“Google employees have witnessed multiple instances in which
hundreds of “progressive” Googlers would target a single co-worker for
harassment, and even potential violence, over a politicized matter, humiliating
the person and sabotaging his career.” –Damore v Google Class Action Lawsuit.
The stories and complaints made in the last half of the
lawsuit come from sources who wished to remain anonymous. Normally I would have
an issue with anonymous sources, but they provide external evidence such as
screen shots of conversations to back up their claims.
Google Punishes Other
Employees
After experiencing harassment and discrimination due to
being conservative, male, and Caucasian and providing evidence to Google HR,
Google HR made excuses for the Progressive activists.
The waving away of this misconduct ensured that nothing was
done about the problem. In August 2015 a Google employee raised this issue of
race and gender discrimination/harassment with Urs Hölzle, a Senior Vice President.
This resulted in a targeted campaign of harassment and
threats of blacklisting directed at the Google employee, which management did
nothing to stop. Instead several members of management made statements that had
the effect of encouraging an “unambiguous social pecking” of political
dissidents.
On August 14th 2015 several Google employees
raised the same issues of gender and racial discrimination with two other
Senior Vice Presidents in an email entitled “Concerns regarding intimidation
and blacklisting.”
On August 19th 2015 in retaliation for the Google
employee’s ongoing attempts to end political discrimination at work, his HR
Manager and Director issued a Final Written Warning letter. At no point did
Google retract or repudiate the threats and attacks aimed at the Google
employee.
Examples of the comments that elicited punishment included
the following:
These statements are in no way disorderly, disruptive,
derogatory name-calling, abusive or profane, intimidating or coercive. Instead
they stand in stark contrast to hostile postings aimed at conservative, male,
and/or Caucasian Google employees.
The Final Written Warning issued even repudiated Google’s
policy: “We strive to maintain the open culture often associated with startups,
in which everyone is a hands-on contributor and feels comfortable sharing ideas
and opinions.”
Ironically, the Google employee had provided ample evidence
that Caucasian males who challenged certain assumptions behind the so-called “social
justice” agenda were routinely and unfairly branded as “racists,” “sexists,” or
“bigots,” and targeted for severe written abuse and career sabotage.
The next step after a Final Written Warning is termination.
Google Allows
Workplace Harassment of Trump Supporters
In October 2016, a Site Reliability Manager, became aware
that a Google employee was a supporter of President Trump and held socially
conservative views. These two individuals did not work together, but had become
acquainted through the company’s social mailing lists.
In March 2017 the manager scheduled a meeting with the
Google employee’s manager in an attempt to sabotage the employee’s annual
performance review.
The manager falsely accused the employee of participating in
an illegal “doxing” campaign and also suggested that the employee was involved
in illegal workplace discrimination. Both were absolutely unsupported.
In a later meeting with his manager the Google employee
faced allegations of doxing which the manager said was concerning. The
employee provided evidence that the claims were false and concocted, but his
name and reputation were already besmirched.
Further compounding the issue in March 2017 the manager, posted on a political mailing list visible to all 80,000 employees to brag
about his meeting with the Google employee’s manager for the purposes of
harassing and undermining him.
In this conversation the manager made additional politically
motivated threats toward members of the “conservatives@” mailing list community
at Google. The manager threatened to call Employee Relations to comb through
the mailing list archives to nitpick old posting for Code of Conduct
violations.
Employee Relations at Google does not mediate disputes or
offer advice. Instead they are tasked with investigating employees for policy
violations and building a case for discipline.
The manager also threatened to apply Google’s politically intolerant
and legally questionable employee handbook speech code to communications taking
place between friends off the clock on non-work forums.
The manager’s threats were reported to Google HR, who
replied that the manager had “crossed the line.” However, Google never made the
manager retract his threats or apologize for his sabotage attempts.
The same manager in August of 2017 directed threats of
litigation and termination against unnamed employees who spoke to outside
bloggers in support of Damore and his memo. Google, once again, did nothing to
stop this.
Conservative
Parenting Styles Not Welcome
Google furnishes a large number of internal mailing lists
catering to employees with alternative lifestyles, including but not limited to
furries, polygamy, transgenderism, and plurality (see photo for plurality).
The only lifestyle that was not openly discussed on internal
forums was traditional heterosexual monogamy. In March 2017, Google HR strongly
suggested to a Google employee that conservative and traditional parenting
techniques were unwelcome at Google.
Google HR was responding to a post that was made replying to
a request for conservative parenting advice. The post stated “If I had a child,
I would teach him/her traditional gender roles and patriarchy from a very young
age. That’s the hardest thing to fix later, and our degenerate society
constantly pushes the wrong message.”
Google HR response “We did not find that this post, on its
face, violated any of Google’s policies, but your choice of words could suggest
that you were advocating for a system in which men work outside the home and
women do not, or that you were advocating for rigid adherence to gender
identity at birth. We trust that neither is what you intended to say. We are
providing you with this feedback so that you can better understand how some
Googlers interpreted your statements, and so that you are better equipped to
ensure that Google is a place in which all Googlers are able to reach their
full potential.”
Google Support for
Antifa
In May 2017 one Google employee discovered and reported
several offensive postings attacking Trump supporters and Caucasian males to Google HR.
Google HR responded in June 2017 by stating “Thanks for your
time the other day and sharing your response. We have reviewed the threads that
you sent us and do not find them to be attacking traditionally conservative
views, but more extreme, “alt-right” views that seem to teeter into
discrimination and possibly incite violence against certain groups of people.”
Google has never made any such comments regarding posts
supporting violent vigilante organization, Antifa, or other extreme
leftist/anarchist organizations. A large number of Googlers have set their corporate
profile pictures to Antifa insignias.
Blacklisting
In August 2015 Adam Fletcher, a L6 SRE Manager, Jake McGuire
a L7 SRE Manager, and Nori Heikkinen, a L6 SRE Manager all publicly endorsed
blacklisting conservatives as well as actively preventing them from seeking
employment opportunities at Google.
Fletcher even categorized conservatives as “hostile voices”
and states that “I will never, ever hire/transfer you onto my team. Ever. I don’t
care if you are perfect fit or technically excellent or whatever. I will
actively not work with you, even to the point where your team or product is
impacted by this decision. I’ll communicate why to your manager if it comes up.”
Read the conversation for yourself.
Google’s management-sanctioned blacklists were directed at
specific Google employees who tactfully expressed conservative viewpoints. In
one case, Jay Gengelbach, a L6 SWE Manager, publicly bragged about blacklisting
an intern for failing to change his conservative views. He was supported in his
choice by other employees.
Kim Burchett, a L7 SWE Manager, proposed creating an online
companywide blacklist of political conservatives inside Google.
He was referring to a Google employee who raised concerns of
harassment and discrimination to Urs Hölzle.
Paul Cowan, another manager, reshared Winter’s threat to express his agreement
with it and indicated that he also participated in blacklisting conservatives.
Cowan stated: “If you express a dunderheaded opinion about
religion, about politics, or about ‘social justice’, it turns out I am allowed
to think you’re a halfwit… I’m perfectly within my rights to mentally
categorize you in my dickhead box… Yes, I maintain (mentally, and not (yet)
publicly) [a blacklist]. If I had to work with people on this list, I would
refuse, and try to get them removed; or I would change teams; or I would quit.”
On August 14 2015 a small group of employees complained to
Senior Vice President of Google HR, Laszlo Bock and Senior Vice President of
Legal David Drummond that and alarming number of individuals were calling for
generic firings “if they express[ed] certain opinions on sociopolitical
subjects.”
Google took little or no action regarding this complaint,
made clear by the fact that the blacklisting posts remain live on Google’s
internal corporate network. Google ignored most cases, and occasionally “coached”
the worst offenders.
The primary purpose of these blacklists and suggested
blacklists was to encourage and coordinate the sabotage of promotions,
performance reviews, and employment opportunities for those with conservative
viewpoint.
Google Supports
Blacklists
At a TGIF all-hands meeting on October 26, 2017 an employee
directly asked executives about the appropriateness of keeping political blacklists.
Kent Walker, the Senior Vice President of Legal, dodged the question rather
than repudiating the practice of blacklisting.
On September 8th 2017 a group of conservative
employees met with Paul Manwell, Google CEO Sundar Pichai’s Chief of Staff, concerning
the ongoing problems of politically motivated blacklists, bullying and
discrimination at Google. This meeting was in direct response to the company’s
handling of the Damore situation.
The employees shared their own experience with
discrimination and asked management for three major reforms.
First, clarity around communication policies, recommending
that Google publish a clearer statement on what is acceptable and unacceptable
employee communication, and that any and all complaints about communication be
adjudicated through “a documented, fair, transparent, and appealable process.”
Second, protection from retaliation, asking leadership to make
a public statement that conservatives and supporters of Damore would not be
punished in any way for their political stances.
Third, that the company make it clear that the hostile
language and veiled threats directed at Damore and his supporters were unacceptable,
and in the interest of making Google a healthier environment for employees of
all political stripes, the managers and VPs who made such statements should
retract them.
None of these reforms ever took place.
In October 2017, diversity activists at Google indicated
they had met with VPs Danielle Brown and Eileen Naughton in order to ensure
that they would be able to continue blacklisting and targeting employees with
whom they had political disagreements.
On October 22nd, 2017 a conservative employee
asked HR to put him in contact with leadership to discuss targeted political
harassment. Employee Relations acknowledged this request on October 31 2017. On
December 22 2017 Employee Relations indicated that they would not be following
up on his concerns and considered the matter closed.
Google Blacklists
Conservative Authors
On August 20 2016, Curtis Yarvin, a well-known conservative
blogger who has reportedly advised Steve Bannon, Peter Thiel, and other members
of the Trump administration, visited the Google office to have lunch with an
employee.
Yarvin’s presence tripped a silent alarm, which alerted
security personnel to escort him off the premises. It was later discovered that
other conservative personalities, including Alex Jones and Theodore Beale, are
on the same blacklist.
When asked by an employee if it was possible to removed
writers from the blacklist Google HR refused to help and instead reconfigured
the internal system so that it was no longer possible to see who was on the
blacklist.
Intimidation of
Conservatives with Threats of Termination
One Google employee, referring to two conservative Googlers,
stated “maybe we should just try laying of those people. Please.”
Many Google employees resorted to name-calling, and one called conservative Google employees that reported discrimination to Google HR “poisonous assholes.” They also stated that they knew who the “assholes” were and that they could be easily replaced.
Several conservative employees reported this to Google HR,
but Google HR replied that this was not a policy violation.
Discrimination against
Caucasian Males
On April 4th 2015 a Caucasian male posted a
comment about a “Diversity Town Hall” meeting in which the management stated
that affirmative action was impractical from a legal standpoint.
Liz Fong-Jones, an L5 SRE Manager, responded that she “could
care less about being unfair to white men. You already have all the advantages
in the world.”
Dozens of other employees joined in to insult and belittle
the Caucasian male. They received hundreds of “upvotes” from other Googlers
showing their approval.
The Caucasian male employee’s own manager replied to
chastise him and to promise he would be punished for his apostasy.
Fong-Jones doubled-down in a follow up conversation stating
that the “benefit to everyone as a whole” justifies discrimination against
white men.
When Fong-Jones was reported to Google HR, HR responded that
Fong-Jones was responding “to some pretty insensitive comments from other colleagues
and reacting to an environment that we know have been less than friendly to
women and minorities at times.”
They also claimed that her behavior was taken out of context
and excused her comments. It was only after matters escalated that Google HR
took “action” which, they claim, ranged from “coaching to warnings.”
Chris Busselle, a manager in the Search organization, urged
other Googlers to engage in discriminatory practices. In an April 9th
2017 message Busselle suggested that employees should leverage Google’s
influence to have “cheesy white males” removed from speaker lineups at
conferences.
When the G+ post above was reported to Google HR they
replied “Regarding your concern about Chris Busselle’s G+ post, we have
reviewed and do not find that it violates our policies. You may of course feel
free to provide him feedback about his post.”
Google Does Not
Understand Logical Arguments
A perfect example of Google’s relaxed attitude toward
discrimination against Caucasians and Males is seen in Burchett’s G+ posts, as
seen below.
According to the lawsuit, Burchett continued to make hiring
and promoting decisions at Google and was not reprimanded by Google, even
though Burchett’s posts were reported to Google HR and to the Senior Vice
President of Legal in a formal complaint.
In another example a Google employee reported an offensive
post from an employee in the Developer Product Group. The post stated “If you
put a group of 40-something white men
in a room together and tell them to come up with something creative or
innovative, they’ll come back and tell you how enjoyable the process was, and
how they want to do it again, but they come up with fuck-all as a result!”
When a Google employee presented this to Google HR stating
it was in violation of the Google Code of Conduct and was creating a hostile
workplace that targeted Caucasians, men and individuals over the age of 40.
Google HR responded “Given the context of the post and that
[the employee’s] main point is to highlight that it is helpful to have diverse
perspectives, it doesn’t appear that the post to [sic] violates our policies.”
The employee responded to Google HR by replacing the term “40-something
white men” with “women” and asked how that was not a breach of conduct. Google
failed to respond.
Google’s “Diversity”
Policies
Charles Mendis, an Engineering Director, informed his team
that he was “freezing [headcount]” to reserve future open positions for diverse
candidates. Mendis stated, “For each position we have open work on getting
multiple candidates including a diversity candidate.” He continued “Often the
first qualified candidate is not a diversity candidate, waiting to have a few
qualified candidates and being patient is important.”
This discrimination against Caucasians and males was not
only allowed at Google but supported and actively encouraged. The lawsuit
relates the story of a Google employee who had worked at the company for nearly
a decade without incident.
As soon as Googlers learned he supported conservative
ideologies, he lost his transfer to a different team (that was almost assured
before), received a poor performance rating (his second ever, the first due to bereavement
leave) and was placed on a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP).
These are only a handful of the examples of illegal and
discriminatory conduct at Google. Other employees may be able to point to
innumerable other examples and a compilation of posts and memes from Google’s
internal message boards have been included with the lawsuit as Exhibit B.
These claims made in this lawsuit appear to be clear evidence of discrimination against Caucasians, Men, and Conservatives. Yet that is for a court to decided and in the coming weeks we shall see how this lawsuit unfolds.This is part three of a three part series outlining the lawsuit brought against Google by James Damore. I have provided links to part one and part two if you want the full story.
Part one: Behind the Scenes of Google's Monstrous Culture of Bias
Part two: Google's Culture of Bias REVEALED
I have included a few examples from Exhibit B below:
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