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Jesse Jackson To Take On Silicon Valley's Lack of Diversity
New submitter wyattstorch516 writes "San Jose Mecury News reports that Jesse Jackson will lead a delegation to HP's next board meeting to discuss the hiring of technology companies in regard to African-Americans and Latinos. 'About one in 14 tech workers is black or Latino both in the Silicon Valley and nationally. Blacks and Hispanics make up 13.1 and 16.9 percent of the U.S. population, respectively, according to the most recent Census data.' Jackson sent a letter to HP, Apple, Google, Twitter, Facebook, and others about meeting to discuss diversity issues."
Seriously, I was sick of his guilt-peddling bullshit decades ago.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Black culture doesn't reward or encourage intelligence.
I don't see much diversity in professional hockey.
Maybe Jesse should start his own company, hire strictly based on race, and compete.
Just not his minorities, queue the shakedown parade.
He just wants Jessie Jr to find decent job after he's out of prison...
When you think of all the good people that suffered long, painful deaths from cancer this year, it is simply a travesty of justice that Jackson was not one of them.
Seems like this would be an education issue not a hiring issue. e.g. are there really a lot of underemployed / unemployed black or hispanics with CS degrees?
I suspect the tech industry has a high percentage of minorities due to Indians and other Asians ethnicity.
I've been in the tech industry (software, circuit board design, chip design, and then back to software) for 24 years. I've worked with engineers with heritage from India, China, Korea, various eastern European countries, and probably a couple other countries in Asia. I've never had a black or latino co-worker. In all those years, I've only ever seen us interview a single black candidate, and he so inadequate that he got sent home after speaking with a single interviewer.
Hiring is not the problem. A lack of black and latino candidates worth hiring is.
I don't think HP is the right place to go for this ploy. HP's done a real bang-up job in relation to their consumers in almost every market to say nothing of their staff relations.
The best Mr. Jackson can expect that is that the shareholders concoct a way to pay minorities less than the current staff to save a few bucks on the bottom line.
Mod me down, I shall become more off-topic than you could possibly imagine.
Is the rate at which software engineers find employment affected by racial attitudes? I doubt it. If JJ wants more minorities in tech he needs to encourage said minorities to choose it as a career path. I doubt he's interested in that, though. He'd rather shame these firms into hiring underqualified minorities to increase the ratio.
I guess "diversity" only applies to black.
I think "insert-sport-here" league should hire short, slow, weak players.
I think everyone should be subjected to this race baiting bullshit as consistently and aggressively as possible.
This is the solution to people like this... they exploit white guilt. And in exploiting it, they use it up.
Look at this very forum... look at all the people saying "f this guy"... exactly. Those are the people that are already tapped out of guilt.
I'm amongst them of course. But not everyone has gotten there yet. Let Al run rampant... Everyone he comes into contact with will be inoculated against his tactics.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
So do we know the diversity situation for Jesse's organization? Just curious, as I have no idea what the situation is.
I've worked in high tech (computing) doing software close-to the hardware (assemblers/compilers/binary translators/binary instrumentation tools/some device driver work) since 1985. And in every single company, the primary hiring criteria has been skill set. If you had the right skills, you got hired.
In the companies I've worked for: SKIN COLOR IS IRRELEVANT. Small unknown ones, up through: DEC/HP, Cisco, AMD
To be blunt, if there were two equally qualified candidates for a job, and one was 'not a white guy', the 'not a white guy' got hired in order to improve diversity in the company.
The real gap occurs prior to the engineering hiring process. The real gap starts in grade school.
So if Jesse Jackson can make a dent in the supply of talent, I applaud him for that. He needs to put his money where is (large) mouth is and start some targeted science endowments
Cracker-Jackin Jackson is at it again, let no company fail to donate to the cause lest they be labelled racist and boycotted. Rainbow Push must need more money to pay off another staffer he knocked up.
I dont have a problem with Jesse Jackson...
I **do** have a problem with this reductive, tone-deaf initiative of his...this program won't improve anything.
Just as with the lack of women in tech, the lack of racial diversity is a ***symptom of a greater problem*** and trying to hit some sort of abstract "number" is ridiculous.
The problem goes all the way back to middle school & all the way up through funding for graduate research. We don't know how to **teach technology**...partially because of misperceptions of how the industry works. Steve Jobs as "technology genius" is a perfect example. Jobs was a 'genius' at marketing & dealmaking. He applied innovation to opening new markets & had the vision to see potentials. These are great traits, but have ***nothing to do with actual computing***
The misperceptions influence organizaitonal decisions...which influences academia...which just reinforces the cycle of bad theory/practice.
Diversity is an evolutionary advantage, but it's **two steps** beyond fixing right now...tech's problems are systemic and hitting some artificial quota will not help fix things!!!
First step is to acknowledge we have a problem & start talking about refining + improving how we explain tech to non-techs and students...and integrating those improvements into our systems naturally.
It's sort of a "healing algorythm" that has to go throughout the whole system to optimize.
Thank you Dave Raggett
should go after outsourcing and H-B1 they are the real killers of work.
Asians are not the "right kind" of minority because they spend their time working and have no need for troublemakers.
FTFY
How many black/latino students are 1) attending college and 2) studying CS? (Or 3, self-taught programmers). How many apply for jobs in tech, and what's the acceptance/rejection rate? Are there a significant number of people who decide not to study CS in the first place because of a perception of not being welcome in the workplace? Are there relatively few black/latino tech workers in senior positions because of some adverse selection or simply because there are fewer of them in the industry to begin with?
Similar questions apply to women, who make up roughly 50% of the population but also have low numbers in tech.
Raw numbers don't tell the whole story, although they help direct the questions that we should be asking.
My experience has been that IT is more color blind than many other departments in large companies I've worked at. The problem is lack of qualified job candidates. Hiring somebody or giving them preferential treatment in the hiring process based on their race or skin color is discrimination.
Stop affirmative action.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law - Aleister Crowley
I've worked in tech for 15-20 years now. Since about 2005, I've sat on interview panels.
In all that time, I've interviewed maybe three black people (two of whom ended up getting hired). Same with women. It wasn't that we were intentionally ignoring resumes we thought were from black people or women, we just simply did not ever get them.
I went to college at a school that had a large black student body (although it wouldn't be classified under the "Historically Black College" scheme). Looking at their website, the college is 52% white, 27% black, 10% hispanic white, 3% Asian. However, in my CS101 class (~50 students), it was all white and Asian guys and one white girl (who ended up changing majors).
The high school I went to was roughly 50/50 black/white, but my AP Computer Science class in high school was 100% white. There was actually a pretty good split of girls and boys, though (it was the only "computer" class that offered honors credit, so there was an attraction to people who wanted high class-placement even if they weren't interested in CS).
So yeah. While I don't doubt some corporations are biased in their hiring practices, there also just aren't a lot of black of female applicants, and not a lot of black and/or female CS graduates. I don't know how to address that end of the problem.
...but it's being eaten...by some...Linux or something...
You're kidding me, right? If there is one industry that is by its very nature not racist it's IT. Xenophobia simply doesn't work out if half your coworkers are hailing from abroad. You have all sorts of people working together, the whole thing reeks of favoritism.
Or, in other words, Mr. Jackson trying to play the race card in an attempt to guilt-trip.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
awesome MADTv sketch?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Here is data for C.S. and C.E. bachelors degree recipients in the U.S. See page 5. About 8.7% of degrees were awarded to blacks and Hispanics, which is about one out of 11. So Silicon Valley isn't far off what one would expect based purely on # of degrees awarded. A significant portion of bay area tech workers are likely immigrants to the United States and got their degrees elsewhere. This group likely contains very few blacks and Hispanics. So, if the discussion were limited to Silicon Valley workers born in the United States the the percentage of blacks and Hispanics may well line up with expectations.
To this day, many cities continue to use exclusionary zoning to keep minority groups out of certain neighborhoods. In Silicon Valley, is density tightly controlled? Are minimum parking requirements in place? If so, this could help explain Silicon Valley's lack of diversity.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
But, before hitting Silicon Valley, why not make a stop by the NBA?
I mean, asians and whites are dramatically underrepresented there. I'm sure you see this as a big problem, too.
Right, Jesse?
Um, Jesse?
Do you have ESP?
Everyone in the article keeps saying that Jackson is "shining a spotlight" on the problem. Is he really? He pointed out the lack of blacks and latinos in the tech industry and did fuck-all to state what he believes to be the problem and what we can do to resolve it. If he had come out with figures that showed that there were tons of unemployed or underployed blacks and latinos in the tech industry and that the underlying problem is due to discrimination, then that would give us something to work with. But that doesn't seem to be the case at all. What does he expect these companies to do? Hire underqualified people just to get the numbers to match?
This sounds like what my dad was telling me the other day. He used to work for the federal government and they had very detailed lists of minorities in each department. Every department was often under stress to get their numbers to match percentage of populations. But what population do you go by? National? Regional? Many of these departments were more focused on meeting these quotas than hiring the most qualified candidates, so overall these systems are counterproductive.
And if we're so focused on quotas of fairness, should we put a quota that only 13.9% of NFL players should be black? The fact is that Mr. Jackson did a lot of good when qualified black people couldn't find work due directly to discrimination. And while discrimination may not be completely gone, it is a lot better than it used to be and not every case of underrepresentation today is due to discrimination. So keep fighting the good fight against discrimination, but if you're going to complain about underrepresentation and completely fail to show that it is a result of discrimination rather than a lack of interest or qualification, then you can kindly STFU.
Has Jackson forgotten what happened 15 years ago when he brought his extortion racket to the Valley and tried it out on T.J. Rodgers over at Cypress. Didn't work out too well as I recall. Jackson is the worst kind of opportunist there is. His political capitol these days is greatly reduced, so I see no reason for the current crop of execs to even give him the time of day. There are serious people working on racial justice in this country, but Jackson has never been one of them - he is just in it for himself.
Has nothing to do with being a "nigger". Fact is the culture in the inner-city has a social norm of intimidating kids who want to learn. Just look at the poor kid who got beat up in Chicogo. Jessie should focus more on inspiring inner-city people to get educated. He can then focus on educational institutions to offer more than an athletic scholarship (which is where education makes money - colleage sports is a money racket). Jessie should also focus on black-on-black deaths. More blacks are killed by other blacks than "whitey" lynchings. Jessie is a bad case of the pot calling the kettle black. Let's refrain form the word "nigger" as it only adds ammunition to Jessie, that everyone (AKA "white people") is against them. Personally, I think there are more problems *socially* in the intercity that need to be addressed. IMHO, the only thing holding them down is their own culture. As long as they can blame others, one won't fix themselves first. I have known and worked with many minorities and can only say, that the successful ones succeeded in spite of the jacked up community they came from (I had same problem myself in a way).
Affirmative Action is so decisive that I feel I need to give a bit of background. For all intents and purposes, I'm White (I do have native American ancestors, but too far removed to count tribal membership). I grew up in a part of Hawaii where only 30% of the population was White. Among my own spouse and the spouses of my siblings we have two Asians, one Pacific Islander, and three Latinos (one Latina also is part Black). I do not generally consider myself a racist, nor do I feel any White guilt. Slavery ended so long ago that I would be surprised to meet anyone in the US whose grandparents were slaves in the US. My own ancestors weren't slavers and I believe slavery to be evil, but people of all races can make their own future now.
In Hawaii, preferential treatment is given to Pacific Islanders. At my university, the highest paying jobs for students ($10 / hour) were reserved for Pacific Islanders, while White like me had to be content with $5.25 per hour. I have been turned down numerous times so that a company could get government credit for hiring a less qualified person from a protected class.
We are in the 21st century. We need to get rid of diversity quotas. Let the most qualified person get the job. Bill Cosby is right in that Blacks need to rid themselves of the ghetto mentality and educate themselves. Blacks (everyone, really) need to take responsibility for their own situation instead of blaming it on events from the 1800s.
Unfortunately, the diversity of the population does not equal diversification in job skills.
This is a repeat of Equal Oppertunity and job quota's from 2 decades ago. In the 70's I had a job with a TS clearance in a technical field and I noted the stark lack of some ethnic groups. I asked my employer about this ethnic bias toward White. He showed me the stack of applications. Minorities very rarely applied or even trained in the high tech trades.
Due to affirmative action in the 80's by t US Goverment, a family relative applied for an apprenticeship with Bonniville Power Administration. He had the highest test score, until another canidate passed him due to race, ethnicity, etc. My brother was passed by for the position. The selected canidate failed out of the program. By this time 6 months had passed and he took another posiiton in private industry.
Now 30 years later, the BPA HR staff is in the hotseat because they gave preference to minoriities as part of Affermitive Action, but did not give any preference to Veterans. I and my brother are vets. I did not even apply with BPA because at the time I knew the deck was stacked against me.
Mainzer's email to staff said BPA was now working with DOE to identify the first wave of applicants, including veterans, who were disadvantaged and provide them with priority consideration for positions at BPA. But his email also suggested that the problems went on until April 2013, a year longer than initially reported.
http://www.oregonlive.com/busi...
Stating only a low number are hired is only part of the story. Poor inner city schools, culture, and other factors disadvantage these minority groups. When they change culture, work ethic, schooling, etc and enter the trades, only then will the numbers start to match up.
Do not fix a lack of a race by hiring 100 percent of the applicatents from a race while only picking 5 percent of a mjority. Testing and qualifications do matter to private industry. It should matter in government positions too.
The truth shall set you free!
i'm not against the concept at all, but it's got to be at a larger scale in multiple areas
most of our "tech industry heroes" were ***alienated*** from both Academia & Corporate America. it was their alienation from the "tech industry" that drove them to create something that subverted the bad tendencies that caused their alienation.
we can all think of examples of this
my question: how is setting up a dumbed-down version of a system that ***doesn't work*** going to help?
we don't need to "re-invent the wheel" but we do need to refine how our theory/practice in Academia
we have a whole **public education system**...we don't need headline grabbing "hackathons" where a bunch of Detroit HS students are sat in front of a computer & taught a few lines of C++ or w/e
we need **qualified teachers** in every school in America...teaching from a **coherent theory of Human/machine interaction** that they learned from **gov't funded professors** writing papers that establish a theory that can be put into practice consistently
industry needs to open the wallets as well if they expect to have a quality workforce to draw from and a consumer base with enough disposable income to buy their gadgets
Thank you Dave Raggett
Nearly 100% rejection of race-baiting and skin color preferences. Things really have changed for the better.
PBS program last week about struggles of black people from 1960s through today. Near end of program it was mentioned about maybe reason why so many blacks are still living in poverty (inner cities) is because racism has been institutionalized. Also for many white people they don't see blacks except on TV where typically they are seen as sports stars, entertainers, or getting dragged off to jail. There is the President but lately his popularity is not that high. Couple months ago Charlie Bolden, NASA Administrator, said he has experienced walking into a convention (where he is the only black guy) everyone looks at him like he is out of place (or is he one of the waiters?). When someone recognizes and points out he is the NASA Administrator (and former astronaut and Marine general), at an instant he becomes the most brilliant person in the room. (ok, there are many saying Bolden is not effective NASA Administrator but that's another topic for another discussion. Besides there have been white guys that were ineffective administrators).
It seems to me society should encourage math and science but lots of luck as this country is mesmerized by football. Or put resources into inner city schools will be a good start but unfortunately people will cry foul ("that's socialism!") or say we can't afford it (well we sure found plenty of money to pour into Afghanistan and Iraq). But perhaps ask those at these engineering societies, http://www.nsbe.org/ and http://www.ncalifblackengineer... for their suggestions on what they would present at HP.
mfwright@batnet.com
The person that seems to have the most alignment with this message is Bill Cosby.
Sadly, many of the young'ns don't know much about him... Maybe his new show can provide a platform for his message.
Now that Jesse Jackson is on the case, we can all rest knowing that, as long as there is any discrimination, he will never give up trying to exploit it for personal gain.
Are you being accused of being racist? Are you actually racist? It doesn't matter. All you need to do is give Jesse Jackson money, and he will promise not to make your problems worse than they already are.
Seriously, I was sick of his guilt-peddling bullshit decades ago.
It isn't a question of guilt. It is a question of demographics.
In the future the biggest demographic change in the U.S. is the rise of the majority-minority, an odd concept that shows that we still haven't gotten over the ides that white males are the norm and everyone else is a stranger.
To thrive domestically as well as globally, being multicultural is essential.
How Will Changing Demographics in the U.S, Influence Business In the Coming Decade?
The geek would probably agree that the Republican Party is slowly losing ground as a national force because it is too white, male, inbred and insular. He probably knows that the conflict between the poor and middle class of San Francisco runs deeper than gentrification,
But he refuses to draw any larger conclusions from the evidence which surrounds him.
The only thing stopping more diversity is the lack of candidates with the right skill set. My company has made offers to a wide range of people and we don't care what their background is as long as they have the skills needed. One of the best candidates I interviewed was transgendered and we made her an offer but sadly she didn't join. Everyone who interviewed her recommended her. I have never seen discrimination with any of the tech companies I have worked for. I just have never seen any Latino or Black candidates, period. If I see a compelling resume I'll do a phone interview and if that goes well it leads to an in-person interview. I don't care what the color of their skin is, their sex, whether they're straight or gay, only that they have the skills we need.
If Jesse Jackson wants more diversity then he needs to look at the people graduating from college with computer science and computer engineering degrees and applying those degrees (not going in to IT).
Unfortunately most of the people I interview are not qualified regardless of their race or background. They exaggerate their skills on their resumes or their C coding skills are not up to snuff. I always give the same programming problem as well which I don't consider very difficult and there's more than one way to solve it though most use the simplest method. Sadly, 60% of the people I interview fail it utterly and another 30% miss key corner cases. If they say they've worked on the Linux kernel, I'll ask some basic Linux kernel questions. If they say they've worked on U-Boot, I'll ask some basic U-Boot questions.
Right now we're looking for people who can work on bootloader code for 64-bit embedded chips (U-Boot and/or UEFI). All we ask are that you have the skills and speak English (and even that doesn't have to be perfect if the skills are present). Most of the stuff we ask should be known by anyone with a decent computer science degree and an understanding of basic CPU architecture.
This post is encrypted twice with ROT-13. Documenting or attempting to crack this encryption is illegal.
Jesse Jackson has been so discredited as a race baiter and antagonist, that really its best to just ignore him. There is no racial discrimination. It all has to do with qualifications. The fact is, blacks need to stop flunking out of math class if they want these kinds of jobs. The lackadaisical attitude I would see from blacks in schools is indicative, they just didn't care and they did not want to learn the subject. Most of them want to play football and basketball and had little or no interest in mathematics. In most cases, it was the whites and orientals that took the most interest in and excel at mathematics and engineering. Blacks have had the same opportunities in schools but they refuse to avail themselves of it, so its their own fault.
J.P. Rushton and others have made a strong and compelling argument for the heriditarian model of IQ. IQ has been estimated to be 60% genetic. The evidence is strong enough that there are racial differences in IQ and it is due to genetics that it has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt. IQ differences show up by age 3, long before education can have any effect. IQ is strongly coordinated with brain size. State of the art MRI scan studies have shown that the average size of the Black brain is 5 cubic square inches smaller than that of whites. IQ is strongly correlated with life history traits. Self dressing and toilet training earlier is associated with lower IQ. Black children dress and toilet train earlier, and sexually mature earlier, than Orientals and Whites, this is coordinated strongly with lower IQ levels, with Blacks having a lower IQ than whites and orientals.
This is why blacks avoid mathematics. They are unable to cope with it and therefore either want to become sports stars and when they realize thats not possible, they end up doing some other low skilled labor, or even worse, end up becoming gangsters and drug dealers.
Fools everywhere. But keep in mind, while some admire the bottom rungs of the ladder, others aspire much further up. You wouldn't see too many of them among the wanna-bes, they're probably here making much more money than they could there
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
It will continue to exist as long as people bow to the loud mouths. We have enough collective wisdom showing that he isn't telling the truth or representing the facts. Twenty years ago, we could claim we didn't know or understand. Today, we have mountains of data and research to prove out all of the problems associated with this issue.
YES.
You're one of those closet Republican, "I hate anything the government does always no matter what" people & debating you is pointless.
If you want to talk about your defunct ideas, slide on over to Foxnews.com and have fun in the comments section...
Thank you Dave Raggett
Companies only see green. They don't care about any other color, unless it equates to more green.
Rather than force the companies to hire people who they don't think are qualified, why not sponsor some minorities for 7+ years to them interested in CS and get them a good degree in CS.
Or better yet, Jesse should shut his mouth, go get a technical degree himself, and then do some real work. IMO, he talks a good game, but he doesn't back it up with his lavish lifestyle.
...that the tech industry doesn't so much discriminate against certain groups of people just because they are those groups, but that being in those groups produces a tendency on the part of a large number of that group's members to discriminate against the tech industry by not preparing themselves to be qualified to fill positions in it.
If the tech industry adjusted its standards downwards as far as what they expect hirees to know and be able to do, it wouldn't be the tech industry anymore, and pretty soon everybody working there would no longer have jobs no matter how much the requirements had been relaxed.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
I'm kinda guessing the proud and hard-working Latinos don't like being grouped in with African Americans? Obviously demagogue Jackson see opportunity in including the growing population of Latinos. But, take prison gangs for example, it's not like the Norteños and Sureños want blacks in there, that's why they're totally separate gangs. No one works harder than the proud and respectful Mexicans, not sure if I can say the same for surly African Americans. Lastly, given the huge number of Asians (Indian/Chinese) in tech, why does Jackson think there is lack of diversity???
Jackson is a master of corporate shakedowns and this has *nothing* to do with equality except where his wallet is concerned.
The race card has been played.
Some Hispanic gangs are trying to cleanse their communities of blacks by terrorizing them. Check out the Azusa 13. No love there just because they are both minorities in the US.
But they happen *way* the crap earlier than with people trying to get jobs. You want to fix things? Fix things at like the elementary school level. People living in poverty will have kids that will also be living in poverty. Kids living in poverty are not nearly so likely to a. value getting a good education, or b. be able to get a good education even if they do value it. People who don't get a good education are less likely to get good jobs. People who don't value a good education are less likely to even *want* to aspire to have a good job, or even know where to look.
So, there are totally still racial inequalities... but it isn't really fair to blame Silicon Valley companies, who I can't imagine for the most part would really care what color your skin is, as long as you're the best at whatever job they're hiring for, and can at least like speak English more fluently than not.
While the lack of African-Americans and Latinos in Silicon Valley is certainly a problem worth remedying, this isn't a hiring issue, it's a training issue. Sure, these minorities make up 13.1 and 16.9 percent of the general population, but they make up only 4.6 and 5.2 percent of the Science and Engineering (S&E) workforce - See Table 3.22, NSF S&E Indicators 2014. If we want more of these under-represented groups in our tech companies, we need to first get them to pursue S&E degrees in our schools.
Jackson only gets involved if there is an opportunity for his organization to extort money from a company.
I'm having flashbacks to the Fresh Prince of Bel Air - there have been plenty of TV representations of black families that are not 'Ebonics' ghetto dwellers.
As someone who doesn't live in the US, I honestly couldn't tell you if the Cosby show or The Wire is a more accurate picture of the typical experience of a someone growing up as an African American. I'm not sure how many non-blacks could tell you that either.
Sara
Designer, Gamer, Macgrrl in an XP World
I work in Silicon Valley and have worked at several startups. I am also white. I am also the minority. In most of the companies where I have worked, the majority of the software people have been Indian or Asian. Other jobs in the companies seem to be predominantly white/American. Why do I think this is? Well, our education system and values are a good start. We have been trying to grow the company and have several head count to fill. Most candidates coming in the door are also Indian or Asian, have at *minimum* a Master's degree or PhD, and are very driven to succeed. We pick candidates solely based on their skill sets. If a green girl with tentacles came into the office and was a good technical and business culture fit, we would hire them. Want to get more African-American and Latinos in our doors? Make them better candidates. Period.
Not a chance he will even mention the case of female entrants and employees :)
How does 50% of humanity strikes you, buster?
"Silicon Valley demands Jesse Jackson address lack of qualified applicants interested in working there"
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.