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

I don't get it. I grew up in Silicon Valley and I work in tech, and so do many other people I know. They run the gamut from far-left socialists to libertarians to own a bunch of guns. They have all kinds of ethnic backgrounds and religious views.

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, contrary to what many people are saying, that what has really happened is that it has never been easier to hold an opinion about almost anything. Previously you had to at least partly subscribe to some sort of ideology that was somewhat reasoned. Which meant that you were prepared when you met someone who didn't agree with because most ideologies reason around the same things.

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.