Mm, thanks for calling out the false-negative thing! I think I misparsed that the first time around and got confused between decreasing false negatives and increasing false positives. That's embarrassing, sorry ^_^`
In any case, I think I made a mistake suggesting specific improvements to the memo; lemme pop off the stack a bit:
It's not okay to publish a document to your coworkers that will predictably make them feel unsafe. Full stop.
When you want to express an idea at work, you need to engage in empathy, and try to express yourself in such a way that your coworkers will still feel safe with you. If you can't figure out how to express an idea without hurting your coworkers, then, yeah, you don't get to express it unless you figure something out :/ That's an appropriate workplace policy, and I'm comfortable with the general idea that freedom of expression is subject to some conditions. I know not everybody agrees with that prioritization, though!
More importantly, I'm just tired of articles like this one dismissing the social consequences lens outright. There's more than one valid issue being raised in our community right now, and the importance of one doesn't invalidate the others. Let's have both conversations: how to enable expression of less common ideas, and how to ensure that we express them empathetically. If we approach the problem thoughtfully, I think we can optimize for both :)
(BTW I edited this comment a lot during the first 30 minutes, and pretty significantly changed its contents. Sorry if that ends up being an issue!)
I actually tend to mostly agree with you on this. I think the safest and most rational policy is just to avoid discussing sensitive topics at work so as not to risk creating a hostile atmosphere, and I don't consider this an unreasonable restriction on freedom of expression. Talk politics and immigration with your friends and family, not your teammates at the office.
My problem is that Google as a company, at least as far as the Mountain View campus goes, apparently disagrees. My understanding -- and it's possible I'm wrong -- is that Google supports and encourages openly discussing a variety of topics at work, and the internal tool he used to publish his memo was designed and used exactly for this purpose. (What Googlers apparently describe as "an internal-only Reddit.") If this is true then he was fired not for discussing inappropriate topics, but for holding opinions the hive-mind finds disagreeable.
Either you as a company support discussing sensitive topics in the office, or you don't. If you don't that should be made clear and enforced equally for everyone. If you do then you can't pick and choose which opinions you approve of based on what's popular, and expressing a dissenting opinion should not, at the very least, be a fireable offense!
In any case, I think I made a mistake suggesting specific improvements to the memo; lemme pop off the stack a bit:
It's not okay to publish a document to your coworkers that will predictably make them feel unsafe. Full stop.
When you want to express an idea at work, you need to engage in empathy, and try to express yourself in such a way that your coworkers will still feel safe with you. If you can't figure out how to express an idea without hurting your coworkers, then, yeah, you don't get to express it unless you figure something out :/ That's an appropriate workplace policy, and I'm comfortable with the general idea that freedom of expression is subject to some conditions. I know not everybody agrees with that prioritization, though!
More importantly, I'm just tired of articles like this one dismissing the social consequences lens outright. There's more than one valid issue being raised in our community right now, and the importance of one doesn't invalidate the others. Let's have both conversations: how to enable expression of less common ideas, and how to ensure that we express them empathetically. If we approach the problem thoughtfully, I think we can optimize for both :)
(BTW I edited this comment a lot during the first 30 minutes, and pretty significantly changed its contents. Sorry if that ends up being an issue!)