<story><title>Google Doesn’t Want Staff Debating Politics at Work Anymore</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-23/google-doesn-t-want-employees-debating-politics-at-work-anymore</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>new2628</author><text>I surely enjoy wild associations as much as the next guy, but I meant more pedestrian topics such as:&lt;p&gt;- are you eating meat or are you vegetarian?&lt;p&gt;- do you take a car to work or ride a bike or take public transportation?&lt;p&gt;- do you drink tap water or bottled water?&lt;p&gt;- do you send your kids to private or public school?&lt;p&gt;Now try discussing any of these in depth &amp;quot;without politics&amp;quot;.</text></item><item><author>stcredzero</author><text>&lt;i&gt;That sounds like a fine approach, but unfortunately politics creeps into more and more aspects of life.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;Do a historical survey of people who tried to suffuse politics completely through the lives of their followers. For completeness, look also at the actions of religions in the same way.&lt;p&gt;Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Politics, movements of any kind which demand the entirety of the lives of their followers are often perpetrators of the worst things.&lt;p&gt;As a counterpoint, look to times and places where people are free to be open, to be themselves, and to choose how they live. There is also a power in the dispersal of power. Many call this freedom.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;Like that quote &amp;quot;you may not be interested in war, but ...&amp;quot;&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;The way Robert Heinlein put it was something like this: &amp;quot;The end product of politics is like the result of peristalsis. It&amp;#x27;s not very pleasant, but it&amp;#x27;s no less vital to your health and well being.&amp;quot; I think this is a good analogy. Imagine having a cocktail party conversation with someone singularly obsessed with their digestive tract.</text></item><item><author>new2628</author><text>That sounds like a fine approach, but unfortunately politics creeps into more and more aspects of life, hardly any topic remains apolitical. 
Like that quote &amp;quot;you may not be interested in war, but ...&amp;quot;</text></item><item><author>apple4ever</author><text>Great points. There are plenty of areas to discuss politics, and at work doesn&amp;#x27;t have to be one of them.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;ve studiously avoided talking to anybody at work about politics, as it usually only serves to anger people if you don&amp;#x27;t agree. I&amp;#x27;ve had a successful career of doing that.</text></item><item><author>stcredzero</author><text>&lt;i&gt;I worked at Google for quite a while, 2005-2013, and even then, the internal political discussion was pretty toxic, but a lot smaller in scope since there are far fewer people.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;It sounds like the work culture at Google has rediscovered the emergent factors which gave rise to the traditional cultural strictures against talking about money, politics, and religion.&lt;p&gt;Good science is repeatable. Given that Google is arguably an intellectually friendly environment, where more people than average understand how to talk in ways that get closer to truth, the inadvertent experiment conducted by Google over the past 15 years or so should hold a lot of weight.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;It only makes sense that they&amp;#x27;re cutting down on something that has turned toxic. It&amp;#x27;s a bit disappointing to hear, since I personally enjoyed the occasional, honest discussion with smart people of other viewpoints - these good discussions made the much larger number of ridiculous ones, bearable.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;It sounds like the overall cost-benefit tradeoff supports Google corporate&amp;#x27;s decision. (There were externalities beyond the discussions themselves.)</text></item><item><author>oppositelock</author><text>I worked at Google for quite a while, 2005-2013, and even then, the internal political discussion was pretty toxic, but a lot smaller in scope since there are far fewer people.&lt;p&gt;There were definitely groups meant for discussing politics, and loudmouths like me willingly participated in those - however, it was very uncivil. There was a majority view in the company, and if anyone didn&amp;#x27;t agree with the majority view, the majority engaged in heckling, ridicule, etc. It was already becoming an echo chamber, and as the majority grew, their tactics grew more petty and vicious. However, this was expected in the politics groups, and you knowingly entered that fray.&lt;p&gt;What seems to be happening a lot lately is that politics are spilling over into large, global mailing lists which target a whole geographic region, so many people get involved, and when a company has 200k employees and contractors, you will find some outliers in there who will pick nasty fights.&lt;p&gt;It only makes sense that they&amp;#x27;re cutting down on something that has turned toxic. It&amp;#x27;s a bit disappointing to hear, since I personally enjoyed the occasional, honest discussion with smart people of other viewpoints - these good discussions made the much larger number of ridiculous ones, bearable.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>tidepod12</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m trying to say this as politely as possible, but... are you serious?&lt;p&gt;If you seriously cannot have conversations at this level without them turning into political discussions, you really need to reflect on your conversational habits. It is absolutely not normal or healthy if you can&amp;#x27;t talk about &lt;i&gt;drinking water&lt;/i&gt; without it turning political.&lt;p&gt;My SO is a vegetarian. It comes up &lt;i&gt;a lot&lt;/i&gt;, both with my friends (who are all meat eaters) and newly met people alike, but I seriously cannot think of &lt;i&gt;one single time&lt;/i&gt; it has turned into a political issue.&lt;p&gt;If these topics are frequently turning political for you, it&amp;#x27;s on you.</text></comment>
<story><title>Google Doesn’t Want Staff Debating Politics at Work Anymore</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-23/google-doesn-t-want-employees-debating-politics-at-work-anymore</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>new2628</author><text>I surely enjoy wild associations as much as the next guy, but I meant more pedestrian topics such as:&lt;p&gt;- are you eating meat or are you vegetarian?&lt;p&gt;- do you take a car to work or ride a bike or take public transportation?&lt;p&gt;- do you drink tap water or bottled water?&lt;p&gt;- do you send your kids to private or public school?&lt;p&gt;Now try discussing any of these in depth &amp;quot;without politics&amp;quot;.</text></item><item><author>stcredzero</author><text>&lt;i&gt;That sounds like a fine approach, but unfortunately politics creeps into more and more aspects of life.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;Do a historical survey of people who tried to suffuse politics completely through the lives of their followers. For completeness, look also at the actions of religions in the same way.&lt;p&gt;Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Politics, movements of any kind which demand the entirety of the lives of their followers are often perpetrators of the worst things.&lt;p&gt;As a counterpoint, look to times and places where people are free to be open, to be themselves, and to choose how they live. There is also a power in the dispersal of power. Many call this freedom.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;Like that quote &amp;quot;you may not be interested in war, but ...&amp;quot;&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;The way Robert Heinlein put it was something like this: &amp;quot;The end product of politics is like the result of peristalsis. It&amp;#x27;s not very pleasant, but it&amp;#x27;s no less vital to your health and well being.&amp;quot; I think this is a good analogy. Imagine having a cocktail party conversation with someone singularly obsessed with their digestive tract.</text></item><item><author>new2628</author><text>That sounds like a fine approach, but unfortunately politics creeps into more and more aspects of life, hardly any topic remains apolitical. 
Like that quote &amp;quot;you may not be interested in war, but ...&amp;quot;</text></item><item><author>apple4ever</author><text>Great points. There are plenty of areas to discuss politics, and at work doesn&amp;#x27;t have to be one of them.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;ve studiously avoided talking to anybody at work about politics, as it usually only serves to anger people if you don&amp;#x27;t agree. I&amp;#x27;ve had a successful career of doing that.</text></item><item><author>stcredzero</author><text>&lt;i&gt;I worked at Google for quite a while, 2005-2013, and even then, the internal political discussion was pretty toxic, but a lot smaller in scope since there are far fewer people.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;It sounds like the work culture at Google has rediscovered the emergent factors which gave rise to the traditional cultural strictures against talking about money, politics, and religion.&lt;p&gt;Good science is repeatable. Given that Google is arguably an intellectually friendly environment, where more people than average understand how to talk in ways that get closer to truth, the inadvertent experiment conducted by Google over the past 15 years or so should hold a lot of weight.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;It only makes sense that they&amp;#x27;re cutting down on something that has turned toxic. It&amp;#x27;s a bit disappointing to hear, since I personally enjoyed the occasional, honest discussion with smart people of other viewpoints - these good discussions made the much larger number of ridiculous ones, bearable.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;It sounds like the overall cost-benefit tradeoff supports Google corporate&amp;#x27;s decision. (There were externalities beyond the discussions themselves.)</text></item><item><author>oppositelock</author><text>I worked at Google for quite a while, 2005-2013, and even then, the internal political discussion was pretty toxic, but a lot smaller in scope since there are far fewer people.&lt;p&gt;There were definitely groups meant for discussing politics, and loudmouths like me willingly participated in those - however, it was very uncivil. There was a majority view in the company, and if anyone didn&amp;#x27;t agree with the majority view, the majority engaged in heckling, ridicule, etc. It was already becoming an echo chamber, and as the majority grew, their tactics grew more petty and vicious. However, this was expected in the politics groups, and you knowingly entered that fray.&lt;p&gt;What seems to be happening a lot lately is that politics are spilling over into large, global mailing lists which target a whole geographic region, so many people get involved, and when a company has 200k employees and contractors, you will find some outliers in there who will pick nasty fights.&lt;p&gt;It only makes sense that they&amp;#x27;re cutting down on something that has turned toxic. It&amp;#x27;s a bit disappointing to hear, since I personally enjoyed the occasional, honest discussion with smart people of other viewpoints - these good discussions made the much larger number of ridiculous ones, bearable.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>cco</author><text>These are all very easy to discuss at work without politics. You ask, &amp;quot;Do you have any dietary restrictions? If so you should make sure to read the menu closely, it&amp;#x27;ll tell you what the dish contains.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;There, now I know as much as I need to about my coworker&amp;#x27;s diet. We&amp;#x27;re here to work and if you&amp;#x27;re going to be a member of a _diverse_ community with a shared goal you&amp;#x27;re going to need to accept that other people live their lives differently than yours and that&amp;#x27;s ok. I don&amp;#x27;t need to know the reason my coworker is a vegetarian I just need to let them know if my cookies that I brought to work contain animal products.&lt;p&gt;If you refuse to get along the result will be internal strife and the shared goal, a successful company, a working community, etc. will fail.</text></comment>