Another basic example: imagine working at Basecamp and being like "Can we sponsor Django Girls?" (whatever the Rails equivalent is) Like maybe you want to have a more diverse team and this is one way of trying to recruit for it.

Without these "oh politics is sin" things, the bosses saying no might require them to justify it. Instead they can now weasel their way out of this kind of stuff, and basically shield themselves from criticism on this front, even if people internally might want to change [0]

Lots of conservative ideology is around this, trying to turn some subjective defense of beliefs into like... some objective rules about not doing X/Y/Z (basically maintaining the status quo). I'm not saying the decision makers are conservative, but that's what the result is going to be here.

(tbh I think there are good reasons to minimize discussions about current events into places where people aren't forced to be exposed to them at work. I know I don't want to, just cuz I'm already exposed to it a lot. But there's a difference between banning politics talk and just asking people to keep it in certain areas IMO)

[0] https://basecamp.com/about/team they don't have the engineering/non-engineering split here, but 50-odd people and they have 3 Dans + 3 Jasons. There are definitely companies with more absurd balances and the people at Basecamp probably would like to see improvements! But this kinda stuff makes it harder.

> "Can we sponsor Django Girls?"

Sure, just do it with your own money, not company money

Should I pay for recruiter fees out of my own pocket if I want to send a recruiter to an HBCU while I'm at it?

I'm not going to do a diversity spiel, but I have had the "would be nice for our team to have different kinds of people" discussion before, and part of solving that can involve more focused recruiting efforts (including stuff like sponsoring those kinds of events). It's totally a work-related thing. Why would I pay out of pocket to help my company hire?

Recruiting is different than public outreach. I think the strategy in recruiting is to hire the best people you can regardless of identity. “Best” is qualified by the tasks of the particular role

> "would be nice for our team to have different kinds of people"

so if you have a business case for recruiting different kinds of people (who currently don't get recruited), then that's not a political agenda. If you can point to evidence that the recruitment team is missing out on great candidates because of some systemic mis-identification.

But if you are suggesting that it would make the world a more equal place to hire those different people, even though they currently would not be hired, then that's not a great business case, and thus, becomes a political agenda.

> Django Girls is an international non-profit organization started to inspire women from all backgrounds to get interested in technology and to become programmers, offering a safe and friendly environment.

It's something that most tech companies would be willing to sponsor, not political at all.

It is political to sponsor an organisation attempting to correct for the disincentives women face in technical fields. Some people would prefer not to sponsor that, as they believe women are represented at their natural and correct ratios in tech.

Basically some people see affirmative action of any kind as anathema, and they get angry and insecure when these things are suggested, and people respond in turn. So I see how this could become a source of conflict.

Strong disagree here. By only including women they have made it highly political.

To be clear: are you saying that corporations shouldn’t sponsor anything, or are you singling out Django Girls as a “political” sponsorship?

If the latter, you’re kinda proving GP’s point. Django Girls is an ostensibly non-political organization, politicized solely because it acknowledges an aspect of people’s identity.

Idk anything about django girls (or the org behind django) I was assuming it’s an example of a politically motivated public outreach. Seems to me company time is better spent making good products than doing outreach. Like I have my own politically-motivated community involvements, but they have nothing to do with whatever company I work for, and I’ll continue doing them when I change companies anyway.

Companies sponsor things all the time — as marketing, to help with recruitment, etc. So my question is, do you think all corporate sponsorships are inappropriate? Or just “political” ones?

I think /individuals/ should be political actors, not companies. Companies should focus on market operations: build product, provide service. Maybe that doesn’t directly answer the question but I’m not sure it’s a great question tbh.

> because your spouse existing is a “political” concept

The point is to explicitly not politicize these conversations and instead talk and relate on a human-to-human level

My point is that some people consider my equal participation in that conversation to be inherently political. My point is essentially that anti-lgbt folk will dehumanize the conversation under the guise of “no politics”. Or at least that they could, and that it sure used to happen an awful lot, and it wasn’t that long ago.

It sure is. But “being reduced to a label” is one of the outcomes of such policies, and it’s exactly what I worry about when they’re enacted (because that’s how it used to work).

I’m not the one making it an identity politics / label issue; I’m saying “these policies are cover for mean people to reduce me to just a label and then weaponize that against me.”

> But “being reduced to a label” is one of the outcomes of such policies

I don’t really see how this can be the case because the very use of such labels as political categories is being removed. If the labels can’t be used then they can’t be weaponized

That’s not what they’re doing though - they’re not saying “we cannot say the word ‘gay’ any more because that makes the sentence a political sentence.” They’re saying you can’t talk about politics, and honestly specific words don’t even have to come into play. You can weaponize the policy easily without using specific words at all.

I worked in tech over twenty years ago and I knew multiple same sex couples back then. It wasn’t an issue at all. This was the Bay Area. May have been different elsewhere. It is still not an issue in the Bay Area.

The Bay Area has always been a bit ahead of the curve there - but my point isn’t just an LGBT thing... that’s the example most relevant to me personally. People of color could probably talk about similar issues related to this kind of policy.

Of note: Basecamp was at least until recently based primarily in the Midwest, in Chicago. Bay Area culture influences them in the same way it influences all tech culture, but they are certainly situated in a different culture than that of the Bay.

(Also of note is that while SF specifically was friendlier to LGBT people historically, this is a difference of degrees: LGBT folks in SF experienced plenty of discrimination over the years. And personally, it’s the only place I’ve been called a “faggot” while walking on the sidewalk - multiple times. Anecdote, but still.)

This^^ It's one of the gayest places on earth, of _course_ it's going to be more accepting.

I mean we’re really getting lost in the weeds here, I think. Like it’s not just about LGBT issues, it’s just an easy, personally relevant example for me to use.

To your point though: Chicago is decent, but arguably less so than SF.