sexism
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Microsoft faces 238 complaints of gender discrimination
Microsoft has been accused of 238 cases of gender discrimination or sexual harassment by female employees working in US-based technical jobs, according to court filings made available this week. The complaints were made between 2010 and 2016, and include systemically denying pay rises or promotions to women working at the company. The plaintiff's attorneys are pushing to proceed as a class action lawsuit, but a trial has not yet been scheduled.
Labor board says Google legally fired diversity memo writer
James Damore may claim Google was wrong to fire him over his memo criticizing the company's diversity culture, but a federal government overseer begs to differ. The National Labor Relations Board has published a January memo recommending a dismissal of Damore's then-active complaint. Board attorney Jayme Sophir found that Damore was protected under federal law when he criticized Google, but that he wasn't protected when he suggested that women were biologically inferior at programming. His remarks were likely to create "serious dissension and disruption" in the workplace, Sophir said, and that actuallly happened -- women pulled their candidacy for engineering positions after hearing of Damore's memo.
Uber hires first chief diversity officer to further reform its culture
Last year, Susan Fowler, a former Uber employee, penned an essay detailing rampant sexual harassment and sexism at the company as well as a complete lack of interest on the part of administrators to do anything about it. That report led to an investigation, a handful of firings and eventually a new CEO. The investigation into Uber's toxic culture, conducted by Eric Holder and Tammy Albarran and shared with the company last June, recommended the company establish a chief diversity and inclusion officer position and now Uber finally has.
A fifth of startup founders think sexism reports are 'overblown'
Despite the pervasive issue of sexism and harassment in Silicon Valley gaining prominence in recent times, it seems the industry still has a long way to go in acknowledging the problem. A survey by venture firm First Round Capital polled 800 startup founders and found that 19 percent of respondents (that's nearly a fifth) believe sexual harassment in tech has been "overblown" by the media, while 40 percent say the issue is "more significant than the media is reporting". Meanwhile, 53 percent say they, or someone they know, has personally experienced sexual harassment in the workplace.
Reddit bans misogynist community as part of anti-violence crackdown
Reddit's crackdown on hate-filled, violent communities isn't just limited to banning racists: the social site has banned r/Incels, the misogynistic "involuntary celibates" subreddit. While the company isn't diving into specific posts that prompted the ban, a spokeswoman pointed us to the October 25th policy change that forbids content which "encourages, glorifies, incites, or calls for violence or physical harm." And given Incels' history, it's easy to see why the subreddit ran afoul of these limits.
Google sued by female ex-employees over pay discrimination
Google's salary practices are back in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons. Three women who worked for the company are suing over gender-based wage discrimination. The plaintiffs claim Google knew about the pay inequalities (or, at least, should have been aware of them). The suit -- filed on Thursday in San Francisco Superior Court -- aims to represent the thousands of Google employees in California, and seeks lost wages and a slice of the company's profits.
How to get fired in the tech industry
Step 1: Decide you'd like to write a memo. The topic is completely up to you. But, remember, you want the title to be both alarming and relevant to current social conversations. (#SEO #Content) For example, we'll use a memo called "Google's Ideological Echo Chamber." Its title plays off the widespread hand-wringing over filter bubbles on social media, reminding readers of their enemies and immediately placing everyone on edge. That sucker's gonna get a lot of clicks.
Google employee's anti-diversity screed enrages coworkers (updated)
For all the talk of improving diversity in technology companies and getting employees to treat each other with respect, it's clear that there's still a long way to go. Motherboard has learned that a Google staffer infuriated many of his coworkers after publishing a viral document attacking the company's purported "ideological echo chamber." He contended that women had low representation in software engineering due to biological differences (because they prefer people more than things, he claims), and said that the company should drop attempts to include different cultures and genders to instead focus on accommodating conservative social views.
Facebook is slowly becoming less white and less male
Facebook's latest diversity stats are in, and it seems that while the process is glacially-slow, the company is becoming less white and less male. In the last year, the number of women in tech has risen from 17% to 19%, with women accounting for 27% of all new graduate hires in engineering and 21% of all new technical hires. The number of Hispanics at the company has increased from 4% to 5%, while the number of black people has risen from 2% to 3%. These figures don't represent a particularly impressive move forward from last year, but they are in many cases much better than they were in 2014. According to a blog post by the company, much of this "success" can be attributed to a range of diversity-focused programs, designed to eradicate the White Boys' Club mentality that has long-plagued Facebook's boardrooms.
UploadVR sued for ‘rampant’ sexism, general awfulness
UploadVR is the workplace that has everything, at least if you enjoy walking around an office with condom wrappers on the floor. That's just one of many charges being leveled against it by its former director of digital and social media in a recent lawsuit. She alleges that the company was a hotbed of "rampant" sexism and that its co-founders created a toxic working environment for women.
WSJ: Facebook rejects female-authored code more often than male
Facebook has been accused of issues with bias before, but that was about suppressing conservative political views. Today's allegations run into sexism territory. But rather than being something surface-level seen explicitly by its users, the Wall Street Journal reports that back-end code written by female engineers is rejected more often than work by males by 35 percent.
Facebook group hosted naked photos of women soldiers
Private Facebook groups can be valuable discussion areas for like-minded people, but they can also promote toxic behavior in the wrong circumstances. The Center for Investigative Reporting has revealed that the US' Naval Criminal Investigative Service is looking into a Facebook group, Marines United, that was used by soldiers in the US and UK (including the Marine Corps, Navy Corpsman and Royal Marines) to share naked photos of servicewomen. While the group has had some above-board discussions, according to one anonymous veteran, it has been dominated by "creepy, stalker-like" photography, revenge porn and the vile talk to match. Over two dozen of the women were identified by their names and positions.
Tesla engineer sues over sexist workplace culture (updated)
If it wasn't already evident that Silicon Valley's issues with sexist culture extend beyond Uber, it is now. Tesla engineer AJ Vandermeyden has revealed that she's suing her employer over allegations that the electric car maker ignored complaints of discrimination and "pervasive harassment." She says she was paid less than men she replaced, and that she and fellow female engineers weren't given promotions even though they were at least as qualified as men. The harassment, meanwhile, included "inappropriate language, whistling and catcalls," according to the lawsuit.
Investors and employees aren't buying Uber's sexism 'probe'
Nobody was terribly surprised by revelations from former engineer Susan Fowler about a sexist, bro-centric Uber culture that protects "high performer" employees. And many folks aren't impressed by CEO Travis Kalanick's investigation into the matter by company lawyer Eric Holder and board member Arianna Huffington. During a secretly recorded meeting with Kalanick and more than 100 female engineers (obtained by Buzzfeed), employees said they don't need Holder to tell them sexual harassment problems at the company are "systemic."
Uber reportedly ignored repeated sexual harassment by manager
A former engineer at Uber wrote that she was sexually harassed and that her complaints were ignored by the human resources department, despite other harassment reports against the same manager. Furthermore, she says she was threatened with firing for reporting sexist emails and other issues. Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has responded, calling what she describes as "abhorrent" and saying "anyone who behaves this way or thinks this is OK will be fired."
Oracle faces Labor Department lawsuit over job discrimination
Google isn't the only Silicon Valley staple facing a lawsuit over the fairness of its hiring practices. The US Department of Labor has sued Oracle for allegedly conducting discriminatory employment practices. The enterprise tech giant is accused of paying white male workers more than minorities and women in similar positions, and of favoring Asian people for "technical roles." The lawsuit isn't coming out of the blue, though -- it's really the culmination of a battle that started when an investigation began in 2014.
The year's biggest loser was the American public
Even if we judge 2016 purely on the musical legends it stole from us, it would be an awful one. The truth is, this year has been rough by any standard. Our social networks, ostensibly designed to connect us, led us to turn on one another. Incidents of harassment and abuse came to define Twitter. Our already bitter and destructive discourse dissolved even further in the midst of a divisive election season. Meanwhile Facebook was flooded with an alarming number of fake news stories. And if that wasn't enough, we were constantly reminded that none of us are safe from the seemingly endless barrage of hackers. Yep, this year the American public lost, big league.
Airbnb now requires that hosts accept anti-discrimination rules
Remember how Airbnb said it would ask you to agree to a non-discrimination policy if you wanted to host guests? That's now in effect. As of November 1st, hosts must abide by rules forbidding them from discriminating against guests. In the US, they're explicitly barred from discrimination based on factors such as race, nationality, disability, gender identity or sexual orientation. Hosts can label shared living spaces as open solely to same-gender guests (to discourage creeps) and warn disabled guests about accessibility problems, but those are the only major exceptions.
Uber and Lyft aren't immune to racial discrimination by drivers
For a while, ridesharing has been seen as a possible solution to the racial discrimination you sometimes see with taxis. If drivers can't always see or hear you first, they're less likely to reject your request, right? Unfortunately, the industry isn't entirely color-blind. A newly published study reveals that there's still some bias in the ridesharing world. Uber drivers in Boston were over twice as likely to cancel rides on people with black-sounding names, for example, while black men waiting for rides in Seattle faced tangibly longer wait times for both Lyft and Uber.
Marvel writer chased off Twitter by pathetic misogynists
A year ago, Marvel announced that the character Mockingbird would be getting her first solo series helmed by author Chelsea Cain. The book ran from March until it was cancelled this month, with the final cover prominently displaying the message "Ask Me About My Feminist Agenda." Predictably, this provoked the vile side of Twitter, and after the trolls amped up their harassment, Cain deactivated her account this morning. Once again, the social platform's failure to combat harassment allowed a vocal minority to drive away a creative voice.
