Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

Some of my most libertarian/pro-gun friends have not been shy about their political views and it hasn't hurt their tech careers at all. They are far more welcome here than liberals are in other parts of the country.

It seems to me, from personal experience, that the people who feel alienated are the ones who bring politics to work in an overbearing contrarian way, seeking to cause offense under the guise of "debate," and then pretend to be shocked when people don't want to put up with their shit. Work is for working; it's not a debating society, and especially not when the debating is done in bad faith.

Peter Thiel has been more politically vocal than most, and he is vocal about things he knows to be unpopular. He can't be surprised that people who disagree with him are also vocal. If he can't take the heat he should stay out of the kitchen.

I think that's the whole point though. The article is saying that there is too much heat simply because they express their opposing viewpoints. "Stay out of the kitchen" means "close your mouth around Silicon Valley liberals" or you'll experience backlash.

While this may not be your personal experience, the article essentially says that the somewhat ironic message coming out of the Valley from people in the "party of tolerance" is that they tolerate everyone except those that have opposing viewpoints.

No, it means don't expect to be able to say controversial stuff without people who disagree with you also having their say.

Exactly, that's why he moved away.

It's interesting that you specifically choose "libertarian". While maybe technically further to the right than Republican it truly seems supporting specifically Republican candidates is wholly furiously unacceptable in the bay area -- especially at tech companies. Try wearing a pin, t-shirt, hat, etc... "openly" supporting Trump to a tech company in the city -- actually for the safety of your career and physical self better not.

Look, if you're going to speak at the RNC and actively support Trump, you will be on the opposite side of a super-majority of college-educated people in this country at this point. And definitely a large super-majority of people under 35, women, Asian Americans, Latinos and African Americans. So if you're surrounded by such people, and are loudly promoting such views, don't expect your interlocutors to not criticize them, or necessarily want to hear them ad nauseum.

The evidence however suggests that Mr. Thiel is certainly being given PLENTY of platforms to continue expressing his viewpoints in a respectful manner in front of influential crowds of people, including students. Who is pushing this whole narrative?

Adding this as an edit: Also, do you work in the Bay Area currently (you mentioned you grew up there)? There is a pretty substantial discrepancy between voicing political views in high school and college vs. when people actually start working. I have met more than an order of magnitude more conservatives and non-liberals in 4 years of university in the Bay Area as compared working in tech there - 25 to 30 in unviersity vs. exactly 1 in industry. Also edited in the fact that I work in the Bay Area in the first sentence, so I realized I didn't mention it until the last.

I understand that there are many people who voted for Trump, but that does not mean that the opinion is something that should be considered being in line with the norms of the free society and far past conservative viewpoint.

(Not in the sense that you have no right to your opinion, in the sense that person having that opinion loses the respect of others.)

At my last job, several employees openly supported Trump, and they didn't suffer any consequences.

I also think it is odd that we can see the flaws in everyone everywhere else, but the flaws in our own environ seem so hard to spot. I'm reminded of this in these times: http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html

> Diff present ideas against those of various past cultures, and see what you get. Some will be shocking by present standards. Ok, fine; but which might also be true?

The norms you mention are obviously not where you think they are. I think you may be out of touch.

It's the same with Trump. Some voters - many millions of them - overlooked his many flaws and voted for him, for any of a variety of reasons. That doesn't automatically make them racists, bigots, sexists, idiots, or any of the other labels that liberals like to put on Trump voters. I'm not even endorsing a specific viewpoint here - I'm just saying that instantly ostracizing someone from their workplace social scene (if not their job altogether) based on one data point that by itself means next to nothing is wrong.

Thiel has been around for a long time and his views have been given extensive consideration - I'd say he's a well known public figure out here on the west coast. It seems to me that people have listened to him and that a significant fraction have subsequently arrived at a negative conclusion about him.

I don't care very much but there are a ton of people out there afraid of being damore'd.

> People in Silicon Valley “openly lie to one another out of fear of losing their jobs or being publicly crucified..."

> Sometimes Silicon Valley venture-capital investors and startup founders “have a certain way of thinking, and if you don’t fit into that way of thinking you’re not in the cool club”

are things that I can absolutely identify with. And I consider myself a moderate liberal, I can only imagine what mainstream conservatives are thinking.

You can be dismissed from leading a company today by privately supporting conservative causes. And there’s very little threat of a liberal CEO being dismissed independent of his private/public statements.

I have no desire to speak to any particular political subject in this forum; but it’s incredibly disingenuous to pretend this only happens to people who take public conservative positions.

Though even the charitable reading of your statement suggests that you believe that conservatives should stay in the closest. Which is a fascinating turn to say the least...

And, as a religious conservative guy in tech I’ll add my point of view: it’s okay to talk politics at work as long as you agree with everyone else. Those of us with dissenting world paradigms spend most of the day quietly wishing these conversations would end. Because there isn’t debate to be had at work; dissenting views are not welcome.

I'm hesitant to share anecdotes so I'll keep them fuzzy, but a few things I've seen are along the lines of places removing a comedic joke item because it /might/ give a newcomer the impression that the place "normalizes fascism" (rationale was fear someone wouldn't understand it's a joke and thus let's err on the side of keeping the space sterile), and hiring/comp policies designed around explicitly not paying men more than woman for the same role (everyone's the same role when your company doesn't have roles...) regardless of experience, performance, market, etc. at the expense of acquiring or retaining outstanding talent. And look what happened at Google...

It all comes from good intentions, but IMO it really just misses the mark and reduces an otherwise complex and human landscape to arbitrary statistics and n=1 anecdotes. There is very little intellectual rigor, or proven methodology and a lot of pandering to the political atmosphere (and this happens at places juggling millions of dollars of investor capital). On top of that, I don't understand why the office needs to be the place to explore these issues. If there are objectively systemic issues and discrepancies between e.g. genders in the US today that need correction, then we need to solve those with government policy and social activism. And if our society and our system of government does not respond, perhaps you just have to grow up realize that despite your self-endowed intellectual infallibility, some other people disagree and you might be barking up the wrong tree. Or, don't concede and keep fighting for justice, but don't bring it to work because you're too impatient or lack the perseverance to see your issue through at local, state, and national levels.

So even if other areas might have (for the sake of the argument), on average, more jerks that just don't get it or have a few things to learn about being inclusive and respectful in the way they conduct their daily lives, people don't build operational business policies around solving the perceived problems or shortcomings (not saying HR departments can't lay ground rules, but I'm talking about operational strategies). And that's the difference between an office in SF and an office in NYC or Boston, or Austin, etc.

I would not be surprised if the fact that people find some of Thiel's politics to be unfavorable is impacting his ability to function professionally in the Bay Area. When people's professional livelihood is at steak, of course they will gravitate towards communities where they are not otherwise encumbered. In the case of Thiel, money seems less of an issue, so I suspect he's also making a social statement about the state of affairs down by the bay. Celebrate or listen, but I hope you choose to listen because talent and money are all SV has got going for it, and if those things leave you can kiss the glory days goodbye.

/2cents

That really has nothing to do with Silicon Valley specifically, Trump supporter has become a bad word in many big cities that Bush supporter never was.

I also agree that tech companies can be a difficult place for constructive political debate (or even agree-to-disagree conversations), and I do not think this is a good thing.

Last I checked it was only slightly more than half the eligible voting population that actually voted in the presidential election.

Popularity is quite orthogonal to controversy regardless. Our current president is controversial, and it can be argued that controversy is the very thing responsible for the votes he received.

This is false equivalence. People like Clinton might appear corrupt for republicans and Dick Cheney might be horrible for democrats, but Trump is in completely different plane.

>workplace social scene (if not their job altogether) based on one data point that by itself means next to nothing is wrong.

What you think is the threshold where political opinion can become personal? When your family is deported?

Silicon Valley has always been different from the rest of the U.S. The "H.P. way" was in its time a radical and progressive thing.

Because you should be "fearing your ass off" when people are afraid to express their legitimate political views. This has all happened before and it wasn't pretty.

update: come on downvoters. At least give me a clue.

> Now, more and more, I feel like it's a Russian nesting doll of facades -- Washington DC with fewer neck ties, where people openly lie to one another out of fear of losing their jobs or being publicly crucified. It's weird, unsettling, and, frankly, really dangerous. There's way too much power here for politeness to be sustainable. If no one feels they can say "Hey, I know it makes everyone uncomfortable, but I think there's a leak in the fuel rods in this nuclear submarine..." we're headed for big trouble.

I can definitely identify with this sentiment.

If this were actually true of the current milieu of tech employment in the bay area, I'd likely still be a willing and active participant in that workforce.

Substantial energy is wasted discussing ideologies and arranging/having meetings on what are fundamentally social issues we're not realistically fixing in the short-term at the workplace from the bottom-up. The reasons appeared largely focused on satisfying the expectations of a vocal minority of SJW-types bringing this crap into the workplace with HR departments jumping at the opportunity to appear busy and influential.

Edit: Maybe my experiences were unique, though my social circles were complaining of similar things at their respective startups.

Of course. Everything does. It's just of general description of reality.

I think people like this were ironically and unwittingly recruiting people to the other side. Which is unfortunate.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

The company has raised hundreds of millions of dollars and has hundreds of employees. In my experience I didn't notice a single situation in which their conservative views had negative impacts on the company. In fact I think their conservative background helped the company raise money from VCs, who I'd wager are more conservative than average.

1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBg6hU5zXDA

The thing about Trump is that the moderate left and even many from the moderate right (my uncle never voted for a democrat until 2016) are mostly disgusted with the guy. It isn’t really about politics as it is about human decency against sexism, racism, and so on.

But even if you're well fed and feel secure in your future economic prospects, not caring very much about racism and sexism doesn't make you racist or sexist. It seems to me that most Republicans just don't care about those two things nearly as much as they care about other things. If you're surrounded by only white people, racism becomes a very abstract concept, vs if you live in a large multicultural city.

As a party, Democrats really need to start working on understanding the people who don't vote for them, rather than just assuming they're just insane bigots and insulting them as such in the process.

If this were true the far left wouldn't be able to discuss social issues at work either, but they are.

Today there are so many source of information that you are never really forced to dive deeper into something. If you see something repeated enough you get a very strong sense of it being true. Many fringe opinions spread without people realizing that they are just that. They aren't used to people disagreeing with them so when people do so strongly they feel alienated.

In regards to Thiel moving, and other VCs praising China, I think that has more to do with people in general becoming more skeptical about SV. Which is a bad thing if you are a VC and are selling "disruption", but probably a good thing for engineers.

Consider though that one thing the alt-right will never accept is that racial diversity in the workplace is a net positive in itself. Whether it's true or false, it's just apart of the parcel.

Now how would someone like that feel comfortable in a workplace that tells you that being against racial diversity is racist? You don't even have to bring up your opinions, it's beamed to you on a regular basis through meetings, announcements and slack conversations.

I personally had a similar experience recently at my job in Australia in relation to the vote on gay marriage. Even though I am myself gay and have a boyfriend, I was in favour of a plebiscite.

This was in complete opposition to rest of the company, who went so far as to joint write a letter with other companies demanding the government not allow a plebiscite and to instead just pass gay marriage without a public vote.

There was alot of implication around that anyone who disagreed wanted the vote for a chance to vote no and more importantly, to allow for an advertising campaign against gays to intimidate the community as a whole.

People made the claim around myself that obvious the reason people want the plebecide is because they are homophobic racist rednecks.

I don't know maybe i'm just rambling at this point but It's just not nice to work in an environment where you have to listen to people trash your character based on your beliefs and you can't say anything otherwise your "discussing politics" and "rocking the boat".

Maybe I'm biased because not being in the US most of my knowledge about it is from HN links and discussions along with a few other blog posts here and there but: if that were true, we wouldn't be seeing "but mah inclusion!" posts and discussions on/about American startups every single day around here.

The endgame hopefully is that intellectually dishonest strategies from all sides become discredited.

Also, the point is not that less conservatives are in tech companies is the issue. I am under no illusion that probably no more than 10-15% of SV tech workers are going to be conservative. This is well within my personal estimate judging from people I met in university (during which they were more open about their political leanings) who went on to go into tech. It's that the conservatives that are (and even centrists and less-extreme liberals) feel the need to put on a facade while at work and that the political environment has become isolated to the extent that even mainstream conservative and even centrist views are considered abjectly racist or wrong.

I'd consider an office with 5% conservatives where those conservatives feel empowered to share their opinion to be a better working environment, as compared to an office with 25% conservatives where all those conservatives put on a facade of liberalism out of fear of repercussion.

That made me stop and think. I'm trying to imagine a picture of someone who is against racial diversity but isn't remotely racist and whilst I agree there's no logical contradiction inherent in that position I do struggle to think of a realistic portrait of such an individual.

I might be missing something here but can you spell out this position for me in a bit more detail? I'm genuinely interested as I wonder if my definition of "racist" or my definition of "against racial diversity" might be different to yours.

Admittedly, I don't even like the term "conservative", like Naval would say, pinning labels onto yourself only forces you into static positions that you end up having to defend, even if you don't 100% buy into them.

I simply happen to have certain stances and ideas that are in opposition to the mainstream thought of SV. As much as I'd love to discuss them, potentially learning more about them myself and (gasp!) even changing my mind in the process, I'm not comfortable doing it. There's a high chance I will be immediately labeled as "racist / sexist / bigot / white supremacist / [fill in the blank]" for even contemplating disagreement on these topics (let's take "diversity" or how we're handling it as a society as an example) without any supporting evidence.

Unfortunately, as of today, bigoteering has 0% burden on the person making the accusation and 100% of the weight put on the accused. It's always safe to call someone a witch, but proving them wrong in one's defense is nigh impossible.

Ironically, the most open minded and considerate conversations about diversity that I've ever had were with black coworkers. I've learned plenty from them, changed my stance several times, realized I didn't know that much before.

The worst were almost always with overrepresented majorities who were "stepping in to speak up for their less-advantaged brethren". I've never learned anything from them on the topics they were so zealous about. It's the diversity version of "white knighting".

It's hard not to become jaded and assume that most people in this latter category don't actually care, and just want to establish themselves at the top of the moral hierarchy through vacuous virtue signaling. It's disappointing.

Related: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window

I think most people here could see that not going over well. Would we then think of china and japan as mostly racist?

I don't really want to get into racist/racial debate on HN, other than to say it's not some tiny opinion only held by white supremacists and neo-nazis.

That and you will find if you look into the research on race differences (eg: genetic influences on IQ) that these topics are not even close to be declared settled and are still hotly contested.

However, this isn’t actually the issue - the issue is that the (relatively small) population of conservative-leaning (or just not-entirely-liberal) people in SV and elsewhere cannot expect to speak their minds and also keep their careers. Even relatively milquetoast, vaguely conservative people like Brendan Eich are (evidently) at serious risk.

Like many other commenters in this thread, you choose a wording that would be more appropriate if the extent of the problem were obnoxious Republicans not getting invited to happy hour/their coworkers' birthday party/?. The type of situation that people complain about, whether it is accurate or not, seems to be more along the lines that if you are in the wrong half of Silicon Valley companies, being recognised as deviating from the obnoxious Democrat position on any issue of import may result in your colleagues organising to report you to HR and/or rile up a small city's worth of Twitter users to call for your company to terminate you or be boycotted itself, not to mention potential long-term consequences along the lines of easily googleable Medium articles with your name on them or entries in an unknown number of blacklists circulated to recruiters through activist backchannels. How accurate or common any of these are is completely up to discussion, but dismissing them as if any of what is alleged amounts to a normal and healthy free speech reaction just seems disingenuous.

Thankfully, most people there don't talk about politics. Maybe 5% of the population are constantly bringing it up though, rarely in direct work functions, but in any other message board or forum.

Ah the SJW boogyman. A quick way to get anybody with a functioning brain to dismiss everything you say.

The folks I'm mostly talking about don't actually believe in that, so obviously my "they" was too broad, indeed.

> Someone from a minority might well have had an better life with more opportunities than someone from a privileged class.

I don't think this has anything to do with what I'm talking about, except maybe as an intentional deflection? We're talking about white resentment as a phenomenon, not Bill the blue collar veteran who was tricked into plundering loot for Halliburton in 2004 or something.

> Comparing groups does not translate into comparing individuals (interestingly this is the same intellectual shortcut that leads to racism)

Discussing race as a phenomenon doesn't make you racist, and this talking point is often used by alt-righters to make some sort of "actually, anti-racists are the REAL racists" narrative. I don't buy it.

edit: My views are failing in the marketplace of ideas! Feel free to leave a comment if you want to engage.

He has to put up with people thinking he is an asshole. We the proletariat have to put up with the people he can buy into power, which affects our livelihood, health, the future of our society. If I had the money to sue him out of existence, as he is wont to do to others, I would.

Fuck him.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/california-preside...

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/11/09/behind-trump...

That is, you know. One of those norms. A rather important one, too.

>definitely a large super-majority

Don't use phrases like this without defining them in concrete terms and providing stats. If 1/3 of the people supported Trump in those categories, opposition could easily be counted as a super majority but that would significantly weaken your case. Ignoring and belittling the views of 1/3 of your group is not really acceptable in other contexts.

Actually yes. I don't think that's far-fetched by our standards. And on the whole I'm quite proud of the distance we in the West have travelled on this issue.

However - the reason we're where we are is because slavery, colonialism and immigration have rather forced us to confront the issue in a way that other nations have not needed to.

Nearly everyone from Silicon Valley that's progressive/liberal thinks there's no problem or that the problem is something else.

Nearly everyone not fitting the description above thinks there's a problem and that it alienates them.

However, for conservatives it's an open question of whether they really are underrepresented or they seem underrepresented because they're hiding their viewpoint.

Perhaps a more useful parallel would be sexual orientation a couple decades ago, where there used to be all kinds of policies like "don't ask, don't tell" and you might have gotten an impression that your company or industry has very few gay people while in fact they're there just hiding in the closet.

More to the point, even if you were correct about their racial homogeneity that would not be a model that the United States can or should seek to emulate.

EDIT: Jokes aside, I simply do not talk about political affiliations with anyone, whatsoever. I have no problem having a little back and forth regarding an issue here or an issue there as well as discussing heavier subjects such as foreign policy. To be honest, I do find myself policing my language to not give away who I may or may not have voted for in the past every now and then.

I should probably note I live outside of the US and talking politics can really mess with everyday relationships. I made a decision to vote only on issues while trying to abstain from the whole "this is my sports team" mentality which sort of takes hold of people where I live.

When you vote for someone who appears to be corrupt, don't be surprised when you're thought to be corrupt.

When you vote for someone who appears to be rich, don't be surprised when you're thought to be rich.

When you vote for someone who appears to take a lot of money from Saudi Arabia, don't be surprised when you're thought to take a lot of money from Saudi Arabia.

Are you starting to see how childish that logic is?

www.thumbtack.com/

In USA, the nation is mixed, heterogenous, and thus being anti-diversity unavoidably involves some discrimination of your fellow citizens, being an asshole to some groups of them; and justifying this discrimination tends to require some racist arguments.

In homogenous countries like Japan, the issue is different - you can easily consider other races/ethnicities as equally good/valid/etc while at the same time being anti-diversity, favoring near-zero permanent immigration; i.e. a simple status quo position "the other races are nice, let's visit, chat, trade, exchange experiences but let us stay here and let them stay there" is feasible, unlike USA.

In USA, acknowledging "there's us and there's them" race separation divides the country, in Japan the same thing can unite it. Treating members of another race as guests that are different/separate from your group is reasonable in homogeous nations and horrid in "melting pot" nations.

* That affirmative action should be illegal or more heavily restricted.

* That unlawful residents should be removed from the country, even if previous administrations chose not to enforce immigration law.

* That welfare programs should be cut back.

* That taxes should be reduced, even if they're reduced in such a way that the wealthy receive a greater tax cut than the non-wealthy.

* That restrictions on firearms purchases and ownership should be kept permissive, and that restrictive local laws (e.g. California's) are unlawful.

* That the US should be more restrictive in allowing foreigners to work in the country (e.g. raising the minimum salary for H1B workers)

* That inequalities in education, employment, and achievement should not be presumed to be indications of bias.

These are just quick examples. Personally, I advise anyone to conceal their political leanings if they agree with any of these statements in my current workplace if they wish to preserve their career prospects, and I think that's a shame. All of these are things that half to 30% of the voting population believes in, and are on the core platform of one of the two major US parties. Any workplace that claims to tolerate conservative views should tolerate these statements.

"Conservative", "liberal", "centrist", etc. are by no means monolithic attributes. I think these labels are better described as broad generalizations of individual positions on issues. For example, I agree with 70-80% of "liberal" positions (maybe closer to 60% if you include San Francisco local issues, but there's arguments to be made that's more "far-left" vs. "left" than liberal vs. conservative). I still consider myself a liberal. That said, I still do censor myself on any non-anonymous forums for the remaining 20-30%.

In over two decades of work in corporate as well as entrepreneurial environments, I've not seen a difference in efficacy within groups that would be attributed to being either racially diverse or non-diverse.

For example, if there were three groups working on a given technical project, one composed of all white men, one composed of all Asian women, and one composed of a mix of race and gender, would the diverse group produce a superior result? My experience is that they would not. Sufficiently and equally incentivized and qualified, all groups would likely produce similar results.

So, I'd consider myself as somebody who's "against racial diversity" mainly because I haven't experienced it improving the core competencies of my company -- which is what I care about. Nor have I found compelling research supporting higher performance by more diverse groups. Thus, efforts to improve diversity, for diversity's sake, in my experience, feels like an effort to make a change that's not related, and might even be a distraction, to making my company more effective.

One way I see this working is a person who believes in individualistic meritocracy with libertarian leanings. In this post I'll try to lay out the point of view of hypothetical person (so not everything I say here represents my own personal beliefs or something I personally agree with).

First, the meritocracy part: Such a person would say that all workplace decisions should be made on a totally race-blind basis: "I don't care what race the people at my startup are, what matters is if they can code (if that's what their job title entails)." If it so happens that our society has relatively few people of X race who can code at the required skill level, then as an inevitable consequence on average startups will employ few people of race X, because there simply aren't enough skilled programmers of race X to go around.

Second, the libertarian part: Sure, it's indisputable that there are a ton of social and economic issues that people of race X encounter at home, in their communities, in school, that end up causing fewer young adults of race X to be coders. But it's certainly not this startup's job to try to fix the upbringing of employees that has resulted in their inadequacy to supply the needed labor. This startup's job is more along the lines of, if a person can't do the work the company needs them to do, they shouldn't be working here.

It's not even the government's job to fix this. When it tries, it only succeeds at wasting resources, turning the people it's trying to help into permanent dependents of the taxpayers, and poisoning the reputation of the actual high achievers of race X because everyone who sees them now assumes "Oh, he/she can't possibly actually be able to do his/her job, the only reason he/she's in that position is there's a quota of minorities to fill so the company doesn't get called out / boycotted / sued for insufficient diversity..."

Third, the individualistic part: Do we really want a society based on the group identities of different races? That seems like a recipe for perpetuating our race problems, not fixing them. If you enshrine "racial diversity" into any kind of official or quasi-official policy, then by definition the policy is treating under-represented races favorably and over-represented races unfavorably.

I mean if xenophobic is defined as preferring your own race compared to others then I guess pretty much the entire world is xenophobic except white liberals in western countries.

China or Japan doesn't (in recent decades at least) put nearly the same amount of effort into destabilizing other countries that they have no cultural affinity with compared to countries like the US.

To me, I would consider these actions more "racist" or "xenophobic" than restricting immigration to prevent excessive racial/cultural diversity. To me this is the rise and fall of nation states 101. More diversity in race and cultures leads to more conflict. You can't have a race riots between two races that don't live in the same nation.

To take this a bit away from race, just look at the middle east. Countries like iraq are doomed constant civil war because of the racial/cultural lines which are commonly expressed through religion sects. I think it would be pretty fair to say that without diversity, iraq as a nation would be much more stable and prosperous.

If it's xenophobic to understand race exists and the human condition is one that accepts race at a foundational level, then I guess we are all born Xenophobic. I personally don't believe in living by original sins.

you will and should face ostracism and other consequences for saying, believing, and doing things that people find abhorrent or evil. free speech means you're free to believe those things, and everybody else is free to call you evil, and coordinate accordingly.

conservatism in the United States has enabled the murder of countless children, both through the NRA's fanaticism re assault weapons, and through the weird effective impunity police have re criminal prosecution, even after killing children. conservatism in the US has enabled the destruction of the environment. the Trump campaign and presidency have seen a rapid escalation of hate crimes, and after Charlottesville the president explicitly defended the white supremacists in attendance.

there is so much blood on the hands of the conservative movement. so much racism. so much sexism. so much fear-mongering and rabble-rousing. how could you possibly expect to do that kind of thing without facing CRITICISM? how could you possibly be the victims here?

If it's implausible for someone to imagine expressing their beliefs without being labelled a bigot then it's just as much a statement about the environment they're in as it is about the beliefs in question.

It's simply a cheap tactic that is used in an attempt to de-legitimize opposing viewpoints and end conversations.

Maybe it’s not politics that gets you into trouble, it just seems that some people will never be dominant enough for their tastes.

Hilariously enough, Clinton and Obama deported far and away more people.

Comments like "blood on the hands of $movement", by contrast, are battle fodder. Irrespective of your politics, that's the sort of thing that provokes worse from others and leads to all-out war, which we're trying to avoid on this site. So if you'd please not post like that here, we'd appreciate it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Equality of opportunities/rights for the particular individual wherever they may be, not attempting to get equality of outcomes for the aggregate by harming individual rights or justifying local oppression by some wider goal.

If a gay person has to hide their orientation, it's bad - not because gays need protection, but because that individual is restricted.

If someone has to hide their religion, it's bad - not because that religion needs protection, but because that person gets restricted.

If someone has to hide their political affiliation - same thing, no matter if it's support of some presidential candidate, legalization or criminalization of some drug, support for or against unions, etc, etc.

"Feeling alienated" because others don't agree with you is a reasonable result; I mean, this is a zero sum game, all viewpoints can't be most popular everywhere. But it crosses the line when it comes to actual discrimination in the workplace, which is bad no matter whether it's done by or against the nationally dominant "tribe". If people have to shut up or face personal consequences (as opposed to getting ignored because the voice of others is considered more sane), then "You have every right to speak" has failed.

If I can say whatever I want but my political opponents (who want to implement evil policies for immoral reasons) can not, then we don't have free speech. Even if someone rabidly opposes free, inclusive, diverse society, says so, and gets punished for that - that's not a free, inclusive, diverse society; just as in that overused "Voltaire" (Evelyn Beatrice Hall) quote.

Political opponents will always consider and label each others policies and arguments as immoral and unacceptable, as you say, extreme and noxious; so unless we allow (in practice, by ensuring that people don't get punished for that by others) speech that seems immoral, unacceptable, extreme and noxious then we ensure that the political opposition doesn't get free speech. People should be able to talk in our workplace about why they like the noxious candidate and why the evil policy is needed (to achieve the immoral reason) without me or the workplace punishing them - otherwise I might not be able to talk in our workplace about why I like my candidate and why I want to have the opposite policy for incompatible moral reasons, which seem immoral and evil to them.

A lot of my colleagues who happily brand themselves as liberal, all think unregulated illegal immigration will cause problem, I don't think there is any chance they will self identify as conservative.

As an individual I might agree with some of the points, but disagree with the rest, like I all for more restrictive gun control and think it is due to an outdated law. It is indeed a problem itself to force people into two buckets and create a us-vs-the-world mentality.

And not too long ago, hell, even currently in some places, it was considered a mainstream conservative view that gays should not have the same rights to marry. If a person holding that view were to work at, say, Grindr, I would absolutely expect them to receive push back on it.

AFDC got replaced with the more restrictive TANF as the primary federal-funded welfare program in the 1990s by the Republican Congress with Clinton’s support, but welfare was not repealed.

When you say you're "against racial diversity" you are saying you prefer racial homogeneity. If that's not what you mean, you should rethink how you state your preference. Many people would take that statement to mean that you're an avowed racist.

You know your situation better than I do, but based on your descriptions I'm with your company on these. You haven't painted a very sympathetic picture of whatever this joke item is, and as for comp, I mean, it seems pretty logical that men and women should be paid the same for the same role, no? That doesn't mean you can't hire/retain talent, you just implement a leveling system like every other company and promote high performers to higher levels.

As for Google, are we talking about the guy who was a dick and caused a massive PR problem and got fired for it? And if your claim is that companies are making bad business decisions and you're pointing at Google, doesn't their 750B market cap undermine the point?

Again, the fact that the majority of people would call a given viewpoint bigoted is just as much a statement about the environment that calls the view bigoted as it is about the view itself. Plenty of mainstream liberal views would be considered bigoted in other developed democracies (e.g. a lot of European countries don't practice affirmative action). Conversely, plenty of mainstream conservative views would be considered bigoted by liberals (I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that I don't need to give an example).

[1] "Prejudice is an affective feeling towards a person or group member based solely on their group membership. The word is often used to refer to preconceived, usually unfavorable, feelings towards people or a person because of their sex, gender, beliefs, values, social class, age, disability, religion, sexuality, race/ethnicity, language, nationality, beauty, occupation, education, criminality, sport team affiliation or other personal characteristics. In this case, it refers to a positive or negative evaluation of another person based on their perceived group membership" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice

Looking at 2016 voting habits in the Bay Area, Donald Trump got double digit election returns in every county. That’s not even factoring "never Trump" conservatives who voted 3rd party or stayed home. So there are a fair amount of conservatives here. For comparison there are more Trump voters in San Francisco than African Americans.

I'm anti-diversity not because I don't believe races exist, I'm anti-diversity because I think hiring people for the color of the skin is itself racist. Affirmative action has made me skeptical of every woman or "diverse" person in high places, because when I see their authority, all I think about is how they had an edge just because of their biology.

I really don't care about natural racial diversity, it's inevitable in our country. However, I'm not really a fan of cultural diversity. A culture defines what is expected from one another socially, and without any set norms, people have no predictable way to interact, which is no good IMO. I understand that multinational corporations are required to allow for multiculturalism so they can behave globally, but I don't see why local areas can't have their own cultures.

I have reasoning behind my opinions, but because they are currently taboo, the only way I can discuss my opinions are on anonymous forums like this. That's sad to me. I may be wrong, there may be a flaw in my reasoning, but because I can't discuss them in public, the discovery of those flaws becomes delayed.

And in case I didn't make this clear, that was just a quick dump of views that I think are generally considered conservative. Real life is much more nuanced than a list of bullet points. I fully agree that there are, for example, people who want tougher immigration laws but otherwise don't consider themselves conservative.

[1] https://readwrite.com/2014/01/24/github-meritocracy-rug/ I realize this is just one example, but people on my own company's forums have caught flak for using the word "meritocracy".

I would expect you to agree with this since you say you haven't observed a systematic difference in performance between these groups. No?

My own thinking is that it's good to invite a diverse applicant pool, but final hiring decisions shouldn't use diversity except as a tie-breaker. At the same time one should try to be aware of one's own biases, and rigorously careful not to devalue candidates unlike oneself.

Honestly I think it is, although if I were having a discussion with a coworker I would couch it in slightly different terms, because many of my coworkers aren't very familiar with guns. e.g. defining assault weapons (varies depending on locale), asking why they are concerned about this like bayonet lugs, are they aware of anyone who has been killed by a bayonet charge in the US since the Civil War, what's wrong with barrel shrouds, etc

Having children is literally the most socially acceptable thing you can do amongst almost all political ideologies. Its incredibly common and parents are held up on a pedestal just for existing.

But he thinks the liberal elites are somehow out to get him for being a parent and he's a persecuted minority. He's said "liking being a parent is such an unpopular opinion."

He has a million other benign things he thinks he's being persecuted for but the kids thing is just the most bizarre and totally detached from reality.

It's like, you'd have to totally ignore reality to have this viewpoint... At the same time it seems like a really sad life.

I wonder if they actually believe this shit or it's just a means to an end.

If discrimination based on race or sex is bad, then why is affirmative action good?

This isn’t new; women have been telling us this for many years now.

Given that the definition of an "assault weapon" has nothing to do with the actual capabilities of a firearm, and everything to do with the shape of its grip, the presence of collapsing stocks, etc. I'd say yes it is pretty absurd. For example this [1] rifle is exactly the same in caliber, capability, and general functionality as the infamous AR-15 yet is not targeted by even the most restrictive States' definitions of assault weapons. Heck, even liberal publications are catching on to the fact that "assault weapons" are a red herring: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/sunday-review/the-assault...

> what is the absurd part here? how many kids can a gay person be alleged to have killed just by being gay?

Pick a more relevant liberal policy: How many people have been killed by prisoners on parole? Should all politicians who support reduced prison sentences and earlier parole, as well as individuals who support those policies, be held responsible for the crimes that parolees and released prisoners commit crimes? This number is much greater than the number of school shootings.

That fact should not be used as justification to ostracize, or otherwise take actions against people who believe in more lenient parole and less prison time - and people who support conservative policies should get the same respect.

[1] https://image.sportsmansguide.com/adimgs/e/6/637956_ts.jpg

But sense I'm neither populist or a religious conservative, I'm just as much in the bubble as anyone.

As to your second part, as to what its origin is, its clearly in response to a multigenerational systemic suppression of certain classes. That is not in debate, and frankly from my white male perch, I continue to see firsthand much more of the lingering slights and biases against certain classes and groups, that affect their career and their inclusion, than I ever have any anti white male sentiment or anti white male advancent credo.

So in summary - I really dont think much has changed, and that isnt a good thing.

Marc Andressen said something similar in an interview, I'm going to dig it up and post it here as an edit. Here it is, the relevant bits are around 28 minutes: https://a16z.com/2017/05/15/andreessen-primack-dc-tech-polic...

This statement shows a big divide between our worldviews. You believe that they fail to succeed in our country because they are part of a disadvantaged group, while I believe it's because they either 1) lack the money to earn social status signals required to start a career(degree, social network), or 2) their culture prevents success. There are plenty of disadvantaged white folk who are held back by those two issues too, yet mainstream media calls them "privileged" because they happen to be white, despite the fact that they grew up poor, live in an economically depressed area, work manual labor, and have a culture that doesn't strive for more.

Sure, historic racism would explain why the divides aren't symmetrical, but I think the whole nation would be better if our politicians would focus on economics instead of identity politics.

Otherwise we agree. I come from a very white, very depressed region. I understand the dynamics well.

As to the govt, I believe the vast majority of all social programs do deal with things on an economic basis. So I dont see the conflict. Once again, not an either or. Most things arent.

I know my negative emotional reaction to seeing a "diverse" leader is racist and sexist, but that's not going away while their advantage is codified in every single corporate handbook in the country.

The question isn't, or shouldn't be, "Do we have representation of women/conservatives/whatever in proportion to demographics?" Instead, the question should be "Are we treating people unfairly?"

For example, I'd feel quite comfortable wearing a Burnie Sanders shirt or hat to work. I'd expect that wearing a MAGA hat would cause problems.

The treatment of women in tech is a very well documented issue, to the point where one would have to be willfully ignorant of the issue. The biggest “evidence” of the War on Christmas is a coffee cup, and companies simply acknowledging the fact that many other faiths and cultures have celebrations during that time of year.

Seriously, here is how it went down from what I remember:

Damore writes controversial internal only paper -> another googler takes the document meant for internal only viewing and shares it with the media -> someone removes most/all graphs and citations to make it look more like an opinion piece (most likely to flame up more media attention) -> journalist posts internal document without permission from company.

That is at least 2 people going out of there way (in a most likely illegal way too) essentially trying to start a witch hunt on this guy and ruin his life for writing 1 paper just because they do not agree with him.

The key part of merpnderp's quote is "or agrees with any of his policies". There are tons things that are perceived as "Trump's policies" (and some are in fact his policies) that are just mainstream Republican policies. Just don't confuse "policies" with rhetoric, because in the case of Trump he says one thing and does another all the time. Of course it's a bit odd to me that people who think he's a pathological liar (a viewpoint I can totally understand!) always act surprised when his words don't match his actions...

I know less about Japan, but everything I've read suggests that Japanese are also extremely racist.

As for Google having a huge market cap, isn't it a a rather common liberal/left-wing trope that uch great wealth comes from being evil?

It would be weird to feel offended, or more specifically, "discriminated" against, were you to discuss publicly, in the company of other co-workers, your specific actions in the bedroom or bathroom.

For example, I hope no one is arguing for ensuring "our free speech rights" to talk about the details of their bowl movements or bedroom proclivities in a sprint planning meeting.

> otherwise I might not be able to talk in our workplace about why I like my candidate and why I want to have the opposite policy for incompatible moral reasons, which seem immoral and evil to them.

Why do people expect a different response to, and treatment of, political opinions?

Even if what you would consider a "political opinion" is advertised, circulated or pushed by your employer, your coworkers, "general vibes" - why the expectation that any and all political opinions should be granted the utmost respect, neutrality and objectivity? And most specifically, why this expectation in the workplace? When has the workplace become a "safe space", where, if one political opinion is discussed, all must be allowed to?

Sexual orientation was deemed (ImNAL, my simple understanding) a protected class - in that, we (via our legal system) agreed discrimination against this class is illegal (like age, race).

Are you arguing for not only political affiliation, but political expression to be protected as well?

Should, say, an extremely conservatively run family business be allowed to deny employment to a candidate specifically because they have strong liberal views?

I personally think political opinions and affiliation are nowhere near as fundamentally universal as age and race. For one, opinions are a choice. Therefore, 100% yes, such a business would be well within its rights to deny the candidate employment.

Workplaces are dictatorships, not democracies. If part of that absolute command structure includes the discussion of only one side of a political opinion, it does not follow that all opinions should be given the opportunity to be heard (for fear that it _might_ discourage its existence and expression nonetheless!). I would even go so far as to say perhaps you are too eager to express your own opinions, and too quick to feel threatened by the sound of others. Since politics is an expression of values, are you not holding one set of values, while in the company of what seems to be scores of people who hold no such ones themselves?

Politics is an inherently divisive, generally un-or-misinformed and emotional topic. I have some political opinions not everyone, or even most, will agree with (find me an example of two people who share in common all political opinions!). If I have such an urge to also present those view points, I would then also rationally be prepared for the backlash. My opinions have not been censored, I can go to any street corner, website or pub to discuss any such opinion I might have.

My employment ramifications would be the same as discussing activities of the bedroom or bathroom in those environments; in taste, a private conversation of a sensitive topic. Loudly and publicly; a risk calculation incurred by my employer - one they are allowed to make with any prejudice they desire.

https://youtu.be/agU-mHFcXdw

You can find similar clips from Hillary and Schumer, just not from this decade.

( And before anyone thinks that 'oppress' is too strong a word, the inability to marry caused tax and inheritance implications for LGBTQ individuals in California, some of which were unrecoverable. To this point, consider that people who died during Prop 8 will never get justice; will never get equal representation. )

I am sorry you feel like your views are unwelcome/oppressed, but religious groups in the United States have a very long and extremely well-documented history of doing real, lasting, absolutely life-altering harm to LGBTQ individuals. This harm caused to LGBTQ Americans isn't the same as feeling like your views are unwelcome at your place of work, and I hope you can at least see the difference.

Brendan Eich may sincerely hold his religious beliefs, but he didn't stop at simply believing: he gave money to further an utterly poisonous cause that brought real, and in some case unrecoverable, harm to tens of thousands of Californians.

I recall Bush being constantly vilified by the left for having a tiny intellect, for constantly making gaffes like "is our children learning", for the Iraq war (he's a war criminal etc), for drone strikes, for supporting torture, for not caring about the environment at all - especially the shock when a simple minded Texan oilman won out over intellectual climate change activist Al Gore.

There were many people not just in the USA but around the world who felt they could not speak up in support of Bush, outside of rural America.

Seems like time is erasing or distorting these memories. I remember him being just as hated as Trump is today.

Five years ago I felt my political views were pretty mainstream for the tech industry, for the Valley (although I did not live there). I'd have described myself as a centrist or maybe centre-left.

These days my views have shifted, I can feel myself getting more conservative with time. It's not an age thing. It's more that I've started to notice the sort of tactic you used above - faced with someone making conservative arguments you disagree with you didn't bother debating the points he made. Instead you just lied about what he said and then attacked a straw man.

This is consistently how Damore is treated. There are liberal arguments that can be made about what he wrote - people could point out methodological errors in his studies, or logic errors in his arguments. But they never seem to do that. Whether it's in the media (who love calling what he wrote an "anti diversity memo" even though it praises diversity and has ideas for how to increase the number of women in tech), or on Hacker News, the tactic is always the same - pretend he claimed women are worse than men and then viciously attack him on a personal level. And it's just totally false.

The same tactic crops up in other similar contexts. Jordan Peterson being interviewed on Channel 4 is a recent notorious example. The guy made debatable but essentially conservative arguments about how men and women are not the same, the gender pay gap has multiple causes and so on. And Cathy Newman (the interviewer), who clearly isn't really interviewing him at all but rather sees her job as destroying the ideological enemy, just constantly twists his words. The entire interview consists of her exclaiming, "So what you're saying is ..." followed by some absurd straw man that bore no resemblance to what the guy just said.

It got so insane that by the end of the interview, after Peterson made a long and complicated point about the biological roots of social hierarchies using the nervous system of lobsters as an example, she replied "So what you're saying is, we should organise our society along the lines of the lobsters" and the guy doesn't even blink or miss his stride. He just gets right on with correcting her, because by that point the lying and distorting of what he just said has become so predictable:

https://youtu.be/aMcjxSThD54?t=26m55s

It's one of the most astonishing TV interviews I've ever seen and that sort of debating "tactic" is everywhere.

So why does Pichai still have a job?

We know the reason - because CEO-firing moral outrage only works in one direction in California.

you're permitting a standard political talking point to be an entire topic of discussion, and then screening out some individual replies because they invoke additional standard political talking points.

you're allowing some standard political talking points and disallowing others. if you're doing that, it would be convenient for your users if you were to specify which standard political talking points are valid topics of discussion, and which other standard political talking points will get your comments banned.

The problem is that the word "diversity" doesn't actually mean merely having the presence of different races. Nobody who argues for "racial diversity" ceases to argue the moment the first black or Asian person is hired.

Rather, the phrase "racial diversity" has become code for its own kind of racism against white people. It doesn't mean the dictionary definition of diversity, consisting of multiple types. It means specifically eliminating and pushing out white people on the grounds that there are lots of them around in western countries, so harming them in some concrete, objective way isn't really harmful.

Moreover, the tactics normally used to obtain this so-called diversity are usually anti-meritocratic: literally the promotion and rewarding of people who do not deserve it on the basis of their work or skills alone, but just on the basis of skin colour. This is poisonous and demeaning to those people who do work hard, but don't benefit from being born "diverse".

It's really quite sad that this is actually a topic for debate, and that the ever more extreme elements in California have tried to make "meritocracy" a dirty word. But ultimately it'll be to the benefit of companies in other parts of the world who don't care about this strange and poisonous offshoot of political dialogue. I doubt there are many companies in Russia or China that force all employees to spend time on unconscious bias training, or who reliability promote unqualified people because of their DNA.

I agree it seems odd to believe that anyone could be against having children. But the world is full of large groups of people who hold odd and unsubstantiated opinions. Perhaps he's met people who really do look down on him for having kids. Perhaps he's stumbled across a group of old fashioned Malthusians who think children = population growth = destroying the environment and he's extrapolated that belief out incorrectly onto a much wider group.

To your wider point, conservatives are absolutely victimised in some parts of society. That's what the entire article in the WSJ is about. That's what happened to Damore. Note that Damore filed a complaint with the NLRB: they wrote a memo that put the word "scientific" in scare quotes, and stated that bringing up scientific studies of gender differences was sexual harassment. So literally attempting to argue conservative viewpoints by reference to scientific studies is now considered sexual harassment and the government will not defend it: if that isn't going to create a feeling of victimisation, what is?

And the third of Americans that support him... are just idiots.

My friends and colleagues are more mellow than yours I guess.

Your coworkers just want you to leave your religion and xenophobia and or mild racism at home.

Does society not include all the people that voted for Trump?

Why does Google shove "diversity panels" down their employees throats, then?

Talk is cheap. There's little reason Trump has sexually harassed anyone more than Bill Clinton - and Hillary still sticks by him.

1. your immigrant coworkers who entered the country on H1B or other visas;

2. coworkers who benefited from affirmative action to get into university;

3. friends/relatives of law-abiding-but-undocumented aliens.

You might think you are just making abstract policy statements. But to your listeners, you are making threats to destroy their livelihood and their families. Of course they react negatively!

How would you react if someone, in the name of abstract policy, argued that people belonging to your demographic group don't deserve jobs or should be kicked out of the country?

Why is it terrible to dismiss people by calling them SJWs, but not calling them racist.

Maybe because those individuals know to keep their mouths shut?

Does that sound unfamiliar? If so, it’s probably because you never read what he actually wrote, and instead just accepted unquestioning the media propaganda.

Many news sources also spread the same lie you are, so I assume you’re just parroting the headlines (like many of us are guilty of). The problem is, the dishonesty of this propaganda does real harm.

However, such a position is very much unusual and marginal in the US or (IMHO) the Anglosphere in general. By contrast, I had encountered some rather aggressive childfree activists on the Russian-speaking segment of the Internet.

I see Trump's rise as a response to people on the left who celebrate "the end of men", expel men without giving them an opportunity to defend themselves, unapologetically depict men and white people (and white men most of all) as evil, demand white people "absent themselves", and offer jobs for which white people need not apply. Not "far-left crazies", but major media outlets and universities.

When the media and academic culture is so toxic to any white men who speak up for their own interests, only someone who has no filter, like Trump, dares to speak at all.

For the most part, they ignored Obama's many gaffes (RSPCT, 51 states, "corpse"-man, bring inefficiencies to our health care system, etc...) while endlessly mocking Republicans for similar gaffes.

Is being anti-abortion bigotry & hate?

There is an a implications to everything. Have an opinion on healthcare, and someone might die according to you preferred version of it.

He participated within the political system, he did not "[believe] that it is okay to actively oppress LGBTQ employees", except, in your interpretation, by participating in the political system. This extends to "any potential employees who believe in LGBTQ equality" in the same way it extends to anyone with any political opinion; I could mirror the exact same sentiment wrt pro-choice - "believes it is ok to actively murder" etc.

Obviously, yes, there is a substantive difference between removing someone who has only entered so far as the border checkpoint is on the US side of the border and removing someone who has been living in the US. That's the whole point of pointing it out.

Whether he may be a conservative or liberal is irrelevant to me and to the discussion.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-end...

> the rules intended to protect victims of sexual assault mean students have lost their right to due process

https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2017/09/the-un...

> professor Bret Weinstein refused to comply with students interested in 'social justice' that demanded a day without white people on campus

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2017/05/30/evergreen...

> The ad said the [University of Louisville] Department of Physics and Astronomy “announces a tenure-track assistant professor position that will be filled by an African-American, Hispanic American or a Native American Indian.”

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2015/12/16/u-l-ripped-h...

Those are only examples to prove these claims aren't "baseless". If you're interested, I'm sure you can find more such incidents yourself.

Also, while it sounds like you downvoted me, I'm not being downvoted (net). Perhaps there are more people out there who are aware of these things than you think.

I could just as easily say that colleges don't support interracial marriage based on Bob Jones University but that would be intellectually dishonest.

I'd be very interested if you could find examples of publicly-funded universities (as these universities are) telling black people not to come to campus or not to apply for a job.

Or a respected mainstream media publication (equivalent to The Atlantic) reviewing a book discussing The End of Women.

> https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-end....

It's a complete mischaracterization to call that celebrating the end of men. If anything it is worrying about it.

"There is a maximum of 60 months of benefits within one's lifetime, but some states have instituted shorter periods."

Many Americans think you can collect welfare payments, which are about $300 per person, depending on the state, in perpetuity.

That's just not true.

I still wonder where this 'welfare' system is that people think exist.

It covers both sides of the story, including people who seem to be celebrating.

However, consider this: blood type is important in Asia yet most people in the USA do not even know their blood type so, we could conclude it's not important here. Now, imagine a movement to force blood type diversity took root in the American tech. Then, would it be still hard for you to picture someone who does not believe that the blood type diversity is a good in itself yet is not a "burahara"-type bigot who thinks the B-type people are inferior?

TheCoelocanth already beat me to it, but this article doesn't do any celebrating about the "end of men". It's very sympathetic about how the changing US economy has gutted many traditionally-male fields. And in so far as support for Trump is driven by the economic uncertainty of men, it does a lot to explain that component. But your original claim is ridiculous. I don't have a lot of free time right now, do any of your links honestly support your argument?

He funded nakedly oppressive political activity. Passing a law to deny consenting adults the right to marry solely on the basis of their sexual orientation is oppression by itself. That Prop 8 had significant financial and legal consequences for tens of thousands of Californians is the proof that the act was overtly oppressive.

[1] http://www.dictionary.com/browse/oppress

The real reason conservatives have so much trouble in liberal places is their outright refusal to acknowledge their political and social behavior is profoundly harmful to segments of society.

The solution is so, so, so easy: a conservative person should simply find somewhere else to live if they are unhappy in any geographic regions where a lot of liberals are busy using their constitutionally guaranteed right to freedom of expression to build the kind of society they want.

In any case, conservatives at large are currently working on law that will allow people to discriminate at will against people if they feel like it infringes on their religious liberty. ( In fact, just such a law has already been passed in Indiana. Signed by Mike Pence. )

So while conservatives now complain bitterly about discrimination, they're the one's busily enshrining it in laws at various levels.

Imagine if a religious liberty bill passes. In fact, I can't wait. Then I can fire all my conservative employees en masse for offending my liberal Christian religious views.

Does that help you see why this madness must end? Why no one wants it?

> Postgenocide Rwanda elected to heal itself by becoming the first country with a majority of women in parliament.

(where female dominance is described as "healing")

> In fact, the more women dominate, the more they behave, fittingly, like the dominant sex.

> she and her girlfriend (played by Beyoncé) kill a bad boyfriend and random others in a homicidal spree and then escape in their yellow pickup truck, Gaga bragging, “We did it, Honey B.”

That's just a few quotes from the article. I agree, it's mostly neutral.

For true celebration, it's probably necessary to look elsewhere...like Beyoncé's song Run The World (Girls).

* Evolution isn’t an atheist fact vs some religious alternate truth; evolution is a scientific fact.

* Personality differences (note: not to be confused with IQ or proficiency!) between male and female isn’t a conservative fact vs some liberal alternate; it’s a scientific fact.

Damore suggested we use these well established cross cultural personality differences to inspire positive improvements to the workplace that will allow women and men alike to more naturally be attracted to this line of work, and to thrive in it!

But because the scientifically uncontrovertial truths he quoted to formulate his argument are not currently considered “politically correct”, he was basically “crucified” and made an example of.

Scientific consensus is not conservative or liberal, religious or atheist, etc. Scientific consensus is the best unbiased reflection of reality we have.

Of course, any use of the words “fact” or “truth” must be qualified with the appropriate level of uncertainty — not even the best scientific establishments can reach fully 100% confidence — but may established scientific “facts” are called such because our uncertainty levels of them can become so incredibly low. The law of gravity, the claim that the world is not flat, and many others are clear examples of this.

We MUST stop politicizing the notion of “fact”, unless you really want to enter a post-truth world where unjustified opinions and feelings hold equal truth to scientific facts established with literal mountains of evidence and broad consensus.

If observing scientific fact creates a “hostile workplace” and is a fireable offense, then we have truly entered an Orwellian age of Wrongthink and Thoughtcrime, where we must all constantly police our own thoughts and utterance so as not to contradict the ideology of The Party.

He wasn’t even quoting scientific fact for hostile purposes; it appears entirely benevolently motivated, out of a desire to create an engineering culture more compatible with feminine personalities (which even many males have, as he points out!)

But because it touched a topic of political sensitivity and quotes a scientific fact that was “politically incorrect”, the truth of his argument, and even the well intentions of it, were made irrelevant. He was crucified, to make an example to all of what truths must never be spoken.

And this is why we can’t have nice things. Now we can’t even speak about making the workplace more suitable to women, because to discuss that would imply that there’s a difference in personality between women and men — and such a thing now can get you fired.

But since you don't, what exactly do you expect me to say here that will convince you in 30 seconds?

I don't agree - there is a subset of people that criticize meritocracy as a concept because they believe the idea of 'merit' is inherently racist and classist - if you start at a different level, it becomes more difficult for you to accrue 'merit' and so that needs to be balanced and taken into account. Some people believe this is much more important than hiring or promoting on 'merit'

Can you find any stats showing that a White male has a harder time in America getting a job, getting a loan, getting a mortgage or lease, getting into college, etc than an equally qualified non White male?

Somewhere they can create a Christian cake shop in peace, you mean?

Law follows morality, not the other way around.

If abortion is murder, the crime of possibly creating a hostile workplace pales in comparison.

Hillary Clinton said that after the election.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/the-future-is-female-hillary-clin...

If we agree that's a loaded term, perhaps we can also agree that in terms of dividing people by race and gender, Trump isn't so different from many leaders on the left. He's merely the first Republican who plays the game of identity politics that the left has played for so long.

I think it's a terrible shame that the dream of a race-blind, gender-blind society was abandoned...but the left, not Trump, is to blame for that.

It was a Republican, Eisenhower, who sent the army to enforce school integration after the Brown v Board of Education decision. Nixon [often accused of this "Southern Strategy"] was Vice President at the time.

And a much higher percentage of Republicans than Democrats in Congress voted for the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/88-1964/s409

But the Democrats are certainly good at rewriting history in their favor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_8E3ENrKrQ

And you have heard of Strom Thurman haven’t you?

I've also heard of the many racist Southern Democrats who opposed civil rights and remained Democrats after 1964 (many much longer), including: John Stennis, Herman Talmadge, James Eastland, Allen Ellender, Russell Long, John Sparkman, John McClellan, Richard Russell, George Wallace, Lester Maddox, John Rarick, Robert Byrd, and Al Gore, Sr.

But are you really going to defend the Party of Trump as being inclusive?

Are you really claiming that the Southern Strategy didn’t exist despite the words of Lee Atwater?

And the claim that interview with Lee Atwater is talking about Republican strategy makes no sense. It starts with "in 1954 you start out saying n....r, n....r, n....r." But in 1954 the South was solidly Democratic and Republicans were sending troops there to force integration. The quote describes a supposed "southern strategy" beginning in 1954 that bears no relation to reality in 1954. Why should we believe the rest of it when it's wrong from the beginning?

The people who write about these things always say they don't like when the word meritocracy is being used to hide bias.

But, parties change and they try to appeal to enough different coalitions to get elected. The Republican Party use to be about free trade, "pulling yourself up by the bootstraps and not blaming others for your plight in life" and at least give lip service to caring about the deficit. Now they are completely the opposite.

I certainly agree that parties' political positions change. That doesn't mean any particular claim of change is true.

Every politician breaks campaign promises and Trump is no exception. Now if you donate or otherwise contribute a lot of money to a candidate then they will support you. That much is clear and it does not take a lot of money. The only reason we don't have gun control is because the gun lobby has enough votes in Congress.

There is no such thing. If you want to join and meet up with other conservatives, you totally can. There are Republican party offices all over. Hell, in the middle of Silicon Valley there is the huge conservative Hoover Institution think tank.

But if you want to come to work and say a bunch of obviously unpopular things and expect that it's all just going to be cool, it's not. Work is work, everyone thinks before they say things. No workplace is different in this regard. Like the previous commenter said, work is not a debating society, it's really common for people to put up with their coworkers, grin and take it, etc. because that's how teamwork happens. It's not something only conservatives have to deal with.

Do you live anywhere near a University? Get your butt there and count how many white men there are in Professor's chairs. Then count how many of the tenured Professors are white men. Then count how many of the head administrators are white men.

Absolute delusion.

They aren't equal things though. The latter is basically you promoting the idea that people of different backgrounds aren't as welcome in the workplace. Especially if your workplace hires anyone on an H1-B or on any other kind of visa, or anyone from Iran, Sudan, Iraq, or the other Muslim ban countries.

I get that in terms of an election they are both equally valid political candidates. But the actual substance of both pieces of clothing is different. One is easily going to divide any workplace where you have employees of foreign nationalities or minorities and the other isn't. There's a reason why what you expect from both scenarios makes sense.

Look man, welcome to being an underrepresented minority / woman in the US. This is our every day everywhere we go. We always have to watch our tongues make sure what we're saying doesn't get us labelled as "uppity" or "thuggish" or "bossy" etc etc etc.

You're coming to terms with the fact that in any society you have to consider how other people will react to what you do. Congrats.

If you're dumb enough to switch how you vote on something that is unquestionably going to change your personal economic, social, and political future because someone went a little overboard in calling people racists, then you deserve to have your country decline.

I think it is because there are already places for constructive political debate. You can go there to do that. In the workplace, be civil, and if people are telling you they don't like you to do X and Y be reasonable and willing to compromise / apologize if you need to.

1) SJW isn't a bad thing, like racism. social justice (the literal term) is what all people want in their society. It's preached by nearly every religion (the idea that the poor are equal to the rich, the black people equal to the white, etc).

2) Racist is an adjective but SJW is a group affiliation often attributed to people who don't wish to be affiliated that way. A person can say a racist thing, but no one can do an SJW thing. We can qualify certain things and statements as racist or not. We cannot do the same with SJW. SJW will always be used to denigrate someone. Racist, however, can be used analytically and without malice.

If all you care about is skin color you're missing my point.

wrt point #1, SJW and Social-Justice Advocate are different terms. Justice is a subjective term, the word itself may have a positive implication, but the implication of "SJW" is that their brand of social justice is neither just nor good.

I disagree with point #2 though: the word "racist" is used to denigrate (label people who do not accept the label) more than otherwise. A person can absolutely say an "SJW thing" - the kind of thing an SJW would say. This may be ambiguous, but so is racist; it depends on a personal definition of what constitutes racism just as mush as SJW does.

In fact, willfully creeping the scope of words such as "racist" to include e.g. microaggressions is partly what differentiates SJWs.

Why is use of the term 'SJW' to dismiss viewpoints not ok - but use of the word 'racist' for the same purpose is rife.

Here's another: https://practicaltheorist.wordpress.com/2012/11/14/the-myth-...

Here's a critique stating that the terms aren't defined enough to be said to be 'just'

http://assets.press.princeton.edu/chapters/s6818.pdf

The last one is the most fascinating, I really recommend you read it if you're interested in these things. Amartya Sen is brilliant.

How many of them were unqualified, but given the job over a more qualified woman, just because they were a man?

I'm sure there are cases of that happening, somewhere. But I can point to multiple examples in the past year alone of jobs being advertised explicitly and in writing as not being open to white men. I do not recall ever seeing jobs being advertised as not open to women.

As it is, you're pointing at a disparity and implying - but not even outright stating - that it must be due to bias, or that white men can't possibly be being attacked or can't possibly fear for their careers, merely because there are a lot of them.

Would you have made the same sorts of arguments about black slaves, on the grounds that there were loads of non-enslaved blacks in Africa at the time of the slave ships, so clearly they couldn't be that oppressed. I mean just look at the quantities. Clearly you would not have made that argument because it'd be bogus. Merely having a common attribute doesn't imply you can't be oppressed.

I described the argument as a straw man because it is one. Damore verifiably did not say he thought women at Google were inferior. I'm not surprised you're tired of people saying "straw man!" in discussions about Damore: as I note, nobody seems to be able to argue that he's wrong, so they just attack things he didn't say, and then other people have to point that out. If you dislike that, then point out strawmen yourself. Perhaps eventually people who dislike Damore's perspective will then stop strawmanning him.

I doubt very seriously that people are opposed to bringing back jobs to America. What politician has a platform of "we want to send jobs overseas"?

Ronald Reagan was all for gun control in the 60s as was the NRA when the Black Panther Party started legally walking around with guns in California (the Muliford Act). You want to see gun control? Start encouraging as many minorities as possible to apply for open carry permits.