sudneo @ sudneo @lemmy.world

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2 yr. ago

How is this relevant? What does that tell you about particular individuals also?

Yes.

If you can also argument your position, I would be grateful.

I respectfully disagree. If you think that organizing such events, with sponsors of that caliber is just a matter of "go do one", then we simply have different point of views. I also did not make qualitative comparisons between who gets oppressed, I am simply observing that there are so many components to discrimination in tech that focusing on only one (intentionally, even after the opportunity to expand opened up presented itself) is not synergic with the long term strategy.

It's fine to disagree, this is ultimately a subjective ideological call. I simply disliked the tone of the article overall. I would have liked some more in depth analysis of the impact (and reasons) of layoffs and maybe some interview to those people who "crashed" the event. Maybe with some sprinkle of discussion of unionization and collective fight, but I guess it was not fitting in an article about an event sponsored by the very same who laid off tens of thousands of people.

I was going to answer, but then I realized that if this is what you chose to understand from my comment(s), probably that means you don't want to have a conversation. I will save my time, if you don't mind.

I am, and in fact I have explicitly challenged this very same intention. I have explicitly mentioned that I feel is harmful to certain objectives not to extend the struggle to more oppressed categories, by using the power gathered (arguably expresses by having such large sponsors).

If you don't feel like trying to understand my point and choose to just post edgy one-liners, there is no need to have the conversation at all. You can let me know, I will block you and I will spare some notifications to myself and some reading for yourself.

Quantitative measuring tells you nothing. You have no visibility of the "starting condition", how many foreigners are not even accepted a job interview, how many apply, etc. Discrimination is not something that can be measure with a scale.

Not to talk about age, ageism is huge in tech. Old people are sometimes fired to be replaced (hello IBM). In my company we are at around 25% women, 20% on engineering. I still need to meet a person over 50 (in engineering), I think there are maybe 3-4 over 40 (on a total of 300).

Also, discrimination doesn't mean just not getting hired, it means contractual penalties, less salary etc., which happen in some cases with women too, of course.

That said, I am not arguing that women in tech are not discriminated, of course they are. I am saying that there are multiple vector of discrimination and that we should be able to fight against the general phenomenon, without having to choose which discrimination to keep and which to fight.

I am fully aware that those barriers exist. I am arguing (in other comments I am more explicit) about fighting against barriers, not a particular barrier.

I am also a foreigner in another country, and despite being a privileged person from many point of views (I could attend public university despite my family being poor), I have experienced some form of discrimination myself, so please don't make assumption about other people's. I am not blind to those kind of barriers, I simply have different opinions on the actions to take to improve the overall situation, with the goal of removing the concept of barrier, not any particular one (if that makes sense).

Problem for what?

I exist, I need a job to live, I have job, I try my best not to be an asshole, I fight (and vote) for a better society, for social and civil rights.

Why exactly I - since I am a man I feel included in your statement - should be THE problem?

I am also copying another response:

My point is that there is nothing else for issue related to other discriminations. And yet, before thinking whether those men (who showed up) maybe are also oppressed and discriminated, they have been simply labeled as "men" and therefore intruders, by definition. I would think that an oppressed community would realize the commonalities with other oppressed categories and use this to expand the struggle to them as well. Instead the rethoric behind this article makes me think that this is one of those events which is ultimately functional to the conservation of the status quo: big tech companies which sponsor the event and gain some visibility and good karma points to boost diversity while nothing really changes or is done to address the fundamental issue with discrimination (in general, not a specific one), because this is ultimately functional to the companies, which can leverage them to fight a fragmented worker's front.

people living on Native American reservations, or blind or deaf people, or the mentally ill, or the homeless, or whomever,

The difference between women in tech and the examples you made in my opinion is exactly that the examples address the whole universe of people affected by a particular discrimination or disadvantage. In the case of woman in tech, a single aspect of a more general problem is cherry picked. Again, I don't want to use moral terms, I just think in terms of objectives to pursue. I have the feeling that the objective for some of the people who are talking about "intruders" is not to improve the culture in tech to eliminate discrimination and privileges, but a simple issue of "we want to be a bigger % of the privileged". As such, I feel that the struggle is inherently reactionary, entrenching the overall dynamic of discrimination and fragmentation of the working class, simply tweaking a bit the appearance.

While it's for sure true that organizing all of this did not happen in a vacuum, I would also argue that ultimately this is also the result of a "more privileged" status quo, bigger amount of power and influence, compared to other minorities that simply can't achieve the same. Rather than using this power for the benefit of other oppressed, it seems that the idea is to just fight your own battle. I don't want to say it's wrong, I just think that this does not fit in my idea of struggle to improve the society. If I were a man who needed a job and I was labeled as intruder, non invited or something, I would have a problem tomorrow to join a union with those who labeled me, because the feeling I would get is that there is no mutual recognition of common problems and class. In turn, this means that when tomorrow there will be the need to protest against the various Apple, Microsoft, etc. Workers are going to have less power, not to mention that some of the people will think that since X% more women are hired in tech there is maybe nothing to protest in the first place.

My point is that there is nothing else for issue related to other discriminations. And yet, before thinking whether those men (who showed up) maybe are also oppressed and discriminated, they have been simply labeled as "men" and therefore intruders, by definition. I would think that an oppressed community would realize the commonalities with other oppressed categories and use this to expand the struggle to them as well. Instead the rethoric behind this article makes me think that this is one of those events which is ultimately functional to the conservation of the status quo: big tech companies which sponsor the event and gain some visibility and good karma points to boost diversity while nothing really changes or is done to address the fundamental issue with discrimination (in general, not a specific one), because this is ultimately functional to the companies, which can leverage them to fight a fragmented worker's front.

My point is that looking at this just as men showing up at a woman thing inherently fails to acknowledge the reality of the discrimination on the workplace, discarding specifically any debate on why that would be the case. In other words, looking at those as just "men" is a sign of the inability to look at discrimination more broadly, and in my opinion reflects really bad on the intention of people who are working towards the elimination of gender discrimination. From my leftist perspective I see these kind of events as a push to extend the struggle to other victims of the system, rather than as those people ruining your turf.

I am simply not convinced of this collective "we". Sorry, but me random foreigner with no family support, no perfect language etc. Might have no advantage (or even be at disadvantage) with a woman who got shipped to ivy league.

Reducing all to just gender is simply a way to not solve the discrimination (generally, not a specific discrimination) while legitimizing those very same companies who sponsored the event by giving them some marketing flair.

I am personally conflicted, because I do think that women in tech face cultural discrimination, I just feel that this is not an instance of privileged people wanting to colonize and pollute a safe space for people who get discriminated. I think these kind of pieces are alienating for some people and generally hurt the class solidarity which - in my opinion - is a nonnegotiable requirement to get rid of all discrimination.

I personally agree with this, but:

• this is hardly a community event. Being a woman (or a man) doesn't make you a member of a community by default (being a member in my opinion requires deliberate participation) plus this is a job fair sponsored by some of the biggest companies in US.
• what if you don't have a community? For example, a foreigner? Is it OK to alienate these people (an even weaker minority)?

In other words, I would agree if we were talking about the tech-bros with families worth 6 digits behind and huge networks they can leverage. However way more attributes are a determining factors than just gender.

My point is that while privilege can be applied to a category, it doesn't make sense for a small number of individuals.

As I mentioned in another comment, look at the video, and notice how most men are clearly foreigners. Foreigners who maybe need a job to keep their visa or that anyway might not have the same network of support behind because they are just 2nd generation.

In my opinion, alienating fellow victims of a discriminatory system is at best shortsighted.

I also disagree with you deliberately labeling convenience what can very likely be necessity. I understand this aids your argument, but I find it purely based on prejudice.

Gender is absolutely not the only nor the most important discriminating factor in tech. Being a foreigner and, probably most commonly, being old is an extreme disadvantage in tech. Similarly, a woman coming from a wealthy family might be a privileged compared to a man coming from a poor background (which translates into lower access to education, resources, etc.).

Look at the video in the article, and tell me you don't notice some commonalities among the men in the queues.

I see mostly foreigners, who most likely have no network of support, and need a job to maintain a VISA before getting kicked out of the country. Are they in a better or worse position compared to a local woman? Does it even make sense to start asking these questions?

I want to challenge this vision where discriminations are only looked at through the lens of gender division. This is shortsighted because discrimination on the workplace is extremely diverse and it exists for the benefit of those same sponsors of this event.

How dare workers in (potentially desperate?) need of a job to look for jobs. They are men and belonging to that category automatically makes them rich and privileged. The working class should be united against common enemies, not divided because of gender. While it's obvious that women in tech are discriminated, alienating fellow victims, even if males, is not the answer to the problem.

Capital really won the class war...

The whole landscape of health trackers is depressing. I bought a fitbit last year as I could expend it at work, and I ended up leaving it in a drawer exactly for the uneasy feeling of sharing very sensitive data. Health data is probably the most impactful on personal lives (insurances, banks, etc.), and it's astonishing to me how it's too much to ask to a company that makes watches to have watches as their mine business model.

I understand sharing data for further analysis etc., but I should be able to use my health tracker locally, only talking to my phone app and nothing else, similar to how gadgetbridge works. I was eyeing banglejs specifically to be able to do this, even though it's not really a health tracker.

I assumed the "story" was the personal one of Messina-Denaro.

Yes, bit the qualitative difference of providing direct competition to the "grazed" material exists. There is a difference between AI generated audiobooks and AI generated audiobooks with the voice of X, for X. Once AI can perfectly reproduce X's voice, his/her value as a voice actor is 0, hence the "overgrazing". Is not the same thing compared to simply being able to provide audiobooks with any other voice.

While the analogy is not perfect, you can think that the harm is getting lost in the noise. If the "overgrazing" of content on the internet (content which has the purpose of being read/listened/etc. Often for a job) causes a huge amount of other content based on it (AI-generated), then the original is damaged by being lost in the noise.