Thoughts:

- It's pretty annoying to see the guy described as having a PhD in systems biology from Harvard. Word from a friend is he dropped out after 2 years. And even if he had the degree, it doesn't really doesn't make him any more an authority on psychology or gender dynamics than the layman. Especially when half his links are blog posts.

- The guy's an idiot if he expected to keep his job after calling his female colleagues more neurotic and less stress tolerant. Especially coming from a biology background where environment is just as stressful but the gender ratio tips the other way.

- Saying "I'm just commenting on general trends, don't take it personally" doesn't make what comes after any less offensive or wrong. The same goes for "PC culture isn't going to like this but..."

- The arguments from inherent genetic differences tend to always ignore the social differences, past and present, that favor one group over another. Most positive initiatives (select training and outreach to women, under-represented minorites) are evolutions on previous affirmative action policies as a way of addressing the whole "it's not fair to those of us in the present who aren't responsible for the actions of others in the past" argument.

- It's hard to read this:

I’ve heard several calls for increased empathy on diversity issues. While I strongly support trying to understand how and why people think the way they do, relying on affective empathy—feeling another’s pain—causes us to focus on anecdotes, favor individuals similar to us, and harbor other irrational and dangerous biases. Being emotionally unengaged helps us better reason about the facts.

And not think that this guy doesn't play well with others.

I've read the document. Then I went and saw what the media wrote and said about the document. I'm not sure that any reporter or journalist actually sat down and read the damn thing.

https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/3914586/Googles-Ideological-Echo-Chamber.pdf

IMO worth a read. Some of it is on point some of it comes off as a reddit MRA post. But the guy writes that there is a culture of fear for people with different ideas then gets fired for having.... different ideas,

Eh, I think that a lot of this is being blown quite a bit out of proportion, and I think that the original "manifesto" and this article actually compliment each other's points better than they contradict. Before we get started, I recommend that you read the manifesto, if you haven't already.

I should also perhaps include a caveat that I'm a white man born in the Appalachians and raised in Florida. I can be quite conservative in some of my views. I can also be quite liberal in others. I voted for Bernie and see myself as a Progressive/Socialist on most economic issues, but for social issues I am a conservative who thinks that both parties and our media have corrupted the modern interpretation of conservative social policies into making things far too "black and white". I'm new here after lurking a bit. I hope that we can get along and have a productive discussion.

This particular manifesto may not be the best-written or best-argued illustration of the problems, but it's the one that has sparked the discussion. From my reading of the document in question, the most significant point made is the one illustrated in this figure: .

Yes, the author then goes on to focus only on the differences in the averages of male and female personalities. He does this to claim that certain resources within google that are only provided to women to help manage stress should be provided to both men and women. He also argues that similar resources to help minority ethnicities should be available to white people. As the author of the linked article asserts, one of the most important aspects of engineering are figuring out the complex social structure behind the project being developed. When some ethnicities are provided extra tools to understanding these structures, that gives them an unfair advantage. Rather than having programs for certain minorities in gender or ethnicity, there should be programs introducing the structure of the company to all new hires.

The author of this "manifesto" does not always make his points very clearly, and he does make some points counterproductive to (what I see as) his primary thesis. Everyone needs to learn that saying something inflammatory might feel good, but rarely does good. He feels ostracized and angry, and that predisposed him to say (and believe) some of these things. But as someone with more conservative social views, I still agree with the major point: if you provide a service to help new people adjust to the culture of a company, you have to provide it to everyone. Some women might not need advice in handling stress, and some men might: why restrict this resource to women only?

Whether you're a black woman from an inner city, or a white man from Appalachia, you are likely to feel a culture shock when trying to interact with the peoples and culture of Silicon Valley. Both of these archetypes, and indeed everyone, should have access to tools that aid in understanding the culture and social structures that exist at such a massive "planet-scale" company (or society!). The white man from Appalachia shouldn't be disadvantaged just because "most" white people that go to work there didn't have a culture shock to deal with.

I may not know much about the author of the original document in question, but I understand how he feels to be ignored, and to have everyone assume that he must be able to fit in just fine with the current world order just because he's a white male. Rather than take his complaints seriously, he was fired and is being called a sexist. If such an attitude continues then the heartland of our country will continue to struggle to adapt to this changing, global world, and it will turn to anyone who pays them any attention (see Trump).

Our current culture of political correctness is broken because it tries to help mushy, ill-defined groups of people that don't have solid boundaries rather than just anyone who needs help. It is inherently racist. To make true progress we must replace it. Right now, many of my friends and neighbors would like that replacement to act as a sort of revenge that returns to them undue advantage, because that's the only type of replacement that's being offered to them. We must come together and understand each other to fix our social ills. We must do this in a way that does not focus on race, but instead on the basis of the needs of individuals.

P.S. The author also makes some claims that do not fit in with his major thesis, but instead dance around a similar theme (e.g. de-emphasize empathy, prioritize intention, etc). I have neglected to tackle them in this already-long answer. If you would like me to follow-up, feel free to ask about any of the points that I neglected here. I am also interested in hearing how any of you might disagree with any of my analysis.

The manifesto is sad. Trite, and willfully uninformed on even the most basic readings on the topics in question.

He does bring up some good points about how to speak on sensitive topics, and the CEO - Sundar Pichai - even agrees with him on many things.

But yeah... Google is better off without this idiot peeing in the pool.

I think this game is an interesting response to the original manifesto as well

I haven't read the "manifesto," but I do have an engineer title, and that title has moved past using numbers. And "planet scale" and "carrier class" apply similarly to utilities.

I was going to say the writer here is correct in skipping gender differences, but after putting my phone down for a few minutes (to clean up cat vomit) I want to come back to it.

Are men and women different? Yeah, probably. But where the manifesto writer failed was not recognizing the scale and scope of those differences.

I think the scale is tiny when talking on terms as broad as gender. And because it's tiny, there's tons of overlap. It's sort of like sports: at the elite level the best man is faster than the fastest woman. But once we move beyond the outlier best of the best, everyone starts blurring together.

And the scope is important, too. The writer here talks about this in section 2. Engineering isn't comparable to winning a race. It's far broader than that and requires more diverse skills, some of which women excel at.

When I think about the people I've worked with, there are a lot of white men, but there are non-whites and women throughout my career. And thinking about those fifty or hundred engineers (and quasi-engineers) I've worked with closely enough to judge? Being bad at one's engineering job isn't unique to any single qualifier.

A man trying to claim women aren't good at his job sounds like someone trying to justify why it's ok for him to be bad at his job.

Edit: I have read the manifesto now. The writer writes from the perspective of things like microaggressions being routinely discussed and criticized at Google. I can't speak to that. If it does exist, I can imagine it being exhausting to hear. Other than being unable to comment on the actual culture at Google, I have nothing to edit above. I have my doubts that culture actually exists outside of far left and far right (as a boogeyman) internet forums.

I've basically always worked in customer service and I can guarantee I have a skillset the guy who wrote this manifesto doesn't even know exists. I've realized lately that people who don't have people skills have no idea what they even are. The other day while I was helping to train somebody a quarter of what I told her was system related and the rest was how to say something or how to break away from a conversation. These skills are more relevant to my job but they are extremely relevant to any higher level position especially somebody who coordinates a team.

I would love to get out of customer service like this eventually, right now I want to do one of those beekeeping companies where you set up the hive and everything at homes/farms for people and maintain them. If I stick with that I will succeed because of these people skills I have. If I didn't have them I wouldn't be able to move up positions and I would be stuck working for somebody else the rest of my life.

I'd say it's an appropriate tag.

Better than say #genderwar or #politicalcorrectnessgonewild