Google’s ‘Horrifying, Menacing’ Memo

“The memo felt to me like a bazooka, it sounded like a cannon. Its words – loud like bombs – gave me a temporary form of PTSD.”

There was once a time when Gersh Kuntzman’s response to shooting an AR-15 was one of the most over-the-top things on the net.

But, that was over a year ago. And life comes at you fast.

These days, in order to subject oneself to horrifying, menacing violence (even in the face of a potential nuclear holocaust on the West Coast), all one has to do is simply read (or vociferously refuse to read) a… memo.

But is it true? Was Damore committing violence? Should people fear him?

Let’s see the conclusion of this memo, which many claim “condemns diversity” and “says women are biologically unfit to work in tech,” in all its horror…

[Gasp!]

It’s Not Unreasonable to Disagree

It isn’t unreasonable to disagree with the memo’s premise.

It isn’t unreasonable to say he is wrong or misinformed. It isn’t unreasonable to refute it, either. It isn’t unreasonable to, let’s say, Google his claims and see how they shake out.

It is, however, unreasonable to wake up, brush your teeth and go throughout your day as if you are the moral and intellectual superior of anyone you disagree with — yet never give yourself a chance to prove it to the world when the opportunity arises.

Even though Damore’s argument had more hedges than the Queen’s estate, he’s been vilified by people who mostly refuse to even counter his argument with opposing research. Or even give him, a fellow employee, the benefit of the doubt.

Stefan Molyneux and professor Jordan Peterson took the time to talk to him. By talking to him, they showed he’s not some “14 word” slurring bigot, the enemy against all that is progress.

He’s just a guy with an (potentially overly-)analytical mind who dared to offer his opinions and offer a few suggestions. (Opinions of which four scientists responded to, mostly favorably — we’ll get to that in just one moment.)

The Boy, Girl, Person? Zir Who Cried Wolf

Many major media firms have been quick to run stories which paint him, predictably, as “sexist” and a “racist” and a “[enter your favorite epithet]”…

Not necessarily, it seems, because they disagree with every single thing his memo said — because that’s highly unlikely.

But because shaming people into submission and silence is a much easier (and more effective) tactic than taking the time to refute arguments, point-by-point, with facts.

And, for the media, the cost of shaming and hyperbole is low. It takes little thought and little time and the payoff is enormous. Bombastic headlines which tickle the amygdala and promote moral outrage, after all, are easy ways to get clicks and shares. (Many people won’t even read past the headline before they click the “Share” button — if it’s good enough.)

It is the path of least resistance. (And, remember: It’s only anti-science when it comes to questioning any facet of the climate doctrine.)

Googlers were so quick to send him to the digital gallows, it’s almost as if they were actively trying to prove him right: Google, he claimed in his memo, is “a politically correct monoculture that maintains its hold by shaming dissenters into silence.”

(Meanwhile, inside Google…)

What is Google?

Remember, we’re talking about Google here — its bread and butter is information. It’s the largest search engine in the world.

It’s the company that manages the global Internet’s marketplace of ideas.

If some scientifically-sourced ideas are simply too reprehensible to look at internally — what does that say about Google’s neutrality as a service? (Might I suggest DuckDuckGo?)

For the other side of the argument…

Four scientists have responded to the #GoogleManifesto controversy. (And the traffic to the original article crashed Quillette’s site all day yesterday.)

We’ll start with professor Lee Jussim and link to the rest of them on Quillette. For a nuanced perspective, they’re all worth a read.

Jussim is an author and professor of social psychology at Rutgers University and was a Fellow and Consulting Scholar at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University (2013-15).

(He’s probably the one regular LFT readers will most agree with — which is why it’s important to read them all.)

Here’s what he had to say:

Lee Jussim

The author of the Google essay on issues related to diversity gets nearly all of the science and its implications exactly right.

Its main points are that:

1. Neither the left nor the right gets diversity completely right;

2. The social science evidence on implicit and explicit bias has been wildly oversold and is far weaker than most people seem to realize;

3. Google has, perhaps unintentionally, created an authoritarian atmosphere that has stifled discussion of these issues by stigmatizing anyone who disagrees as a bigot and instituted authoritarian policies of reverse discrimination;

4. The policies and atmosphere systematically ignore biological, cognitive, educational, and social science research on the nature and sources of individual and group differences.

I cannot speak to the atmosphere at Google, but:

1. Given that the author gets everything else right, I am pretty confident he is right about that too;

2. It is a painfully familiar atmosphere, one that is a lot like academia.

Here, I mainly focus on the reactions to the essay on the Gizmodo site, which indirectly and ironically validate much of the author’s analysis. Very few of the comments actually engage the arguments; they just fling insults and slurs. Yes, slurs.

In 1960, the most common slurs were insulting labels for demographic groups. In 2017, the most common slurs involve labelling anyone who you disagree with on issues such as affirmative action, diversity, gaps, and inequality as a racist, sexist, homophobe, or bigot.

Quote:

Hey, has Google fired that ignorant sexist shitball yet?

— John Scalzi (@scalzi) August 7, 2017

This starts with the title of the Gizmodo post, which labels the article as a “screed,” which dictionary.com defines as a “rant.”

Quote:

Exclusive: Here’s The Full 10-Page Anti-Diversity Screed Circulating Internally At Google https://t.co/urnMfNDnkh

— Gizmodo Australia (@GizmodoAU) August 5, 2017

This essay may not get everything 100% right, but it is certainly not a rant. And it stands in sharp contrast to most of the comments, which are little more than snarky modern slurs.

The arrogance of most of the comments reflects exactly the type of smug self-appointed superiority that has led to widespread resentment of the left among reasonable people. To the extent that such views correspond to those at Google, they vindicate the essayist’s claims about the authoritarian and repressive atmosphere there.

Even the response by Google’s new VP in charge of diversity simply ignores all of the author’s arguments, and vacuously affirms Google’s commitment to diversity. The essay is vastly more thoughtful, linked to the science, and well-reasoned than nearly all of the comments.

If I had one recommendation, it would be this: That, before commenting on these issues, Google executives read two books: John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty and Jonathan Haidt’s The Righteous Mind.

Mill: “…unmeasured vituperation employed on the side of the prevailing opinion, really does deter people from professing contrary opinions, and from listening to those who profess them.”

Haidt: “If you think that moral reasoning is something we do to figure out the truth, you’ll be constantly frustrated by how foolish, biased, and illogical people become when they disagree with you.”

[Click here for all four of the responses from scientists on Quillette’s page.]

Until tomorrow,

Chris Campbell
Managing editor, Laissez Faire Today 

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