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Conservative protesters scuttled plans to gather outside Googles offices this weekend, putting on hold an effort to take Americas culture wars directly to Silicon Valley.

The region was long insulated from political rancor, but now has become one of the most important ideological battlegrounds. That became ever more clear Wednesday, when protest organizers said that the news coverage surrounding their plans had led to threats from left-wing terrorist groups.

The now-postponed rallies were inspired by James Damore, the former Google engineer who was fired last week for posting a 10-page internal memo arguing that the lack of women in tech could be attributed to biological differences. His dismissal sparked an outcry from conservatives who say their opinions are being muzzled by liberal technology companies and led Damore to criticize his former company for promoting a particularly intense echo chamber.

The March on Google stands for free speech and the open discussion of ideas, wrote event organizer Jack Posobiec, a conservative media figure who pushed the Pizzagate and Seth Rich conspiracy theories and recently was retweeted by the president.

Posobiec, who did not respond to questions sent to his Facebook page, had said that the planned marches would not be alt-right events and that he wanted to avoid the violence and mayhem experienced in Charlottesville, Va., last weekend.

Protests had been planned for Saturday at Google headquarters in Mountain View, Calif., and other company offices such as Venice, Atlanta, Pittsburgh and Seattle.

Organizers say they now plan to hold the events in a few weeks time.

A post on the marchs website said the event was postponed because of threats from unspecified alt-left terrorist groups, including one from someone threatening to drive a car into the march.

The Mountain View Police Department, Atlanta Police Department and the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington, D.C., said Wednesday morning that they had not received any reports of such threats. Police departments in several other cities did not immediately respond to requests for comment; the FBI declined to comment.

The march organizers repeated use of the term alt-left as well as placing blame for the postponement of the protests on left-leaning groups and news outlets echoed rhetoric used by President Trump the day before. On Tuesday, Trump used alt-left to describe anti-racism counter-protesters who demonstrated against last weekends far-right rally in Charlottesville, and he faulted both sides for the violence there a contention at odds with local police accounts.

The mayhem in Charlottesville included clashes between armed white militias and counter-protesters, as well as deadly violence: A car driven by a man described by authorities as a white supremacist plowed into a crowd of counter-protesters, killing a woman, Heather Heyer, and injuring more than a dozen others.

Mountain View police have said organizers of the Google protests were not connected to Charlottesville rally participants.

We want you to know that we are working with both Google and with the event planners to ensure the protest is a peaceful one, the department said Tuesday in a statement.

Damore told CNBC that he is not involved with the marches, adding, I dont support efforts to try to hurt Google directly.

Still, his memo pointed to the clash of ideas within the technology industry at a time when its products play an increasingly bigger role in the daily lives of Americans.

Facebook, YouTube, Twitch, Snapchat and other social media occupy 5 1/2 hours of the average U.S. adults week, according to Nielsen, a span that has grown sharply in recent years. And the online platforms power to spread and enforce cultural values has become a matter of contention across the political spectrum.

Conservatives point to years of evidence of a liberal agenda in the tech industry. Theyve drawn comparisons between Damore's case and Mozilla Chief Executive Brendan Eich, who stepped down a decade ago following outrage over his support of a ban on same-sex marriage.

More recently, right-wing activists say YouTube is filtering conservative videos so that they wont appear unless users toggle their settings to accept graphic or potentially offensive content.

The conditions are a far cry from just a few years ago, when technologists were thought of as political neophytes the descendants of a counterculture that turned hippies into billionaires like Steve Jobs. If there was a political streak in the valley, it tended to be libertarian.

But the 2016 presidential election demonstrated just how influential the regions platforms are to American public opinion.

Where would Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders presidential campaign have gone without the rabid support of smartphone-wielding millennials spreading #FeelTheBern?

And how long would Donald Trumps campaign have lasted without his supporters memes and the candidates personal Twitter account?

Jeremy Carl, a former tech worker who serves as a fellow at conservative think tank Hoover Institution, said the anger among his ideological peers stems from egregious actions taken by Google and other big tech companies.

Efforts to take down or stunt the growth of potentially offensive online publications have reached a ridiculous level, he said.

Despite Trumps victory last year with the aid of a fearsome social media strategy, conservatives accuse Facebook, Twitter and Google of censoring their points of view by suspending accounts and firing employees like Damore who speak out against diversity training.

The recklessness of the industry and its partisan politics have brought us to this point. They have no credibility among the right to do self-regulation, said Carl, who has advocated for treating Google as a utility company that must provide a neutral service.

At stake is the future of news and information in a country where facts are so often viewed through a political lens. Control of these digital platforms, once thought to be apolitical, could swing the national conversation around culture and politics.

What also irks critics is that there are few alternatives to Google and Facebook. So conservatives who dont like those companies politics feel they have no choice but to keep using their services.

Internet people brag about freedom of expression in the U.S. relative to whats available in China, but thats just not the case when you look at the Internet monopolies in the U.S., said Ron Unz, a Palo Alto software entrepreneur who launched unsuccessful campaigns for California governor and English-only education.

Youre talking about something closer to modern totalitarianism, Unz added.

(By comparison, China tightly monitors discourse on its closed-off Internet, employing thousands of censors and trolls to promote the governments positions and stifle open dissent).

Unz said he thinks tech companies should be held to the same standards as the government when it comes to freedom of expression because of their market dominance.

If the government is legally prohibited from censoring certain forms of speech, it seems wrong to allow Google to do what the government cant do, Unz said.

It doesnt help either that tech companies operate in near secrecy driving suspicion that the Googles and Facebooks of the world are stifling conservative views with lines of hidden code.

The tech industrys point of view is embedded deep in the product, not announced on the packaging, wrote Ezra Klein, editor-in-chief of Vox. Its biases are quietly built into algorithms, reflected in platform rules, expressed in code few of us can understand and fewer of us will ever read.

Its been difficult for Silicon Valley to adapt to the new political order. Many companies are at odds with conservative positions on immigration, climate change and sexual identity taking stances that seemed safely mainstream until recently.

Nonetheless, theyve tried to appear more welcoming to Trump and his supporters.

Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook, Amazon Chief Executive Jeff Bezos and Eric Schmidt, head of Googles parent company Alphabet, are among the big names that agreed to advise the president on his technology council.

Google has also tried to hire more conservatives for its lobbying and policy initiatives, and Facebook donated money to the Conservative Political Action Conference in February. The social network also replaced its news editors with an algorithm after conservatives said employees were suppressing right-wing content.

To be sure, Silicon Valley counts some conservatives and Trump supporters among its list of top entrepreneurs. None is more famous than Peter Thiel, the co-founder of PayPal and a billionaire venture capitalist, who spoke strongly in support of then-candidate Trump at the Republican National Convention last year. Thiel, despite running large investment funds, has become an outcast in some circles of the industry for his work with Trump.

Times staff writer Tracey Lien contributed to this report.

david.pierson@latimes.com

paresh.dave@latimes.com

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UPDATES:

11:55 a.m.: This article was updated with new details, including information about purported threats and comments from various police departments.

7:05 a.m.: This article was updated with the postponement of the marches.

This article was originally published at 5 a.m.

View post:
Protests against Google are postponed as culture wars roil Silicon Valley - Los Angeles Times

A A

Esther Cepeda is a columnist with the Washington Post Writers Group. Email: estherjcepeda@washpost.com.

As someone who shuns celebrity news, gossip and whatever is breaking the internet on a given day, Anne Helen Petersons new book, Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud: The Rise and Reign of the Unruly Woman, was not a natural fit for me.

But as a rich reality-TV star tweets policy from the White House, it seems warranted to consider celebrity as a lens through which to try to understand our current political moment.

By this logic, its worth taking stock of female archetypes through the stories of some of the most talked-about women of the last few years and Peterson does so in near scholarly detail.

Her selection of so-called unruly women is notable and engaging for its seeming randomness.

Petersons mix of profiles includes those who have been around so long Serena Williams, Madonna and Hillary Clinton that at first they seem unlikely to provide any new insight into the cultural moment. And then there are those, like Lena Dunham, Caitlyn Jenner and Kim Kardashian, who you may already be sick and tired of hearing about. But dig in and youll be treated to myriad aspects of famous women that you may never have considered.

For instance, you might have thought that the tennis champion Williams was strictly a success story. But Peterson digs deep into the racial abuse and sexual snark that have followed Williams as she broke the mold of the traditional tennis ideal of understated, moneyed elegance that corresponds with upper-class America.

Similarly, in Petersons investigation of rapper Nicki Minaj, readers are shown that beyond the tabloid frenzy surrounding her overtly sexual branding we find a woman who defines herself by her business acumen. She prides herself on her hard work, has found a way to play by her own rules in a music industry dominated by men, and calls out women who tear other women down.

Describing an interview in which a female reporter, referring to an incident between some of the men in Minajs orbit, asked the rapper whether she thrived on drama, Peterson quotes Minaj: Thats the typical thing that women do. What did you putting me down right there do for you? Women blame women for things that have nothing to do with them. To put down a woman for something that men do, as if theyre children and Im responsible, has nothing to do with you asking stupid questions, but you know thats not just a stupid question. Thats a premeditated thing you just did.

It was a relief to see at least one strong criticism of a culture in which female journalists and consumers lead the charge in the judgment about whether a female celebrity is too fat (actress Melissa McCarthy), too gross (actresses Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer) or too loud (novelist Jennifer Weiner).

Peterson has written an intelligent and fascinating book that prompts us to make connections and subsequently allows us to reconsider how we judge women in the public eye.

Because I tend to ignore anything Kardashian related, I had been unaware of the connection between the social media-fueled images of maternity and childbirth perfection and the health crises that plagued Kim Kardashians high-risk pregnancies.

Similarly, Petersons chapter on Jenners transition and the ways in which it is not emblematic of an everyday persons financial, emotional and societal struggles in being transgender is a mini-masterpiece of LGBTQ history.

I enjoyed reading Petersons study of unruly women, but I have to say its too bad that no Asian-American or Hispanic women made it into her book. As a result, it feels like they were lumped together in a category marked Too Invisible or Too Marginalized and, surely, this cant be.

From Tiger Moms (Amy Chua) to the first female Doctor Watson (Lucy Liu) and any number of controversial or beloved Hispanic celebrities (Sofia Vergara and Selena Quintanilla spring to mind), unruly women come in all races and ethnicities.

Follow this link:
Cepeda: 'Unruly' women bring culture wars into sharp focus - The Columbian

The Google engineer who blamed biological differences for the paucity of women in tech had every right to express his views. And Google likely had every right to fire him, workplace experts and lawyers say.

Special circumstances -- from the country's divisive political climate to Silicon Valley's broader problem with gender equity -- contributed to the outrage and subsequent firing. But the fallout should still serve as a warning to anyone in any industry expressing unpopular, fiery viewpoints.

"Anyone who makes a statement like this and expects to stick around ... is foolish," said David Lewis, CEO of Operations Inc., a human resources consulting firm.

Why He Lost His Job

The engineer, James Damore, wrote a memo criticizing Google for pushing mentoring and diversity programs and for "alienating conservatives." The parts that drew the most outrage made such assertions as women "prefer jobs in social and artistic areas" and have a "lower stress tolerance" and "harder time" leading, while more men "may like coding because it requires systemizing."

Google's code of conduct says workers "are expected to do their utmost to create a workplace culture that is free of harassment, intimidation, bias, and unlawful discrimination." Google's CEO, Sundar Picahi, said Damore violated this code.

Yonatan Zunger, who recently left Google as a senior engineer, wrote in a Medium post that he would have had no choice but to fire Damore had he been his supervisor.

"Do you understand that at this point, I could not in good conscience assign anyone to work with you?" he wrote . "I certainly couldn't assign any women to deal with this, a good number of the people you might have to work with may simply punch you in the face."

Though one might argue for a right to free speech, however unpopular, such protections are generally limited to government and other public employees -- and to unionized workers with rights to disciplinary hearings before any firing.

Broader protections are granted to comments about workplace conditions. Damore argues in a federal labor complaint that this applies to his case, but experts disagree.

"By posting that memo, he forfeited his job," said Jennifer Lee Magas, public relations professor at Pace University and a former employment law attorney. "He was fired for his words, but also for being daft enough to post these thoughts on an open workplace forum, where he was sure to be met with backlash and to offend his colleagues -- male and female alike."

Uniquely Google

The fallout comes as Silicon Valley faces a watershed moment over gender and ethnic diversity.

Blamed for years for not hiring enough women and minorities -- and not welcoming them once they are hired -- tech companies such as Google, Facebook and Uber have promised big changes. These have included diversity and mentoring programs and coding classes for groups underrepresented among the companies' technical and leadership staff. Many tech companies also pledge to interview, though not necessarily hire, minority candidates.

These are the sorts of things Damore's memo railed against.

As such, experts say Damore might not have been fired at a company that doesn't have such a clear message on diversity.

In addition, had Damore worked for a smaller, lesser-known company, an internal memo might not have created such a "media storm," said Aimee Delaney, a Hinshaw & Culbertson attorney who represents companies on labor matters.

A Different World

Still, bringing so much public, negative attention would spell trouble for any worker. That's especially so in this age of fast-spreading social media posts, when internal company documents can easily leak and go viral.

It didn't help that this was in the heart of Silicon Valley, where typing fingers are on 24/7 and people rarely disconnect from social media, even on a quiet August weekend. Or that Google is a brand consumers interact with all day -- and want to read about when memos go viral.

Perhaps the biggest lesson is this: Don't be so quick to post your angry thoughts for thousands, then millions, to see.

Michael Schmidt, vice chairman of labor and employment at the Cozen O'Connor law firm, said that while workers might have refrained from such remarks around the physical watercooler, "people treat ... electronic communications much more informally than face-to-face speech."

But the consequences are similar, if not more severe.

Explosive Climate

Initially shared on an internal Google network, the memo leaked out to the public over the weekend, first in bits and pieces and then in its 10-page entirety.

It took a life of its own as outsiders weighed in. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange took to Twitter to offer Damore a job. One conservative group, Americans for Limited Government, criticized what it called Google's politically correct culture and left-wing bias. Others called for a Google boycott.

Known for its motto, "don't be evil," Google is broadly seen as a liberal-leaning company, something Damore criticized in his manifesto. Liberals and tech industry leaders came to Google's defense and denounced Damore's claims as baseless and harmful.

"It's fair to say that whatever side of the political aisle you are on, ... we are in a climate where we are dealing with very highly charged and emotional issues," Schmidt said. "And those issues are spilling into the workplace."

Instead of looking for a bright-line test on what is permissible, he said, "both sides need to understand there has to be a sensitivity to the bigger picture," a level of respect and cultural sensitivity across all demographics.

2017 Associated Press under contract with NewsEdge/Acquire Media. All rights reserved.

Tom Graham:

Posted: 2017-08-14 @ 12:37pm PT

Google can fire or hire anyone they want, this is not a freedom of speech issue. This is a fraud issue, and Google is the fraudster. How, exactly, is someone supposed "to do their utmost to create a workplace culture that is free of harassment, intimidation, bias, and unlawful discrimination" in a climate so closed minded? Google encourages employees to contribute "out of the box thinking" on every project they work on. The ex-employee saw Google's hiring and recruitment practices and feared they might be illegal and brought that to Googles attention, at the same time expressed the scientific reasons that he felt that Googles employee sex and nationality mix should reflect the Actual Application Pool of people who have chosen a career in IT and not the 50:50 men:women ratio of the general population. He then explained why more men than women choose to go into IT and why more men than women tend to go into high stress jobs which might explain the gender disparity in management and IT. But apparently now, siting psychological studies and evolutionary biology is deemed "progressing negative stereotypes" Wake up Google snowflakes! Hens and Roosters ARE DIFFERENT BIOLOGICALLY! They do not learn their behavior socially. All sexually reproducing creatures have male and female tendencies. It is illogical and untruthful to claim that humans are so separate from nature that biology doesn't have any effect. The memo asks that we acknowledge that effect and move toward ways of addressing it. Googles management handled this inappropriately, and perhaps, depending on how their policies are worded, fraudulently.

Carl:

Posted: 2017-08-14 @ 12:33pm PT

As a male who has worked in engineering for more than 20 years, I felt that many of Damore's observations were true. Women in engineering usually gravitate to functions such as project management that have more human interaction. And why not? They are often very good at it, and very appreciated for their contributions. Not too many women like the nitty gritty stuff. But if they do, no one resents that or tries to hold them back. We know from our extended families that women play a far different role in our social interactions. And, again, why not? One thing, though, women are a little sensitive and most men in the work place learn to do the rope a dope rather than speaking the unspeakable as this poor fellow did.

Koko Banes:

Posted: 2017-08-14 @ 12:23pm PT

We could discuss the immorality of gender-exclusivity but the fact remains: biological characteristics form a large part of normal activity.

The problem with tech is at the higher levels of programming. The fact remains that most women are not dedicated to a 10x programmer's lifestyle from 1st grade on. Once you realize choices in early life impact later life it's too late.

No one can "wish" themselves onto an NFL team. No one can "dream" their way into Hooters. However, to create 10x jobs not only takes a long ramp but discussions on how to achieve it must be open to all manner of mind-state. Keep the discussions open and a solution occurs. Encouraging emotional reactions ... NOT !

WLR:

Posted: 2017-08-14 @ 12:02pm PT

That sends the message that you don't "really" have freedom of speech -- unless, of course, it follows the liberal politically correct guidelines. Why do people that say: "Women and minorities deserve men's job's even if the men are more qualified..." get fired? Oh, I see because they are righteously "correct.

Jack Daniels:

Posted: 2017-08-14 @ 11:51am PT

Then they should be fired, not Damore. No one should punch someone for a differing opinion, and this one is based on science. No one's actually disputing Damore's views, only that he had the balls to express them by a company that encourages its employees to do so.

Aillen:

Posted: 2017-08-14 @ 11:50am PT

No, the biggest lesson is companies like Google need to rewrite their policies about allowing free speech. This firing is clearly in the wrong. The memo circulated for a while without any issues until extrasensitive people in power blew it out of proportion.

andy:

Posted: 2017-08-14 @ 11:47am PT

Go ask the women why they don't pick electric engineering or software engineering or computer science as major in college. Jesus Christ. Women make the choice and now they come back and ask company why they are not hired. Cause it is geeky and hard and no women want to be around geeks all day long. They rather go have fun.

Gary:

Posted: 2017-08-14 @ 11:45am PT

Thinking women get a fair shake? Think again! It will be CENTURIES be4 women are treated even 50% like men...

Reality Bites:

Posted: 2017-08-13 @ 1:41pm PT

Google managers are a special kind of stupid... the kind that is visible from space.

S.:

Posted: 2017-08-12 @ 2:05pm PT

But no, because they don't want diversity, and they don't want the most qualified competent, they won't.

More:
Google Gender Debacle Speaks to Tech Culture Wars - NewsFactor Network

(Last Updated On: August 13, 2017)

Inside GamerGate: A Social History of the Gamer Revolt is currently available right now on Amazon for $4.99. The 202-page, non-fiction book recounts specific events that occurred during the height of the #GamerGate saga, told through the lens of author James Desborough.

The gonzo style approach that Desborough took with covering #GamerGate was written to offer an alternative view of the events that unfolded around the explosive hashtag. It also attempts to give readers insight and details on the consumer revolt that the mainstream media and most enthusiast press have refused to cover in an evenhanded or honest fashion.

Desborough recently offered to answer some questions about the recently released e-book and his experiences with #GamerGate that eventually led him to writing about it. He also covers what sort of information both casual readers and hardcore gamers might glean from picking up a copy of the book. You can check out the interview below.

One Angry Gamer: So first of all how involved were you in #GamerGate and how much of it did you participate in?

James Desborough: I was involved since before it was Gamergate. Having previously been a bit of a booster on Depression Quest as a sufferer myself and even a defender of Quinn I was worried about what I was hearing. The only real sources of information were the early IRC channels and theres logs of me visiting one to ask what the hell was going on, and then leaving. That mere presence, by the way, was taken as damning enough to pull an interview on the issue I did for The Escapist, later on down the line.

I was mostly involved on Twitter, then on Youtube, and in discussions, debates and arguments around the issues in the tabletop gaming community. It got quite nasty. I got burned out in 2016 but kept a weather eye on what was going on, even as it died down.

So I was really rather involved, attended a meet up in the UK, battled constantly for what I thought was right, wrote a lot of emails but not for boycotts and took a lot of personal and professional hits on Gamergates behalf.

OAG: When did you decide to start working on the book? How long was it after #GamerGate got underway did you decide to put pen to paper?

James: I was umming and ahhing and discussing the idea with people for some time, going way back to 2016 after Id left, but it was the announcement of Quinns book and my awareness of it that kicked it into high gear and ultimately led me to take the plunge. Well, that and gamedropping (mentioning Gamergate) in all sorts of stupid media articles and trying to link it to the Alt-Right or Trump. It became clear that the other versions of the stories needed to be out there, and from a personal gonzo perspective, not as dry text. We needed something counter to what will inevitably be the lies and misrepresentations in Crash Override, but with a personal touch. I normally prefer to be more dry, measured and academic, but thats not what this needed.

OAG: And on the subject of length how did you decide what events to cover from #GamerGate in order to give it a start and end? Some people still feel as if the event is going on while others feel its concluded. What did you feel was a good end point, so to speak, for covering the event(s)?

James: For me it really did end petering out in 2016 and giving birth to legacy movements such as the ongoing fights over regionalisation and censorship relating to Japanese games. So I planned to historically contextualise it and then cover it from before it was Gamergate, right back to establishing events and contemporaneous context, through to what I considered the end. Then of course The Last Night happened and even since I finished the book we now have relevant things like the GoogleMemo or the reporting on Charlottesville which has included gamedropping which I would have included if I were still working on the book now. At some point you have to type your final full-stop though.

OAG: Three years after #GamerGate started a lot of people still dont know what it is. For people completely out of the loop, will a book like Inside GamerGate be able to catch them up on all the necessary information to get a grasp on what the event was about? Or is it something that more-so outlines the media narratives and ideological slants that helped push the subject into mainstream ever-so-briefly?

James: I hope so. I think the main thing that a lot of people dont understand is how this fits into a much broader historical narrative around fear and loathing of new media that can be traced all the way back to the advent of the printing press, and no, Im not being hyperbolic. For slightly older nerds the shadows of the PMRC, Satanic Panic and Jack Thompson are supremely important in understanding Gamergate but unless youre immersed in nerd history its hard to grok the how and why of the whole thing. The nerd media willfully misrepresented and the mainstream media was criminally lazy. The book, if it can do anything, can at least contextualise that and hopefully humanise Gamergate participants. I dont know how many anti-gamergate people will even bother to read it, but at least its now part of the historical record.

OAG: Some people might be quick to dismiss the book because it doesnt take a listen and believe approach to the subject matter, or because it counteracts the mainstream narrative. For those people who have already read the Wikipedia entry for #GamerGate or decided to get their info from a Gawker/Gizmodo site, how does the book deal with convincing these people that they may be approaching the topic from the wrong perspective?

James: Listen and believe cuts both ways. Listen and believe to me. You dont have to agree with me, but you can at least read it and, as a result, understand my point of view, why I involved myself, why I was outraged and fought so hard and through me maybe you can understand some of the revolt as a whole. The personal touch and the, somewhat controversial, shock opener is intended to try and hit them over the head with that side from the get go. Well see if it works.

OAG: Ultimately, what do you hope to achieve with Inside GamerGate now that its out on the market and available for the general public to consume? Is it about reaching people who may have been misled? Informing people who didnt know #GamerGate existed? Perhaps convincing the media that they really managed to get #GamerGate wrong? Or is it about achieving something else entirely?

James: All of that would be great but I am content that there is, at the very least, now a record from our perspective. I think Brad Glasgows Gamergate book, when it comes out, and mine would make a good complimentary set of books on things. Mine more personal, his more objective.

OAG: If the book manages to really take off, would you consider doing a follow-up or is the one book on #GamerGate enough?

James: Ive been surprised how well it has done. Maybe non-fiction is what I should be writing I wouldnt do another Gamergate book but I could, perhaps, be tempted to write something about the Culture War of the 2010s and how it relates to history. Ive been shocked and appalled at how politically and historically illiterate so many actors in this drama are, both AntiFa and the Alt-Right people especially. Its a fascinating and disappointing point in history. I dont think thered be enough interest in that though, especially written by a somewhat amateur commentator without a pre-existing media platform, and who would publish it? Im too left wing for one set of publishers and too politically incorrect for the other set. Self publishing is exhausting and I prefer to save that for my game design, which is a lot more fun!

One isnt enough, but its enough for me to write.

Huge thanks to James for answering the questions. You can either check out the book on Amazon to learn more, or you can follow James Desboroughs content on YouTube through his Grim Jim channel.

(Artwork courtesy of Kukuruyo)

Original post:
Inside GamerGate Interview: Media Lies, Gamedropping And Culture Wars - One Angry Gamer (blog)

The Google engineer who blamed biological differences for the paucity of women in tech had every right to express his views. And Google likely had every right to fire him, workplace experts and lawyers say.

Special circumstances -- from the country's divisive political climate to Silicon Valley's broader problem with gender equity -- contributed to the outrage and subsequent firing. But the fallout should still serve as a warning to anyone in any industry expressing unpopular, fiery viewpoints.

"Anyone who makes a statement like this and expects to stick around ... is foolish," said David Lewis, CEO of Operations Inc., a human resources consulting firm.

Why He Lost His Job

The engineer, James Damore, wrote a memo criticizing Google for pushing mentoring and diversity programs and for "alienating conservatives." The parts that drew the most outrage made such assertions as women "prefer jobs in social and artistic areas" and have a "lower stress tolerance" and "harder time" leading, while more men "may like coding because it requires systemizing."

Google's code of conduct says workers "are expected to do their utmost to create a workplace culture that is free of harassment, intimidation, bias, and unlawful discrimination." Google's CEO, Sundar Picahi, said Damore violated this code.

Yonatan Zunger, who recently left Google as a senior engineer, wrote in a Medium post that he would have had no choice but to fire Damore had he been his supervisor.

"Do you understand that at this point, I could not in good conscience assign anyone to work with you?" he wrote . "I certainly couldn't assign any women to deal with this, a good number of the people you might have to work with may simply punch you in the face."

Though one might argue for a right to free speech, however unpopular, such protections are generally limited to government and other public employees -- and to unionized workers with rights to disciplinary hearings before any firing.

Broader protections are granted to comments about workplace conditions. Damore argues in a federal labor complaint that this applies to his case, but experts disagree.

"By posting that memo, he forfeited his job," said Jennifer Lee Magas, public relations professor at Pace University and a former employment law attorney. "He was fired for his words, but also for being daft enough to post these thoughts on an open workplace forum, where he was sure to be met with backlash and to offend his colleagues -- male and female alike."

Uniquely Google

The fallout comes as Silicon Valley faces a watershed moment over gender and ethnic diversity.

Blamed for years for not hiring enough women and minorities -- and not welcoming them once they are hired -- tech companies such as Google, Facebook and Uber have promised big changes. These have included diversity and mentoring programs and coding classes for groups underrepresented among the companies' technical and leadership staff. Many tech companies also pledge to interview, though not necessarily hire, minority candidates.

These are the sorts of things Damore's memo railed against.

As such, experts say Damore might not have been fired at a company that doesn't have such a clear message on diversity.

In addition, had Damore worked for a smaller, lesser-known company, an internal memo might not have created such a "media storm," said Aimee Delaney, a Hinshaw & Culbertson attorney who represents companies on labor matters.

A Different World

Still, bringing so much public, negative attention would spell trouble for any worker. That's especially so in this age of fast-spreading social media posts, when internal company documents can easily leak and go viral.

It didn't help that this was in the heart of Silicon Valley, where typing fingers are on 24/7 and people rarely disconnect from social media, even on a quiet August weekend. Or that Google is a brand consumers interact with all day -- and want to read about when memos go viral.

Perhaps the biggest lesson is this: Don't be so quick to post your angry thoughts for thousands, then millions, to see.

Michael Schmidt, vice chairman of labor and employment at the Cozen O'Connor law firm, said that while workers might have refrained from such remarks around the physical watercooler, "people treat ... electronic communications much more informally than face-to-face speech."

But the consequences are similar, if not more severe.

Explosive Climate

Initially shared on an internal Google network, the memo leaked out to the public over the weekend, first in bits and pieces and then in its 10-page entirety.

It took a life of its own as outsiders weighed in. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange took to Twitter to offer Damore a job. One conservative group, Americans for Limited Government, criticized what it called Google's politically correct culture and left-wing bias. Others called for a Google boycott.

Known for its motto, "don't be evil," Google is broadly seen as a liberal-leaning company, something Damore criticized in his manifesto. Liberals and tech industry leaders came to Google's defense and denounced Damore's claims as baseless and harmful.

"It's fair to say that whatever side of the political aisle you are on, ... we are in a climate where we are dealing with very highly charged and emotional issues," Schmidt said. "And those issues are spilling into the workplace."

Instead of looking for a bright-line test on what is permissible, he said, "both sides need to understand there has to be a sensitivity to the bigger picture," a level of respect and cultural sensitivity across all demographics.

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Google Gender Debacle Speaks to Tech Culture Wars - Top Tech News