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Comment by vertex-four | Hacker News Reader

"Have an honest discussion", "review", etc, are all weasel words for "cut down on". This is the same across industries, it's bog-standard doublespeak. To "have an honest discussion" about a diversity program that we're not already having means that at least one party has a strong belief that they should be ended or seriously cut down.

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> To "have an honest discussion" about a diversity program that we're not already having means that at least one party has a strong belief that they should be ended or seriously cut down.

Stated differently: Someone has an opinion that the system currently in place doesn't fully work and wants to discuss change.

If we're not allowed to invite to a discussion, how else do you suggest we facilitate change, or investigate the need for such change?

You don't seriously imply that there's never a need to review the basis for existing programs? Or are you just ignoring the general principle of things "because diversity"?

No, my point is solely in response to that post - to say "we need to have an honest discussion" is quite specifically to say "we need to end/severely cut down on it". If you wanted to suggest another path to hiring women - say, apprenticeships - you could do that without needing to prefix that with "we need an honest discussion". Whether we actually do or not is irrelevant, but suggesting that it's somehow not saying that is at the very least confused and misguided.

> No, my point is solely in response to that post - to say "we need to have an honest discussion" is quite specifically to say "we need to end/severely cut down on it"

That's not how I read it.

I read it as trying as carefully as possible to start a discussion about having a discussion about a topic by many deemed to be sensitive. And change doesn't have to merely be cutting something, as you suggest. It can be replacing something ineffective/unfair with something more effective or less unfair.

There's literally nothing in that sentence which says "we need to remove/cut down on all programs related to subject $x". I'm not sure where you're getting that from. To me, your response to this fairly harmless email seems overly defensive. Are you acting rationally based on what has been said, or are overreacting based on things you assume to be said?

Maybe this would be a good time to (re?)-read the original email[1]?

[1] https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/3914586/Googles-I...

I'm getting that from the fact that I'm reasonably heavily involved in politics in my country and I'm well aware of the wording used to wrap up ideas in such a way that they're going to be accepted by as many people as possible without ever actually explaining what you're about to do.

"We need to have an honest discussion" or the dreaded word "review" always prefaces dicing up some policy, usually without an adequate replacement.

Even if that's true, and the writer was advancing a hidden, more devious agenda, I still think its likely that the best course of action is to engage it as if it were advanced in good faith, in a fair, reasonable way.

Encouraging immediate, unthinking, righteous and moralistic condemnation over rational discourse on issues close to the friction points of various cultural/ideological conflicts, is quite a dangerous thing to do, even if its satisfying and cathartic (that's precisely why its so damn dangerous).

And? Blaming everyone for "double speak" is rather counter-productive and a great way to destroy the discussion, as it ignores some people are actually interested in a honest discussion. What a wonderful way to create toxic environment ...

Having an open discussion means you accept that other participants may have very different opinions, and agree that honest fact-based discussion is the correct solution.

No. If you want to suggest cutting down on something, suggest cutting down on it. Don't wrap it up on weasel words that never actually say "cut down on it". Governments, management, etc, are well-known for this tactic - they'll say "we're going to review this policy", and the next thing you know it's been diced to shreds, but the politicians/management involved never actually outright said "we're ending this policy" so they get off without apparently having ever said anything to alienate anyone.

The fact that group X is known to use certain tactic does not mean Y is using it too.

In any case, screaming "WE'RE NOT EVEN DISCUSSING THAT!" and calling for getting the person fired is hardly a proper response. What I'd like to see is a fact-based response to the memo, showing numbers/reasoning for the individual policies, etc.

My main take away is you really can't openly discuss this topic (not just in Google), which was one of the points. Ironic.

> The fact that group X is known to use certain tactic does not mean Y is using it too.

No, the use of English in politics (which this is) is pretty consistent, actually, in my experience. If he wanted to have a discussion, point at a policy and suggest an alternative rather than falling back on "merit is good, women are terrible engineers".

Replacing discriminatory hiring with paid apprenticeships and other education for groups the organisation is lacking in, would be a great example. Men can still get into Google because there's more of them in the pool. They're never discriminated against for a job, since the apprenticeship pool is separate from the job pool. Google gets a more-qualified, more-diverse workplace with more control over its training program. A win for everybody.

Firstly, I'm not a native speaker and I don't dare to judge how consistently is English used in politics. But once again, I claim that making conclusions merely based on "language similarity" or something like that is a poor way to discuss stuff.

Secondly, I find it perfectly valid to discuss the very foundation of the policies (instead of discussing individual policies).

FWIW this does not mean I agree with the memo. But I think the immediate calls for getting the guy fired (and firing him) are damaging for the discussion.

The story is currently at "1600 points by QUFB 14 hours ago | 2129 comments" so your take away that you can't discuss this topic is indeed ironic.

The primary place where the policies should be discussed is the company. He got fired for sharing his opinions. I don't see how is that supporting open discussion of the topic?

So you're saying that discussing something, a discussion which can lead to cutting it down if deemed appropriate, is never a good thing? The way I see it, you're effectively rallying against a closer examination of a system regardless of whether it's a system that benefits or hinders the environment it exists in.

I hope you'll forgive me for saying it but that is my definition of the "burying your head in the sand" expression.

edit: furthermore, what if he's in fact saying that he wants them to be cut down? Why isn't that a reasonable motive to want something to be more closely examined?

If you're coming to the table with the pre-conceived notion that the program is bad and needs to be shut down without adequate replacement, then that's not in good faith. I'm responding to the idea that this person is, somehow, wanting a good-faith discussion - he's not, he has a specific goal of shutting down the program.

If people would like to discuss this, they can at least discuss it for what it is - an attack on the program. Treat it as such. Don't hide behind "he just wants to talk".

There are, no doubt, many people who discuss Google's diversity programs every day on a good-faith basis. They don't need a manifesto in order to do so.

It seems that it is you who is coming to the table with the pre-conceived notion that the program is an absolute good and that the letter is an absolute bad.

I read the letter. It has some very good points - many of which feminists have been pointing out for ages, to the surprise of nobody who's actually been listening to feminists. It also has some terrible points, and uses a severe misunderstanding of gender to attack women who work for or intend to work for Google. The decent points it does make are mostly an aside to the main point, which is that the author has a very strong belief that diversity programs are inherently bad and that women are biologically weak engineers.

I added an edit later, I assume it was after you replied so I'll ask again:

What's the problem of wanting some light shed on a program because someone openly believes it should be shut down? They're not doing an executive decision to shut it down without allowing for discussion, which is exactly what Google management is doing. He posted an opinion, partially based on facts and partially based on conjecture to bring attention to it.

In short: there's nothing wrong with wanting a program to be shut down and using that as motivation to put it in the spotlight. I don't see how motivations should get in the way of discussion and examination of existing systems; a system that is beneficial to it's environment should be able to stand on its own merits.

ugh, my "in short" is as long as its preceding paragraph :(

Generally speaking, actually, the vast majority of systems are fragile enough to fail to stand up to consistent attack. I don't subscribe at all to your belief that a good system can never be successfully attacked.

I think we're in agreement on what the original author personally believes about diversity programs. But there is a difference between outright calling for the end of diversity programs at Google and wanting to discuss it further. It seems that the commenter I originally replied to in this chain doesn't differentiate between these two goals, which is why I said something in the first place.

There is no reason to discuss it in a way which you think requires a manifesto as a preface unless you think they should be ended or severely cut down in some way. And the author quite obviously does think that. So yes, taking it as the first step in an attack on diversity programs is perfectly reasonable. Most people are perfectly happy to talk about them with someone who didn't come up to them with the pre-formed argument that they should be scrapped or that they're harmful.

Maybe I'm reading too much into your post but I sense some anger or indignance. If that's true it is misplaced. Understand that if he phrased it any other way, he would have been further crucified.

Phrasing it more honestly and straightforward would be heresy in a corporate environment.

No, I'm mostly upset that people are taking the document as something much lighter than what it is due to its use of weasel words. Take a critical read of it with some understanding of political speech and what comes out is "the author believes that all gender-based diversity programs should be scrapped with minimal replacement" - I'd like people to read it as that and discuss it based on what it actually means, rather than trying to suggest that it's anything less than that.

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