Judge Dismisses Lawsuit That Claims Google Paid Female Employees Less Than Male Colleagues (cnn.com) 257
A California judge has rejected a class action claim against Google for alleged gender inequity. In September, three female Google employees filed a lawsuit against Google, claiming the search giant "engaged in systemic and pervasive pay and promotion discrimination." They sought class action status on behalf of women who have worked at Google in California for the past four years. CNN reports: This week, a judge rejected their request to make the suit a class action. A judge ruled that the class was "overbroad," stating that it "does not purport to distinguish between female employees who may have valid claims against Google based upon its alleged conduct from those who do not." Jim Finberg, the lawyer representing the plaintiffs, said his clients plan to file an amended complaint seeking class action certification. He said it will address the court's ruling and make "clear that Google violates the California Equal Pay Act throughout California and throughout the class period by paying women less than men for substantially equal work in nearly every job classification."
#MeeToo Crowd will appeal until (Score:5, Insightful)
it find a liberal judge.
It's been said before, companies do not systematically pay women less, if they did, they would only hire women.
Re: #MeeToo Crowd will appeal until (Score:5, Interesting)
Sexual harassment and sexual assault should not be tolerated. But there's no nuance to the discussions, no proportionality between the allegations and the reaction. People are afraid to speak up and question what's going on right now. The are some parallels between Star Trek TNG'S The Drumhead and movements like #Metoo.
When anyone who calls into question how far the movement will go is labeled as being against women, which I've seen happen, it's out of hand. I'm for changing the status quo, but left unchecked, these movements get out of hand. When that happens, the consequences can be harmful to most or all involved. Look at the French Revolution as a movement based on an admirable goal that completely got out of control.
The goal seems to be to punish men, but there isn't a lot of discussion on how to actually solve the problem. The real issue is the differential in power that lends itself to abuse, and how when victims speak up, they often face retribution. Yes, there needs to be consequences for abuse, but that doesn't actually solve the problem that enables the abuse to happen to begin with. That is the logical end goal, but that's not what the movement seems to be after.
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Look at cases like Brian Banks, Duke Lacrosse, Hofstra, Jackie, and Mattress girls for starters.
It's funny how so many people who push the "listen and believe" crap will turn around and use the Salem witch trials as an example of women being persecuted, when the reason for the trials w
divide & conquer (Score:5, Insightful)
If they scream loudly enough and often enough about a non-existent problem - remember in almost all US megacorps, there is codified systemic employment bias against men - then we will forget about the real problems in the workplace.
Workers upset that wages are stagnant while cost of living is skyrocketing? "He looked at me the wrong way! Reeeeeeeeeee!"
Workers angry that their jobs are being offshored while executives sit back and collect handsome bonuses? "He said 'hi' to me, I feel harassed. Burn the witch! Reeeeeeeeeee!"
Workers demoralized because the entire management of the company went to the same three elitist private schools, and public school grads don't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting promoted? "Misogyny! Microaggressions! Literally Hitler! Reeeeeeeeeee!"
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Do you have any actual evidence of this? Like a series of examples that show a "systemic employment bias against men", or that there are significant numbers of people saying "He looked at me the wrong way! Reeeeeeeeeee!"?
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Nonsense we have been told we are the privileged class so long that people just believe it without question. The are pros and cons to both sexes.
Women's Disadvantages: ....
Get paid less
Physically weaker.
Expected to wait to be asked out.
Get used as prostitutes/ sex slaves
Are expected to have a higher standard of beauty.
Sexually harassed more.
Expected to be lady like.
Men's disadvantages:
we are less happy, in my country 3 times the suicide rate,
we have less friends.
we live shorter lives.
we are expected to go t
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MRAs are not a men's rights movement in their current form, they're just a bunch of anti-feminists.
So your response is the same as what the other side says all the time about yours?
"Feminism is not about women's rights in their current form, they just hate men!"
"Antifa today isn't about anti-fascism. They're just fascists!"
"Liberals today aren't about liberal values. They're more like illberals!"
An actual men's rights movement would fight toxic assumptions about men and how men should behave
So how could an actual men's rights movement be feminism, as AmiMojo suggested? AmiMojo (and yourself) aren't fighting against toxic assumptions about men. You're doing the opposite here. You're perpetuating a to
Re: #MeeToo Crowd will appeal until (Score:5, Insightful)
That depends on what aspect you're talking about. With sexual harassment, yes, definite problem. And interestingly enough, it turns out that those who often shame it are purveyors of it.
With regard to pay discrimination, sorry, but there's no merit to it. Yes, there is an earnings gap, but no, there isn't some giant man conspiracy or corporate culture that makes it so. The research has been done extensively on this, and in the vast majority of cases, the earnings difference comes down to good ol' fashioned biology, especially when it comes to maternity. This is one of those things in life that cannot be helped.
Re: #MeeToo Crowd will appeal until (Score:2, Informative)
No, there is not an earning gap.
This has been debunked over and over and over, by the Obama administration, by literally hundreds of studies, by HR departments, and by anecdote when looking at the claims of individuals who claim it.
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Bullshit.
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What an absolutely insightful riposte.
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James Damore had it right. The solution to the earnings gap is to pay women 17% more than men.
Re: #MeeToo Crowd will appeal until (Score:4, Informative)
You want to spout this lie again? After it's been debunked over and over and over? The biological stuff is still there, the pink dolls and cars are still there, the maths and engineering stuff is still there.
Here is the same video as always, the one put forth when you make these debunked claims again and again.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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The ultimate proof is that in countries that addressed these issues, like Iceland and Norway, the gap went away. All the supposedly biological stuff about girls liking pink dolls and boys liking cars fell away too, especially in maths and engineering. Boys in those countries tend to be better communicators too.
As you say, it's not a conspiracy, it's just unintentional systemic bias.
Citation please. There is no mention of any of the those things in your link.
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Not true. In fact some research shows that the more equal the society, the bigger the difference between what men and women choose to do.
Re: #MeeToo Crowd will appeal until (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, when all you can do is try belittle someone else's points rather than actually disprove any of them it goes to show that you don't actually have a leg to stand on. You're merely reflexively disagreeing with someone, refusing to admit you're wrong when you know you are.
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I didn't read the article linked above, but I did read Damore's paper. He did a piss-poor job of supporting his points. Some of his claims weren't cited at all, and those which were supported were mostly just links to wikipedia articles or individual studies. It's the sort of "proof" that I expect to see
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You found a sack of lies that supports your beliefs, and so you treat it as gospel and expect everyone else to sing along. You'll find that only works with others who already believe what you do, and like you are closed-minded.
Re: #MeeToo Crowd will appeal until (Score:4, Insightful)
Bull-shit!
You make ANYONE afraid long enough, ESPECIALLY for an unjustified reason, you're going to, eventually, get blowback.
And, seeing as we're talking about multiple groups of people who seem to have a hard time separating fact and reason from emotion and anger, that blowback is going to be FUGLY.
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Unless the person they're communicating interest in is going through a radfem phase.
Then, even breathing the same air is "rape".
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LOL!
Go for it!
Re: #MeeToo Crowd will appeal until (Score:2, Interesting)
I don't think the problem is men in power, I think it's people in power. I don't know if power corrupts or the people who move up in orgs all share the same traits, but I think it's power over gender. I work on a mostly female team with multiple levels of female management and the sexual harassment is systemic and horrible. I totally understand why woman legitimately bitch about it so much. I've even gone to hr, with emails and chats, the female HR person actually said I should just enjoy the attention.
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Why on earth would that be true? The misogynist boss isn't spending his money...
He's spending his budget. The other boss competes (Score:3)
Two bosses each have a budget of $1 million to hire people.
If it's true that their $1 million budget will hire either 8 men or 10 equally effective women*, any smart boss would hire the ten women. His department will be more productive and he'll get bonuses and promotions.
So it *is* his money, in the sense that it's his budget to spend on his team, and he'll be judged on the results.
There are some misogynistic manager, for sure. Maybe not many, but there are some. There are also other managers in the compa
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You claim that discrimination is self-correcting, but there is plenty of evidence that it is not. Racial segregation persisted for more than a century in America despite being against the economic interests of its practitioners.
Another example is sexual discrimination in Japan. Men are usually promoted based on seniority rather than competence, while women are generally excluded from the hierarchy. So it is common for a "super secretary" to be actually running the company, while her incompetent boss sit
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Some multi-nationals from America and Europe are able to take advantage of the situation by opening branches in Japan and hiring very competent women at bargain salaries
So it is self-correcting. Just not always in the most predictable ways.
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Probably not, since the lawsuit wasn't actually thrown out at all. The headline is a lie. The judge simply declined to allow it to become a class action because the class was too broad, but the actual claim that women were systematically paid less will still go ahead and be tested in court.
Reactionary much?
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On Saturday I was stood with my arm out, not moving. A woman came up to me and leaned against my arm, then turned her back to me so that my hand ran across her breasts and I ended up cupping one of them until I realised and moved.
#MeToo
(she did apologise afterwards)
the real economic question (Score:2)
Speaking as an Economics professor . . .
It is easy to explain why someone would pay a woman less than a man.
It is, at best, difficult to explain why anyone would hire a man that has to be paid more than a woman . . .
doc hawk
Next step (Score:3, Insightful)
The women will claim they were sexual assaulted in order to get even with Google. Anything and everything seems to constitute sexual assault these days. There are egregious examples like Harvey Weinstein, but much of this is about punishing men so women can take their places without having to earn it.
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No one deserves the results of biased treatment - neither men with pay bonus nor women without
Which is why Jzanu supports prostate cancer screenings for women and maternity services for men paid for by the government.
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Pay is what you are willing to accept and basically the employer saying screw you. If they can badger you to take less they will and women are more easy for corporations to badger and they get paid less. This not collectively but individually and on average. Are they women who get paid more, yes but they are tougher, more individually minded and more willing to stick up for themselves and in the minority. So employers want more women because they are easier to push around and manipulate than men on average
Re:Next step (Score:5, Interesting)
In a team of 5 men, the men are free to bounce ideas off each other, insult each other frequently, and establish a stable hierarchy. Creativity is unleashed, but incompetence is punished quickly. They can get shit done, and nobody sits around crying about how offended they are. At the end of the day, whatever got yelled at whoever is tabled, and you can grab a beer together, no hard feelings.
In a team of 4 men and 1 woman, the 4 men must walk around on eggshells and constantly self-censor. Should the women ever at any time feel that she is anything other than the most important person in the room, any or all of the men will face lawsuits or blackballing from HR firms. Creativity is squashed immediately: whatever the woman suggests must be adopted without criticism, else it is mansplaining and lawsuit time. You can't get a beer after work: include the woman and it is sexual harassment, exclude the woman and it is sexual discrimination.
Productivity collapses as you add additional women to the team. God help you if there's a minority among them. Stasi informers were less zealous.
Is it any wonder that the politically incorrect developing world is eating our lunch?
Re:Next step (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm no social justice warrior at all, but this is incredibly generalizing. It just completely depends on the people involved. It sounds like you had a bad experience once, and then assumed it's the same everywhere.
It's not. I've worked with women in teams that resulted in an unpleasant work environment. And I've worked with women in teams that resulted in a great project.
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They sound like 1337 moron snowflakes to me.
If you're walking on eggshells it is because you are a disgusting asshole, and you should have already been keeping to yourself whatever disgusting thing you really "think."
Social skills and HR (Score:2)
They sound like 1337 moron snowflakes to me.
If you're walking on eggshells it is because you are a disgusting asshole, and you should have already been keeping to yourself whatever disgusting thing you really "think."
Yes, the above described group of 5 men a probably a bunch of nerds with absolutely zero social skill. (In fact, so few social awareness that they can't even understand what they are going wrong, and how they should handle the communication to avoid devolving into this kind of situations).
Except that, despite being huge unbearable ass-holes, they can manage to get shit done if their all work as a thigh unit.
To me it seems that, although the characters of the guys in that group is problematic, the over all i
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I used to work in a team of six men (5+me). It was hell. People constantly jockeying for position in the hierarchy, unable to back down from bad ideas and lose face. Endless bickering and low level bullying to try to get one-up on each other.
I've also worked on all-male teams that were fine.
I've worked in mixed teams and they have all been fine. There isn't a hierarchy, people just recognize each other's skill and ask for help when they know that someone else has a better handle on something than they do. T
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Well that is right, but the opposite is true also. Being the only guy in an all female team isn't any better either. It's only without HR and legal involved. A ratio of 1:4 isn't diversity, it's Yoko Ono and the Beatles.
But contrary to your above claim, adding more women doesn't make it worse, but you have to add enough to be at least somewhere in the general area of 50:50. (Threshold probably being somewhere in the 30:70 area)
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In a team of 4 men and 1 woman, the 4 men must walk around on eggshells and constantly self-censor.
This dynamic applies to any homogeneous group of people. It could be 4 Caucasians, or 4 gamers, or 4 jocks, or 4 Christians + 1 other person.
But this is complex. There is a line between the group members tapping into their shared background in order to communicate effectively, and merely being assholes to people outside of their shared background. In the case of the 4 men + 1 woman, are these guys just sexist jerks? If not, they really should be able to find a shared understanding with the woman. But i
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Jesus, you need help. I'd say your workplace sounds like Harvey Weinstein's frontal cortex, but the way you write suggests you never have seen a real-life workplace.
My thoughts exactly. Out of the dozens of companies I've worked, only one resembles that (and it was a pigshitpile.) Normal people do not do this. There is no need to be a vulgarian to get things done (in software or whatever.)
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In a team of 5 men, the men are free to bounce ideas off each other, insult each other frequently, and establish a stable hierarchy. Creativity is unleashed, but incompetence is punished quickly. They can get shit done, and nobody sits around crying about how offended they are. At the end of the day, whatever got yelled at whoever is tabled, and you can grab a beer together, no hard feelings.
In a team of 4 men and 1 woman, the 4 men must walk around on eggshells and constantly self-censor. Should the women ever at any time feel that she is anything other than the most important person in the room, any or all of the men will face lawsuits or blackballing from HR firms. Creativity is squashed immediately: whatever the woman suggests must be adopted without criticism, else it is mansplaining and lawsuit time. You can't get a beer after work: include the woman and it is sexual harassment, exclude the woman and it is sexual discrimination.
Productivity collapses as you add additional women to the team. God help you if there's a minority among them. Stasi informers were less zealous.
Is it any wonder that the politically incorrect developing world is eating our lunch?
Jesus, you need help. I'd say your workplace sounds like Harvey Weinstein's frontal cortex, but the way you write suggests you never have seen a real-life workplace.
When real workplaces don't go like that, it's because people in them don't follow all the new rules and subscribe to the new groupthink.
That's great, while it lasts ... but the boom could be lowered at any time.
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You need help. Or you need to work with different people or something. What you are describing, that shit is not normal. That people actually vote this shit "insightful", holy crap, you guys need to grow the hell up and become men (real men, not boys with a need to thump your chest like capuchin monkeys pretending to be gorillas.)
The fact you had to resort to name calling to belittle his point shows he's right and you're wrong. It's why he's voted up, and you're not.
Males and Females interact differently. "Bro culture" is not bad, "Bros" are not a negative. Trying to paint it as so, and trying to paint people who are more upfront and frank about their positions and who aren't afraid of a little conflict to get stuff done quicker are not bad, as much as your ilk tries to make them out to be.
The more PC society gets, the less stuff
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You need help. Or you need to work with different people or something. What you are describing, that shit is not normal. That people actually vote this shit "insightful", holy crap, you guys need to grow the hell up and become men (real men, not boys with a need to thump your chest like capuchin monkeys pretending to be gorillas.)
The fact you had to resort to name calling to belittle his point shows he's right and you're wrong. It's why he's voted up, and you're not.
Males and Females interact differently. "Bro culture" is not bad, "Bros" are not a negative. Trying to paint it as so, and trying to paint people who are more upfront and frank about their positions and who aren't afraid of a little conflict to get stuff done quicker are not bad, as much as your ilk tries to make them out to be.
The more PC society gets, the less stuff actually gets done, the more processes are put in place, and the more people argue about people instead of ideas. The less PC society is, the more actual ideas are discussed, based on the idea's merits, rather than who put them forth, and whether they are "Acceptable" or not.
Try it sometimes, discuss an idea you think is "unacceptable" based on its sole merit. You might find that it's your perceived societal norm that's flawed, not the "unacceptable" idea.
I belittle the point because the point deserves belittling. There is no goddamned way that normal people who know how to communicate with other members of the human race in a professional manner need to do any of the bullshit that he purports. And yes, the bro-culture (as depicted in his post) is bad because it purports a level of aggressiveness as if it were a logical necessity to productivity.
That people vote him up (or me down) it's damned irrelevant and does not make his point right. People that truly
Re:Next step (Score:5, Insightful)
...the five members of the team are not all of equal value, because the one woman brings something that none of her colleagues have, a woman's perspective.
You're saying there are innate differences due to gender. One gender could do something the other couldn't. Then wouldn't those differences mean women and men are not necessarily equally effective? And if that's the case, then wouldn't different pay could be justified by different productivity?
Or to put it simply, if you accept there are innate differences between the genders, then you must necessarily accept different pay, hiring ratio and other such metrics can be a natural outcome due to those differences.
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You're saying there are innate differences due to gender.
That's an odd way to interpret it. Seems like the GP is talking about life experiences, which are not genetic.
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Seems like the GP is talking about life experiences, which are not genetic
Life experiences do depend on gender
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That's an odd way to interpret it. Seems like the GP is talking about life experiences, which are not genetic.
Your employer does not give one shit whether your differences are genetic or not, and that is completely irrelevant in any case. They only care whether you're going to be the most help in making money. It doesn't matter to them whether you're different because of your life experience or because of your DNA. If you're different in a way that helps them make money, they want to hire you.
Granted, there are numerous exceptions, where specific employers don't want to hire specific people because of prejudice. Bu
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You're saying there are innate differences due to gender. One gender could do something the other couldn't.
He did not say this. You are doing exactly what people fear most in a discussion. When someone says "person X is different from person Y" that does not give you the right to label them as racist or sexist or classist or something, which is where you are heading. Not all differences are "innate" and not all differences mean someone is less capable. That's a leap of logic you made.
Re:Next step (Score:4, Insightful)
I said nothing of the sort. I said a different perspective, which derives primarily from different life experience. Would you seriously try to argue that women and men have the same life experiences? No innate difference at all is required to have a different way of seeing the world.
If that perspective leads to making different decisions (better decisions, as you claim), then there are behavioral differences between the genders. That behavior could translate to better team dynamics, but it could also translate to worse individual performance. You've simply discounted the negative possibility because... well, I don't know. Plus, you didn't provide a source for your claim.
As it happens, I believe there is ample evidence, both in common experience and in formal studies, that there are innate differences between men and women, in the sense of slightly different statistical distributions of abilities. Individual variation absolutely dwarfs these statistical biases, though, so there's no whatsoever point in applying gender stereotypes to evaluate a given individual.
No disagreement here.
Different pay absolutely could and should be justified by different productivity. That said, my experience in the field of software engineering, is that if there's a systematic difference in productivity it's in favor of women. I suspect that's not a result of inherently greater capability in female engineers, but of various selection biases against them, which collectively mean that a woman has to be better than her male peers to be perceived to be as good.
How do you know you're not simply biased against men? Perhaps others have an accurate assessment of those women, while you perceived them to be more productive because of your bias.
Basically, there is almost no reason whatsoever to expect that slight differences in distribution of ability (and they really are slight) would cause the large differences in employee population that we see and every reason to expect that the differences we see are a result of bias. Note that bias need not be intentional to be real. In fact it's easy to construct plausible scenarios in when everyone is trying hard to be completely meritocratic and the result is completely unmeritocratic.
Then perhaps hiring (and promotions) should not take into gender account at all. Make it so that the gender (or in fact any other physical trait) could not be determined, e.g. instead of in-person interviews, do only IM interviews. Why doesn't any software company do this? Oh right, because it would skew their numbers even further towards men and the so-called feminists would have a fit.
...the recent paucity of women in software engineering...
I'd like to see a source for that. A quick look suggests the opposite is happening.
The clear implication is that the rare women with the talent and interest for the job would be significantly more valuable to a company, precisely because of their rarity.
No. Women are not collectibles, rareness does not equate to value. Men of similar talent should be recruited just as aggressively.
And in any case, if you pursue them because of their gender, then you are already a sexist, because you presume their ability is tied to whether their genitals exist inside or outside their body.
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And in any case, if you pursue them because of their gender, then you are already a sexist, because you presume their ability is tied to whether their genitals exist inside or outside their body.
You were doing great until you got here; this is total and complete bullshit.
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You know this guy is nuts, because for the first time in Slashdot history I completely agree with drinkypoo.
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You were doing great until you got here; this is total and complete bullshit.
How ? If you discriminite positively towards women, you're still discriminating based on sex/gender and thus you are being sexist. That it's positive towards the gender you prefer to give affirmative action for doesn't change the fact.
Affirmative action is systemic discrimination and thus is sexist and racist.
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If that perspective leads to making different decisions (better decisions, as you claim)
Sigh. Your inability to read means there's no point in discussing this with you.
Do that adjustment, if you want and also the oppos (Score:5, Interesting)
If you want to adjust for whatever you think the value of diversity is, fine - if you're the boss and you think it'll help your team be more effective, cool.
ALSO recognize there are other effects, if you want to the best performance. At my last job, my department shared a wing of the building with the accounting department. The accounting department was mostly women, including the CFO. My department was mostly men. In my department, we socialized by "giving each shit" - basically insulting each other, as male friends and co-workers do. We enjoyed some competition and it helped us do a better job. My boss, who was female, got along well in the culture of our department too - a culture that followed traditionally masculine norms.
The accounting department, mostly females, functioned differently. They didn't "give each shit" to socialize, rather they complimented each other, including "where did you get those great shoes?" That worked for them. The department of women had a way of working together based on how women normally interact, and it worked well.
My current job was similar. We had a good team, who helped each other a lot. We were learning a lot from each other. Then our team was combined with a team from another country, with a different culture. That has made daily Scrums, code reviews, and generally getting things done MUCH harder because in their culture you don't criticize someone's work and you definitely don't ever ask for help. We have to be very careful about learning from each other now because if you point out a different way to do something, somebody is going to get offended - it's insulting, in their culture. Don't offer to help when you have free time and relevant expertise - that means you're implying they are stupid or incompetent. The other team may have been doing great work using whatever social norms they used, but forced diversity has a real cost to our team. Just before combining with the other team, we also hired a guy from another country, with another set of norms about how team members should interact. It makes things tricky. Part of my job is training my team mates on some things. It's really hard to train the one guy who comes from another culture, because I don't understand how to relate to him, how to approach him.
Diversity has some benefits, and it has some costs. My boss at the last job wasn't a girlie girl. She enjoyed "hanging out with the guys", so it was a natural fit. The soft, sensitive guy who worked in accounting with the ladies my have been a natural fit too. Forcing "diversity", especially one man on a team of women or one woman in a team of men has some costs. I never thought about gender when I hired but if I'm ever in a position where I *have* to think about, I'd much rather have a fully balanced team of four women and four men than have only one "odd man out" in a team where everyone else is the opposite gender or culture, leading to one person not fitting in with how the team works.
Just FYI, thinking back over who I've hired, I've hired probably 65% women, 35% men, mostly because I hired for people working under my direct daily supervision and I'm an alpha, dominate personality. In other words, there was no question I was the boss and the leader. A nice, caring boss maybe, but very much the boss. I generally want things to be done my way. At least, learn my way and start by doing it my way,
then make changes only after you fully understand how I do it and why I do it that way. On average, more women are comfortable working in that type of than men. Men *generally tend* to want roles with more autonomy than what I hired for. The men generally didn't stick around as long as the women.
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Just FYI, thinking back over who I've hired, I've hired probably 65% women, 35% men, mostly because I hired for people working under my direct daily supervision and I'm an alpha, dominate personality. In other words, there was no question I was the boss and the leader. A nice, caring boss maybe, but very much the boss. I generally want things to be done my way. At least, learn my way and start by doing it my way, then make changes only after you fully understand how I do it and why I do it that way. On average, more women are comfortable working in that type of than men. Men *generally tend* to want roles with more autonomy than what I hired for. The men generally didn't stick around as long as the women.
Sounds like you wanted cogs, not professionals, treating the latter badly in the name of "alphaness."
However, your experience is similar to what military leaders have said. Women train more easily. They follow instruction. They conform. But when novelty is needed, a "stepping-up", or in a high-stress environment, squads with women under perform in nearly every category tested. [npr.org]
Being a professional also involves following directions and patterns from above (within reason). It's part of professional discipline (which many people confuse with being cogs.)
I can see exactly where the op is coming from. I've seen my share of fools who simply can't follow directions. My way-or-the-highway. I actually had to work with one like that just recently (a woman mind you). And a few years before, with another one, a man. In both cases, they were both utterly destructive to productivity.
Ask a
Some tasks (explosives) require following procedur (Score:2)
> Sounds like you wanted cogs, not professionals, treating the latter badly in the name of "alphaness."
Some tasks, such as handling explosives, require carefully following well-defined procedures. Other jobs require taking initiative. I supervised a couple people handling explosives and I don't think I was "treating them badly" by asking them to do it properly so they don't get blown up. Aircraft maintenance is another "do it this way" job, composing music is a "do your own thing" job. Taking initiat
That's a good question (Score:3)
> Is it diversity, or is that other team just really shit?
That's a fair question. I charitably assume they don't suck, they just work *differently*.
> I don't think the Agile development methodology is related to any particular ... or cultural group
The Agile Manifesto, which basically defines Agile, is short and easy to read:
We are uncovering better ways of developing
software by doing it and helping others do it.
Through this work we have come to value:
Individuals and interactions over processes and to
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We are uncovering better ways of developing ...
software by doing it and helping others do it.
Through this work we have come to value:
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools ...
The first and second sentences say it's about values (social / cultural.values) including helping others develop software.
I guess you mean first and third, but even so... They seem to be saying that they value people interacting rather than following a process or using a tool, but doesn't say anything about social or cultural values. Just that people interacting is a better development strategy than processes.
"Working software over comprehensive documentation"
"Whatever works" isn't a cultural thing?
I think you are reading way too much into this. Whatever works is an engineering thing. And they didn't even say that, you took their utilitarian, pragmatic statement and repeated something you heard that sounds a bit li
Read up on some other cultures, especially at work (Score:2)
> They seem to be saying that they value people interacting rather than following a process or using a tool, but doesn't say anything about social or cultural values.
If you don't think that an emphasis on individuals and people interacting, as opposed to following the process, is a cultural thing, read up on some other cultures. One good example would be Japan. Read a bit about how people do their jobs in Japan, what corporate culture is like. China too. It's VERY different from the US.
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Okay, let's agree to disagree, but how does it relate to the original point? First team were a bunch of guys being "jocks" or want of a better word, and the second team was more about communication and interaction yet somehow was also terrible at communication and interaction.
How is this related to diversity? Do you mean cultural diversity, as in trying to integrate the "jocks" and the agile team somehow created a hostile environment? I'm not seeing how diversity is the cause of the effect.
Two examples from my original post (Score:3)
The two examples I gave from my original post were showing each other better ways to do things, and offering / getting help when someone has time available to help or someone is having a hard time with something.
In Texas, if you're broken down on the side of the road, most likely someone will stop to help within just a few minutes. If a native Texan is painting the inside of their house, there is a good chance friends are helping. That's Texas culture. Our team at work, in the Dallas office, had the same c
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Okay, so it's nothing to do with agile, it's that this person is from another country. A country you didn't mention for some reason.
But the real issue seems to be this individual hasn't made any effort to understand the culture they work in. I'm also impressed by how homogenous Texan culture seems to be - in British culture a person's reaction to friendly advice can be anywhere on the spectrum, it's an individual thing.
That IS merit (Score:2)
In these jobs, following directions IS merit. It's important that things be done right; more important than trying out new ideas on live systems that can do real damage.
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Based on the idea that diverse teams are more effective, more creative or more productive, due to the value of a diversity of viewpoints, it's clear to me that the members of the team that bring said diverse viewpoints provide additional value above and beyond their competence.
Ever heard the term "Too many cooks spoil the soup?"
Yes, in some cases, "unleashing the team's creativity" can be useful.
But, at other times, they just need to put their heads down and bang out the work they're being asked to bang out.
Does this mean something "great" could be missed? Sure.
How much would you miss eating if the team doesn't deliver (because they're so busy being "creative" that they never actually finish a damn project) and everyone is canned?
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I think, though, that an argument can be made for a pay bonus for women, in industries where they're less common.
You're a sexist shit then.
I support equal pay for people doing the same job. That means paying female software engineers the same as equally contributing and equivalently skilled male ones.
I also don't support paying male teachers more, although I do support paying male nurses more - they end up doing a harder job than the female ones due to the strength related tasks being given to them.
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I accept that men and women have different perspectives, different viewpoints, and different view sets. And I agree with you and James Damore that in tech, at least, it would be well worth it to pay women 27% more than men to make up for the lifetime earnings gap.
I love the idea.
Re:Next step (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd like to see the phrase "sexual assault" go away and be replaced with a description of what *actually happened*. It's too easy to fit a multitude of different behaviours into a neat little box like "sexual assault" and defame somebody with it.
Also, you can tell by the fact that only men are being "outed" that there's an agenda at play in the media. Just like how you only ever see "black lives matter" but not "Chinese lives matter" or "white lives matter" or "immigrants lives matter" or anything else that doesn't fit into their flavour of the week agenda based reporting.
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I'd like to see the phrase "sexual assault" go away and be replaced with a description of what *actually happened*. It's too easy to fit a multitude of different behaviours into a neat little box like "sexual assault" and defame somebody with it.
Especially if that box is neither neat nor little. Too much things get mixed here. When you read a report of groping you can't "metoo" with a "yes and that one guy looked at me and I didn't like it." Oh my - did he go further and even said "Hi!"? What a pig!
I usually lobby for the "Georeg Clooney Test": It is NOT sexual harassment if it would be OK if George Clooney did it.
Re: Next step (Score:2)
The Constitution is lovely tourist attraction. I've seen it once. Very old and important looking. Long wait in line to see it. Impressive.
Suprised This Got Covered (Score:3)
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>Seems like the new normal is cover the accusation as a scandal and don't cover the follow-up result.
You know how I know you're young (or unusually sheltered)?
This could be interesting. Statistics are interest (Score:5, Interesting)
This may be interesting to watch. Individual cases of discrimination are often like any other case there is direct evidence, or not. Class actions tend to rely on statistics and that always reminds me of a certain university case.
In the university case, the primary evidence brought by the plaintiffs was that the school accepted a significantly higher percentage of male applicants than female applicants. That seemed pretty clear-cut. If the school admits 60% of male applicants and 45% of females, that looks a lot like there may be systematic discrimination against women.
The school pointed out that EVERY department admitted a higher percentage of women than men, however. When every department admits 60% of female applicants and 45% of men that looks a lot like systematically favoring women - discrimination against men.
Here's what had happened. The school had one department that was highly regarded, with competitive admissions. I don't recall offhand what the department was, so for the sake of this discussion let's call it the nursing school. It just so happened that the best department, the department with the most competitive admissions, was a department with mostly women applying. Most people who applied to the nursing school we're not accepted, and most people who applied to the nursing program were women.
Most male applicants applied to other, less competitive programs at the school.
Women had a BETTER chance of getting into the nursing program than men did. Every department admitted women at a higher rate, but the school as a whole rejected more females because their nursing program was that good - they rejected more nursing applicants than other majors.
The sad lesson for university administrators - if you don't want to be accused of discrimination, make sure the programs that women enjoy aren't your best programs, which will make admissions more competitive.
Re:This could be interesting. Statistics are inter (Score:5, Informative)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpson%27s_paradox#UC_Berkeley_gender_bias
Thanks for that. *Afraid* of being sued (Score:2)
Thanks. I couldn't remember which school it was. I bet the same thing applies to Texas A&M with it's highly competitive veterinary school, but I was thinking that's not the famous instance.
It's interesting that even multiple peer-reviewed papers mention the lawsuit - the lawsuit that apparently never was. According to Peter Bickel, one of the statisticians who authored the original study, the graduate school dean was for some reason *afraid* they'd be sued, and asked Bickel to look into the statistic,
Swype. You don't have to hit each letter (Score:2)
Protip: You don't have to press each letter separately on your phone; you can swipe across the keyboard and the phone will figure it out. Every once in a while it makes an error, tough. In business correspondence you may want to check for such errors. On Slashdot, I don't care.
Comments don't appear to be reading the summary (Score:2)
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Re: Comments don't appear to be reading the summar (Score:2)
Sounds more like incompetent lawyers. I certainly had no problem getting class-action status over EA's Spore almost a decade ago.
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Sounds more like incompetent lawyers. I certainly had no problem getting class-action status over EA's Spore almost a decade ago.
So you're were a lawyer on the case then? So there were no dismissals in that case? Before you answer, you do know we have Google and can look these things up, right?
Wait for it, wait for it... (Score:5, Funny)
They sought class action status on behalf of women... A judge ruled that the class was overbroad,"
Ohhhhhh, I get it!
Similar != equal (Score:2)
Substantially similar jobs often arenâ(TM)t.
My organization had a dispute when jobs were being re-profiled and positions redefined. For the vast majority of us our actual tasks did not change. A small group decided to challenge their job profiles, instead of taking the two profiles and figuring out how the differences applied, they said they do the same general tasks as me and my coworker. They donâ(TM)t actually know what we do, or how much responsibility we have. They assumed the jobs were simil
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Stop posting with your iOS device, it fucks up the '
Re: Similar != equal (Score:2)
Thats slashdots fault for not supporting proper fucking unicode.
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Thats slashdots fault for not supporting proper fucking unicode.
Every other browser puts a ' into the text when you press the ' key, and a " into the text when you press the " key. Slashdot is pathetic, but Apple is shit.
Don't Make The Mistake... (Score:5, Insightful)
If anything, the exact opposite could be true.
The Judge will know that this case is going to be ferociously defended by Google, that it will garner a very great deal of public interest and scrutiny and that, if it gets as far as substantive rulings, could very well set a precedent and become case law that is cited in future disputes. In other words, the Judge simply can't afford to allow even a small chink or gap or flaw in the prosecution's argument, because to do so would be to invite the defendants to demand that the case be tossed.
Nor should you read the above statement and conclude that I believe the Judge to be inclined towards the plaintiffs in this case. The Judge will equally demand that the defendants are thorough and reasoned in their arguments.
This case has all the hallmarks of something that will be super-significant. The Court is simply making sure that both parties put their best legal foot forward.
What's the end result of all this? (Score:2)
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No women get hired. Period. Can't pay them less if they don't get hired at all. But then I suppose that would be discrimination too. Can't live with them, can't live without them. Then what the fuck do we do?
Pay every employee the same amount of money, like the military does. Earn more through rank promotions based on performance. Of course, then promotions would get political.
The simplest answer here is to subject every company to an annual payroll audit. You would have to standardize job titles (no more of this hipster "Director of Zen Relations" bullshit) so that an audit would fairly and accurately compare like job titles between men and women.
celebrate! (Score:2)
or not. Remember gay marriage thing in California from ten years ago? When population voted several times to instate marriage as it is, and Californian Supreme Court striking it down?
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Fucking moron.
Re:Economists Have Already Explained Why This Happ (Score:4, Informative)
Plus women just work fewer hours. I pulled our door badge logs a few months ago, and even with the report screwing-up and not counting men that worked more than 24 hours straight, men still worked about 106% longer hours than the women. IIRC, the average for women was 36 hours a week and 74 hours a week for the male engineers. Of course the women are going to make less.
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I think your sexist theories are being supported by pretty shoddy data.
and even with the report screwing-up and not counting men that worked more than 24 hours straight......the average was 74 hours a week for the male engineers.
You do realize that that's more than six 12hr shifts per week, which is illegal in many states regardless of job classification. Regardless, who the fuck is working 74 hrs per week, and what is wrong with them? That's an absolutely abusive working schedule, and I can't fathom why someone would volunteer for that for any length of time. And unless those men are getting paid 106% more, and most of the wage-gap data shows far less than thi
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You have to badge out where I work, too. First our office, then the entrance to the elevator hall, -- arguably you could crowd-surf through one or more of these -- but then the main turnstile which allows only 1 person per swipe. Admittedly these are banks but it's been like this everywhere I've worked in the last 15+ years.
Re: Economists Have Already Explained Why This Hap (Score:2)
Yes they make you badge out. This is a basic security practice and has been in most big businesses for a good while.
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When did DDG start even keeping search histories?
Re: Dismiss the lawsuit or your search history goe (Score:2)
From day one. Duck Duck Go is an obvious honeypot.
Re: wrong headline (Score:2)
That is a dismissal. Otherwise an appeal would have to be filed. Basic fucking civics, go back to school.