WSJ: Facebook's Point System Fails To Close Diversity Gap 415
theodp writes: Gizmodo and others are picking up on a Wall Street Journal story (Warning: may be paywalled) which reported that Facebook's failure to move the needle on diversity is all the more surprising because the social network awarded Facebook recruiters double points for a "diversity hire" -- a female, Black, or Hispanic engineer -- compared to the hire of a White or Asian male. Facebook declined to comment on whether this points-based system is still in effect. The WSJ also notes that Intel has paid its employees double referral bonuses for women, minorities, and veterans. The reward schemes evoke memories of gender-based (and later race-based) incentives offered for K-12 coding and STEM programs run by tech-backed Code.org (to which Facebook just pledged $15 million) and Google, which offered lower funding or no funding at all to teachers if participation by female students was deemed unacceptable to the sponsoring organizations. Facebook's efforts also seem consistent with the tech-backed Every Student Succeeds Act, which calls for increasing CS and STEM access to address a tech-declared national crisis, but only "for students through grade 12 who are members of groups underrepresented in such subject fields, such as female students, minority students, English learners, children with disabilities, and economically disadvantaged students." Hey, sometimes "every" doesn't mean "every!"
More proof (Score:5, Funny)
- AmiMojo
Re: (Score:3)
More proof of systemic racism: even though the white recruiters were given an incentive to hire for diversity, their innate racist tendencies overrode that incentive and they continued to hire cisgender white males.
I know you're being sarcastic, but I have to wonder why race & sex are usually the only criteria for "diversity"? I'd be willing to bet that most tech companies have a much higher proportion of LGBTQXYZ employees & also more atheists. Why aren't things like sexual preference or religious affiliation considered in these statistics?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
LGBT people and atheists don't usually have a massive great chip on their shoulder and go out and riot if they don't get what they think they're owed by society. Isn't it odd how there's no quota required for indians? Perhaps its something to do with them working hard and not expecting a good job to be handed to them on a plate simply because of their skin colour.
Re:More proof (Score:5, Informative)
LGBT people and atheists don't usually have a massive great chip on their shoulder and go out and riot if they don't get what they think they're owed by society.
They don't riot, they litigate.
Re: (Score:3)
LGBT people and atheists don't usually have a massive great chip on their shoulder and go out and riot if they don't get what they think they're owed by society.
They don't riot, they litigate.
Would you rather people take assholes to court or just cut to the chase and punch them in the face?
Some of us would rather encourage civilized behavior than be part of the problem.
They only give points for traditionally disadvantaged groups who are visibly different. Female, check. Non-white, check. That hardly captures all the ways people are different from one another, and it doesn't even take into account other ways people are discriminated against that are easily visible. Ageism is rampant at Facebo
Re: More proof (Score:2, Informative)
If you call people with differing political opinions "assholes" in online discussion, there's a good chance it's you who's the asshole in person.
Re: (Score:2)
I have no problem calling someone an asshole if they think it's acceptable to deny equal rights to classes of people.
Re: More proof (Score:3)
I'm all in favor of equal rights for everyone. But this trend of dismissing those with whom one disagrees as "assholes", "shitlords", and similar puerile insults does nothing but diminish the quality of public discussion.
Re: More proof (Score:5, Insightful)
I completely disagree.
It's 1967, and a bunch of people don't want equal rights for black people; some of them even want to bring back lynchings, and they all want to deny them voting rights, the right to sit anywhere on the bus, the right to use the same drinking fountains and bathrooms, etc.
Are you seriously going to tell me that it's "puerile" to dismiss these people as "assholes"? That we should have a rational discussion with them? Sorry, but fuck that.
It's no different today, it's just the group being oppressed is different (homosexuals/LGBTetc.). Heck, they still don't want them using the same bathrooms.
If you're in favor of making a whole group of people second-class citizens, then you're an asshole, full stop. This isn't about "disagreement", it's about basic human rights. Even Donald Trump thinks trans people should use whatever bathroom they feel comfortable in. There's a little room for rational discussion at the fringes (like the wedding cake issue: equal rights. vs. rights of business owners to choose who to do business with, but this was also mostly settled with the CRA in the 60s, mainly it's just extremist libertarians who want to regress on this out of some misguided notion that "the invisible hand" of "the market" will magically correct this), but not much. Mostly it's just a bunch of religious assholes who want to deny people equal rights under the law, and it's little different from what those peoples' brethren in the 60s and before did to black people.
Re: (Score:3)
It's 1967, and a bunch of people don't want equal rights for black people; some of them even want to bring back lynchings, and they all want to deny them voting rights, the right to sit anywhere on the bus, the right to use the same drinking fountains and bathrooms, etc.
Are you seriously going to tell me that it's "puerile" to dismiss these people as "assholes"? That we should have a rational discussion with them?
Correct, it would be puerile to dismiss those folks as "assholes". Many of them were doubtless fairly pleasant people in their daily lives. (I am not one of those people who thinks almost everyone is a douchebag.)
The right word for the group you describe would be "racists". And yes, calm and rational discussion can be an effective way to deal with individual racists. That kind of racist is not very common anymore, but I've encountered a few. Know what in my experience reliably makes them stop and recon
Re: More proof (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think you'll find many people who want to deny anyone equal rights under the law. More likely you have a disagreement about what those rights are, and what "equality" means in context. But what do I know? I'm just an asshole on the internet.
Re: (Score:3)
meh, it's minor enough that i'll allow it.
everybody who you disagree with online is an asshole.
though... to be fair, most people are assholes in general, so... you know, safe bet.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
LGBT people and atheists don't usually have a massive great chip on their shoulder
BUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Oh wait, you were being serious? Let me laugh even harder. BUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Re: (Score:2)
Sexual preference is more of a private thing, people can't tell you are straight or gay just by looking at you unless you advertise the fact. Therefore it tends not to be something that is discriminated against in hiring, although obviously where there is overt homophobia it's a concern.
Religious reference is just that, a preference, and thus generally not protected in the same way as genetic factors. Society does allow some consideration for religion, mostly for historical reasons, but only to the point wh
Re: (Score:2)
Again, it's only of interest re diversity if there is a detectable problem , so if you have evidence of one you should post it.
Oh, I'm not saying it's a problem. I'm saying that there's more to diversity than what the diversity echo chamber says there is.
Re: (Score:2)
There's enough evidence right here on slashdot - no need to look further :-)
Though if you make the mistake of going on Facebook, you'll find so much evidence of open hate that it will leave you wondering about whether large swaths of the human race aren't deserving of a major extinction event.
[deleted rant with examples of Facebook's various contributions to the Internet Hate/Rage Machine. I'll just say that they reached a new low when they repeatedly censored posts with a picture of a cancer survivor sh
Re: (Score:2)
Because you can't see it. If you are a huge flamer and act fantastically gay, that's your fault; but any class of obviously-heterosexual white male might actually be deepthroating 78 cocks at night and getting horny over the thought of being all soaped up and wet with a barracks of marines. It's not your business and you just can't tell.
It's harder to hide being black or having tits.
Re: (Score:2)
And also a much higher proportion of foreigners from Europe. But for the sake of diversity statistics, those people (who all speak difference languages and come from different cultures) tend to be considered the same as plane 'ole white Americans.
Re:More proof (Score:5, Insightful)
More proof of systemic racism: even though the white recruiters were given an incentive to hire for diversity, their innate racist tendencies overrode that incentive and they continued to hire cisgender white males.
- AmiMojo
Nice try but if you look at the actual numbers, facebook, google, etc.. are hiring a *higher* percentage of minorities than are graduating from college. You can't hire what doesn't exists. You either need to start much earlier in the process (high school, grade school) or you need to admit that people are different and their interests and abilities push them to different paths. You rarely hear anything about the lack of male nurses, male teachers, male social workers, etc... The one traditionally male profession that does attract a large percentage of females (doctors) has flipped to being more female. The truth is that most women don't want to code and the ones that do have no problem getting a job.
Re: (Score:2)
Citation please? (Score:5, Informative)
Citation please? Where are those "actual numbers" you reference?
But here's my citation, putting black CS grads at 4.5% but hires at 2%...
http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/10/12/silicon-valley-diversity-tech-hiring-computer-science-graduates-african-american-hispanic/14684211/ [usatoday.com]
Re:Citation please? (Score:4, Informative)
4.5% of new recipients were African American, and 2% of technology workers at seven self-selected Silicon Valley companies are African American.
Firstly, there's the issue of the companies not being representative, but instead self selected. Secondly, the fact that new grads are being compared to the entire workforce make it an apples-to-oranges comparison. You should be comparing to the total number of hires of new grads - it would take a generation for graduation numbers to percolate through the entire workforce.
Re:More proof (Score:4, Insightful)
are hiring a *higher* percentage of minorities than are graduating from college
Do you have some stats for that? TFA links to this [wsj.com] paywalled article that says there are more minority graduates than jobs. This US government report [census.gov] says the same thing.
male nurses, male teachers, male social workers
Read the news, at least in the UK this has been a major issue since the 90s at least and is getting millions of Pounds spent on fixing it. Men looking to become primary school teachers get massive incentives, for example.
Re:More proof (Score:5, Insightful)
...and is getting millions of Pounds spent on fixing it. Men looking to become primary school teachers get massive incentives, for example.
There's a good reason we don't do that in America: any man who wants to be around little kids like that is automatically deemed a pedophile and has a cloud of suspicion around him. Almost no man is dumb enough to go into that field because of this, even though I'm sure many would like to if society weren't so paranoid about it.
Re: (Score:3)
It's the same in the UK. About 20 years ago we reached peak paedo-panic, and have been trying to combat it ever since. It died down a bit after the papers stopped fearmongering and whipping up anger, but that was only after people started rioting.
Re:More proof (Score:4, Interesting)
I think the truth is a lot more complicated really, and all we really have is conjecture. My opinion is that:
1) programming and engineering are not very prestigious jobs in the US, unlike medicine or law, and also unlike other societies (like India or China). In addition, these jobs are generally not paid that well (compared to being a doctor), and don't have much upward potential.
1a) layoffs of engineers and programmers are constantly in the news, and have been since I was in high school over 2 decades ago
2) males are far more likely to have very very mild autism-spectrum disorders like Asperger's which cause them to not be terribly social, and prefer jobs where they spend most of their time working on a computer rather than talking to people
3) little girls are generally not encouraged to have an interest in math and science by their parents (and maybe teachers), unlike little boys. It's usually more conservative people who have more kids anyway, so they raise them with these backwards attitudes
Add up all these things, and what you get is that when a girl is really smart and wants a high-paying career, she's going to go into medicine or law. In medicine particularly, the jobs are far more stable, higher paying, you have a direct and positive impact on peoples' lives (I sure as hell can't point to much I've done as helping people), you get far more prestige, and you get to interact with people instead of sit in a noisy open-plan work area, with streams of people walking right by your desk, with headphones on to block out the din, staring at a screen all day, and then being pressured to spend extra unpaid time to meet some arbitrary deadline. Why would a smart woman want this job?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
... Giving them more for recruiting not recruiting white and asian males is the very definition of sexism and racism.
So to fix racism/sexism ... they are being racist and sexist.
Maybe the problem isn't racism or sexism ... ever consider that? Nope, you didn't. You keep assuming the lazy option.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:More proof (Score:5, Insightful)
My college CS classmates were dominantly Chinese, Middle Eastern and White (in that order), with one or two Indian (eastern) students. This is in New Mexico, where half the phonebook is hispanic last names. Looking at the broader Engineering school, there were a handful of hispanic students, but they were vastly outnumbered by Asian, Middle Eastern, and White students. The hispanic and native american students tended to go toward business, medicine and art.
Don't jump to the assumption that racism is at play when there are many more variables that could account for this perceived slight.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:More proof (Score:5, Insightful)
> My college CS classmates were dominantly Chinese, Middle Eastern and White (in that order), with one or two Indian (eastern) students.
If you are a black or hispanic child, you are much less likely to have a computer growing up than a white child. By the time you get to college you will be miles behind other students that have been tinkering with computers for their whole lives.
If that's the case, how are the Chinese, Indian, and middle eastern kids getting their hands on computers at such young ages? They don't seem to have any problems overcoming any disadvantages they had.
Sorry, I don't buy it. It's not because of having computers growing up, it's because of cultural differences. Asian and middle eastern cultures value engineering and think of it as a prestigious career; black and Hispanic cultures simply do not.
When did you start "seeing" yourself as a engineer (Score:3)
Stereotype threat originates both from within the Black communities ( Studious kids are picked on for "acting white" ), and externally ( Teachers do not push Black kids as hard as they do other racists due to their bias ).
Re: (Score:2)
This is more or less what Facebook is saying, that there aren't enough candidates from those groups so even offering incentives to find them doesn't help.
The stats seem to show that minority and female STEM graduates have a poorer rate of employment than other groups, but also for minorities and some sciences much lower graduation rates too. So Facebook isn't entirely wrong there, but isn't entirely right either.
They are at least investing a lot in education, recruitment and making the jobs more attractive
aren't enough candidates so we need H-1B's! (Score:2)
aren't enough candidates so we need H-1B's!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
There may be racism at play, but I don't think it can be solved in quotas at this level. The problem is that the pool of candidates is low to begin with.
While I note that percentage-wise the discrepancy between say, white and black hires is significant, in actual numbers, there are significantly more whites who graduate, but do not get jobs. There are more whites who don't get jobs than there are black candidates in total. To me, that means there is a bigger problem than a mere percentage gap. The fact
Re: (Score:3)
From TFA:
"recruiters donâ(TM)t actually have the power to hire any of the diverse candidates they find; hiring managers make those decisions"
In other words, they could only feed candidates to the hiring managers, who then selected the best candidates. Which leads us to
"Facebook blamed its lack of diversity on the applicant pool"
Which explains why they are spending so much money to increase it. It's hardly surprising either.
This story is just race-baiting, trying to make people angry over the "points ba
Re: (Score:2)
I thought that the story was that URMs weren't given enough opportunities for recruitment, or were actively discouraged from seeking open positions. Now that a strong recruitment push favoring URMs has apparently failed, you're saying that didn't matter anyway, since racist hiring managers blocked hiring of URM recruits? What will it be next? Say URM recruits are hired, but, surprise surprise, don't perform as well (since they necessarily cannot represent the best available talent as a group -- obviously in
Re: (Score:3)
No, that's not what I'm saying.
They have made some progress due to better recruitment, TFA points that out. What they are saying is that they are struggling to get to the point where hiring is representative of society, and they are blaming it on graduates not being representative either.
Once again, to be absolutely clear, I'm not accusing anyone of being racist. What is happening here is institutional bias, not individual racists being biased. Institutional bias is the term we use to describe the way, for
Re: (Score:2)
Isn't this really just a handicap system? If you're not X, you get an advantage; that is logically-equivalent to being assigned a handicap for being X.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Everyone is equal, but some are more equal than others.
Re:More proof (Score:5, Insightful)
The summary is misleading. The recruiters are rewarded for finding minority candidates, but they only feed them to hiring managers. The hiring managers have no incentive to do anything other than pick the candidate they think is best, with best being some combination of qualifications, interpersonal skills, experience, wage requirements etc.
Frankly the summary is just flamebait, the way it frames what is happening. It's actually kind of ironic that people are modding me down as flamebait when they have been triggered by the inaccurate trolling summary.
Re:More proof (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, you're always going to find some reason why "it didn't work." You're doing all sorts of mental gymnastics in order to come up with an explanation of something that is already perfectly explained with a far simpler truth: People are not all the same, and groups of people are not all alike. People within groups share certain biological and cultural similarities (which is why they are grouped), and those differences are sufficient to explain why some people will be interested in tech jobs and others won't.
Does "systematic racisms/sexism" exist? I don't know because that's a meaningless term used by the intellectually lazy. If you want to stop actual racism and actual sexism that is happening, then that's great. So do I. But you need to target something specific. Tell me specifically which institution is racist/sexist and let's go solve that problem. Then we'll move onto the next one until there are no more. But crying about "systematic" problems with vague evidence -- though it may make you feel a false sense of accomplishment -- doesn't solve anything.
Re:More proof (Score:4, Interesting)
Bah. I work for a school district in a very ethnically diverse city. One that WANTS to hire people of underrepresented groups.
We recently had an open job made available, in the technology field. Basic technical support. Advertised on our website, sent out to the various public job opportunity sites as well.
I spoke with one of my coworkers about this, one who was tasked with interviewing the attendees. Interviews were only done AFTER they passed a basic skills test.
Of the 300 people who applied for two positions, 4 were female. FOUR. Of those four, only one passed the skills test. When interviewed, she stated she had a problem with one of the requirements: the ability to lift 25 pounds on an occasional basis ( think printer). Following that, she stated she did not want to move computers around because they were dirty, someone else would need to do this.
Even then, the recruiters kept telling our department to consider her for the position.
Racially, the group was overwhelmingly white or hispanic, with black or asian interviewees being underrepresented based on the population.
Re: (Score:3)
The problem is that we don't understand the social forces involved. We can't figure out from basic principles if girls are not good at STEM or if girls are pushed from STEM. We don't have a society where people do what they like without pressure from gender roles. We know darn well that boys and girls get different treatment in a lot of ways. If we had some way of knowing that STEM would be X% female if everyone did what he or she was good at and liked to do, that would be really handy. We don't, and
Re:More proof (Score:5, Informative)
The hiring managers have no incentive to do anything other than pick the candidate they think is best
I really, really doubt that's true.
Every large company has policies for quotas/affirmative action/cultural diversity/whatever-you-want-to-call-it. In the last Fortune 500 company I worked, a hiring manager had to write a letter justifying why they didn't offer a job to any minority candidate sent for an interview by HR. No letter was required for white males.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Molding a definition to fit your politics is 1984-esque.
Racism is discrimination or bigotry on the basis of race, not that load of crap you just spewed.
You're right. Here's the dictionary definition of "bigotry": "stubborn and complete intolerance of any creed, belief, or opinion that differs from one's own." Note that the concept of "race" is absent from the definition, so "bigotry on the basis of race"? Not a thing, according to the definition.
Words end up meaning what most people generally agree they mean, which often diverge from dictionary definitions. Most people would generally agree that someone who believes that persons of a specific race are inhe
Re:More proof (Score:4, Insightful)
You're right. Here's the dictionary definition of "bigotry": "stubborn and complete intolerance of any creed, belief, or opinion that differs from one's own." Note that the concept of "race" is absent from the definition, so "bigotry on the basis of race"? Not a thing, according to the definition.
Reading comprehension fail. The definition refers to the intolerance found in someone's creed, belief or opinion, not intolerance about someone else's creed, belief, or opinion. For instance, having the opinion that a race is inferior and being unwilling to accept you are wrong (intolerance) would be bigotry.
Words end up meaning what most people generally agree they mean, which often diverge from dictionary definitions. Most people would generally agree that someone who believes that persons of a specific race are inherently inferior, is a bigot.
Words certainly do change over time, and the worst examples of this include when two very different (or even opposite) meanings are given to the same word because of ignorance of the population. Literally literally meaning figuratively is a good example.
Racism apologists are certainly attempting to re-use the word racism to mean any form of discrimination in an attempt to imply inclusive discrimination is just as bad as considering another race sub-human. It is a deeply ignorant attempt by people unwilling to accept their own privilege or at least who are unwilling to extend that privilege to others.
Re: (Score:3)
You're right. Here's the dictionary definition of "bigotry": "stubborn and complete intolerance of any creed, belief, or opinion that differs from one's own."
Reading comprehension fail. The definition refers to the intolerance found in someone's creed, belief or opinion, not intolerance about someone else's creed, belief, or opinion.
The reading comprehension problem I'm having is with your twist on the definition, not the definition itself. The definition I posted was copied from dictionary.com. Let's try another source [oxforddictionaries.com]. "bigotry: Intolerance toward those who hold different opinions from oneself". Not having intolerant opinions, but actually being/acting intolerant.
Re: (Score:2)
Racism: [oxforddictionaries.com]
1. Prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one’s own race is superior:
a program to combat racism
1.1 The belief that all members of each race possess characteristics, abilities, or qualities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races:
Language is fluid, and there is certainly a push to consider policies to fight racism as racist themselves, but that is not the tra
Re:More proof (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one’s own race is superior
The concept I see being pushed these days is that only a member of an oppressed minority can be a victim of racism, and a member of an oppressed minority cannot be a racist, regardless of who he/she discriminates against.
Re:More proof (Score:5, Informative)
That's exactly what affirmative action is. It says blacks are not as good as whites, can't compete, and thus need a loving, guiding hand to help them up.
No, it is saying socio-economic factors make it less likely for African Americans to succeed, and this will not be changed for hundreds of years if society does not lend a hand. The average household wealth of a white family is $656k, while the average for African Americans is $85k. This disparity was $355k vs $67k thirty years ago, so the gap is widening in both real dollars and ratio. (source [cnn.com])
And it makes sense the gap would widen without significant societal assistance. If you believe it often takes money to make money, or that school districts with better funding often provide better education, it is painfully obvious this inequality cannot be reduced without outside assistance.
Re:More proof (Score:5, Insightful)
If the real problem is that poor people need a hand (which they do) and it's just that black people are generally more poor than white people (which they are), then policies that address the disadvantage of poverty directly will, as a consequence of the existing racial bias in poverty, automatically help black people more than it does white people, to exactly the extent of that bias, and for only so long as that bias persists.
No need for policies to directly address race at all.
Re:More proof (Score:4, Interesting)
That's exactly what affirmative action is. It says blacks are not as good as whites, can't compete, and thus need a loving, guiding hand to help them up.
No, it is saying socio-economic factors make it less likely for African Americans to succeed, and this will not be changed for hundreds of years if society does not lend a hand.
Then why not base assistance on those socio-economic factors, instead of racist discrimination based on race?
Re: (Score:3)
No, it is saying socio-economic factors make it less likely for African Americans to succeed, and this will not be changed for hundreds of years if society does not lend a hand.
If that were true, then why are we doling out extra assistance based on "race" instead of basing it on socio-economic status? The checkbox on the form asks to which "race" you belong, not how well off you are.
Re:More proof (Score:4, Informative)
If the real problem is that poor people need a hand ... No need for policies to directly address race at all.
This is simply not backed up by facts [pewtrusts.org]. Four in five black children who started in the top three quintiles experienced downward mobility, compared with just two in five white children. Three in five white children who started in the bottom two quintiles experienced upward mobility, versus just one in four black children.
Minorities really do have more trouble with income mobility than whites in similar economic situations. Twice as many relatively well off black children experience downward mobility than similar white children, and well under half as many poor black children see upward mobility when compared to similar white children.
We should certainly have programs which help all poor individuals, but that does not exclude racially targeted programs from being necessary as well.
Re: (Score:2)
Except they are above the ethnic distribution.
If they wanted to match they would need to hire more native americans and fire a whole bunch of black people and asians.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Facebook's latest diversity stats: http://newsroom.fb.com/news/20... [fb.com]
The are doing well in some areas but poorly in others. Apple is fairly similar, with minorities in particular being over-represented in the low paying, low skill retail jobs and underrepresented in the more desirable skilled jobs.
And before you say it, the solution isn't to fire them and hire more white guys at retail. We are trying to make things better, not worse. The solution is to increase opportunities for the better jobs, which will a
Re: (Score:3)
I find it interesting that I have become some kind of legendary "SJW", with all these stereotypical "SJW" traits and beliefs that I don't actually have. It shows how powerful this kind of labelling is - people just assume you fit their imaginary caricature and don't pay attention to the detail of what you say any more.
Fortunately there are still some people who read with care. I'll admit I'm not always one of them, but at least I do admit it.
And for the record, I would never post a statement like that. To b
Re: (Score:3)
You're a single jewish woman?
That's what I thought SJW stood for, for the longest time.
Re: (Score:2)
When I first read the singles classified in the paper, I thought GSOH meant 'Good Salary, Own Home' and commented that at least these women were being honest about what they were after.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Nice though, but wrong approach (Score:4, Insightful)
In most European countries favoring someone for the color of their skin would be be illegal, even if it was 'positive discrimination'.
People who think this is a good idea should watch the Equal Opportunities episode of Yes Minister.
Re: (Score:2)
It certainly is the wrong approach, but not necessarily because of any unfairness. It is wrong because it simply doesn't work. We need to fix the pipeline of incoming workers before we can expect companies to do anything through recruiter policies. I just went back to get my Masters in CS finishing a couple years ago, and each class was at least 75% white / asian males. Some classes were 100%.
The only thing Facebook could do is set up their own training programs for people with little to no STEM background
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Nice though, but wrong approach (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
That's the problem I have - you cannot legislate equality, and you can't make it magically happen by discriminating against the majority.
There is a problem of underprivileged kids not getting the resources and, more importantly, the encouragement from their parents and peers, to study and work hard in school, or to enter the STEM fields. I look back and realize that my generation was the first (child of the 60s) in which segregation was actually illegal - but that means the parents of my minority peers suf
Points based systems are inherently racist. (Score:5, Insightful)
So we're going to discriminate white and asian applicants over one of another race?
Goodness, isn't that similar to what happened to blacks during the early 20th century too?
Being racist to stop racism doesn't solve the problem. It's just more racism.
Re: (Score:2)
Being racist to stop racism doesn't solve the problem. It's just more racism.
Racism is the belief one group is inherently superior to another. The belief that one group has socio-economic barriers which need to be mitigated is not racism. The process of fixing these barriers does include discrimination, but only because the English language uses this same term for multiple things. Exclusive discrimination can only be fought with inclusive discrimination, because a group being excluded because of institutional discrimination could never catch up without inclusive policies.
Re: (Score:3)
If you have institutional discrimination, don't support the institutions that discriminate. If a shop keeper doesn't want you to buy in his store because you're black, don't go there and tell others so they don't go there either, eventually they close shop.
If Facebook doesn't WANT black people in their workforce and has a policy to discriminate against blacks (which would be illegal but that's besides the point), don't support them.
Institutional racism has largely been outlawed and is otherwise untenable fo
Re: (Score:3)
So we're going to discriminate white and asian applicants over one of another race?
Goodness, isn't that similar to what happened to blacks during the early 20th century too?
Being racist to stop racism doesn't solve the problem. It's just more racism.
It's a kludge to try to solve the problem of income inequality. My kids are mixed-race and enjoy all the advantages of a family in a comfortable financial position. They got more attention when they were very young since one parent could afford to stay home. That means they heard a lot more language on a daily basis. They go to a good Pre-K program and will go to a decent school when the time is right. They also have college savings plans so they won't have to worry (so much) about paying for college a
Female CS Grads were only 18%.... (Score:5, Insightful)
In 2013, 18% of bachelor’s degrees in computing were earned by women
How in the heck do they expect to get equal numbers of female and male people into programming jobs in the field. It would seem 'equal' hiring would be around 18% of the population of programmers to make it apples to apples. That would indicate 'fair' hiring.
That said, I do believe in encouraging everyone to get more experience in STEM at a younger age, then to make informed decisions about if this is a career they would like to pursue. It is nuts to me that they are trying to hire 50% of the work force out of 18% of the graduates. That is just not going to work. Just goes to prove we really do need better math education at all levels.....
Re:Female CS Grads were only 18%.... (Score:4, Insightful)
How in the heck do they expect to get equal numbers of female and male people into programming jobs in the field. It would seem 'equal' hiring would be around 18% of the population of programmers to make it apples to apples. That would indicate 'fair' hiring.
That's easy: hire unqualified candidates.
Re: (Score:2)
A significant number of people working at Facebook are not programming.
They also hire marketing, sales, HR, management, support and lots more non-IT jobs.
I wouldn't be surprised if IT personel were a minority within Facebook.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
This is why I don't like the (media driven?) obsession with beating up a few select highly-visible tech companies over their hiring diversity statistics. The applicant pool is small enough, and the real energy needs to target the middle-school (or earlier) levels.
By pushing hard to improve these ratios, the highly-visible companies are just depriving the rest of the entire industry of any opportunity diversity whatsoever. Heck, the numbers feel so bad, that if they actually did drop the bar low enough and
Re: (Score:2)
Actually 18% hiring would be too much. There isn't a guarantee of a job just because of the completion of a degree program. If you're hiring 100% of that group's grads, you are definitely taking C and D level players into your company. That shouldn't happen unless all groups have 100% hire rates due to demand outstripping supply.
Diversity quotas make things *worse* (Score:5, Insightful)
Not only do you get people that are worse off, it tends to overcorrect to remove non-minorities.
Then you wonder why your bigoted policy ends up with lots of incompetent diversity candidates.
Re:Diversity quotas make things *worse* (Score:5, Insightful)
Not only do you get people that are worse off, it tends to overcorrect to remove non-minorities.
Not only that, but then the actual best qualified minorities get looked at and they wonder to themselves, "Are they looking at me and wondering if I am actually the best qualified or of I'm here because of a quota? Am I going to have to prove myself by working 50% or 100% harder than the white guy sitting next to me at the table despite the fact that I already worked 50% or 100% harder to get here because I love what I do and this what I was born for?" As a minority who has worked very hard and has a passion for technology that has been a fear of mine. I am thankful that I have not encountered that (or at least if I have I have not taken notice of it), though I have had friends (both other minorities and women) who have experience it.
Then you wonder why your bigoted policy ends up with lots of incompetent diversity candidates.
And that's the other problem. These diversity programs actually end up becoming a drag for the minorities and women who are passionate and worked hard because they love the field and not because someone trying to fill a diversity quota recruited them.
Sadly it is much more difficult to measure these sorts of effects, so success is defined by number/percentage of minorities/women hired and pay parity/disparity, which are actually atrocious metrics to use for too many reasons to enumerate.
No, I don't wonder (Score:2)
Aren't you begging the question? Any proof what you said is what actually happens? Because I believe what happens is that by casting a "wider net" recruiters do get minority candidates who are equally qualified.
Re: (Score:3)
Read TFA, there are no quotas. The summary is trolling you.
Re: (Score:3)
Then you wonder why your bigoted policy ends up with lots of incompetent diversity candidates.
That is only a problem if you lower your standards to achieve diversity. It is possible to maintain standards while favoring minorities if you do it by casting a wider net. That's easier said than done, of course.
some stats (Score:2)
As one data point of comparison, here [exploringcs.org] is some demographic data for AP Computer Science test takers in California for the year 2012. Looking at students who take the AP exam may be a good proxy for identifying students who will one day be applying for top-tier positions. Among this gr
Re: (Score:2)
The fix (Score:3)
Stop hiring males, only hire white women, and a token Asian woman to fetch coffee. You'll see the complaints stop immediately.
Re: (Score:2)
how far down this rabbit hole do we go? (Score:2)
I have strabismus (wandering eye) - is my group 'underrepresented' in the tech field, can I get free training and preferential hiring?
How about inverted nipples? My wife has them. Are there enough inverted-nipples in the tech fields that she could get some help too?
Without enough wandering-eye and inverted-nipple programmers, are we REALLY doing our best to promote diversity?
Beyond Stupid (Score:2)
So the same guy who is complaining that there aren't enough STEM graduates overall is confused about why he can't find any minorities among the already limited pool to hire from? Does somebody need to give this jack-hole a lesson in basic math and what the term minority means?
This is (one reason) why the US is losing business (Score:3)
If you reward based on irrelevant factors, you will be overtaken by a competitor who rewards based on relevant ones. Is there anything more irrelevant to the performance of a worker than what color their skin happens to be?
Diversity is about more than gender and race. (Score:3)
What about age? What's the age makeup of Facebook's staff?
Consider that over 60% of the American workforce of "Computer and mathematical occupations" is over 35, how did facebook do?
Not diverse. At all.
(http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat11b.htm)
Re: (Score:2)
You will notice that the push now is for equity, not equality.
The world is an inherently unequal place. It is much easier to give people equal opportunity than achieve equal results.
Re: (Score:2)
But that can't be true, because that would be admitting that there are innate differences between the sexes and that's just not PC to talk about.
This is easily disproven by looking at countries like China, Iran and others where women make up close to 50% of computer science graduates. Whatever the problem is, it is not "innate".
Re: (Score:2)
For minorities it is much simpler. As a black student in the US, you are much
Re: (Score:3)
The wording of this post made me realize something - what we need isn't "more diversity" - what we need is "less systemic discrimination". Those are subtly different things. You can have zero systemic discrimination and still have relatively homogenous-in-some-attribute populations in particular vocations or geographic areas. Conversely, you can have heterogenous populations and still have massive systemic discrimination.