
The Full 10-Page Anti-Diversity Screed Circulating Internally at Google - akalin
https://gizmodo.com/exclusive-heres-the-full-10-page-anti-diversity-screed-1797564320/amp
======
factsaresacred
I fail to understand the outrage but attribute that to the fact that few
bothered to read the document before allowing themselves to be outraged by it
- such is the shallow, feeling-fueled, hysteria-laden media cycle of today.

The doc presents a point-of-view, grounded in reality. Furthermore it's not
"anti-diversity", but rather anti-discrimination - specifically 'positive
'discrimination which it discredits while presenting alternative policies that
are more inclusive (according to the author) and reflective of inherent
psychological differences.

Have I read it wrong? Somebody correct me if I missed the controversial bits.

Edit: OK, it comes off the rails a little at the "Why we’re blind" section but
overall it's food for thought (and no doubt a catharsis for many Right-leaning
Googlers).

Since when is dialectics grounds for ostracism?

~~~
rayiner
The argument basically proceeds as follows:

1) Gender differences exist

2) ???

3) Differences in representation are explainable by gender differences

The problem with the "???" step is that it's unrigorous handwaving. "Women
prefer working with people." Okay, so that's why the majority of accountants
are women? That's why STEM fields that don't involve people at all (math,
biology) actually have quite a lot of women, while programming doesn't have
much women despite being on the social/people-oriented end of the spectrum?

It's not that people are angry about the article's conclusions despite
acknowledging the strength of the logical/factual basis. It's that people
won't give sloppy reasoning the benefit of the doubt when they don't like the
conclusion.

~~~
haberman
I agree that "???" is unrigorous handwaving. And I don't think it purports to
be rigorous; from the document: "Differences in distributions of traits
between men and women _may in part_ explain why we don’t have 50%
representation of women in tech and leadership." (emphasis mine). "May" and
"in part." I don't think this purports to be a proof.

Is this argument any more rigorous?

1\. There is a non-50% representation between men and women in tech.

2\. Unjust discrimination and societal pressures are the only possible
explanation for this imbalance. Therefore we must intervene until it is 50%.

There is no doubt that unjust discrimination and societal pressures exist, and
that we should fight these so that anyone with talent and interest can succeed
in this field.

However, if 100% of these pressures were removed, would we have exactly 50%
representation of men and women in tech? Many people appear to believe very
strongly that this is true. What is the basis for this belief? Are we willing
to entertain the possibility that, even without these pressures, we would have
less than 50% representation of women in tech?

~~~
taysic
Who says we need 50% women in tech? Has Google released a statement on this?
While I have seen some inflammatory articles on the subject I don't know that
many woman care if there are 50% woman in tech. I can tell you as a female
engineer, I just hope that women know it's open to them and feel comfortable
joining the field. I don't care about convincing uninterested people.

Instead here are some of the issues Google seeks to address which seem plenty
reasonable to me.

"Our goal is to create an environment in which every Googler can thrive. We
check and recheck our people processes (including promotions, compensation,
and more) to ensure fairness and equity in all things that impact Googlers.
For example, we took action when we saw that women in tech were less likely to
self-nominate for promotions. We’ve also long had gender pay equity in our
workforce and we recently shared our approach to compensation with the hope
that other organizations will adopt similar fair pay practices."
[https://www.google.com/diversity/at-
google.html](https://www.google.com/diversity/at-google.html)

~~~
pacala
Not Google, but there are tech companies out there that set hiring quotas
significantly higher than what the CS schools are producing [~20% female for
the past 10 years].

[https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/04/why-
is-...](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/04/why-is-silicon-
valley-so-awful-to-women/517788/)

> Well, not quotas. You can’t say quotas. At least not in the United States.
> In some European countries, like Norway, real, actual quotas—for example, a
> rule saying that 40 percent of a public company’s board members must be
> female—have worked well; qualified women have been found and the Earth has
> continued turning. However, in the U.S., hiring quotas are illegal. “We
> never use the word quota at Intel,” says Danielle Brown, the company’s chief
> diversity and inclusion officer. Rather, Intel set extremely firm hiring
> goals. For 2015, it wanted 40 percent of hires to be female or
> underrepresented minorities.

> But since it began linking bonuses to diversity hiring, Intel has met or
> exceeded its goals. In 2015, 43 percent of new hires were women and
> underrepresented minorities, three percentage points above its target. Last
> year, it upped its goal to 45 percent of new hires, and met it.

[https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/diversity/diversity-...](https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/diversity/diversity-
at-intel.html)

> US female new hires 35%

~~~
sabujp
she now works for google

------
chroma
I notice a lot of misrepresentation of views on both sides, almost to the
point of strawmanning. I think a charitable interpretation of the author's
best points can be summarized as follows:

\- Racism & sexism still exist, even at Google. This is bad. (On the bright
side, the problem seems to be getting better over time.)

\- It's good (and good for business) to eliminate discrimination based on
gender, race, sexual preference, etc.

\- There are many benign reasons why a completely unbiased company can still
have skewed demographics. One possible reason is that women & men tend to
differ in psychological makeup. (Unfortunately, it looks like links to some
studies supporting this claim were removed from the post, along with some
charts.)

\- Therefore, Google should focus on eliminating bias & discrimination, not on
getting employee demographics to match the nation as a whole. In short: focus
on equality of opportunity, not equality of outcome. If sex-specific
psychological differences exist, the only way to get equal outcomes would be
to lower the hiring bar for women or raise the bar for men.

\- If men & women tend to be psychologically different, Google should be aware
of that and change work practices to better accommodate women. For example:
More pair programming, as (to use the language of the author) that allows more
working with people rather than things. Though for competitive positions
requiring long hours (usually management), such changes may not be possible.

These points seem to be put forth in good faith by a frustrated employee who
lacks tact. Moreover, I don't think these topics should lie outside the realm
of debate. Either they're not true, in which case they can be dismissed with
counter-evidence. Or they are true, and Google is wasting tremendous resources
trying to solve these problems in the wrong way.

~~~
taysic
As a female engineer I don't resonate with the proposed changes for woman
working with other people etc. I'm a very independent worker and that's partly
why I've thrived in this field. In short, I don't think companies should make
any adjustments based on gender. Just ignore it - that part I agree with - let
people self select what and where they want to work themselves. And I also
don't agree with quotas though I see how they might have served a purpose at
one time.

If other woman are anything like me, the bullet list comparing two different
points of view are cringe. People are so hard to define. And woman in
particular I think generally don't feel like their potential is known yet
because their presence in the workplace is so young relatively. So the last
thing anyone wants is to be categorized by old stereotypes.

~~~
chroma
I also thought the pair programming example was odd, as I've never noticed
different propensities for pairing based on gender. As far as I can tell, it
is equally disliked. :)

~~~
qbaqbaqba
Maybe it's supposed to be more like a tutoring? I don't know if such policy
exists in Google but many American companies having their software houses in
Poland give woman extra points during recruitment only for their gender, in
order to help them start a real work even if for various reasons they miss
some experience, not because of their gender but because there is much less
experienced female programmers than male programmers. I don't suggest that the
tutoring should be obligatory for females and made by males but simply a help
from a more experienced employee would help all newcomers. I was lucky enough
to get my first job in a quite small company with quite small teams and many
very experienced employees(10 years in the same company wasn't that uncommon)
and I took enormous advantage from such informal tutoring.

------
asploder
It’s interesting that the author considers the conceptual framework of
microaggressions spurious, while describing his negative experiences as a
conservative Googler in terms of what a feminist might describe as
microaggressions. To further undermine his own point, he asserts that several
harms against conservatives have been caused by these microaggressions.

The difference between effective negative feedback and
harassment/microaggressions is the former encapsulates a desire for the person
receiving the feedback to succeed. Or, in the feminist lexicon, empathy.

~~~
santoshalper
I noticed that as well. I find it interesting that the alt-right has started
to embrace so much of modern feminist/liberal terminology and tacitly accepted
so many of the premises.

The modern alt-right conservative: "I don't believe in safe spaces, but please
stop bullying me!"

~~~
twh270
This is incredibly disingenuous. Much of the left considers simple
disagreement to be micro-aggression, while at the same time finding it
perfectly acceptable to launch hate-filled screeds of animosity and hatred at
anyone who doesn't toe the line, e.g. "You're a fucking animal that deserves
to be put down!!"

Your comment implicitly supports this sort of misbehavior, implying that any
complaint by an "alt-righter" is just whining and carries no legitimacy.

Both the far left and alt-right have adopted extremist positions and in
general have nothing good to say about each other. Please don't legitimize
hateful, unacceptable behavior from the left just because the alt-right has
learned to play some of the same games.

~~~
smhost
> This is incredibly disingenuous.

> Much of the left considers simple disagreement to be micro-aggression...

Tone down on the hypocrisy. If you want your side's arguments to be evaluated
fairly, don't make ridiculous oversimplifications of the other side's
positions.

~~~
DalaiObama
Have you tried actually disagreeing with leftists?

Many can handle it fine and have a decent discussion. But many will explode in
self righteous rage and do all the things people blinded by hate do.

~~~
LyndsySimon
This is my experience as well. On the right, extremists tend to sort of "clam
up" and just stop engaging in meaningful dialogue. On the left, they tend to
attack the person challenging them.

I say this as as extreme libertarian, so I have my share of disagreements with
both.

------
rayiner
The intellectual contortion required to get from the premise to the conclusion
is actually quite impressive.

> On average, men and women biologically differ in many ways. These
> differences aren’t just socially constructed because:

> They’re universal across human cultures

Except the gender ratio in science/engineering is anything but universal
across cultures. 70% of science/engineering students in Iran are women:
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/amyguttman/2015/12/09/set-to-
ta...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/amyguttman/2015/12/09/set-to-take-over-
tech-70-of-irans-science-and-engineering-students-are-women/#44efca2e44de).
Indeed, in many parts of the world that are not known for being "liberal" with
regard to gender equality, women make up a significantly higher percentage of
the scientific workforce than in the U.S.:
[http://www.catalyst.org/knowledge/women-science-
technology-e...](http://www.catalyst.org/knowledge/women-science-technology-
engineering-and-mathematics-stem) (44% in Latin America, 40% in Eastern
Europe, 37% in the Arab states).

In the Soviet Union, a majority of engineers were women; after the fall that
proportion went way down (from 60% to 40%):
[http://www.asee.org/public/conferences/20/papers/6985/downlo...](http://www.asee.org/public/conferences/20/papers/6985/download).

> Openness directed towards feelings and aesthetics rather than ideas. Women
> generally also have a stronger interest in people rather than things,
> relative to men (also interpreted as empathizing vs. systemizing).

If this were true, shouldn't women's interest in CS be going up now that the
web is all about feelings/aesthetics/social? Programming, in my view, is
actually in the middle in the "people versus things" spectrum. It's much more
about people than, say, math. And of course, 45% of math majors are women, so
I'm not sure how that fits into the author's theory.

> Women on average are more cooperative

Maybe, but does the degree of that effect explain the observed differences in
representation? Tech is actually very cooperative. Compare, for example,
litigation, which is all about confrontation and acrimony. But a third (and
growing) of all litigators are women!

~~~
eintagsfiege
What do you know about women in CS in Iran? How many of them end up working in
CS? I wouldn't jump to conclusions just because you find such outliers. Some
weird mechanisms might be driving such numbers (like people not being given a
choice what to study, people being forced to study something useful because
they can't afford to study literature or gender studies for fun, women
studying just to meet men to marry, men having mostly died in a recent war,
and so on...).

Edit: I am not allowed to comment anymore, so this Eintagsfliege (mayfly) will
die now. Bye.

~~~
smb06
> I wouldn't jump to conclusions just because you find such outliers. Some
> weird mechanisms might be driving such numbers

~~~
eintagsfiege
Well do you know anything about what is going on in Iran? Then please share.

~~~
spaceseaman
He's pointing out that you can use your argument as a counter-argument to
yourself. As a result, your point is more or less moot, and all that remains
is an appeal to cognitive bias (women enter these fields for "fun" or to find
a husband, while men do it for the "real reasons" or something like that [1])

[1] The beauty of your vagueness is that it allows someone to inject whatever
they believe is the "real cause" of the problem in the United States,
perfectly allowing them to project their own bias upon your post as well. It
also makes it difficult for someone else to counter it since they're not
entirely sure what you're trying to say at all. An intriguing approach I must
say.

------
Smaug123
Oh dear, this seems like a bit of an unwise thing to have written. Whether or
not it's true, it's something you're Not Allowed to reason about, where "Not
Allowed" is in the sense of PG's
[http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html) .

~~~
naiveattack
This was an excellent read about how to deal with the irrationality and
repression of mobs. Thanks.

Perhaps this is where anonymous speech is important as it allows the
discussion of ideas without giving importance to the persons behind them. Of
courae, allowing for the fact that nothing can be truly anonymous :)

~~~
TheLilHipster
> Perhaps this is where anonymous speech is important

I'd like to rebut that point as we have anonymous, mainstream means to
socialize nowadays. Chaotic (4chan) and moderated (mediums like Hacker News).

Users speak truth to power all the time on these platforms, is it effective?
eh.

IMO there is a lot of value in these words coming from someone (from google)
who is clearly switched-on, yet has A LOT to lose. Either the discussion is
presented to the general populace and we accept it and learn from it, or the
google employee becomes a martyr.

Either way, the fallout of this document is what interests me.

------
jondubois
I agree that giving someone an unfair advantage because of their gender or
race is a form of discrimination. Gender and race are just two of many factors
that individuals might struggle with when it comes to their career and life.

If you're an introvert, short, fat, nerdy-looking or you have a weak posture;
there's no support group to offset your shortcomings and all the insidious
ways in which they will sabotage your career! It's no coincidence that CEOs
look like and talk like CEOs - We live in a superficial world and we are
animals; there is no need to moralise things; it might just come across as
hypocrisy.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
When you have a culture where more than 40 million people live below the
poverty line and even wealthy people can be bankrupted by medical conditions,
debates about workplace privilege seem like a niche form of special pleading.

The US economy is a monstrous engine powered by discrimination and inequality.
Discrimination against (mostly) college educated women who might want to be
developers is barely a footnote in the much wider political picture where
access to high quality education, business development opportunities, housing,
and health care, are so strictly rationed they might as well not exist for a
depressingly large percentage of the population.

If discrimination is wrong, then it's wrong for everyone. If it's only wrong
when some people are affected by it, then _it 's still discrimination_ \- and
the argument is really about which kinds of discrimination are socially
acceptable, which aren't, and to whom.

~~~
jondubois
Very true, it's completely arbitrary in the grand scheme of things and it
doesn't deserve so much limelight. If it's a problem in one company, then the
discussion should be kept within the confines of the one company instead of
making it everyone's fault and everyone's problem. It's preemptively biasing
us to overcompensate in areas that are already very well compensated.

------
swframe2
I was talking to coworker who recently transferred from China to the US. He
told me that China is will dominate the US because diversity is the greatest
US weakness.

Kind of shocking because our company is about 1/3 White, Indian and Chinese.
But he doesn't see that as diversity. I think that is the answer that he can't
see. Once groups accept each other as equals diversity becomes a non-issue. It
does take work and there are lot of people who are not ready.

In addition, China is not one culture. It has many but maybe they are not as
visible? I suspect secretly they are still very active behind closed doors.

In general, I feel that many immigrants have come from societies that are much
more homogeneous. When they see US racial or gender problems some think that
it's a weakness. I think that these problems can (and will) be solved but I
can understand that given their upbringing they see it as an unsolvable
problem.

Unfortunately, I don't think mandatory "busting unconscious bias" training
will work for everyone. For some, their bias is just too deep. In time, I
think many come around but some will never change. Unfortunately, they do hold
a lot of power and when you report to one, you can find yourself setup to fail
before you know it.

I've said this before: Women, please don't put up with stuff and don't give
up. Please seek out a mentor who can help you become an executive in the
company. The best way to fix this is to rise above it. It is not easy but
please don't give up.

And for the "people against affirmative action", there are other ways to
address your concerns. You can ask harvard to accept donations to increase
class sizes. When some all-male colleges started accepting women, they doubled
the class size. Please don't make it a race war. Harvard really only cares
about money (and reputation). Find out what they want in order to get what you
want. You don't have to take slots from people escaping a 300-year cycle of
poverty. No it is not your fault, but it is your country (for better or for
worse).

~~~
rifung
> I was talking to coworker who recently transferred from China to the US. He
> told me that China is will dominate the US because diversity is the greatest
> US weakness.

Has said coworker seen the research which suggests diversity increases company
performance? [http://www.mckinsey.com/business-
functions/organization/our-...](http://www.mckinsey.com/business-
functions/organization/our-insights/why-diversity-matters)

~~~
ethanhunt_
The study doesn't control for companies are probably much more likely to have
Diversity Programs if they are doing really well.

Sounds like a study that finds people who buy Rolexes live longer. It's not
the Rolex: it's that only rich people who have money to take care of
themselves well can afford a Rolex.

------
smsm42
Can anybody explain to me why it is called "anti-diversity" or even
"sexist"[1]? Never in the whole document the author argues against diversity.

[1] [https://www.recode.net/2017/8/5/16102476/google-diversity-
vp...](https://www.recode.net/2017/8/5/16102476/google-diversity-vp-employee-
memo)

~~~
the_cyber_pass
It's a product of the left/right divide in modern American politics. It's
mostly a dog whistle so the other side knows he is ok to unperson.

------
devrandomguy
Well, this is an issue that I would never have dared to tackle, myself, mainly
because I do not have the political skill to do it safely. So, I offer a
thank-you and a salute to the less inhibited guy who rose up and drew the
first bullet. Now that I have had a chance to read this and observe the public
reaction, my own views have developed further.

I was already of the opinion that the various -ism movements each represent a
form of discrimination themselves, towards the inverse set of people that they
represent. That starts to become a problem when there are people in the
intersection of many inverse sets of -isms. This time, let's not create
another -ism; let's not make "counterminorityism" just another thing to bash
people over the head with.

Instead, it is time to design a continuous reintegration process for our
network of distinctive identity groups, to ensure that they do not become
incompatible over time. We need a social/psychological framework for
identifying and rectifying arbitrary imbalances of resources and social power,
because that is a common theme in the root causes of all of the -isms. We need
to acknowledge our culture's memes [1] as an increasingly powerful force,
worthy of serious study and possibly even regulation or open engineering; take
a close look at the psychological manipulation of advertising, to see why this
is needed.

This true unification, for lack of a more specific word, would likely be every
bit as disruptive to current social and economic structures as the decline of
slavery; most powerful organizations would prefer to play meaningless games
with the -isms, perhaps even play one minority off of another [2] to prevent a
unification. It is something that we will have to develop from the ground up,
and develop over time, with collaboration from all fields and all identities.
As you can see, at this point, my (our?) feelings and thoughts on the matter
are still rough, unpolished, in a state of growth. We need to start seriously
thinking about these things, lest we find ourselves on the losing side of a
new -ism.

[1] Ideas, beliefs and themes that persist in our collective psyche, not
animated gifs.

[2] We are all in a minority. If you aren't, then that is your minority, and
you get no love, no assistance, because of what you are. Welcome to the
minorities.

------
Animats
I'm amazed that people are seriously upset by someone publishing that.

Somehow, most of the women I know don't complain about harassment much. The
one who does complain mostly gets it from her female boss. The one in SF tech
says that Uber people tend to be jerks but the rest of the industry there
isn't bad. The one from France has more problems with age than with sex. The
lawyer has had some annoyances, but finds it useful to be underestimated by
the other side. The ocean lifeguard fought her way onto the L.A. County
lifeguards (competitive with no special allowances for women, and few women
make it; this is the real-world Baywatch) and is proud that some macho guys
apologized to her.

This probably reflects that they're all horse people. Once you're used to
dealing with somewhat pushy half-ton animals, microaggressions aren't a big
deal.

~~~
rifung
> Somehow, most of the women I know don't complain about harassment much.

It does not seem productive to trivialize and disregard people's issues only
because we haven't witnessed them ourselves.

Indeed this attitude is actually why an internal group where people can report
sexist, racist, and other inappropriate behavior is called "Yes at Google",
because so many people thought this kind of thing doesn't happen, or at least
it wouldn't at Google.

~~~
tbrownaw
_It does not seem productive to trivialize and disregard people 's issues only
because we haven't witnessed them ourselves._

There's a difference between trivializing or disregarding particular
complaints, vs questioning just how representative they are of the broader
situation.

------
ankushnarula
A 2011 Norwegian documentary series had an episode called "The Gender Paradox"
that examined this very issue in depth with interviews with evolutionary
biologists, neuroscientists, psychologists and sociologists. It arrived at the
conclusion that employment disparities increase in many professional fields
due to natural divergent proclivities when socio-economic opportunities become
equal for the sexes.

ON AVERAGE in Norway (one of the top 5 most equal countries), females prefer
more people-oriented fields such as medicine and males will favor more
systems-oriented fields such as engineering. Again, this is ON AVERAGE. There
are major overlaps in many fields (e.g. arts and research sciences) - and in
some fields there is virtually none (e.g. nursing vs sanitation). This is not
controversial amongst scientists who do their best to suspend ideological or
wishful thinking.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5LRdW8xw70](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5LRdW8xw70)

------
mAdamTus
He started out well, but about halfway through meandered into bullshit. Bad
data, cherry picked data, incorrect incorrect understanding of the science,
incorrect conclusions -- he even referenced the Cultural Marxism Conspiracy
theory:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankfurt_School#Cultural_Marx...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankfurt_School#Cultural_Marxism_conspiracy_theory)

By the time we hit "why we're blind" he's gone fully off the rails.

I sympathize with him -- and even agree with several points, but he did
himself a huge disservice here.

~~~
marknutter
Why do you call Cultural Marxism a conspiracy theory? Have you actually read
through any of the papers being pumped out by humanities departments in
academia? Not only is marxism on full display, it's actively promoted. Hell,
it's one of the foundational elements of Critical Theory.

~~~
mAdamTus
Nutter indeed.

------
dennisgorelik
Google (and other tech employers) wants to discriminate in favor of hiring
more female engineers, because teams with a little bit higher ratio of female
engineers work better overall, even if individual female engineers are not the
best individual contributors on their teams.

However, openly stating that Google wants to discriminate in favor of females
- is illegal.

So Google uses double-speak and encourages hiring more females under
"affirmative action" and "diversity" guidelines.

Not everyone understands double-speak, so there is disconnect between what
Google is trying to do and opinions on the ground ("why do we discriminate
against males in favor of females?").

That disconnect results in internal popularity of "Anti-Diversity" papers like
this.

~~~
notacoward
Or maybe Google wants to hire more female engineers because they realize that
19% representation does not reflect any kind of natural proclivity and
therefore must reflect some kind of discrimination. One might plausibly argue
that innate differences - more in preference rather than ability - could
account for a small difference. 55:45? OK, I can believe that. 60:40?
Beginning to wonder. 81:19? Absolutely not.

Where discrimination clearly exists, Google could quite reasonably want to
compensate for it. No, not by lowering the bar or setting quotas. Legality
aside, we should all know by now that hiring less able candidates isn't good
for anyone - often least of all for the candidate who is being set up to fail.
Other approaches include casting a wider net, training interviewers to avoid
unconscious bias that could lead to false negatives, increasing retention by
providing support and additional training (e.g. in negotiating techniques at
performance-review time).

None of these lead to anyone less qualified overtaking anyone who is more so.
They drive people like the "echo chamber" author nuts only because those
people refuse to acknowledge that the problem exists (or matters) in the first
place. Because they can't conclusively pin either the problem or solution down
to one place in our social code, they decide it's a feature rather than a bug.
It's the very same tendency that makes them - and anyone who enables or
defends them - crappy engineers. I'll bet "echo chamber" guy was on the way
out already, for reasons unrelated to political beliefs. It's not "brave" to
manufacture an excuse for getting canned that doesn't require acknowledgement
of one's own insufficiency.

------
lotsoflumens
TL;DR

Some guy not only speaks his mind, but has the balls to actually write his
thoughts down.

The completely predictable response from "forward thinking progressives"
follows.

~~~
Pulcinella
Are not those people also just speaking their mind?

~~~
lotsoflumens
I assume they are .. however, they take no risks with their shaming.

------
JelteF
I'm really wondering if those removed hyperlinks are pointing to sources for
the stuff that's stated as facts. I really miss any references of some of the
claims he's making and I find it hard to believe that the writer added none at
all.

------
LouisSayers
Good on him.

We should appreciate our differences and understand them rather than bury them
under "equality".

I hope some good comes of this.

------
cpr
We had this discussion years ago on my Harvard class list, back during the
Larry Summers flap.

Obviously, no one would be/could be against women choosing whatever field of
study and work that fulfills them the most. (I say that with 6 daughters in
mind!)

However, perhaps the lower representation of women in STEM is simply because
they find other fields more interesting (law, medicine, what-have-you). STEM
(at least the academic path) is a fairly single-minded grind, and that
wouldn't appeal to many people. Apparently it appeals to fewer women than men,
and I don't blame them! What's so great about STEM, honestly? It's just
another field of human endeavor, with no particular reason to value it more
highly than others. (Certainly, it's clearly valued by the HN community, but
we're a tiny slice of the real world.)

(I did learn (sadly) from that discussion that women have been grossly
discriminated against in certain scientific fields in academia--one of my
classmates is the astronomy head at a midwestern university, and she had
plenty of examples to share, getting there.)

Aside: Seems to me that the public outrage is at least partially just virtue-
signaling.

~~~
fatbird
When I see someone mention virtue signalling, I dismiss them as posturing for
their community of opinion. Is that fair?

------
davesque
I don't really understand why this is getting so much attention. It's just
some guy's opinion.

~~~
magicalist
Yeah, I assume it's the gossip aspect. Tech people love to mock tabloids and
celebrity magazines, but they (we) still flock to this kind of "leak" and the
takedowns of whoever is the current tech messiah.

As for the document itself, you can read literally the exact same bullshit
posted on HN several times a day (and then the same kind of responses that
were in the motherboard piece), so I'm not sure what's worth writing home
about.

------
jorgemf
> I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men
> and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences
> may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and
> leadership. Many of these differences are small and there’s significant
> overlap between men and women, so you can’t say anything about an individual
> given these population level distributions.

What are your opinions about this? Do you think biological differences leads
to social differences (not only gender but race, height, etc)? Do our
"intelligences" [1] differ based on our gender? [2]

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligenc...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences)

[2] [https://www.elsevier.com/connect/can-brain-biology-
explain-w...](https://www.elsevier.com/connect/can-brain-biology-explain-why-
men-and-women-think-and-act-differently)

~~~
MichaelGG
Some US sports are very non diverse, but it's ok because it's majority non
white, and everyone agrees is mostly meritorious - Athletic performance is
hard to fake (outside drugs).

Yet even suggesting that minds are subject to the same kinds of differences is
considered heresy. It's almost dualistic - as if we're all born with a
mind/soul of the same capability.

~~~
fatbird
It's not heresy. Sports represent a closed ecosystem of relatively
straightforward traits->skill benefits. Professions are not bounded the way
athletic roles are. The fields of law and medicine removed various sexist
barriers to women participating, and female participation increased; I've seen
no one suggest that the professions have significantly shifted in nature due
to an influx of female brains.

Against that, we have a long history of pseudo-scientific arguments that
biological differences matter and thus justify discrimination. And we have a
long history of ending discrimination and proving those arguments to be
bullshit, so we're now rightly sceptical of the sort of biological determinism
that the manifesto author wants to resurrect.

~~~
jorgemf
> I've seen no one suggest that the professions have significantly shifted in
> nature due to an influx of female brains

Here you have it:
[https://youtu.be/cVaTc15plVs?t=1851](https://youtu.be/cVaTc15plVs?t=1851)

Most people in the video are scientists and work in the topic.

~~~
fatbird
I see that it's an extended attack on the nurture side from the nature side
based on the fact that, despite years of concerted government effort,
significant gender divisions remain at the professional level in Norway. I'm
not disputing these facts.

I'm not seeing that it asserts that the influx of women into the medical or
legal professions has substantially changed how those professions are
practiced. If women think differently than men, wouldn't a significant
increase in the number of women in a profession show up as a change in the
general model of the profession?

The author of the manifesto actually suggests changing the practice of
software development at Google (e.g., more pair programming) to make it more
friendly to women's natural inclinations, as a way of achieving better gender
balance instead of affirmative action programs.

~~~
jorgemf
> If women think differently than men, wouldn't a significant increase in the
> number of women in a profession show up as a change in the general model of
> the profession?

It makes sense but I think the problem is that women do not get leadership
roles very often, so they cannot change things. The two theories about why
this happen is, first, the oppression of the women and the glass ceiling [1];
second, the women avoid confrontation and stress which are typical in
leadership roles.

I like the idea of changing things to include more diversity. I don't know if
it can apply to everything but I think it should be an option to explore. Pair
programming is a good idea, another good idea is to have more meetings to
discuss the processes and getting feedback from projects. Definitely a more
emphatic mind will help a lot for this. I don't think this is economically
viable in small companies, but Google could give it a try.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_ceiling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_ceiling)

------
Invictus0
It is one thing to debated the veracity of a view, it is another to declare
that that view should not be debated. For every point there is a counterpoint;
every argument a counterargument. Arguing that the reasoning is flawed is not
sufficient to ban it from discussion.

~~~
scribu
So, would you also agree that the existence of climate change should still be
up for debate, even though there is overwhelming scientific evidence in one
direction?

NB: I do not know what the scientific consensus is on cognitive differences
between men and women.

~~~
davesque
That's a straw man reply. You cherry picked one of the most easily defensible
claims and then implied that the OP would disagree. What gives you the right
to implicate them in this way? Or did I miss another post in this thread where
the OP did, in fact, express skepticism of climate change?

~~~
scribu
What _stops_ me from implicating them in this way? The OP made an unqualified
assertion - "for _every_ point" \- which means it would apply even to the most
extreme example.

Edit: And I didn't ask the OP if they are skeptical of climate change. I
merely asked if they would be in favour of letting those that are skeptical
express their opinion.

~~~
Pilfer
> _The OP made an unqualified assertion - "for every point"_

No, it is possible to defend every point imaginable. Look up "Hempel's
ravens". It is trivial to generate evidence supporting or opposing any claim
you like.

------
greenyoda
There's already extensive discussion of this here, with the full text linked
as the top comment:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14934581](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14934581)

~~~
factsaresacred
That post is 12 hours old, the comment with the link was posted 30min ago.

~~~
ehsankia
And most people in that post had not seen the document. They were commenting
on the biased reporting from an article, who themselves got a biased
interpretation from an employee. That's 2-3 levels of indirection there.

------
sgustard
My son was in the hospital recently and the head surgeon was a woman. Her
primary assistant was a woman. The anesthesiologist and her assistant were
women. There was a male nurse or two.

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have encountered this situation 25 years ago. I'm
sure "biological factors" mean "most women don't go into medicine" because of
the years of hard work separated from their families, and they aren't excited
by the technical bits. Even if you wanted to hire women doctors, they don't
bother going to medical school.

I'm sure a thousand male doctors wrote a thousand letters just like this one
as they saw their workplaces changing. And guess what, it happened anyway, and
the state of medical care across the world is better than ever.

The field of software engineering is still crawling out of the stone age.

~~~
koffiezet
I think it's more a cultural problem where certain jobs and studies are very
polarized and tied to a specific gender. This is not just software
engineering/it, but a lot more common than you would think, also the other way
around.

When talking about masters, where consistently over the last 10 years or so,
56% of the students is female here in Belgium, law, medical and chemistry
studies are currently 60%+ female and some studies, like language, biology,
crime, pharmaceutical are 70%+ female, arts and psychology 80%+ and pedagogy
and logopedic/audiologic over 90%. That are pretty huge gaps, and yet that's
not something you hear about that often.

These stats are taken from multiple reports (in Dutch) from a few universities
here in Belgium in years ranging from 2010 to 2013 [1] [2], and one report I
only have on paper (all with pretty similar results)

Yes there are also many areas where it's more equally divided (surprisingly,
mathematics and economics), but I don't think it's necessarily the 'software
engineering' field, it's for a large part society. My gf for example studied
chemistry, and even if she's a bit of a geek sometimes, she never even
considered software engineering/it as a study. And when I asked her why, she
said it just doesn't have any appeal to her, although when I taught her to
write small scripts in python and some basic HTML she thought that was
awesome.

And I know quite a few geeky girls just like her, doing stuff ranging from
having studied sexology, veterinary, economics, law, chemistry, ... Only 3 of
the ones I knew started in software engineering and 2 never finished. One
became a cop, the other switched to medical, and the one that finished her
degree now teaches mostly math since she didn't see herself writing software
her entire career.

The only way I see to get more women interested in engineering in general, is
to get girls interested from a young age. You can't just wave your magic wand
around and wish there's a even a 70/30 male/female ratio when only 10% of the
software engineering students in the first year is female, and many of them
drop out over the years.

[1]
[https://www.kuleuven.be/diversiteit/pdf/20130927%20Gender%20...](https://www.kuleuven.be/diversiteit/pdf/20130927%20Gender%20en%20Studenten%20Openbaar.pdf)

[2] [http://www.ugent.be/nl/univgent/waarvoor-staat-
ugent/diversi...](http://www.ugent.be/nl/univgent/waarvoor-staat-
ugent/diversiteit-en-gender/beleidscel/pers-en-publicaties/mv-rapport.pdf)

------
Quarrelsome
> Microaggression training

wat? They now train people in microaggressions at work? Is the "training"
mandatory?

~~~
DonbunEf7
It's not mandatory. However, when I was at Google several years ago, it showed
up on my calendar, it was not optional, my manager said that I was expected to
attend, and I attended. But it's not mandatory.

~~~
renaudg
So is it ""not mandatory"" then ?

------
nthcolumn
He, and it is a 'he' has missed the point entirely. It is not that we do not
recognize that people are different, it is that we value that diversity and
therefore endeavor to remove from our community such impediments to achieving
a balanced social group. It is a classic dominant social group position that
the incomers fit in rather than the group dynamic have to change to
accommodate. It is surprising to have a Google thought-leader with such low-
brow views. If you think you are in an echo-chamber or bubble perhaps it is
simply because nobody agrees with you.

------
FlashGit
Well I'm fully on board with the notion that (workplace) diversity is
overrated nonsense but this document could only be described as counter-
productive at best. So things like this will only be used to justify the very
thing he claims to be objecting to.

------
feelin_googley
"...(ignoring or being ashamed of its core business)..."

This deserves its own "manifesto".

In case of any misinterpretation, I interpret "core business" to mean the ever
exciting business of selling online ads.

------
JelteF
How is this not on the front page btw? It has almost 200 points an comments in
2 hours and it's placed 37 at the moment. This seems like a failure of the HN
ranking algorithm. @dang (or someone else) could you explain what's up here?

~~~
TimTheTinker
Another article along similar lines seems to have received similar un-
accounted-for down-modding:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14834758](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14834758)

------
didibus
I hear a lot of complaints about conservative ideas being shunned and bullied,
but I disagree completely. Why haven't I read a 10 page pro-diversity creed
circulating at google?

I haven't heard or read about progressive ideas in a long time, a long long
time.

I'd be willing to bet a pro diversity creed would get much stronger bullying
against it too.

Anyways, I'm tired of this issue, and people trying to pretend there's an
optimal truth. This is a human made field, if we wanted, we could change it.
We just need to agree on what to optimize for, and there lies the problem, I
don't think we know or care what we ultimately optimize for. Too me, it seems
we're currently optimizing for the stock market. And until it's clear that
women make a big impact on that, people will be cautious to fray too far from
what's been tried and worked in the past.

~~~
tmh79
First of all, let me lead with: I'm a neoliberal democrat type person, I
support diversity initiatives, reaching out to and supporting under
represented communities, making changing to work culture to help people who
haven't succeeded historically (IE mothers who leave to take care of their
kids) etc. I disagree with most of the points in the guys doc.

> Why haven't I read a 10 page pro-diversity creed circulating at google?

The corporate culture in SV is pretty far to the left (all things being
considered), you don't see things like a 10 page pro-diversity creed
circulating internally because for the most part, those type of documents are
official company policy. IMO, this is a good thing.

I think open discussion of ideas like the one in this document would be
beneficial because they are easy to refute and all people involved can take it
as a learning or educating experience. The guys conclusions aren't "morally
bad", but they are "demonstrably wrong" and its easy to see why if honest
discussion was permitted. The problem is, open discussion is not permitted
because the culture of the left seems to confuse "demonstrably wrong" with
"morally bad" and thus makes having bad ideas a sin, instead of say, an
opportunity that one can be educated on an enlightened.

~~~
didibus
How many people in SV join Google and spend time thinking about why those
policies are in place, what underlying principle and reasoning has warranted
them? How many explanation is there for why the current Google status quo
leans left or appears to do so? Is that open for discussion too? I don't think
so.

Now, I also find it ironic that status quo is considered progressive. The
underlying principle of progressivism is change, continuous improvement
through conscious change, measured by the impact on the lowest common
denominator and the sum of all value. That is, you want to make the pie bigger
and the smallest piece of pie bigger too.

I'm open for conversation, but you need to hear all data points to make an
informed decision, one way discourse is possibly worse then no discourse.

------
adjkant
I have one simple ask here. To those who agree with any of this article beyond
"we should be able to discuss this openly", please read this. People have all
read this document, and if you agree with it, you value diversity of opinion.
I'm not asking anyone to debate it - there's plenty of that here which doesn't
seem to be going anywhere, as usual, which you can and should join into to try
to reverse that. But read this first.

[https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/04/why-
is-...](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/04/why-is-silicon-
valley-so-awful-to-women/517788/)

------
smithsmith
The author has a point. One suggestion to hire people without bias is to make
the interview online for the most part and then conduct very few face to face
interview with multiple rounds and getting an averaged feed back of the
interviewees in text format and judge based upon it.

------
TimTheTinker
Is this being downmodded? (230 points, 3 hours ago, 298 comments, and already
on page 4)

~~~
TimTheTinker
#290 6 hours later. This must have been down-modded. Before we ascribe
political intent, however, consider that they may downmod controversial posts
regardless of political leaning.

------
alexryan
I’m very sad to see this happening to a great company like google. I first
encountered the new culture at Google I/O extended event I attended a few
months ago. It disturbed me very deeply but I couldn’t figure out exactly why
since I didn’t actually disagree with anything that the diversity proponents
wanted to achieve. I’ve had some time to process it though, and here’s the
deeper issue that I find so disturbing about what seems to be happening at
google ...

How we habitually respond to “uncomfortable situations” in life matters a
great deal. As individuals, it strongly influences our trajectory in life. In
companies, the predominant tendency strongly influences the trajectory of the
company.

One option is to habitually respond by “getting curious” and by “identifying
that part of our predictive model of the world which is weak and seeking to
understand the situation more deeply with the intent of strengthening our
predictive model.” When we choose this option we tend to want to listen
intently to those who believe differently than us, to seek to understand the
deeper needs that are driving them, and to strive to pursue win-win (or
“positive sum”) solutions to problems. The option tends to leads to a
strengthening of “moonshot thinking” because our confidence in our ability to
solve problems grows in direct proportion to the strength of our predictive
model of the world.

Another option is to habitually respond by “being offended”, ”to sink into
victimhood, powerlessness, learned helplessness”, “dividing into us vs them”,
“initiating conflict”, “appealing to authority to protect us from the threat
of them”. When we choose this option, we tend to disconnect from those who
believe differently than us, to be unaware of the deeper needs that are
driving their behavior, and to sink into pursuing win-loss (or zero sum)
solutions to our problems. This option tends to lead to a strengthening of a
downward spiral of “victimhood thinking” which decreases our confidence in our
ability to solve difficult problems by skillful means.

edited: What I find so tragic about this is ... we have 7.5 billion minds in
this world growing ever more connected to each other and to vast sums of
knowledge by the internet. From a first principles perspective these minds
represent more than enough resources to solve the most challenging problems
that affect us all. If we would only fight each other with win-loss intent
LESS and instead direct our aggression towards solving the difficult important
problems that affect us all, we could solve these difficult problems so much
more quickly. Why would we choose waste time fighting each other, when we
could, for example, be building a piece of the puzzle that helps researchers
cure the leukemia that my friend’s young son was just diagnosed with? Why
would we make that choice?

Presumably this was the hope of the google founders who established the
mission of “organizing the world’s information and making it universally
accessible.”?

I propose that >the tendency to “get offended” and “seek win-loss” solutions
to problems should be targeted for extermination. We are better than this. >
the tendency to “get curious” and find “win-win” solutions should to take its
place.

------
mrcabada
I believe the gap is more cultural-made than sex-made. Basically there are the
same differences of capabilities between two random males and between a random
male and a random female.

~~~
the_cyber_pass
If you are talking about IQ the data would support you, the problem comes when
you look at standard deviation and we see men have a slightly higher standard
deviation which leads to the extremes on both sides being overwhelmingly male.
It's not something we need to worry about much in day to day interactions
because you wont notice it but in hyper selective environments it might become
an something people notice.

~~~
mrcabada
How do we now this isn't something that is being caused due to the female
being suppressed in our history? This studies are biased due to the fact that
females haven't been treated equally for centuries and this affects on how the
female see the world, affecting the real purpose of the study.

It's like taking a male that you have treated emotionally bad and you tell him
thru all his life he can't do this and that and a male where you tell him he
must be strong, he must do this and that. Boths are males and I bet you will
find the same differences between these two males and between a male and a
female.

------
aliakhtar
The first ever computer programmers were women.Ada Lovelace, Grace Hopper, etc
did pioneering work in the field. Women can absolutely be great programmers.

------
vfulco
Wow, refreshing. The truth will set you free.

------
drdeadringer
It seems that my receiving my SWE Lifetime Member pin about a week ago is a
bit fortuitous.

------
hudibras
Wow, I didn't know I could cringe that much in such a short time.

~~~
davesque
The only thing cringe worthy IMO was that he didn't appear to cite any studies
or data to back up his claims. Or did that publication of the document omit
things like that? If he had done so, would it still be cringe worthy?

~~~
ggreer
From Gizmodo's summary:

> Two charts and several hyperlinks are also omitted.

I'm guessing the author did link to studies (or at least summaries of
studies), but these were removed by Gizmodo or the leaker.

~~~
davesque
Yes. I'm seeing now many reports that the Gizmodo publication, which was
billed as the "full 10-page" memo, was, in fact, abridged and omitted links to
data that the author had cited to support his arguments.

Very disingenuous.

------
JacobJans
This guy claims that women are more neurotic and talkative than men; and that
they prefer thinking about aesthetics; and that women are more "cooperative."

The subtext is that this is the reason we shouldn't support women becoming
software engineers.

Uggghhh.

~~~
glorkk
You either fail at reading comprehension or you are being dishonest.

Nowhere does the author say we "shouldn't support women becoming software
engineers". His argument is simply that women are, on average, less inclined
to become software engineers because of innate psychological differences,
which explains the unbalanced gender ratio in tech. He suggests we should stop
all forms of "positive" discrimination in the form of employment quotas that
are aimed to correct the gender imbalance, and instead select individuals
based on their merit.

~~~
notacoward
> employment quotas that are aimed to correct the gender imbalance, and
> instead select individuals based on their merit.

That is itself misrepresentative enough that your own snark about reading
comprehension or dishonesty rebounds on you. Quotas aren't the issue. Echo
Chamber Guy is railing against _all_ measures to increase diversity, including
many that would _improve_ the correlation between merit and hiring/promotion.

------
0xbear
As a former Googler: dude is _so_ getting fired and blacklisted. I've seen
people driven out just for saying someone else looks good in a bathing suit.
Not a direct or indirect report, mind you, a person completely outside the
chain of command, at a team event in (IIRC) Hawaii. A small minority of people
takes victim mentality and makes it near religious internal dogma. The rest
just go along with it due to fat paychecks and the lack of desire to get fired
for not being PC enough.

~~~
door
> I've seen people driven out just for saying someone else looks good in a
> bathing suit.

understandably, as that is extremely unprofessional and sexual harassment

~~~
stagbeetle
Your comment was one of the points argued in the memo.

It's important to understand and prioritize intention or else: > _increases
[in our] our sensitivity, which is not universally positive: sensitivity
increases both our tendency to take offense and our self censorship, leading
to authoritarian policies._

This means distinguishing between a well-meaning comment and a maleficent or
predatory remark.

~~~
door
your intentions don't excuse inappropriate behavior.

if you really didn't intend to say something that made someone feel
disrespected, your response should be "Oh, I am so sorry, I won't make that
kind of comment in the future", not "Well you're wrong for being offended."
that kind of response is basically saying "your feelings don't matter, all
that matters is what is going on in my head and not what I actually did and
how it actually made you feel"

~~~
stagbeetle
Intent is vital in the deliverance and sentencing of criminals (as well as
severity).

You'll find that the U.S.A's EEOC does not label one-off remarks as sexual
harassment.[0]

[0][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_harassment#EEOC_Definit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_harassment#EEOC_Definition)

~~~
kemayo
There's a difference between "sexual harassment" and "sexual harassment to a
level that's criminal". I think it's reasonable to say that something is
simultaneously inappropriate at work _and_ not something you should be
arrested for.

~~~
stagbeetle
Is the primary authority's (EEOC) definition of sexual harassment: _It is
unlawful to harass a person (an applicant or employee) because of that
person’s sex. Harassment can include “sexual harassment” or unwelcome sexual
advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical harassment
of a sexual nature._ [0]

And is the primary authority's (EEOC) definition of harassment in general:
_Offensive conduct may include, but is not limited to, offensive jokes, slurs,
epithets or name calling, physical assaults or threats, intimidation, ridicule
or mockery, insults or put-downs, offensive objects or pictures, and
interference with work performance._ [1]

Neither of which make the remark in-question constitute of sexual harassment
or harassment in-general. I'm sure there is a proper word that accurately
describes unwanted remarks about a person's body, but by calling it sexual
harassment you are marginalizing the serious cases of sexual harassment that
fit under the legal definition.

[0][https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/sexual_harassment.cfm](https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/sexual_harassment.cfm)
[1][https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/harassment.cfm](https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/harassment.cfm)

~~~
kemayo
Mind you, by that definition it's easy to construe it as borderline "unwelcome
sexual advances" or "verbal harassment of a sexual nature".

That said, I acknowledge it's very situational whether something might be read
as unwelcome. Which is why avoiding these things in a professional context
seems pretty wise.

Anyway, since we're replying here to door's comment... I think they're right
regardless of whether we want to call it "sexual harassment". If you offend
someone in a way which feels creepy / harassing to them, even assuming that
you _absolutely_ meant it in a non-sexual non-flirtatious entirely-platonic
matter, your should apologize, maybe clarify your intentions, and say you'll
do better in the future. Attempting to argue that you didn't mean it that way
so they shouldn't be offended is counterproductive.

~~~
stagbeetle
I agree with you there. If someone unintentionally offends another, an
apology, followed up with extras (e.g clarification) where needed, is the
correct course of action.

My only gripe was with semantics, which have the potential to do more harm
than good.

------
jerrylives
> internal meme network

i really want to believe that at Google there is a massive distributed cluster
dedicated solely to facilitating meme throughput

~~~
akhilcacharya
There most likely is, I know an engineer that works on it.

Apparently they were one of the teams piloting Tensorflow for Android...have
no idea why though....

~~~
humanrebar
Sometimes the best places to swing for the fences, technologically, are places
far away from the core business, where the impact of a half-baked idea is
minimal.

------
devrandomguy
How is it sexual?

~~~
door
straight men commenting on the attractiveness of women's bodies is pretty
blatantly sexual. what other reason is there to make that kind of comment?
"pure aesthetics"? like Wow Jessica from accounting's body is consistent with
Greek Ideals about Archetypal Female Beauty. come on.

~~~
devrandomguy
Commenting on someone's bathing suit is not inherently sexual, because we do
it in non-sexual contexts; for example, I complemented my nephiew's new swim
trunks earlier this summer.

A particular complement might be sexual, but we shouldn't assume that. For all
we know, the guy is gay, and we are now discriminating against that.

Furthermore, commenting directly on the awesomeness of someone else's body is
also not inherently sexual. Have you never admired a female athlete, the way
you admire a male athelete?

~~~
door
>Furthermore, commenting directly on the awesomeness of someone else's body is
also not sexual. Have you never admired a femal athlete, the way you admire a
male athelete?

I am bisexual so the analogy doesn't quite work lol. and yes sometimes that
can be non-sexual, but a workplace is not a place to make those kinds of
comments because it is a VERY thin line and can easily make someone
uncomfortable. and 99% of the time men commenting on women's bodies is sexual
or has sexual undertones so it's really a corner case here. when's the last
time you heard a straight man say something like "wow she always has super
cool outfits and I love what she does with her makeup" or whatever lol.

~~~
smsm42
> 99% of the time men commenting on women's bodies is sexual or has sexual
> undertones

Stereotyping is ok, as long as we do it for the right reasons!

> when's the last time you heard a straight man say something like "wow she
> always has super cool outfits and I love what she does with her makeup" or
> whatever lol.

The same time the same straight men wasn't called sexual harasser for such
comment. So you basically say "men complimenting women coworkers are sexual
harassers" and then ask "why don't men compliment women coworkers more in non-
sexual context?". I hope you can see a case of circular reasoning here.

~~~
door
no i made a distinction between commenting on the attractiveness of a woman's
body and something that is purely aesthetic and non-sexual (clothing and
makeup)

------
cbeach
"Viewpoint diversity is arguably the most important type of diversity and
political orientation is one of the most fundamental and significant ways in
which people view things differently."

As an experiment, I'd like to see if HN upvotes or downvotes this statement
from the memo.

I'm willing to put my karma score on the line to find out what HNers believe
(this will help me decide if HN is a community worth investing further time
in).

~~~
humanrebar
You might be getting downvoted by people who don't like this kind of
experiment. Or your use of scare quotes or something. I'm not sure you can
draw a lot of conclusions from the score on your post.

But, yes, most of the HN community lives in a bubble. If we're honest, we all
do, but people who take pride on their education and intelligence are
especially challenged when finding that kind of humility.

~~~
cbeach
Good points. I have removed the scare quotes (not intended as such)

------
fatbird
Yonatan Zunger, a (recently departed) distinguished engineer at Google, wrote
a very good response: [https://medium.com/@yonatanzunger/so-about-this-
googlers-man...](https://medium.com/@yonatanzunger/so-about-this-googlers-
manifesto-1e3773ed1788)

~~~
rcpt
chroma's summary above does a much better job understanding the manifesto than
that medium post imo (cf
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14938457](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14938457)
). Yonatan just hones in on that one botched idea and then berates the author
for the rest of the post.

~~~
fatbird
Chroma's summary is a "charitable interpretation" (his words), and shouldn't
be considered necessarily accurate or representative of the manifesto author's
intent. A straight faced reading of it yields something not nearly as
constructive as what Chroma presented.

Yonatan isn't simply berating the author. He's explaining in detail why the
manifesto is problematic in many ways that have to do with context and
circumstance. What the author presents as ideological intolerance, Yonatan
describes as the host of practical considerations to running a business and a
workplace that, one suspects, the author wouldn't have a problem with if he
weren't feeling constrained.

------
URSpider94
Wow, this paper is a textbook example of begging the question. The author
makes a number of completely unfounded generalizations about women and men,
then goes on to use those as a basis for protesting against Google's corporate
diversity programs.

I wonder if the author would like to keep walking out on his very weak limb,
and claim that African-Americans are under-represented in tech because of
their genetic characteristics.

------
abalone
Also ridiculously racist. Really!

Amidst his rambling "evolutionary psychology" argument concerning the gender
gap he also protests racial diversity programs.[1] And his explanation for
that? Are black people also bad at programming because of evolution? It's
buried here:

"Left tends to deny science concerning biological differences between people
(e.g., _IQ_ and sex differences)." (emphasis mine)

So non-whites are doing worse in engineering because they're dumber, according
to science. Seriously, does dressing these views up in pseudo-academic prose
make them any less racist?

[1] "Stretch, BOLD, CSSI, Engineering Practicum (to an extent), and several
other Google funded internal and external programs are for people with a
certain gender or race"

~~~
Qub3d
I can't speak for software engineers as I'm not really one myself, but I have
seen evidence that guys in the development and IT fields are legitimately
_scared_ of interacting with women and in the process violating some rule they
didn't know of [0]. Reality may be different from what they perceive, the but
point is that some men do actually perceive this "threat". The motivations of
this internal letter, whatever they are, seem to be almost certainly highly
emotional.

Whenever a difficult, nuanced topic like the one HN is discussing here comes
up, its important to consider the medium by which all of us are communicating.
Your quote with emphasis added is a perfect example: it may have been
something this particularly frustrated individual threw out without much
thought (the entire letter going public at all shows a lack of thought), but
it could very well have been dog-whistling to racists.

The thing is, we can't know. Unless we're in a forum (in the Socratic sense)
where thoughts can be clarified, I propose we take things at their face value.
That's all we can confidently do.

[0]:[http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=2091#comment-326664](http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=2091#comment-326664)

