those problems, of course the right decision seems obvious.

EDIT: I think the incompatibility is a result of some rules and norms that need changing. I don't think the conflict is a law of nature.

Not being able to come up with a way to do what you want does not mean you are correct to just do what you want anyway.

> Sure. But people on the wrong side of the Google monoculture feel like they have to be closeted at work. They don't want to feel that way either

Everyone has to be closed at work; it's a part of being in a professional environment. For example, you can't go up to your co-worker and tell them you think they're a complete idiot even if you think so.

In social settings this is possible because relationships can just end, but that's not the case for a business where you are expected to interact with the same people often.

This would be a reasonable take to me if the issue he took up could reasonably be described as significantly affecting his everyday work life; the key difference I see in your "double standard" is that the woman can't walk away from being a woman in a male dominated profession.

I'm not sure anyone can come up with a better way to discuss the issue. I'm open to ideas if you have any.

I've asked this around HN many times over the last week. Most of them boil down to letting people who probably disagree with you edit your thoughts before you release them. Or not releasing your thoughts in any meaningful way.

If you were Damore, what would have been a healthier way to start a broader discussion on the issue?

Ano/pseudonymity.

Hindsight is 20/20. But honestly falling back to ano/pseudo feels like a loss.

Would this have happened if the paper had been written by a woman?

> For example, you can't go up to your co-worker and tell them you think they're a complete idiot even if you think so.

Sure you can - if you are supported Trump, or were even just he prevailed over Hillary, thousands of people in Google either called you an idiot or agreed with the statement. You should have heard the tone of conversation on the 9th. Between that and the cry-ins that were hosted, it was an absolutely disgusting, pathetic display of personal bias and lack of understanding of a large swath of America.

Sheer indignation changes nothing.

The "diversity culture" Left has been very succesful in a kind of cultural engineering where any deviation from accepted consensus is inches from being labeled "hate". Lone wolf kamikaze-type performances will only strengthen it.

What the fucking alt-right has been doing about this is trying to ignore the facts altogether, which may have populist impact but will alienate the professional/intellectual circles where this consensus takes root.

Maybe it's worth looking at the much-cited-in-this-thread Wired piece that agrees with Damore about everything substantive and then in full non sequitur condemns him.They're doing something effective.

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Frankly, I have no idea of what to do about the toxic change in culture we have been experiencing. I try to avoid this kind of thining altogether -- it's a huge distraction from just trying to become the best version of me, etc. But I do understand that indignation and anger on our side is a windfall for theirs. If you're really willing to take them on you need to think seriously about strategy.