Google CEO Sundar Pichai Says He Does Not Regret Firing James Damore (theverge.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Google CEO Sundar Pichai responded today to the firing of employee James Damore over his controversial memo on workplace diversity, stating that while he does not regret the decision, he regrets that people misunderstood it as a politically motivated event. Speaking in a live conversation with journalist and Recode co-founder Kara Swisher, MSNBC host Ari Melber, and YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki in San Francisco, Pichai said that the decision to fire Damore was about ensuring women at Google felt like the company was committed to creating a welcoming environment.

"I regret that people misunderstand that we may have made this for a political belief one way or another," Pichai said. "It's important for the women at Google, and all the people at Google, that we want to make a inclusive environment." When pressed by Swisher on the issue of regret, Pichai stated more definitively, "I don't regret it." Wojcicki, who has spoken publicly about how Damore's memo affected her personally, followed up with, "I think it was the right decision."

Comments

Epic bullshit

[HornWumpus]

Of course it was political. How stupid do they think we are?

Re:Epic bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

The majority of people did not read the memo. The actual content of the memo is not sexist, but it is challenging. People would rather round it down to a common category that they can definitively reject with full social support....than put forth the mental effort of understand what he actually said, what he actually meant, and how well-supported it actually is.

Pointing out to these people that they did not read the memo will not motivate them to read it. And even if it does, when they read it they will just skim it and zoom in on the catch-phrases, missing the actual meaning and instead seeing their own expectations reflected right back at them.

The ability to stay truly objective, in a domain like this, is rare. Most people simply cannot do it. Nor do they feel the need to try.

Re:Epic bullshit

[fafalone]

Just the other day I saw an article complaining about another extremely racist policy: Color-blind assessment. (See here)
That's a big part of why so many of us on the left aren't thrilled about the progressives are doing... "equality" now means simply switching which groups get preferential treatment, as punishment for past wrongs. It's a completely untenable position. And part of the reason why Trump won... a lot of Democrats just stayed home. Your whole life you advocate for everyone to receive equal treatment, now that makes you a right-wing racist because equal treatment isn't good enough... that alienates people.

Re: Epic bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

White men need to embrace identity politics, we cannot stand against the rising tide of those who hate us as individuals to be destroyed one at a time.

Good news for the competition

[AHuxley]

Encourage the big boring brand to become totally fixated on telling the world about how good it is.
Then look for the people with skills who can work and bring them over to your company.

Is that virtue signalling brand is a really slow, boring place to work?
Your band offers tech and more new tech. The other big brand has long boring meetings about telling the world about how good it is.
What to join a fun, new, dynamic, innovative tech brand? Want to sit in a meeting after boring meeting on the optics of branding and what words to use?
Welcome to an actual tech company that still considers merit and skill? Welcome to the big brand that tells the world about the brand?
Boring big brand meetings on using words all week? A boring big brand that has to stay on message?

Find that fun new tech company thats all about the tech?
Start your own company and get smart people by having no boring meetings :)

Re:"welcoming" and engineering do not mesh

[gweihir]

And fail. Most of the core activities in good engineering is solitary and can only be done that way. In fact, "designed by committee" is about the most negative thing you can say about an engineering product and that is no accident. The whole "team" nonsense was created by bad engineers that struggle to reach the level of a qualified technician and need the group to hide in. Of course, those then want all that "welcoming" bullshit and "safe spaces" and call every environment where their incompetence is actually called out "toxic".

I don't think he's ever going to regret it

[rsilvergun]

worst case he pitches a few million to Demore and his lawyer. Pichai is after bigger fish, to wit: the largely untapped labor pool of female software engineers. There's a dirty joke in there somewhere, but my consideration of it is one of the reasons that labor pool remains untapped.

Now, a better organization could have it's cake an eat it too. e.g. they could keep guys like Damore without driving out women. But I've been in IT for 20 years and I know what a boys club it is. Changing that is _hard_.

Re:I don't think he's ever going to regret it

[Spamalope]

So you haven't read the memo itself. You wouldn't write that they couldn't keep Damore and women if you had, as he was making credible realistic suggestions about how to make the workplace more inviting. Those suggestions ran afoul of progressive ideology though, and daring to suggest that gender is real and that women may feel welcome if things like family life were allowed for is heretical nowadays.

Re:I don't think he's ever going to regret it

[Cederic]

the largely untapped labor pool of female software engineers. There's a dirty joke in there somewhere

Yes, the joke being that this supposed pool exists.

Convince women to enter programming jobs instead of medical ones, or to become software engineers instead of teachers, and maybe that pool will exist.

As a side benefit there'll be a shortage of doctors, nurses and teachers so more men will enter those professions, reducing the male demand for programming jobs.

It's a win in both directions. Except for the poor fuckers now working in a job entirely unsuited to their individual needs and expectations.

Re:Interesting that Pichai responded

[Spamalope]

Yeah. He needs a publicist to make those points on his behalf, especially Google censoring the story. It'd be fun if they crafted some collectivist doublespeak about Google's power/privileged as a media gatekeeper and that they're the oppressor spreading a false narrative.

Re:Regarding the right to not be offended

[Anonymous Coward]

First 25 pages are a bunch of whinging from a snowflake. I doubt there is anything to see in the next 135 are any better.

Re:Regarding the right to not be offended

[larryjoe]

Even if defining culture and etiquette are similar to defining values, there is a world of difference between voicing personal opinions and values and forcing those opinions and values upon financially dependent subordinates. It's that control that renders many normal relationships non-consensual. Sexual relationships and philosophical/religious/political discussions that are fine among friends have such a coercive potential in superior-subordinate relationships that they are legally prohibited in many situations and maybe should be in all such situations. This potentially coercive relationship certainly exists in the employer-employee relationship. Think the way I want you to think or you may be fired, demoted, or otherwise financially penalized. It really is as bad as it sounds.