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

> being against racial diversity is racist

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.

Consider that this is the majority consensus in Japan and China. Imagine going to japan and saying "guys, this workplace is far too asian, what we really need here is some more indians, africans and arabs to get this workplace into the 21st century".

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.

They are both pretty openly xenophobic, no? I didnt think that was in any debate. If your point is that racism isnt the sole province of white people - yes, thats worth remembering. White American liberals (which I am) seem to struggle with allowing their world view to incorporate things like this.

> Would we then think of china and japan as mostly racist

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.

Well I'm western too and from my personal experience I don't think they are racist.

China is less homogenous than you might think, and Japan has groups that face discrimination too even if the divisions are less obvious to Western eyes. And people do criticize Japan's relatively xenophobic attitudes.

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.

No, I feel that the point is rather different, pointing towards a difference between xenophobia and racism.

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.

I'm not racist and, as you would expect me to say, have over the years made several close friends of widely-varying races. (As an aside, isn't it part of the problem that I even have to open my comment on this topic by expressing my non-racist bonafides?)

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.

> someone who is against racial diversity but isn't remotely racist

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.

> They are both pretty openly xenophobic, no?

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.

Why do you oppose racial diversity instead of taking no opinion on it? One would think a neutral observer, seeing no difference in efficacy between different types of workplaces, would not oppose one of those types of workplace anyway. The conclusion I make is that the observer is not neutral, but biased.

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.

> 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.

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.

To me you conflate culture and religion with race. Which is often or at least usually the basis of racism. I dont think race is foundational, in really any way that matters.

The argument for technical people is not that a more diverse group per se produces better results (although that argument is made for some other professions, such as marketing). The argument is rather that by restricting the candidate pool based on irrelevant attributes like ethnicity or gender, one is likely to overlook good candidates and thereby reduce the overall competence of the team.

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.

I think you have a point, but I don't tend to think to consider the current state of all nation states and their dominant cultures as static. 1000 years from now, I imagine much will have changed. Which may or may not involve closed nations to address many of the same issues we in America face. I think we can see this in Europe now.

I think it is an unsettling reaction to have your predominant thought upon seeing a woman or non white male in a position of authority to assume it is because of their gender or race. I find it hard to believe you are not able to find other logical reasons for ot, so it sounds like a choice youve made to view the world through that lense.

There might be other logical reasons that they are in power, but even knowing that affirmative action made their sex or race a factor and that my biology would work against me if I were to apply for their position is enough to make me jealous and bitter about it. I think affirmative action sows divides because of it, and is probably counterproductive nowadays.

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

Isn't Japan notorious for it's racism and xenophobia?

I can speak from my own experience only as I dont study the statistics, but in 20 years of work as a white male I can categorically say ate that my race and gender has never been a hindrance in my career progression. I dont doubt the possibility exists, but I do not based on my network feel its to any noticeable degree. As in, I havent ever observed it happen, as a hiring manager myself or by a hiring manager.

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.

> its clearly in response to a multigenerational systemic suppression of certain classes.... 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.

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.

I dont think we have a divide, my view just includes racism and sexism as things black people and women have to deal with, in addition to what you list for white males. Its not either or. So I guess my question to you is, since you know racism and sexism exist...why are you so wed to subtracting it from their equation?

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'd like affirmative action removed because I believe it does more harm than good nowadays, and maintains racial and gender divides. I think it was necessary when implemented when rampant, blatant, extreme racism and sexism was the norm, but that just simply isn't the norm nowadays.

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.

People in China are in fact racist by Western definitions. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15745355 for details. As I said in that comment, it's not because they're _bad_ people; it's a natural outcome of the way humans stereotype.

Everything I've experienced and read about China (I'm American and lived there for a year) leads me to believe that Han Chinese in China are extremely racist. Look at how they treat their own ethnic minorities, for example (Tibetans, Uighurs, etc.).

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

I oppose racial diversity and am not a racist.

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.

Stop. There are better things to think about.

> I do struggle to think of a realistic portrait of such an individual

Maybe because those individuals know to keep their mouths shut?

As people bring up Asian countries in other comments, I think they miss the point. For all I know Chinese could as well be racists as some comments say.

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?