Google Fires Author of Controversial Anti-Affirmative Action Memo
On Monday, Google fired software engineer James Damore for authoring an internal memo questioning the tech company's diversity efforts and hiring practices after leaked copies went viral on social media.
Over the weekend, the essay, titled "Google's Ideological Echo Chamber," exploded across the internet for suggesting that the employment disparity between men and women in the technology industry could be partially explained by biological differences, rather than discriminatory hiring practices. While originally leaked on Gizmodo, where two charts and several hyperlinks were removed from the document, the memo has since been hosted in its entirety on the website DiversityMemo.com.
In a company-wide memo titled "Our Words Matter," Google's chief executive, Sundar Pichai, announced that Damore had violated the company's code of conduct against "advancing harmful gender stereotypes in our workplace" by publishing the document internally. Additionally, Pichai argued that the memo had negatively affected employees, claiming some were "hurting and feel judged based on their gender."
Under the "Suggestions" heading in the essay, Damore advocated against perpetuating stereotypes and gender roles, arguing that people should be treated "as individuals, not as just another member of their group (tribalism)."
Yesterday, the news site Quilette published a response to the memo written by several prominent scientists, including social psychology professor Lee Jussim, personal psychology professor David P. Schmitt, evolutionary psychology professor Geoffrey Miller and neuroscientist Debra W. Soh. In his evaluation of the empirical claims made by Damore, Jussim concluded that "The author of the Google essay on issues related to diversity gets nearly all of the science and its implications exactly right."
On 4chan, outraged users on /pol/ decided to strike back against the multinational tech company by urging readers to install the Ad Nauseam browser plugin, an automated ad-clicking extension that Google previously banned from the Chrome store. According to Ad Nauseum's creators, the program "quietly clicks" on all ads blocked by the extension uBlock Origin, effectively negating "user tracking, targeting and surveillance."
In an interview with The New York Times, Damore revealed that he would "likely be pursuing legal action," believing that his firing was potentially illegal. Additionally, Damore had submitted a complaint against Google with the U.S. National Labor Relations Board prior to his dismissal.