
Buzzfeed Twitter “like to hear from you if you are not white and not male.” - dghughes
http://www.mediaite.com/online/buzzfeed-canada-is-looking-for-writers-white-males-need-not-apply/
======
cperciva
I have a feeling that someone may be getting a talking-to by their lawyers.
That said, the full tweet was

    
    
        "@BuzzFeedCanada would particularly like to hear from you
        if you are not white and not male."
    

which has a subtly different meaning than it would without the word
"particularly". It's quite common in Canada for job postings to include words
like "we encourage applications from under-represented groups, including
women, Aboriginals, visible minorities, and persons with disabilities",
because encouraging _applications_ from particular groups does not imply bias
in the selection process itself.

~~~
peckrob
While the first tweet could have been phrased a bit more carefully, I
understood what she was trying to do. Saying something along the lines of "we
strongly encourage women and minorities to apply" is, IMHO, completely fine.

But everything after that kinda went completely off the rails. It almost looks
like someone needs to put down Twitter for a few minutes and take a break.

~~~
cperciva
_But everything after that kinda went completely off the rails. It almost
looks like someone needs to put down Twitter for a few minutes and take a
break._

I agree; her bigotry was showing. BuzzFeed might escape a human rights
complaint because the most problematic tweets weren't part of the actual job
posting, though.

------
hitekker
As for 10:05a.m. EST, her current pinned tweet is:

"you owe these pale devils nothing."

[https://twitter.com/Scaachi/status/700703145631023105](https://twitter.com/Scaachi/status/700703145631023105)

Screen grab here:

[http://imgur.com/m5T09G4](http://imgur.com/m5T09G4)

~~~
autoreleasepool
That's pure hate.

~~~
hitekker
So it is, and predictably, her twitter went private.

------
hobs
First tweet, who cares. Subsequent tweets, trolling/asshole, why would you
work for this person no matter what your or their race is?

I know they are probably getting a lot of shade on twitter, but the tweets
sound like a crank, not someone doing hiring. Completely unprofessional.

------
outside1234
Discrimination against white males is just as bad as anything other form of
discrimination.

This is also the wrong way to end up with a more diverse workforce. The "non-
diverse" portion of your workforce, who probably highly support your diversity
efforts in general, will slowly sour over not being given equal opportunity
and float away. It also always leaves the question "Is she really good? Or did
she get the General Manager position because she was female?", which again, is
not what you want. You want diverse candidates to win the positions fair and
square and thereby command the respect of the rest of the team.

The right way to end up a more diverse workforce is to setup a better funnel
to find qualified candidates. This requires work (a lot of it) and then a lot
of outreach to get them come interview for positions.

But the actual decision for a positions (and as a corollary, promotions)
should be on merit, otherwise you are just as bad as the previous state of
affairs.

~~~
daleharvey

      > Discrimination against white males is just 
      > as bad as anything other form of discrimination.
    

It isnt in any way comparable, discrimination against white males mostly hurts
their(our) feelings, discrimination against other demographics has them paid
less, physically and sexually attacked more, put in jail or killed by police
more (insert almost infinite list of results of being systematically
discriminated against for not being a white male)

~~~
dudul
You realize that some white guys are explicitly forbidden to apply to a job,
they won't get a chance to get employment to make a living and feed their
kids. I'm not saying that non-whites don't face the same issues, but how can
you honestly say that it only hurts their "feelings"?

You can be pro-discrimination in favor of minorities, but don't hide behind
the "it only hurts their feelings" fallacy.

------
bmelton
I know I'm not the normal, but this doesn't bother me. I believe that in the
marketplace of ideas, the best ideas tend to win out, and if hiring "non-white
males" is the best idea, then more power to them. Fighting discrimination with
discrimination might or might not prove to be an effective tactic, but it
certainly doesn't paint a pretty picture.

On the flip side, in America this violates EEOC laws, and is pretty clearly
illegal. Someone in a position to hire ought to be aware of this.

~~~
hitekker
Would you be fine with them saying hiring "only white males" in Canada? Or
hiring "only white" in Australia?

~~~
bmelton
I would. Moreover, I would be perfectly happy with them advertising as such,
so that I could know that they were assholes, and happily give my money to
their competitors.

Instead, the system we get is one in which everyone pretends to be inclusive,
and I end up inadvertently giving money to organizations like Chik-Fil-A.

------
Joeboy
Is "You owe these pale demons nothing" a quote from something, or a pastiche
of some style of speech? Maybe US black nationalism or Mugabe-ism? It's not
normal English. Google only finds things about Buzzfeed though. I suspect
there may be a lot of whoosh happening here.

~~~
asymmetric
How is it not normal English?

------
bruceb
Buzzfeed is built on divisive headlines and half true stories. No surprise
this person works there.

------
ryanSrich
I encourage activity like this. It helps me add to the list of companies that
I wouldn't touch with a 10ft pole.

~~~
hitekker
I wonder about some of the folks at Github and at Buzzfeed now. When a
vilified person's employers quietly condone vilification by not speaking out
against it: how does that make the subject of the hate feel?

More worryingly, the employees who are now given free reign to hate: what will
they do with this newfound implicit power?

~~~
ryanSrich
> what will they do with this newfound implicit power?

Condone and nurture the very activities that less-radical movements of the
same nature set out to destroy.

------
krisdol
Not considering white males in a field that's already dominated by women, and
excusing it because it "promotes diversity" ironically sounds like a
hypocritical monoculture.

------
chasing
I'm happy that Buzzfeed is looking to diversify.

But this person's just being an asshole.

------
Kapura
There's a lot of context for the request for under-represented groups in some
of her other tweets. Particularly this chain [1] which begins with:

"1\. The reason why I was sourcing out work specifically from WOC is because
we have filled out freelance roster until June with white dudes."

"2\. I am trying to readjust that balance, which is not illegal. I am not sure
who you are going to sue for affirmative action, but good luck."

[1]
[https://twitter.com/Scaachi/status/700672318406840320](https://twitter.com/Scaachi/status/700672318406840320)

~~~
seivan
Her texts about "pale devils", that's also part of the process of hiring WoC?

There are decent ways to go around this to empower non-white hiring. This
isn't helping anyone, and ends up alienating a lot of people.

~~~
Kapura
It alienates far more fragile white guys than the groups she's looking to
employ. An unfortunate sacrifice, but necessary none the less.

~~~
Redoubts

      >  An unfortunate sacrifice, but necessary none the less.
    

I simply can't agree with this. It seems immature and grossly unnecessary.

------
JamesMcMinn
People such as this are part of the problem. They're not helping, just causing
a bigger divide. Diversity is great, it should be encouraged, but diversity
through exclusion should not.

------
autoreleasepool
I'm convinced Twitter ought to be avoided like the plague. It seems to be
nothing but a place to get publicly humiliated for an accidental slip up in
phrasing or line of thought. People make mistakes, and certain Twitter users
do not forgive them.

I'm not a supporter of any group that uses the sjw acronym. I'm just a
realistic person who has made mistakes with phrasing in the past.

------
teamhappy
Pale Demons is a _great_ name for a band. Wait, what were we talking about?

// You don't like it? Our album drops in december.

------
dudul
People getting to such extremisms are not interested in justice for the
present, they're interested in revenge for the past.

------
douche
It's always interesting watching stories that threaten certain ideologies get
blasted away from the front page

------
timrpeterson
And somebody won't be getting fired.

------
cha5m
There is a difference between affirmative action and bald-faced racism/sexism.
Giving bonus points to underrepresented applicants is fine. Behaving
negatively towards a group of people because of their race/sex is not.

------
dudul
At this point, the title of this submission doesn't reflect what's going on.
It's clearly "white men, go die in a ditch! We hate you!". The first tweets
weren't that sensational, but it went down hill pretty quickly.

------
jakobegger
So I've been looking through this thread and there isn't a single comment
that's supportive of @scaachi

Makes me sad. I love reading HN, but I wish it wasn't such an monocultural
echo chamber of white males that get all riled up every time a woman says
something slightly controversial on twitter.

~~~
autoreleasepool
Supportive of what? Her overt racism? This seems like nothing more than a
hateful and racist stance.

Look, I actually speak differently on this website than I do in real life. In
real life, I use a lot of slang and Spanglish. Im aware of the monoculture
you're talking about. But to me, it was always a nerd/geek monoculture, not a
white one. I guess now that you and others have forced me to think that it's a
homogenous white male culture, I subconsciously think that to.

~~~
jakobegger
I can only imagine what this must feel like for @scaachi. She tries to hire
writers that are underrepresented, and lots of people who have nothing to do
with it start yelling at her. Yeah, she might not have used the most
politically language -- but I think that intent is more important than what
exactly upset people tweet when the situation escalates.

I think that it is extremely important to hire people from diverse
backgrounds, especially when hiring journalists. That's what I believe she was
trying to do, and that's something that we should be supportive of.

~~~
autoreleasepool
If you read my rant above, you'll see that there's more than one side to this.
It's a little patronizing to the people she thinks she's helping.

------
generic_user
The intent here is clearly to exclude based on race and gender not to
encourage ethnic diversity. The language is no subtle, 'NO WHITE MEN' is
simply racism and sexism. This person should be removed from her position and
buzzfeed should issue an apology.

------
seivan
The irony is today we got to hear former Khmer Rogue communist on trial
masquerading their mass murder as "social justice" [0]

I wonder how far people are willing to go for "diversity". Branding a group as
"pale devils" is a good way to start diminish people into justifiable targets.

This isn't going to go away unless someone steps up and stops it.
Unfortunately those who want to stop it are being branded as bigots, and
others can only gain (votes, power, etc) from situation like this.

0: [http://jurist.org/paperchase/2016/02/top-khmer-rogue-says-
he...](http://jurist.org/paperchase/2016/02/top-khmer-rogue-says-he-fought-
for-social-justice.php)

------
pbadger27
It really speaks to the viewership of HN that many of these comments are
negative, along the theme of 'Discrimination against white males is just as
bad as anything other form of discrimination.' This person definitely went
overboard, but given the last 300 years of race in North America,
discriminating in one set of hires for one company is potentially a great
thing. It's amazing that the Canadian constitution literally calls this out in
support of it. When you have certain groups of people that you can look at and
say 'Ok that person has a much lower chance of success in life than I, just
look at them', something is wrong with your country, and people supporting
diversity are taking a step in the right direction.

Heres the bit from the Canadian charter of rights "Subsection (1) does not
preclude any law, program or activity that has as its object the amelioration
of conditions of disadvantaged individuals or groups including those that are
disadvantaged because of race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion,
sex, age or mental or physical disability."

