It's heartening to see tech CEOs speak out against bigotry and disheartening to see other tech leaders remain quiet and it all makes a potent narrative and easy access to the tops of message board front pages.
But it does not. actually. matter. what tech leadership does.
We are not all sitting dutifully in our seats at Moscone waiting to see what "one more thing" from CEOs and venture capitalists is going to look like. We're also not prisoners of the management of companies whose CEOs join the administration or attend summits at Trump's garish Barad-Dûfus.
It may not be true for all workers in all industries but as someone who's been working in tech for more than 20 years I'm telling you that our management needs us more than we need them. There has never been a better market for our services or a set of employers more dependent on our goodwill and cooperation than in 2017.
Do not wait for your firm's CEO to take a stand. Organize with your coworkers. If you don't know how to get started doing that, start thinking of stabs you can take at the problem. Organizing is a problem where code actually might make a difference. Organize a pledge, or a group statement, or meetups. Or some other idea we haven't come up with yet.
A lot of engineers want to believe their work is apolitical. I understand the impulse. But your work is political whether you want it to be or not. If you don't put your market power to use for your beliefs, you're just accepting your employer's default settings, and putting it to work for theirs. Don't accept the defaults.
Organize your workplace. You have a crazy amount of influence you're not using right now. It won't always be like this; don't waste the opportunity.
Places to start:
The Indivisible guide:
https://www.indivisibleguide.com/ --- there are at least 10 software projects buried in this thing, but also remember the same ideas apply on a smaller scale both in local politics and at your work place.
https://twitter.com/techsolidarity --- show up to one of these. They're well attended and they'll interface you to your local (serious) activist community, people actually working with those at risk.
Also things I've said in the last few days that I'd rather not repeat but are relevant:
On calling your reps:
https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=13509555 --- please punch your Senators and Congresspeople's numbers into your speed dial.
On running for office:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13493366 --- please convince a friend to run for local office.
On U2F, TOTP, and SMS:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13493100 --- please disable SMS authentication on services that will let you. :)
If you're building applications to ensure that people put pressure on their local representatives or, even better, to get normal people to run for local elected office, I want to help!