_rpaf's comments

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/discrimination

>1. prejudiced or prejudicial outlook, action, or treatment

Hm. Let's check out the definition of sexism again.

>1. prejudice or discrimination based on sex

Prejudice or discrimination. And discrimination also means prejudiced or prejudicial...since I'm not a tech person like yourself I wouldn't know what 'or' means, it's too complicated for me, but I think I do know what 'and' means: for example, you are wrong about your definition of sexism, and about your definition of discrimination, and about your use of 'or'.

This is great, I love learning new tech concepts on tech forums from tech experts.

In order to be discriminatory, they would have to be broad, ignorant statements based on personal anecdote and prejudice that he pulled out of his ass right before adding 'on average' at the end of the phrase; since they are not that in any way, but carefully researched, unbiased observations, they do not fit the definition of discriminatory.

Now that you've explained to me what facts are, I finally understand James' logic, so please consider this argument won.

What happened to James, who simply circulated a fact-based memo telling half of his coworkers that they need special rules to make things fair since they're at least partly genetically inferior when it comes to the job, was yet another gratuitous act of SJW, PC, fact-censoring repression against one of society's most silenced and powerless collectives: top-salaried, Ivy League educated young white males working at the top companies of male-dominated high growth industries in the largest economy on the planet, like so many others we sadly see so often here on HN.

It's time we finally took a stand on these issues.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sexism

>Definition of sexism

>1. prejudice or discrimination based on sex

Enough. Just believe what you want, I give up. There's no sexism on the tech industry or schools. James Damore is right and is an oppressed victim of his own bravery. Whatever.

Please, PLEASE look up the definition of 'discrimination' in any dictionary you like, and tell me if you really believe that saying 'women are more agreeable and less assertive, on average' does not fit the definition, or that James Damore's many characterizations of women on his memo ("higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance", "women generally have a harder time leading") don't, either. If that's the case, we are simply not going to agree with each other, so we shouldn't waste our time trying.

Oh no, he simply stated that women get paid less not because of sexism, but because it's natural, since they genetically lack assertiveness and are worse at leadership positions and negotiating:

>Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness. This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading.

And certainly he didn't say that women were genetically inferior in high-powered tech jobs! He simply said that they're genetically predisposed to dislike jobs that involve systematizing (such as...tech jobs), and that they're genetically inferior when it comes to handling stressful jobs (which, by pure chance, he happens to exemplify with Googlegeist, a...tech job), since they can't handle stress as well as men do because they're genetically predisposed to anxiety and neuroticism:

>Women generally also have a stronger interest in people rather than things, relative to men (also interpreted as empathizing vs. systemizing). (...) More men may like coding because it requires systemizing. >Neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance). This may contribute to the higher levels of anxiety women report on Googlegeist

I don't even know why I bother. I regret getting into this argument. Believe what you like; as long as you see movements for social improvement as some kind of personal accusation, it's what you'll do anyway. Yes, women in tech are not discriminated against, or if they are, it's either exaggerated or there's a reasonable explanation for it. Whatever, downvote away.

On a section dedicated to offering alternative explanations to sexism for the gender gap in tech, James writes:

>Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness. This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading.

>Neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance).This may contribute to the higher levels of anxiety women report on Googlegeist and to the lower number of women in high stress jobs.

The implication is that it's partly natural that women do worse and get lower salaries at tech. In case there's any adoubt, the section it's written in is titled "Possible non-bias causes of the gender gap in tech", in the subsection "Personality differences".

>Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness. This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading.

Do you see it? The part where he says women are genetically worse leaders, and have worse salaries because they're genetically worse negotiators? Remember, the section is titled "Possible non-bias causes of the gender gap in tech", implying that women are paid less because it's natural, not because of sexist bias.

At any rate, I appreciate the patronizing "making well meaning but confused leaps of logic" pat in the head.

> Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness. This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading.

Yes, that does say that women are genetically worse leaders and implies that their lower salaries are at least in part because they are naturally worse negotiators.

The whole section it's written on is focused on explaining how sexism is mostly a exaggeration and that sex differences can instead be explained by genetic factors. Any more questions?

>Damore said that those differences include women generally having a stronger interest in people rather than things, and tending to be more social, artistic, and prone to neuroticism (a higher-order personality trait)

Imagine thinking that you can literally publish and circulate several revisions of an internal company memo telling 50% of your coworkers that they should be paid less because they're genetically inferior to you in regards to the job and then when people tell you that you're kind of a dick and they want nothing to do with you, getting outraged and making a grandstand about being unfairly and terribly oppressed, while bemoaning of course that people nowadays are "too sensitive".

Sadly, you can find many examples of this amazing exercise in woke coherence right here on HN.

#Edit, since I've been accused of "being ignorant" and not having read the memo by people who clearly haven't read the thing themselves. In a section titled "Possible non-bias causes of the gender gap in tech", wholly dedicated to justifying, among other phenomena, gender pay gap for reasons other than sexist bias, in James Damore's own words:

> Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness. This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading.

>Neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance).This may contribute to the higher levels of anxiety women report on Googlegeist and to the lower number of women in high stress jobs.

>Note, I’m not saying that all men differ from women in the following ways or that these differences are “just.” I’m simply stating that the distribution of preferences and abilities of men and women differ in part due to biological causes and that these differences may explain why we don’t see equal representation of women in tech and leadership.

I've not cherry-picked these quotes. There are no omissions, they're whole, untouched paragraphs.

From someone who worked at MIT.

Here's a link to one I've most recently run into from someone who worked at MIT. Yes, it's a Reddit comment, but if you check out his profile you'll see the user's been on the site for 11 years, has close to 140k karma, and has many posts in the past that refer to his professional career.

https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/d59r46/richard...

>A lot of people are acting like this is just about the Epstein comments. The MIT community was up in arms not just over that but at the mountain of shit Stallman has gotten away with over the last few decades, including crap like telling female researchers he'd kill himself unless they dated him, keeping a mattress in his office and inviting people to lay topless on it, defending pedophilia and child rape. He's been making women at MIT uncomfortable for years

>I wish there were more to tell but it's exactly what it sounds like. He had a mattress in the corner of his office and he'd leave the door open and if you were a woman who happened to walk by or heaven forbid need to talk to him for academic reasons he would find an excuse to invite you to use it

You'll also find other similar stories on that thread.

> He kept the door to his office open, to proudly showcase that mattress and all the implications that went with it. Many female students avoided the corridor with his office for that reason

Now go ahead and tell me it's a coincidence you kept that part out, and it was probably not a big deal, and they were all exaggerating in some inexplicable coordinated effort to be disturbed.

So your arguments basically consist on half-quotes, "it happened long ago, so it isn't true", "unsubstantiated; since there's no recordings of it, he probably just said something nice and was misinterpreted yet again" and "maybe that happened, but since I, a man, who'd never be targeted by his sexual advances, think it's ok, it's ok", completely disregarding the fact that all these accusations have been corroborated by witnesses, ranging from people interviewed on several media and dozens of reports and online comments from people who claim to have worked with him over the years, let alone the several unrelated victims of his "urban legends", and most of all, the fact that people repeatedly let him know about his attitude and he didn't give a damn.

In short, yet another big, somehow coordinated witch hunt by overly sensitive SJWs.

I'm more than ready to agree with you if you can.

I would also like to know, if you don't mind, what you consider to be good reason to "refuse to comply" with addressing someone in a way they prefer to be addressed, by using a three-letter word instead of another three-letter word.

As a reminder, the "small issues" you mention include accusations, by several independent parties, of, among other things:

-Asking female coworkers to lay down topless on a mattress in his office.

-Threatening a colleague to kill himself if he/she didn't go on a date with him.

-Posting up signs in his workplace along the lines of "Knight for Justice (Also: Hot Ladies)".

He has been accused, by several independent parties, of, among other things:

-Asking female coworkers to lay down topless on a mattress in his office.

-Threatening a colleague to kill himself if he/she didn't go on a date with him.

-Posting up signs in his workplace along the lines of "Knight for Justice (Also: Hot Ladies)".

Do you think that reprieving someone for threatening a colleague to kill yourself if they don't give in to your romantic/sexual advances is "throwing BS"? It's an honest question.

-Asking female coworkers to lay down topless on a mattress in his office.

-Threatening a colleague to kill himself if he/she didn't go on a date with him.

-Posting up signs in his workplace along the lines of "Knight for Justice (Also: Hot Ladies)".

He has been accused, by several independent parties, of, among other things:

-Asking female coworkers to lay down topless on a mattress in his office.

-Threatening a colleague to kill himself if he/she didn't go on a date with him.

-Posting up signs in his workplace along the lines of "Knight for Justice (Also: Hot Ladies)".