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 notice you didn't include Alt-right in there which at the moment seem to be political ideology on a big rise and in my personal opinion, I think it's generally less radical than communism.

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".

> 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.

> 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.