A 10-page internal memo titled “Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber”was recently leaked by an employee at Google.
What was the memo about?
It attempts to justify gender imbalance and systemic discrimination in the workplace.
It states that “men and women biologically differ in many ways” and that “Women, on average, have more Neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance)”.
Now Google has distanced itself from the memo.
What is the situation of women in Silicon Valley?
Google, like other companies often do during the time of accusations, is trying to dismiss the pseudo-science and bigotry of the memo as the outburst of a single individual.
But the reality is, these underlying assumptions are common among many in the Silicon Valley.
They also more often than not blame the victim.
Earlier this year, Google was accused of gender pay discrimination by the US labour department.
Uber’s CEO also resigned after stories of harassment and discrimination in the company came to light.
In 2016, a survey found that 60% of the women working in Silicon Valley received unwanted sexual advances and 87% witnessed demeaning comments from colleagues.
Ideas like those in the Google document are a poor attempt to turn the clock back to when patriarchal privilege could display itself with impunity.
