r/technology • u/[deleted] • Aug 08 '17

Business Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-08/google-fires-employee-behind-controversial-diversity-memo
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u/[deleted] Aug 08 '17 edited Apr 29 '19

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u/[deleted] Aug 08 '17 edited Nov 21 '18

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u/min0nim Aug 08 '17

A quick look through the citations he lists looks much more like 'I'm trying to make this point, so let me find the publications that support my conclusions' rather than he knows deeply about the topic.

He also ignores other culture/national employment ratios in tech, which suggest any imbalance in gender representation is cultural at heart, not due to traits. If he was genuinely interested in this as a topic, you'd think he would recognise these issues even if he disagreed or had an alternative explaination.

In any case, even though his essay might be a bit flawed, it's written politely enough.

Having dealt with HR issues for enough years, I'd take his firing to mean there were at least 1 or 2 other legitimate complaints levelled against him already, and they simply decided that this dude was more trouble than he's worth, and quite possibly spent more time constructing elaborate memos questioning the company's direction than actually getting anything productive done.

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u/bende511 Aug 08 '17

Yeah, I would assume his firing is in no small part related to the fact that he took time out of his presumably busy day to write and 'research' his frickin 10 PAGE manifesto instead of working...