I agree with all of this - but not necessarily the premise. If we just go with men/women and majority/minority are different, then we are just doing the same thing to women and minorities - telling them what to do and how to think. The main difference is that it's considered more acceptable because historically, they have been treated as inferior so everyone is sort of subliminally used to it. What's happening right now is that white people and men are essentially being told, in different words and different ways, that they are no longer privileged - by politicians, business, society, etc. And many in those groups are having a difficult time coming to terms with that - through no fault of their own, as that is the world that existed for hundreds or thousands of years prior and is the world that they know. There's no real good solution, which is why society is as fractured as it is. We've been through this before during previous civil rights movements where it's a long process to change how we fundamentally view a group of people. They are contentious and ugly, and we often take steps backward, but generally we do successfully move the ball forward over time.
Uh that "dissenting perspective" is a rehash in age old stereotypes that women aren't wired for STEM and their lack of inclusion in those industries is through the fault of their own. I'm not saying genders aren't different, but the fact that they can't "do STEM" or "do STEM great" is a load of crap that will erode as more women outpace college graduations than men in those fields. Conveniently left out is that those same programs also target minorities of color but he never touches that powder keg through his grand thesis because it's much more acceptable in his 80:20 male environment to tear those programs down through gender and perceived notions of "reverse discrimination". Taking a long approach and ignoring admissions rates, he could easily have said that most women just don't last as developers in less than 10 years no matter what companies do at the moment. That could have been a valid fact shared by both sides, with different conclusions to what should be done. Except he filled in the blanks with confirmation bias as to what the root cause of that is and used it to form a dangerous conclusion that ignorant people are more likely to pick up without their own research.
LMAO, the dude sits there coming up w/ pie demographic pie charts on PPT + XL? free money, man, free money.
1) I have a strong feeling that this guy won't be working at Google for much longer. Google execs have already rebuked his memo. He may be on some unofficial secret blacklist there. Once the "temperature" of this incident cools down (i.e. people move on), Google will either quietly fire him, or he'll "resign". 2) Once he is gone, he may have a difficult time finding another job in tech (or most other fields), especially in the Silicon Valley area. "Bad culture fit" will be a common reason for his rejections. His views on diversity aren't the main problem (I agree with some of his views and disagree with others). The main issue is that he expressed them openly, using company time and resources. In other words, he created a workplace distraction (exacerbated by the fact that this story is getting airtime on major news outlets), and he may become more toxic in the eyes of some of his colleagues. The vast majority of companies, regardless of their views on diversity and politics, would strongly disapprove of an employee that did this. Like others said, it's best to keep quiet about highly controversial, incendiary and volatile subjects (such as politics) in the workplace and around professional colleagues in general. Anyway...as for the low % of women and minorities (Blacks, Hispanics) in engineering and other STEM fields...I feel that at least some of that can be traced all the way back to their grade school years, and the surrounding culture, peer pressure and socialization that occurs during that time. Physiological/biological differences has very little (if anything) to do with it.
Agree that he might be shelved by Google for politics, but I think he'll be able to work at most places on his list of preferred destinations. Good talent is hard to find, and a resume like his is better than a woman's with the same list of acheivements, even with that "AA bump".
Google is one of the most successful company in the world. Ranked #1 some 6 or so years in the row as the best place to work for. Is a Titan among companies. Other companies try to copy them and their ways. They probably even have a VP of employee feelings, who knows. Instead of laughing at them, most should understand them, study them and see why they are so successful.
It's laughable to you bc you most likely have a very narrow view of successful business strategies in the private sector.
Left outraged by Bandwagoner's laughter at VP. Cites success of company as proof of concept despite her starting the job a month ago.
The company's previous escapades show a track record of success. Companies like google, MS, apple, and a lot of others have flop ideas for sure, but they mostly pick winners. While that does not necessarily prove that such a hire is a "winning" idea, it's definitely shows it's in the lineage of it. I read his statements, then read the echo chamber of comments from both sides, and I can't help but think, everyone here is wrong.
Where did he say that women can't "do STEM" or "do STEM great"? Are you making up quotes and passing it off as his position to justify your disapproval of what he wrote? Here is the text: http://gizmodo.com/exclusive-heres-the-full-10-page-anti-diversity-screed-1797564320 Some actual quotes: "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. Discrimination to reach equal representation is unfair, divisive, and bad for business.' "I’ll concentrate on the extreme stance that all differences in outcome are due to differential treatment " "I’m not saying that all men differ from women in the following ways or that these differences are “just.” 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." "This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading. Note that these are just average differences and there’s overlap between men and women, but this is seen solely as a women’s issue. This leads to exclusory programs like Stretch and swaths of men without support." "I hope it’s clear that I’m not saying that diversity is bad, that Google or society is 100% fair, that we shouldn’t try to correct for existing biases, or that minorities have the same experience of those in the majority. My larger point is that we have an intolerance for ideas and evidence that don’t fit a certain ideology. I’m also not saying that we should restrict people to certain gender roles; I’m advocating for quite the opposite: treat people as individuals, not as just another member of their group (tribalism)." No where did he say that women are incapable of doing STEM and doing it well. Saying that women are better at some things then men, on average, and vice versa, and this might explain statistical differences in outcomes in the tech industry is not an argument that women aren't good at STEM. And what is the "dangerous conclusion" he reached? Perhaps, this time, you can draw from what he actually wrote as you attempt to formulate it,
Of course required diversity training is political in nature. Personally I have no problems with a company welcoming its employees to question certain elements of their training programs that they may deem as questionable from a political/moral/business standpoint, so long as it is done in a professional and civil manner. If there is disagreement, hash it out like adults and seek out common ground. Don't demonize the other side just because you disagree with their position. Google's policy evidently allows for employees to communicate opinions as he did on whatever internal platform he used, at least based on what the official Google response was. So the argument that he was wrong to express his opinion because it was political in nature and therefore against company policy does not apply here.[/quote][/QUOTE]
Well, I am a minority in my work place which is probably upwards of 85% white male. But I don't pretend that my situation is typical, and I'm sure women or people with other ethnic backgrounds have more challenges to deal with than me in the field I work in. Well ... except he doesn't at all say that. His direct quotes: "Of course, men and women experience bias, tech, and the workplace differently and we should be cognizant of this, but it’s far from the whole story." "I’m not saying that diversity is bad, that Google or society is 100% fair, that we shouldn’t try to correct for existing biases, or that minorities have the same experience of those in the majority." What ... "biologically inferior"? At no point did he say anything about women being inferior. Believing there are differences on the average, in part biologically driven, that may explain why women haven't had equal representation in a given field is not a claim that they are inferior. He may very well also believe that there is a biological factor that partially explains why men, on average, aren't as equally represented among elementary school teachers as women. Does it mean he simultaneously believes that men are biologically inferior? OK. It may very well be that he is underestimating how much bias women and minorities face in his field that prevent them from succeeding. I wish people would focus on making that argument, rather then characterizing his position as anti-women and pro white man.
When you isolate out all the cultural stuff, actual intrinsic gender differences are tiny. You have to measure really huge populations to pull the effect out from the noise. I did a presentation on the subject for the only graduate level Neuropsychology class I took in college. I had to read a ****-ton of incredibly tedious research on the subject - papers arguing back and forth on on a measurable effect for gender differences in Rey Complex Figure Tests, and what not. And if we are going to give all engineering to men because of their nominal gender bump in spatial reasoning, we need to ground all male airplane pilots and sideline male surgeons because of the gender bump for women in fine hand-eye coordination. The nominal female superiority there is every bit as real and proven. The bottom line is that variation within the group is many orders of magnitude greater than variations between the groups. A lot of the early research on the subject is just thrown out because it is a lot like the early research on racial differences, where people argue that white men are superior to non-whites by measuring cranial cavity capacity, and whatnot. "The Mismeasure of Man" by Stephen Jay Gould is a great book detailing how "impartial" 19th century scientists put their thumb on the scale of their research to prove deeply held beliefs about racial superiority that don't exist in fact. The same applies as much if not more to early "evidence" of male scientific gender superiority.
I think that's a good point. He did acknowledge that there is variations within groups and overlap in abilities/preferences between men and women. He was careful to only talk about gender differences "on average". He also only referred to gender differences as "in part" explainable by biology. But I think its a fair critique that he overstated the biological factor. But his argument does not solely rely on the differences being biology-based. I think his larger point is that differences in outcomes is not 100% a consequence of gender bias in the workplace or in consideration of applicants. This has roots that go way back, to how boys and girls are treated differently as children and through adulthood. As a guy who is clearly a conservative, the guy who wrote the post probably would like to see changes happen more organically (and I think, in time, it would but probably far too slowly) rather than "socially engineering" diversity into the workplace with a top-down approach that he deems "authoritarian".
The problem is that his whole thing is incoherent and nonsensical. He'll say things like what you quoted, but then the rest of his thesis argues the opposite. He's says basically "don't do all the things we do" but then doesn't give suggestions on how to correct for the biases he admits exist. His "solutions" are things like changing the way the jobs work, which is not a correction of biases at all.
Of course, that's not Google or any tech company's goal, so he's just arguing against a completely made up strawman. His arguments would make sense if qualified women were not applying to tech fields and he was trying to explain that away - but they do, and we've seen statistical evidence of bias against them in hiring and promotion, just as we see plenty of statistical evidence of bias against minorities. That's the issue that the tech field is fighting - not trying to get a 50/50 balance of men and women in the workplace.
There exists statistical evidence that a bias exists in hiring and promotion in the tech industry when qualifications/performance are equal, and after accounting for men being more likely to pursue higher wages for various reasons and accounting for it being more culturally/socially acceptable for men to work longer hours and take less time off? Such evidence wouldn't necessarily outright refute his position (he doesn't deny the existence of biases that hurt women and minorities), but depending on the degree of bias it could counter his position quite effectively. Can you point me towards it?
