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Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

(blog.ycombinator.com)
1080 points cbcowans | 2 comments | 15 Aug 17 19:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.413s | source
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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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joe_the_user ◴[15 Aug 17 20:10 UTC] No.15021907[source]▶
I'd actually say just the opposite - the memo seemed to be written as well and in as conciliatory manner as it could be written and the memo made good (or at least plausible) point and bad points. But the bad points were so bad that it was appropriate and necessary to fire Damore.

Essentially, as analogy, there's no way for a person to say "Black people are inferior and shouldn't be hired", as a message broadcast through their entire workplace, and not have that person be creating a hostile work environment for African Americans. If that person says "I don't mean in general, I mean inferior just for this occupation, I don't mean inferior, just 'differently talented, they've got great rhythm'", it doesn't matter, if that person says "here's a study which says this, we should consider this in an open minded fashion" it doesn't matter. The message is unacceptable. That person is done, that person should be done.

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jandrese ◴[15 Aug 17 20:21 UTC] No.15022025[source]▶
It's entirely possible for an argument to be correct, but too narrowly focused.

If you're saying "group X is inferior and and I can prove it mathematically", that's still wrong because those people don't have a choice about being a member of that group and still exist in society. Discriminating against them drags society down. It's a prisoners dilemma. If everybody hires fairly then the relative drag is spread across the entire economy and everyone comes out better in the end. If they try to cheat then they'll have a local advantage but in the end it only encourages everyone else to cheat and you end up in the worst case scenario with the massive drag on society as a whole.

So the only rational solution for these corporations is to pretend to be as inclusive as possible while secretly trying to cheat as much as possible, which is exactly what we see. When some dumbass publishes a paper to the entire world saying "Hey, we should openly cheat.", of course he's going to get fired.

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generic_user ◴[15 Aug 17 20:56 UTC] No.15022444[source]▶
Or you can just move most of your operations to Asia or Eastern Europe where they don't have these western liberal ideological impediments to business. And Ironically provide a higher percentage of highly qualified Women in STEM professions.
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mathw ◴[15 Aug 17 21:29 UTC] No.15022810[source]▶
Well what do you know, I think you just proved that the ratio of qualified women in STEM professions in the Western world is due to cultural discrimination or disincentivisation instead of inherent capability!
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MollyR ◴[15 Aug 17 21:54 UTC] No.15023045[source]▶
As a korean woman, I can tell you its the opposite. We don't have the luxury of pursuing passion jobs.

I would have preferred to be an artist or a philosopher, bu t my family was poor and had bills to pay.

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1. studentrob ◴[15 Aug 17 22:23 UTC] No.15023273[source]▶
Are men there not impacted in the same way?

Point being it is too complicated to nail down a biological factor that was determined from birth.

No culture is completely free from environmental influence. As we age, the influences from our youth act like compound interest. These can change the way we think. Nurture impacts nature, and vice versa. The generally accepted view these days is the process is cyclical,

"neurological traits develop over time under the simultaneous influence of epigenetic, genetic and environmental influences. Everything about humans involves both nature and nurture" [1]

[1] https://www.quora.com/What-do-scientists-think-about-the-bio...

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2. jules ◴[16 Aug 17 02:36 UTC] No.15024556[source]▶
Men are impacted the same way. The argument in the memo is that (1) tech jobs are passion jobs for men to a greater degree than women, hence in societies where people are more able to follow their passion you'd see relatively more men in tech (2) men compete on financial success to a greater degree than women, even if this is not required for survival, so in affluent societies you'd see relatively more men in tech. This would explain why the difference is greater in societies where there is less economic pressure, even though those societies are on average more egalitarian.