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 work in the Bay Area and I have personally worked with (as in, on the same team with and working directly in cooperation. CEOs, founders, etc. are not included in this count), exactly one person who discussed their conservative views. This is in comparison to hundreds of liberals. Sure, you may be able to identify at least one person on variety of ends of the political spectrum, but I don't think anyone can sanely deny a vast under representation of conservatives in Silicon Valley. Granted, Silicon Valley itself is politically imbalanced. But even in San Francisco 9% [1] of voters voted Republican in 2016.Despite that, I haven't witnessed anything close to that share of conservatives in my tech jobs - even in my jobs lower in the Peninsula and in South Bay.

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.

When the topic of underrepresented groups comes up regarding women and minorities, the reason given a lot is that “they’re not interested” or something along those lines. Why would that not be the same reason here?

It could be a reason, but it's a different issue - for women and ethnic minorities it's clear how many of them there are.

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.

Conservatives control the executive and legislative branches of government, and are therefore extremely well represented nationally. Meanwhile you’re comparing this to closeted gay people decades ago.

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

It's not about who is dominant, it's about the fundamental right of the non-dominant minority (whatever that is in any particular place and time) to express themselves and not having to hide.

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.

Sure, people have the right (and possibly a moral duty) to speak against those who they believe to be immoral advocates of the wrong belief.

"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.