A ten-page document objecting to Google’s diversity policies has been published in full online, somewhat stamping out the company’s efforts to become a completely diverse and welcoming organisation to everyone, despite their sex, orientation, faith, race or any other factor.
Motherboard first reported on the existence of the document last week, but now Gizmodo has released the entire contents of the file, which is reportedly a male Google employee’s thoughts about the tech giant’s policies on recruiting and treatment of female employees.
Titled “Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber,” the employee claims that women are under-represented in the tech industry because they are biologically different to men. He also said we should stop getting hung up on the idea that pay inequality is directly related to sexism and efforts by Google to enrol female members of staff in education programmes are “misguided.”
“I value diversity and inclusion, am not denying that sexism exists, and don’t endorse using stereotypes,” the memo states. “When addressing the gap in representation in the population, we need to look at population level differences in distributions. If we can’t have an honest discussion about this, then we can never truly solve the problem.
“Psychological safety is built on mutual respect and acceptance, but unfortunately our culture of shaming and misrepresentation is disrespectful and unaccepting of anyone outside its echo chamber.”
Motherboard has now received a response from Danielle Brown, Google’s vice president of diversity, integrity and governance, who was brought onboard to manage investigations that the company isn’t paying female employees a fair wage.
“Part of building an open, inclusive environment means fostering a culture in which those with alternative views, including different political views, feel safe sharing their opinions. But that discourse needs to work alongside the principles of equal employment found in our Code of Conduct, policies, and anti-discrimination laws,” she said in response to the memo.
She also made it clear that Google does not agree with the writings of this particular employee and his views are not supported, nor encouraged.
