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Comment by tmh79 | Hacker News Reader

Disclaimer: I work at U

Liane was beloved at Uber. I cannot speak to any issues of racial discrimination, but I definitely felt that Lianne was one of the "good" folks at the company, and I am very surprised and dissapointed by this news.

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> I definitely felt that Lianne was one of the "good" folks at the company, and I am very surprised and dissapointed by this news.

People were saying the same thing about Bill Cosby, that he was one of the "good guys" right up until light was shed on his behavior with a specific subset of human beings.

I know great engineers who treat me really well but at the same time are horrible human beings who treat specific subgroups of people in an unacceptable way.

This process of helping such people identify that they have a problem, that they are behaving in an unacceptable way and then fixing it is a good thing.

It sounds like you are comparing a viewers relationship with bill cosby to this person's relationship with the HR rep.

People that knew bill well knew he was weird before he got hit with all the accusations. He would do weird stuff like order people to stand/sit infront of him and watch him eat.

Are you a person of color? Because the issue was about racial discrimination. I don't doubt she may treat non color folks great but you may not be hearing the whole story.

OTOH any company trying to desperately restore its reputation might be inclined to act on the merest whiff of an allegation of this sort.

If you weren’t among those discriminated against, you don’t speak for everyone.

Even if you were among those discriminated against, you don't speak for everyone. No-one speaks for everyone.

Your counter argument is weak. No on claimed she discriminated against everyone. The only claim is that she discriminated against someone and that is all the proof that is needed.

I don’t think you are disagreeing with the person you’re replying to.

Your point that it can be discrimination without affecting all people of <x description> matches their point that one person of <x description> can’t speak for the experiences of all other people like them.

They're not speaking for everyone. They're speaking for themselves. Of being discriminated.

There are those of us who are happy with the new leadership in general who were not fans of her. That's not a conversation I'm having on a public forum, though.

Then why mention it at all? If you're not willing to back up such a statement like that with any kind of reasoning and state so explicitly, why bother telling anyone? This is a forum; implying a place for discussion. If you don't intend to do that, refraining from such provocative but unsubstantiated additions is more positive.

If the person who works at uber wants to know more they know how to get in contact with me, I use my real name here and I’m not about to get fired for providing at least a hint that not everyone was hoodwinked by her.

Also, if you think my hedging here is paranoid: https://www.pcgamer.com/amp/guild-wars-2-writers-fired-follo...

And as a privacy engineer you're unaware of anyway to maintain your privacy and remain anonymous in order to provide constructive additions to the conversation?

You don't fear firing due to stating your dislike of the former exec but fear what might happen if you explain that dislike???

Friend, this is a professional forum and I am trying to be just that: professional. I don’t want to waste my time having to do damage control if the internet decides to shit on me for having an opinion. I want to provide viewpoints to my anonymous coworker upthread that not everyone agrees with them.

Since I feel like I didn’t address the core of your latter point: the difference here is that I don’t violate any agreements with my employer by stating a simple opinion. I put myself at risk when I explain that with information that is 1) worth pageviews and incidniary writing and 2) violates the trust of people I respect who have shared their own anecdotes with me. I could paint broad strokes but that doesn’t help folks understand things any better than if I just elided it entirely.

"providing at least a hint that not everyone was hoodwinked by her"

I think this already goes beyond opinion into insinuation.

That's fair and appreciated. At that point I was agitated and defensive last night, and that came out there.

Couldn't you criticize the parent comment for exactly the same reason? Someone posted "I liked her" and someone else posted "well I didn't."

I see no indication that the parent would refuse to provide reasoning behind their statement.

If I edited my last sentence out and simply ignored any responses instead would you be satisfied?

> If you're not willing to back up such a statement like that with any kind of reasoning and state so explicitly...

This is unwarranted. GP's comment was vague, but no vaguer than the one they were replying to - both offered subjective personal opinions about the topic of the article. That's hardly out of line for a discussion forum.

> why bother telling anyone

To me, the intent here appears to be to offer anecdata to make a case that she wasn't _universally_ beloved. I think it's meaningful and useful to be reminded that employees in a company aren't a bunch of mindless sheep and that they can have different values and opinions.

There's no need to do any lynching/bad-mouthing publically for that.

Seems that she disagrees with you.

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