jariel

"We'll tell a higher-up why his new plan is stupid and that we're not very excited to waste our time on it"

There's a difference between 'what my instinct is' and 'thoughtful communication'.

It's possible in these kinds of situations that 'the plan is objectively dumb' and surely therefore someone might not be interested ... but I've seen more often than not people not really understand why something is initiated, what the objectives are etc. and just make narrow assumptions with belligerance, which they believe is 'being direct'. It's 'direct' in a way, in that it's a 'direct articulation of a narrow set of assumptions' - but that doesn't make it good or professional.

"This is dumb, I don't want to work on it" is surely direct, but it's also essentially an immature and unprofessional way of communicating.

More appropriately it would be: "I don't think this plan will achieve the understanding I have of the objectives for this, this and this reason, but here are some alterations that might work" - or "Technically, I don't think this will work because of this reason, but I don't understand what the non-technical objectives are so my feedback is limited to that scope" - or "I think these areas are more risky than implied, but these areas will work" or better "This won't work for these reasons, but fill us in on the strategic objectives and we can fill in the blanks with something that will, if we can".

I personally appreciate 'directness' a lot, but a lot of people misunderstand that to be 'what I think off the top of my head without trying to actually address the issue'.

And yest, there's way too much sensitivity around criticism going on. Legit criticism needs to be allowed. It's also really hard for some people to separate themselves form their critique or their work and so communications sometimes gets mangled on both sides.

I don't think it's so much 'nothing but the facts' but rather a little more effort to explain 'what it is'.

It's not that the site is 'marketing speak', it's just that it's a 3/10 on communications.

Even two sentences at the top would help.

I've spent a minute on it and I'm not sure what it is.

It's a way to make apps, but it doesn't have a front end? I don't even know what that means.

Oh, I understand all of that of course. I meant some kind of Unicode-specific debate over how it should all work and what the alternatives were.

Can someone comment with relevant experience about the fact that maybe emojis should not be part of unicode? And that we should literally just send tiny images as part of text?

This way, you know the host system is 100% going to represent what you want to say correctly, that the emoji will look right, and you don't need to worry the system will replace it, that it supports it etc..

And you can literally use 'any emoji' you want.

There is an infinite number of things we can put in emojis, why are we trying to standardize such things?

I wonder if someone has some insight as to the history around this?

This is lesson in media, PR, liars, spin, misrepresentation, attempts to explain, yada yada. There are hardly any good actors here: Signal for misrepresenting, the press for turning a blind eye, Facebook for collecting too information etc..

This is a really bad look for tech.

This kind of rhetoric I think might be at the root of the problem.

If you believe the company founders, in the face of being told they occupy their position 'due to privilege' is 'right about everything' then you're the problem.

Telling executives that they are 'denying racism exists' when they are actually only denying that it exists at the company is obviously straw manning.

If you're of the position that 'anyone who questions claims of racism is a white supremacist', then you're entitled to that position, but it's 'war language' that is driving a lot of irresponsible toxicity in the workplace.

Although colonialism played a role, 'it started' before that.

It's fair to at least 'talk about' the 'pyramid of hate' and maybe 'believe in it' so as to 'make a point'.

But I don't think it's ok to accuse regular, well-meaning employers of 'holding up systems of White Supremacy'.

It's also basically tone-deaf for an executive, facing a 'sensitive moment' to challenge claims of racism with 'reverse racism' - even if the executive might have a rhetorical point - it's just going to inflame the situation.

I think the execs should have basically 'not acted out of contempt', said some conciliatory things and moved on. Even if they had a legit point to make, they're supposed to be 'bigger than that'.

So I'm not sure if it's worthwhile to dig into the rhetoric, but rather, they should have just found a way past the issue.

Finally, it's a good example of how toxic this stuff can be.

"It has hints of "reverse racism" "

"That's closer to the camp of "white supremacist" or at the very least, a common defense used by white supremacist."

This kind of gaslighthing though.

"My opponent disagrees with me and is therefore a White Supremacist, or at least close to one!"

If one person says 'this org is racist because of white privilege' - it's possibly contentious, but not unreasonable to suggest that this statement is racist in and of itself.

Just because you might deny 'reverse racism' exists, doesn't mean that it's true, it's a denial, not a disagreement.

Also, indicating that 'this office is not a place of white supremacy' is not 'denying' someone else experience, or their position that 'racism exists'. It's an observation of the nature of the ostensible problem.

It's not 'wilfully ignorant' it's more like 'wilfully insensitive / disagreeable / inflammatory'

That's not quite the right example though.

CRT definitions of 'White Supremacy' are not about 'people acting deliberately' to support it.

CRT laments that 'regular people' doing 'regular things' act unconsciously to support oppressive systems, hence 'White Supremacy'.

Making a film about 'something' and hiring those people you know to make it, who by virtue of your social network might be 'mostly white' - would be an example of 'White Supremacy'.

Ergo - in their view, unless you are actively fighting to dismantle the concept of whiteness - you're supporting 'White Supremacy'.

I believe there is a kernel of truth in systematic, even unconsciously biased systems, however, I don't remotely agree with many of the assertions. Unfortunately, to disagree with their assertions makes you a 'bad person' in their view.

Have a read [1]. A thesis of 'self examination' i.e. a fairly progressive individual addressing their own 'white supremacy' due to their lack of active assertion of issues of equity etc..

http://www.anthropology-news.org/index.php/2019/06/25/disman...

The exec. did not say that.

'White Supremacy' classically means men in Pointy White Hats.

The CRT people now use it to mean 'regular white people' because they, in their regular, day to day actions, uphold oppressive systems i.e. 'White Supremacy'.

The denial is usually of the later, not the former.

Many progressives are now using the denial of the later, to imply denial of the former, as a kind of bad faith rhetorical weapon, which I think is unfair.

That statement is not jarring.

Employees calling the organization 'White Supremacist' is the thing that should be 'jarring' or at least controversial. There are arguments to be made, sure, but the language is fairly extremist.

People are constantly confusing the issue with 'politics'.

This is not about Trump or Obama, that's easily avoided, it's about Identity Politics, which cannot be avoided:

They are arguing over Identity Politics and definitions of privilege.

"“The fact that you can be a white male, and come to this meeting and call people racist and say ‘white supremacy doesn't exist’ when it's blatant at this company is white privilege,” the employee said. “The fact that he wasn’t corrected and was in fact thanked — it makes me sick.”"

The Executive basically stated he doesn't believe the organization or it's culture is rooted in 'White Supremacy' - echoing the aggressive language used nowadays in Critical Race Theory.

The Employee, I believe mischaracterized that statement as 'the denial that racism exists' - which is an unfair, but also pointed out the denial of 'White Priviledge' - which is a valid point to make if one actually believes that.

The argument is existentially problematic - some people believe that groups are not inherently racist, others believe that if there are White executives then the system is inherently racist, going so far as to use terms like 'White Supremacy'.

This 'debate' is raging everywhere right now - schools, public sector, private companies, NGOs etc.

It's hard to rectify because those who don't see systems as overtly or fundamentally racist are challenge by those who do, and those who do, are inclined to believe those that disagree with them are basically evil.

It's a low-grade cultural race war unfortunately, pitting regular people against other regular people, often over some very abstract things, like naming things 'blacklist/whitelist' instead of 'blocklist/playlist' etc..

Without effective retail finance, which is not possible without other things in place first, which are not possible without a baseline of functioning governance, there really is no 'organized' solution that's going to work.

You can't have well run banks without commercial law, you can't have commercial law without great schools, law schools, good legislators, a judiciary, acting in good faith and 'not corrupt'.

Without a systematic, organized solution, it might be worth teaching people skills and abilities that serve to create value without the overhead - for example, carpentry, masonry etc..

My grandfather and family built their own home, their own cottage, installed all of the plumbing themselves and this is in a 'modern nation' less than 100 years ago, and it was not uncommon.

However - they were highly skilled craftspeople, with knowledge and abilities passed down from generation to generation, information that made it 'across the Atlantic' from Europe into the new world without state organs, schools etc. to do so.

We have a hard time today grasping that, we kind of expect 'the government' to make the right trade schools, colleges and universities available for 'where all the knowledge is' but it was never really that way.

Without extra currency floating around to facilitate loans etc, then it's the labour of communities i.e. family, friends children. Amish and Mennonite communities are strong examples of this kind of behaviour, not that they are necessarily the perfect example, but you can see it in action.

There's so much focus on 'top down governance' approaches in these areas because it's the issue that our own governments can speak to in terms of money, grants, investment, and actors on the other side can sign agreements talk about plans etc..

But in reality it's probably worth sometimes looking at such systems as not very governed at all, and developing things that work very well on the local level.

"He told me today that attempting to link the list of customer names to potential genocide represented a case of “catastrophizing” — one that made it impossible for any good-faith discussions to follow. "

And there you have the unavoidable issue.

Some people believing that 'name mocking' is the 'core hate' upon which genocide is built, some people think that's a bridge to far.

I agree with the CEO that the intellectualized vitriol towards the list is just far too much.

It's hard for some people to grasp this, but if you allow rank and file to create councils that allow them to control the company, especially from inflated moral positions, then some of them will do that.

A lot of people I believe express their anger and frustration through aggressive moralization and this is another outlet for that.

There's a 100% chance that these movements attract bad faith actors and will cause problems, they have to be dealt with very carefully.

There's some wilful misattribution or straw-manning by the Guardian here.

'Hard work is an essential ingredient in success' is much more consistent with common beliefs, and it's more or less true.

Nobody is saying 'Just work hard and you will achieve the highest ranks of society'.

It's a 'lie' that anyone actually says that, hence the straw man.

The Guardian however, doesn't really want this to be true, and so like most ideological papers, they shift the goalposts of their supposed ideological opponents and misattribute the logic.

The flaw is right here:

"I have come to understand that the systems that underpin the top professions in Britain are set up to serve only a certain section of society: they’re readily identifiable by privileged backgrounds, particular schools and accents."

Yes, of course, British people, of all people know that.

They've known that for 1000 years.

But saying that 'the top corridors of power are hard to achieve' is a fundamentally different thing then (direct quote): “if you work hard you will get on”.

"If you work hard you will get on" is not "If you work hard you will achieve the top ranks of society".

Finally, there's a woeful lack of gratitude in the author's premise, that he, as an immigrant somehow deserves one of the most choice spots among 60 million residents 'because he worked hard'.

Ironically, as a 'extremely poor immigrant son of a single mother with 12 chilren and a person of colour' - the fact that he was able to receive considerably more and better education than his peers, and has had a very successful career and is a respected member of society actually demonstrates how relatively open, kind and tolerant the UK is at least overall.

He's almost a living, breathing contradiction of his own argument.

This misattribution is a daily, constant problem in the press (almost all of them) and it's a primary source of false information and social malaise.

The G has some great writers, I wish they would try harder.

The argument is not junk, there's value in understanding how taxes work through the value chain.

A little bit like a VAT, we don't want to tax, tax and tax some product that has a long and complicated line of distributors, rather, tax the final product, either using VAT rebates etc.. This is more economically beneficial.

With corporate and individual incomes, we think at little bit the same way - i.e. how the taxation will flow through via corp tax, income tax, dividend tax and cap gains.

In Ontario, if you pay small business corp tax and then a dividend, it's pretty much the same as if you were to take a salary and pay income tax. Obviously, this because the million or so small businesses out there would rig their outgoing cash flows one way or the other, depending on tax treatment.

While cap gains is a special situation, it does still form part of those block of taxes that should naturally relate to one another in terms of how net surpluses are taxed.

When you spend your 'already taxed income' on an entirely new product or service, then that's separate economic activity, and so it's taxed without consideration to your 'previously taxed income'.

The issue has nothing to do with technology, it has to do with 'quality' information ranking and Google's supposed bias with regards to who they deem 'credible' and not.

Breitbart is a much more aggressive tabloid, and individuals within Google wanted to ban it outright, arguably because of their 'poor quality' but mostly because their political bias.

My point is that if there is a 'right wing tabloid with questionable legitimacy' that might make people uncomfortable, it's Breitbart. Not The DM.

People are lamenting the DM here because they use 'click bait' headlines and 'misrepresent' information, people are using shamefully hyperbolic language on this thread.

But in reality The DM is just a regular tabloid, and it's not that bad - technical quality issues notwithstanding.

True - but of the business activity is in EU, then really it's Ireland's issue to sort out with the EU, it's a separate issue from the 'other side' of the taxation in the US. What they should do is sort it out.

The same thing applies to the Daily Beast and any number of other outfits.

That you would pick on this one highlights the bias in the system.

If there were a 'disconcerting rag' it would be Brietbart, not the Daily Mail.

'The Daily Mail' has a case. Go and visit their site right now [1] and tell me where the inflammatory or irresponsible headline is.

Now try 'The Daily Beast' [2], it's I think a little bit worse, and you have this flame-nugget: "White Violence Links Black Lives From Emmett Till to Floyd" which is an interesting thesis, but kind of racist.

The DM really isn't that bad, and much like the issue of 'Fidel Castro' it's a litmus test to see if people are emotionally clouded ideologues or not.

DM is a regular tabloid, that's it.

[1] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/index.html [2] https://www.thedailybeast.com/

Teachers have some of the most powerful Unions in the world.

The Ontario Teacher's Union might be the most powerful organization in Ontario. They own major league sports teams.

Nurses salary in Bay Area is $133K, national average is $80K which is pretty good. [1]

[1] https://www.travelnursing.com/news/career-development/where-...

The TV show 'COPS' would demonstrate very vividly how insane some people can be and of course they are 'selected clips' - but when they film in Canada ... almost nothing happens.

In LA, there used to be (still are?) news items on the 'Helicoptor following the chase' which, as a Canadian, was dumbfounding to me.

Youtube vides of 2 police arresting a man, 4 hands on him, they're putting on the cuffs and them bam he goes for his gun (!!!) - literally right has 2 officers have him under control, the assailant tries to kill the cops.

Traffic cops have people 'take off' on them far too often.

So combine this with the very real availability of guns, and you have quite dangerous situations.

Again, I would repeat that the cops are still overzealous, but unless you're antagonizing you have little to worry about other than maybe a cop in a bad mood.

It's not populist for people to have to deal with the fact that Americans themselves are statistically poorly behaved when confronting cops.

Americans often see a funny bit of behaviour on the news and think 'Oh, that's so Florida' - but for people outside the US the entire country looks like 'Florida'.

That category is a broader measure including basically all the 'helpers' in homes etc.. Some other numbers put nurses (strictly) up there with doctors at somewhat higher than average.

Men commit suicide at about 3-4x the rate of women (it's not quite as high for attempts, men are better at 'getting it done'), often related to occupational issues but nobody seems to think one bit about them. [1]

Education has by far one of the lowest suicide rates - of course, that's only one crude indirect measure of things. Jobs in education tend to be very stable, they are very highly regarded in the social sense (far more so than businessmen, politicians etc.) [2] In some places wages are not so good, but that's not always the case. Nurses are reasonably well comped but it's also impossible to quantify for some stress factors.

Doctor's suicide rates are effectively the highest of any profession (note that for Healthcare as an 'industry' the numbers are lower, but for Doctor specifically, it's high, i.e. most of the industry are not dealing directly with trauma, death).

Overall - I think COVID is obvious a giant bank of stress and generational PTSD and it's surprising how well the workers are taking it.

Doctors and Nurses are some of the most professional and conscientious people out there, the least likely to complain i.e. and occupational sense of duty that transcends 'compensation'.

COVID is a kind of war for them, it's just grinding them down.

[1] https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6903a1.htm

[2] https://moneywise.com/a/the-most-dishonest-profession

[3] http://www.zeroattempts.org/suicide-professions.html

I'm not offering an alternative, I'm pointing out the OP didn't make an argument, or rather one that wasn't based on any reasoning.

"just pay someone else's mortgage instead?" - it has nothing to do with what the owner of the property is doing with their money. If rent is a more viable option, then rent.

Ontario, Canada has a soft kind of rent control that works somewhat well for renting, that's an option.

Including housing in inflation calculations would be another 'option' because very low interest rates create bubbles.

Focusing on affordability in zoning.

Taxing rental income.

Taxing homes sales over a certain price.

Increasing or reducing property taxes.

There are a million variables to make the housing situation work better and crude 'own vs. rent' statements without arguments are not going to help.

Being pulled over is incredibly safe, there's almost zero chance of being shot for people who aren't antagonizing. Policing in America is overly assertive, but remember that almost 1/2 the people they pull over have guns, it's dangerous for them as well creating a bad kind of civil standoff. While more police training and oversight is necessary, it won't materially change the dynamic in any kind of statistically consequential way, it will just be more consistently fair.

I'm down-voting you because you haven't made an argument in the face of the issue.

The flaw the assumption is that somehow 'buying' a home that is 15x your annual salary, that takes your entire life to pay off, is some kind of 'freedom'.

It's not 'ownership' that is the problem, it's when combined with housing inflation etc..

It has nothing to do with liability.

Amazon hosts all sorts of content that could make them otherwise liable, and they are selling billions in knock-off products every month.

They are able to insulate themselves from it quite well - much like 'Avis Car Rental' is not 'liable' for agency or person that does something bad while renting their car.

Amazon's response was at least about PR, and probably a little bit politics.

We know the US spies and so does China - this is not news.

We do not have evidence the NSA is doing industrial espionage.

Moreover, this is Huawei, not technically 'the state' and it's about the fact they are related to the state - and - they've had incredible access as part of their normal operations which is questionable.

China is the most aggressive and active state sponsor of hacking and they 100% do it for purposes of industrial espionage.

Literally 'leaving the door open' to every phone in a nation to a state-backed entity seems unthinkable in 2021.

It's probably going to be best if everyone uses local carrier gear and consulting entities for this kind of work the advantage of 'totally free trade' doesn't seem to be more than what would be lost otherwise.