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Comment by omouse | Hacker News Reader

It's about putting a "merit"ocracy in place that encourages people to backstab and generally act like jerks in order to get ahead.

I don't know why you put meritocracy in quotes, because that's what it is. The merits that are rewarded just so happen to be acting like jerks. In general society that is not a merit; but in the company it is a merit therefore Uber is a meritocracy.

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If keeping important business information for yourself so colleagues fail counts as merit, then yeah, uber is meritocracy. Simultaneously, the word merit lost all meaning.

The example is from original article by susan who started current backslash.

I prefer to call this act "The Meritocrats!" as a way to highlight that it's likely to be obscene and out of line with what people think of as "merits".

A meritocracy is, by definition, a system where participants succeed based on relevant ability and talent. Meritocracies do not involve pushing others down, only pushing yourself up. Backstabbing is a textbook "down" action.

A system that encourages people to backstab to get ahead is effectively just a medeival court, in which employees act as petty nobles jostling for the king/boss's approval.

I put it in quotes because in my view it's not merit that gets you ahead in such an -ocracy.

Merit implies a quality of being good, or otherwise praiseworthy. Being a backstabbing misogynist dickbag gets you ahead at Uber but I would not describe you as worthy of merit.

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