
Racism in Tech - emwa
http://www.feld.com/wp/archives/2011/11/racism-in-tech.html
======
wpietri
For those looking for a more nuanced understanding of this than the eternal
American fight about whether "X is/is not racist", go take some of the tests
at Harvard's Project Implicit:

<https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/>

When I took them, I was pretty confident that I was, as a well-meaning nerd,
beyond any sort of racial bias. I was wrong.

Although I am deeply opposed to racism consciously, various bits of racial
bias lurked in my wiring. It's sort of like how even a very smart person can
have plenty of dumb ideas or dumb reactions, especially on topics they haven't
paid attention to. Since I took those tests, I've been much more aware of
those biases, which a) lets me minimize the effects, b) helps me undermine
them over time, and c) has made me much better able to see the subtle effects
of racial bias generally.

~~~
thwest
I would ask people not to take the test immediately, but rather first spend
time on the authors' distinction about _implicit_ racial attitudes. Racial
bias in this sense is entirely different than overt racism, but still as
important. Admitting that you've unintentionally learned the statistical
biases present in our culture is not admitting you're a racist. When you're ok
with that statement (which can be difficult given the charged USian history of
race!), take the test.

~~~
bluedanieru
_USian_

Stop it.

------
Jun8
I am _fed up_ with all the bla bla around this issue. Really. Look, if you
think there is racism in the tech field (let us define this narrowly as
prejudices against blacks; prejudices against Indians and Chinese are, I
think, a bit different), stop writing cute, angry blog posts; instead write
about what the solution is and what you are doing about it.

That there are too few blacks in the tech industry is a fact. The reason is
actually very simple (as others have commented): _African-Americans are
underrepresented in CS, EE, and other tech fields_. This is similar to the
issue of the dearth of women in these fields. Now, the reasons for this are
complex and are not easy to solve. So, instead, while waiting for the root
causes and biases to go away, be pragmatic and solve the problem at hand.

The solution is easy, but is not affirmative action or specialized VCs or
quotas: It's as simple as increasing the demand of black (or women)
programmers.

How to do this? I am working as a software mentor for two FIRST Robotics Teams
in Chicago South Side, these teams are almost all black and this is their
first exposure to programming (unfortunately, we have to use C++ for first
exposure!) So, I alone have the power to introduce 5-10 black programmers to
tech community! Assume I have 20% success, which is really lousy, that means
1-2 programmers. If 1K people do this, that's 1K more black programmers on the
market.

Another example: Finding that the teams on the Apps for Metro Chicago
challenge were all-male, my friend Pallavi quickly assembled an all-female
team of college students, who won the second prize
(<http://www.metroplanning.org/news-events/blog-post/6262>) and were featured
in the local press.

So, same as starting a company: you don't need anybody's permission to start
helping kids to solve this problem.

~~~
dholowiski
"prejudices against Indians and Chinese are, I think, a bit different" -
Please explain.

~~~
kchodorow
He's saying that black people and women are under-represented in CS. I think
most people would agree that Indians and Chinese people are not
underrepresented, but also can face prejudice.

------
zanek
I'm black and a software engineer for 14 yrs (college degree), and although I
know there are racist people out there, I've never encountered any even once
in 14 years across a ton of companies (startups, fortune 500 companies, etc)

If you can produce something of value, no one gives a shit about your race.
The hundreds of people I've met in tech have been race blind as far as i could
tell. I think the tech industry in general is a meritocracy from my
experience.

I would never join a race based startup, as that seems quite lame to me. Then
again, perhaps I'm an outlier as I think race based anything is stupid (BET,
etc). We're like 99.9% the same yet people think a chemical within their skin
alters something intrinsically about us. Absurd

It really comes down to poor role models in the black community, poor
education & not enough resources. Why would anyone care about your race if you
are producing.

I think racist people in tech would be the exception, not the rule.

------
wccrawford
Racism exists everywhere. In fact, prejudice of all kinds does. And probably
always will.

I worked a company where the employees felt it was okay to make racist or
sexist jokes with the person in the room, so long as the person didn't appear
to mind. It made me terribly uncomfortable, but short of going to management,
nothing I said or did mattered. (I didn't make an ass of myself, though. If
the person isn't going to stand up for themselves, with me already standing,
I'm not going to risk my job for them.)

Maybe those people didn't really mind. I know I don't mind when my ancestry is
made fun of, so long as it's along typical stereotype lines. (Pointed attacks
on my particular ancestors or family are another matter.)

I think we, as a species, have a long way to go in regards to dealing with
each other. We have somehow never learned to treat each other with basic
respect.

~~~
wpietri
Maybe they didn't mind. But I've definitely heard friends in various non-
dominant groups tell stories about the racist, sexist, or anti-gay bias
they've listened to politely because they liked their jobs more than they
liked being honest about the fact that they thought their co-workers were
irredeemable assholes. No way to tell, really.

I will say, though, that the experience is very different when you're part of
the dominant group. As a white male in the US, when people make jokes about
some portion of my mongrel ancestry, it really doesn't matter. But when I was
living in South America, jokes about Americans had a whole new edge to them.
Sometimes they really were funny and welcome. But sometimes they weren't
because the person really had something against gringos. That was at times
really uncomfortable, and I occasionally wondered what it meant for my
physical safety. I still laughed either way, though. Ha! Ha ha!

~~~
wccrawford
I found it hard to believe they didn't mind, even if I know I wouldn't. In 1
case, I was sure the person minded, but he told me repeated that he didn't.
This person was an excellent coder, and ended up quitting a couple years
later. The quit was probably for some of the other working conditions that
didn't go well with his personality (he couldn't say 'no', they kept asking
unreasonable things) but I think the whole package mattered.

I also see your point about it mattering more when you aren't part of the
majority, or if you felt there might be a threat to your person.

------
scarmig
Just to get it out of the way: no one who has ever posted on Hacker News or
has ever been even slightly associated with the Bay Area tech scene is the
least bit racist. We are all 100.0000% meritocratic, and when we popped out of
the womb we were instantly the most color-blind people in history. This is a
given, and anyone who would say otherwise is a whiner who's just too lazy and
stupid to code. (This, by the way, is also how we know that people here are
not at all sexist or homophobic and have highly progressive views on gender.
We're just that good.)

Now that that's out of the way, we can talk about the role of race in tech. I
think it'd be useful to divide it into four categories.

1) Race as felt through through social structure. Minorities (defined as AA,
Native American, and Latinos) have less access to educational resources than
other ethnicities. This is a broader social injustice, and tech can't be held
responsible for it. Tech is also hard at work to help mitigate this problem,
though with varying levels of success.

2) Race as felt through choice of majors. Minorities disproportionately choose
not to major in techy fields. This is in large part due to a combination of 1)
and 3) (to follow). Even to the extent that minorities do have access to high
quality education, it tends to be more liberal arts and non-techy. Minorities
may also perceive that the tech scene tends to be less friendly toward them.

3) Race as felt through network effects. This, I think, is probably the
biggest cause of the recent complaints. Everyone knows here how valuable
having their social community overlap at least somewhat with the tech
community is. Knowing someone who knows someone is how you get jobs and get
involved in new projects. And you learn a whole lot through these informal
interactions (having no CS background, I only learned about Lisp on a date).

People whom we know are usually of similar racial and class backgrounds. Not
through any conscious decisions, but because of shared interests and the fact
that people make friends through other nodes in their own social networks,
nodes that have the same tendency of showing race and class similarity.

4) Racist prejudice. Examples of this are the null set, because no one here is
at all racist.

In the end, though, 3) builds off of itself. You start out as an isolated
island, and if you don't break out of it you'll never achieve your full
potential. Once you do get pulled into it, though, the sky's the limit.

The question we should be asking is how to deal with 3).

~~~
hackinthebochs
Great comment. I love a good, nuanced look at racial issues. Generally smart
people seem unable to use their analytical skills when it comes to race or
other social issues. It's disappointing.

------
bdunbar
_Over the course of the three days, the customer made endless racial and
ethnic slurs directed at B._

Customer is a 'government owned military installation'. What branch? What
site?

Was the customer military or civilian contractor?

The military is [1] _death_ on racisim, sexism, favoritism. Just does not
happen. When it does it gets squashed.

While the military one thing, the individual service members are another. It's
a very masculine culture, not unheard of for best friends to insult each other
with words, phrases, etc that would sound blisteringly insulting to an
outsider. But which are understood by the participants to be 'funnin' around'.

I conjecture: could 'B' have been hooked up with a guy who was trying to bond
and it mis-fired?

[1] My last direct experience was 1993, when I separated. I have several
friends who are enlisted, my step-son has been in the army since 1999.

~~~
JabavuAdams
> The military is [1] _death_ on racisim, sexism, favoritism

Officially, yes, but that's probably BS.

This reminds me of two anecdotes about the IDF (not to make this about Israel
-- it's just the data that I have):

1) One friend assured me that any soldier acting improperly would be
disciplined immediately, as the IDF had very high standards, etc. etc.

2) Another friend used to tell me stories about his IDF stint and how he and
his friends would get high on guard duty all the time.

So ... just because you were in a military, doesn't mean that you know what's
going down with everyone.

Also, the attitude that you evidence in your post makes it _less_ likely that
you'll know the truth, because you'll be more resistant to contrary evidence.

Treat truth as stochastic/unknown. We don't know the truth. Now ask "what
practices or attitudes will tend to help me discover what is true? What
practices or attitudes will tend to obscure the truth?"

The attitude "nope that can't be happening because organization X is so
disciplined" obscures the truth. Especially in an organization that emphasizes
loyalty and duty.

~~~
endtime
The IDF, which has strengths and weaknesses, is not the US military. The main
relevant difference here is that the IDF is composed of every 18 year old in
the country (pretty much), whereas the US military is only composed of those
who want to be in the military. The kind of kids who will get high on guard
duty in Israel won't ever join the military in the US.

~~~
JabavuAdams
Interesting point, but not really relevant to my argument.

What's most interesting about these IDF anecdotes is that you have one ex-
soldier completely dismissing behaviour that another ex-soldier admits to.
That pattern can generalize to any org, regardless of volunteer / non-
volunteer selection. I.e. they can't both be right. One of them is over-
generalizing.

EDIT>

I.e. saying "No one in org X is doing Y" is much less likely (given an
individual's limited personal experience) than saying "someone in org X is
probably doing Y".

~~~
endtime
The OP said "Org X has property P." You responded with "Org Y does not have
property P, and Org Y is like Org X." I claim the second half of that - that
things that are true about the IDF are likely to be true about the US military
- cannot be assumed. Even ignoring the significant cultural differences
between the two countries, there are differences in the demographics the
militaries themselves are composed of.

~~~
JabavuAdams
So at the risk of pedantry ...

I was making a claim about large organizations that depend on loyalty, not
even specifically military organizations.

So, the specific difference between military organizations and cultures are
neatly excluded.

The pattern (of which I gave a specific example) is:

Person X in large org Y claims something is true for ALL members of org Y,
based on X's personal experience.

I submit that humans being what they are and organizations being what they
are, it's more likely that there are bad behaviours that are tolerated in sub-
organizations of Y even if they violate the officially stated rules.

TL;DR Without perfect knowledge it's better to assume that something somewhere
is going wrong than to assume that nothing anywhere is going wrong.

A lot of science, engineering and process control basically boils down to
this. Why do we forget it when dealing with human systems?

~~~
endtime
Behavior/discipline will necessarily be noisier in a conscripted organization
than in a self-selected volunteer organization. I don't think you can
generalize that away.

------
kstenerud
Yeah, some people are genuinely racist, but the fact is that most aren't. What
most people incorrectly call "racism" is actually culture fit issues.

When someone's culture is sufficiently different from yours, it becomes enough
of an unknown to engender fear. And fear due to the unknown leads to paranoid
thought, usually at the subconscious level.

For example, if you get a job candidate whose demeanor screams "from the
hood", you'll definitely pass him/her over. The last thing you want is for
them to start a fight over "respect", or bring some "friends" over to rob the
place (deliberate hyperbole, yes, but this is how the subconscious works).
Similarly, anyone who has had much contact with Indian culture will know that
fraud and corruption are tolerated far more readily than they are in the West.
This means that you need to be on your guard lest the person of that culture
starts behaving as if in that culture. I've seen it happen enough times in my
own experiences, so this is not just idle speculation. This is also why second
gen people have a much easier time of it.

You may argue that you shouldn't "sell out" on your culture just to get ahead
("acting white", for example). I would argue that in remaining "true to your
roots", you hobble yourself by deliberately refusing to make it easier for the
majority to accept you.

I've lived on both sides of this issue. I've seen actually racist people, but
far more often I've seen people who are afraid of the cultural divide, and
move to protect themselves accordingly. I've also seen people change their own
culture to better match the one of the majority, and they made FAR better
lives for themselves than those who refused to do so.

Do racism and sexism exist? Of course they do. And in the rare cases where you
DO encounter the real thing, it is your duty as a civilized person to put a
stop to it. But when it's merely a culture issue, raising a stink about it
will do nothing more than stir up resentment.

~~~
kstenerud
It's always telling when people downvote, yet have no rebuttal.

~~~
JulianMiller520
People don't like to argue with people they deem incapable of understanding
the topic at hand. I hit your hyperbole and read no further because I deemed
your take unintelligent and poorly argued. Hence #downvote

~~~
kstenerud
That's awfully rude. Which part was unintelligent and why? Which part was
poorly argued and why?

~~~
JulianMiller520
It honestly wasn't meant to be rude but I thought most other people would also
stop reading and dismiss it and it wouldn't be productive if you took that to
mean you'd argued a great point and stumped the community. Your assertions
stomp all over sensitive issues on all sides of the issue, you use race-
related language that could be considered inflammatory. If your point was
about cultural sensitivity on both sides of the divide then perhaps you could
have started by showing some in your post. Hope that helps to clarify.

~~~
kstenerud
"Hope that helps to clarify."

Not really... I used some inflammatory language as an example of how paranoid
thought would germinate as fear of an unknown brought someone to the extreme
of the "what if". Kind of like how parents fears can grow into a near
certainty that their child has been abducted by an axe murderer because he's
an hour late coming home from school.

The rest of the post is about fitting in so that you don't trigger that fear
response. In essence, comporting yourself in the same manner as is the
standard in business in the area you find yourself in (i.e. no surprising
behavior). I've made a habit of taking this approach, and it's worked quite
well for me. I also know a number of others who refused to do this, and are
now bitter over the rejection they suffered (sometimes to the level of
violence, actually, which didn't help at all).

------
Macshot
As a Black developer, from an under privileged urban area, without a degree
(but went to college for CS) I can can say that I agree with Arrington. The
reason there aren't more minorities heading to the valley is because they
aren't exposed to the possibilities. I know out of all the black developers I
know I'm one of the few with aspersions of doing my own thing (NoBadGift.com)
let alone know that that's an option.

This is not to say that I haven't experienced racism in my career in
technology. Shoot I have people turn me away because I went to college at an
HBCU (Historically Black College & University). Yet, I don't think that was
because I in this industry just those individuals bias and I know if there
were more minorities exposed to the idea of being entrepreneurs then there
would be far more in the valley.

Don't worry though I hope to be one of those that help with this problem

SN: for anyone who has never experience racism consider yourself lucky. True
story: (mind you I am a well established ,for my age, government contractor.)
After exceeding all of a clients expectations on a project I later had a co-
worker come and tell me how shocked that a black person could code let alone
do it well and that he thought I was only on the team as a ploy by the company
to diversify. Then expected me to take that as a compliment lol. Now that's
only one of many stories i can tell. Just my 2 cent

------
drieddust
I know hacker news crowd is different and most you have not worked in
traditional companies so to those who will say racism is practiced by
minority, here is my one of the favorite anecdote. I understand anecdote is
not data but I have a personal collection of self-experienced anecdotes
,spanning multiple years and client.

I work as an outsourced contracted consultant on a client which outsources to
2 outsourcing firms A(Indian) and B(Native). I work for firm A. Client had a
seemingly untraceable problem which was not solved for more than a year.CTO
personally used to come to my manager’s desk and express his frustration of
not able to resolve the issues. End users were constantly complaining to him.
So task force was prepared to which used to meet every day for hours and talk
in circles with no resolution. They were not even able to devise an attack
plan. I have some reputation for tackling this kind of stuff so they persuaded
my managers and started inviting me to their meetings.

After couple of days of investigation I was able to devise a plan and find out
the root cause and resolution to the problem. Actual was hilarious and sad at
the same time. It was a bigger issue with overall design of the datacentres
which was originally designed by vendor B. Millions were wasted because
someone failed to understand how TCP/IP layers interact with each other.

I know communication is important so I kept everyone updated and prepared a
detailed analysis in doc and ppt format. The moment my analysis was out, guess
what Vendor B tried to blame internet for not behaving to make his solution
work and client rallied behind him. When I shot down his bullshit argument ,
me and my firm were taken out of loop and separate meetings with vendor B
started to propose potentials solutions. After couple of months of proposing
bullshit they again came to us and we provided the solution. Guess what ? We
were out of the loop again and solution implementation started by hiring a
third vendor C(Native again!!) along with vendor B.

------
watty
So one of their customers is racist and now racism is "alive and well". Seems
like they were living in a bubble if they thought racism no longer existed.

------
ctdonath
One anecdote does not constitute "...is alive and well".

------
Aloisius
Frankly, I expect that there is far more discrimination against foreign born
Indians and Chinese in Silicon Valley than there are against black Americans.
I've seen it. I don't believe it to be racism since it is rarely directed
towards anyone who was born in the US regardless of their descent.

I think there is a very real sense of lack of shared cultural values and
overlapping social circles.

During my stint at a certain mid-sized company in Mountain View that happened
to hire quite a few H1Bs, I noticed that engineering teams were split. You had
a tight knit group of people who were American/Western European and sometimes
Japanese and then you had foreign-born Indians and Chinese who socialized with
other foreign-born Indians and Chinese in other parts of the company rather
than with their own team.

It was a bit dysfunctional and depressing.

------
maxklein
I really don't see how racism in tech is relevant, because

a) Nobody knows or cares who wrote a piece of software, because 99.9% of the
time, the customer never sees the photo of the author

b) If your software is super-hot and gaining a lot of traction and people are
smelling the money, they will not care what colour you are

c) For those tiny number of people who don't have traction and want other
peoples money, the colour of your skin may give you a disadvantage with some
particular money givers, but it will give you an advantage with other money
givers

In general, for the success of your product to be affected by peoples
prejudices against you or the colour of your skin, you would have to belong to
a very unlucky 99.99%. If that happens, well, bad luck, try again. That's what
entrepreneurship is all about, isn't it?

~~~
drhayes9
He's not talking about products, he's talking about work environments.

------
vrode
I think the correct term is 'race conditions'.

------
jeffio
If you look at fortune 500 companies, most are run by tall, old white men over
50. The reality in today's world is that if you're a short black woman (for
example), you're up against huge discrimination that runs deep in mainstream
society.

I found this article the other day that Female Fortune 500 CEOs were at an
"all time high". Female CEOs represent just about 3.6% of Fortune 500 company
heads. That's 18, a new record. And it's not a very multicultural bunch:
[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/26/female-
fortune-500-...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/26/female-
fortune-500-ceos_n_1034081.html)

The issue is not "crap", it's a very real issue that a lot of people
experience every day. Thank-you to Brad Feld for putting the spotlight on this
issue into the tech world, at least for a few hours.

~~~
virmundi
Not to exclude racism from the picture, but look at the requirements
profferred for CEO: experience in the field, wisdom and experience in a
management position. Given this it makes sense that many CEOs would be white
males in their 50s. They have experience in the field. They should have gotten
wise (though, that's anybody's guess). They would have had management
experience during their 30s and 40s. So the question is how many, as you said,
short black women were looking to be CEOs of a F500 company 30 years ago when
they were in their 20s? Probably not that many. Given that there are only a
tiny number of F500 CEO positions (500 or so), that small initial population
is competing with a large pool of white men, men in general and taller, non
black women.

It will be interesting to look at CEO ratios in 20-30 years. That's about the
time you'll start seeing women (more in the work force now then every,
especially better educated) start to have the paper credentials to fill those
roles.

------
swah
A & B should either confront the guy or leave. Writing blog posts is not how
this ends, unfortunately.

------
ataggart
It's not clear to me how one distinguishes being treated differently because
they are a minority, from being treated differently because they are an
incompetent ass. And nothing stops the latter from being used as an anecdote
in support of claimed racism.

------
rohern
The gist of this whole story is that CNN is a lousy source of information
about anything. Most of us have known this for at least five years. Cable
journalism is an industry in which a group of people with no specialized
knowledge at all, reporters, get to go on TV and pontificate as if things were
otherwise. Move on.

------
jaequery
I am asian and when I try to play basketball ... black people make fun of me.

What do I do? I accept the fact that I am asian and so it's okay for blacks to
make fun of me when I play basketball.

This is how society works. Sometimes, you just live with it. Stop the whining
and the bitching.

~~~
zanek
This was a really stupid comment. Seems like youre implying playing basketball
is innate ability attributed to being black, and that blacks being
discriminated in tech is similar so they should stop complaining. In reality,
this is a really immature perspective, as most people could probably work in
the tech industry regardless of race. Poor parenting, poor education, socio-
economics etc are the real factors. Being Asian has nothing to do with playing
basketball poorly. Blacks can excel in tech with the proper upbringing and
environment.

------
j45
Sad outcomes occur when some people get their education about the world from
tv and hearsay.

When anyone takes a minute to turn a stranger into a person they fight racism,
or any -ism by delivering social proof of how _to_ behave.

------
jwatte
Never. Ever. Talk to the press! Unless you get all the questions in advance.

------
sigzero
Racism or just prejudice?

~~~
j45
Depends if you're giving or receiving it, I guess.

------
nazgulnarsil
racism is a frictional cost. efficient tend to reduce these.

------
vegai
Cheap more probably equals unskilled. That's all it boils down to.

------
d3x
This entire issue is crap.

I am a black programmer...

I have no college education, came from single family home blah blah womp womp.

I have launched 10+ projects for clients this year alone. I have 1 failed
contract where I left because it just didn't work out.

When I had success it was not because I was black and when I failed it was not
because I was black. Both when I have succeeded and when I have failed was
never been treated like anything but an equal by my peers.

I personally thing that the NewMe accelerator is total crap and should not
exit. What strategic advantage comes from going to a "black" incubator? I dont
have a black startup because I dont have all black customers. The one thing
this has managed to accomplish is to distract people from finding and solving
huge problems and instead focus on some BS issue that has no value.

My only advice to "black" and other entrepreneurs is shut up, go code and make
something awesome. The rest will take care of itself.

This entire issue is being exploited to get attention for Angela Benton and
her new accelerator. I dont think its fair to cast a shadow over the awesome
people I have had the opportunity to work with over the last 12 years in this
field simply because someone wants to get some press at the expense of others.

... now back to coding ...

~~~
ww
The racism that I've come in contact with (in corporate settings at least) is
towards people from India. Not people born here and of Indian descent, but
people _from_ India with Indian culture. It would probably be better to call
it "culturism" or bias against a culture instead of racism. When you go on a
contract and you see 20 employees 50-80% of them being from India and 0% of
them in management or even team lead positions, that's an indicator. It's an
even bigger indicator when all of said employees have been there for 5-10
years or longer and are willing to manage. The absolute smoking gun is when
current the managers bring zero to the table (completely incompetent). These
positions in large companies are often obviously filled with friends with no
merit, technical know how, or leadership ability. As a side note I'm black as
well, and I feel I know these biases when I see them.

~~~
freemarketteddy
</RANT>

Well I think you're right...but this "culturism" that you talk about has
something to do with the fact that Indians from India are not inherently very
good at managing people or software projects.In fact I would say that
statistically Indians who have been educated in India are not good managers
period.

I am myself an Indian and I have a bachelors degree from an Indian University.

In my experience working for corporate america,one of the things that
irritates me most about Indian managers is that they will talk completely from
their asses.They wont write a line of code and yet will make very heavy
technical decisions and then when I disagree they will resort to micro-
managing me instead of making an effort to understand my arguments.

I have repeatedly asked them to actually read the source and understand what I
am talking about but they will relegate it back to me and ask me to send an
email with a lengthy explanation later(They know I am not going to do that).

I have repeatedly pushed for DVCS adoption but apparently IBM Clearcase is a
much better solution than github firewall.None of them (my Indian manager and
his Indian manager and his Indian manager) have actually made an effort to
understand DVCS till date.

Sometimes my manager has actually tried to argue that just because he has 13
years of experience in software he obviously knows more than me about iOS
development and therefore his decision is obviously the right one.(The fact
that he has never really written a line of Objective C is completely
irrelevant.)

In fact when I apply for new jobs I try to make sure that I am not assigned to
an Indian manager.

~~~
rtperson
There's a term for these tendencies: the Power Distance Index.
([http://www.lessonsoffailure.com/developers/real-reason-
outso...](http://www.lessonsoffailure.com/developers/real-reason-outsourcing-
fails/)) The idea behind PDI is that leaders in some cultures expect, and even
to an extent welcome, subordinates who question them. And there are other
cultures where leaders expect obedience above all, regardless of any objective
measure of correctness.

India is a high-PDI country. If you're taking orders from an Indian manager,
for the most part they will expect you to keep your head down, shut up, tow
the line, and do what you're told. This also partially explains Westerners'
complaints about Indian subordinates: that they don't speak up, don't take
responsibility, don't innovate. They have been very thoroughly taught not to.
On the other hand, this also explains the at times amazing attention to detail
-- if details are all you are allowed to control, you will control the living
crap out of them.

~~~
recursive
Very interesting.

(PS: "toe the line" <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toe_the_line> )

------
kahawe
This story is shocking and I hate to nit-pick here but

> _Just to remind all of us that racism is alive and well in the US and in
> tech._ [...] _The customer site is a government owned military
> installation._

This doesn't make it any "better", actually much worse, but this is not "in
tech".

What I find both shocking and curious about racism is that it is a much more
widespread problem throughout the world, not only limited to white racism -
there is very strong racism throughout history in a lot of different cultures
and is still prevalent there today. Why do humans even care about where
someone was born or where they are from? Where and why did racism start at
all?

~~~
ericd
I think there's probably an evolutionary origin - genes that compel their
owners to look out for others with the same genes over those who are unlikely
to share genes were likely to be more successful overall in our more violent
past. Now selection favors those who are able to work well with others of all
races, so perhaps it's fading.

~~~
zootar
Why do you think selection favors "those who are able to work well with others
of all races"?

~~~
ericd
Because being a racist nowadays tends to cause one to be marginalized by
others, and not be as successful. Today's business environment favors the
person who can work well with anyone.

~~~
zootar
Today's business environment does not exert any evolutionary pressure on the
human species.

------
powertower
> Especially at a government facility. In the United States. In 2011. In the
> tech business.

Humans have accumulated (recorded) vast sums of knowledge, and have become
more efficient at building things using that knowledge, but human nature has
not "evolved". The human brain has remained about the same for the last 20,000
years (give or take a few thousand years). There have been no quantum leaps
here. We are exactly what we were 10 years ago, 100 years ago, 1000 years ago,
etc.

That's the real problem... That people think that somehow they are "evolved"
because the year is 2011. And hence the segmentation begins again... Always
seeing your-group as different from other-group, segmenting everything.

A person that pretends that they are not racist, is one that pretend that they
are better than the racist... The problem is they are doing the exact same
thing as the racist, just on a higher level.

~~~
bluedanieru
Our DNA is the same. We are better fed and generally healthier (at least since
the agricultural revolution), most of us are raised better than your average
peasant 1000 years ago, mothers know not to drink during pregnancy (this is a
big one, by the way), etc.

------
suivix
One of my coworkers is black and I don't see any racism here.

------
nubela
Well, I'm not from the valley, but I've heard that in SV, its almost as if 50%
of the population is made of asians, what about that?

~~~
jaryd
terrifying

------
sharkman
Even inside YC. I remember at the YC NYC meetup, the guy on stage in red
sweater (forgot his name) was saying "I was so lucky to be born as white male
in a middle class family"; I was like, WTH, so born as non-white or female is
unlucky?!

~~~
jhamburger
Like Louis CK said in a stand-up routine- "I'm not saying white people are
better, but _being white_ is clearly better." i.e., you're not likely to ever
have an opportunity denied to you in life due to your skin color, or gender.

------
k33n
I think racism is about as far from a relevant issue as you can get. Honestly,
the people who get bent out of shape about it are just as backwards as the few
people who are still actually racist.

Edit: Since davidw is claiming that I think victims of racism are backwards,
I'd like to clarify. I think that all victims of crimes and discrimination
should be treated with respect and dignity by polite society (which far
outnumber racists). It's my opinion that getting upset about a rude military
contractor (like the one in this article) is backwards and is giving his point
of view way more attention than it deserves. He should be disregarded entirely
because his worldview is irrelevant.

This issue clearly touched some nerves.

~~~
DanBC
> _I think racism is about as far from a relevant issue as you can get.
> Honestly, the people who get bent out of shape about it are just as
> backwards as the few people who are still actually racist._

Haven't you just killed your company with this comment? Good Luck with any job
interviews your company gives in the future. You appear to have left them open
to claims of racist discrimination.

~~~
Spyro7
At the risk of losing karma, I have to say that I think this entire thread has
really gone way too far.

Guys, this is HACKER NEWS. I thought we were supposed to hold ourselves to a
higher standard of conversation over here?

Could I just post one thing?

<http://www.paulgraham.com/randomness.html>

If you disagree with what someone writes, then you should reply simply and
without embellishment. To conclude that someone has a "sick mind" or has
"killed their company" is a bit much of a conclusion to draw from a simple
online debate at a tech/startup discussion site.

If Hacker News offered the ability to lock discussions, then I am quite sure
that this one would have been locked.

Can't we all just calm down and get back to coding?

~~~
DanBC
The post said that people who get bent out of shape about racism are
backwards.

Imagine the company not hiring a non-white interviewee, and that person doing
thorough research.

That comment is findable in search engines.

k33n has left himself open to accusations of racism, and put his company at
risk of lawsuits.

~~~
k33n
Imagine yourself picking up a law book and actually learning something. You'd
delete your comments out of shame.

