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Comment by k-mcgrady | Hacker News Reader

This thread seems to be a perfect demonstration of the problems when it comes to diversity in tech. People just don't seem to get it. I see the same thing in threads around big SV names sexually harassing women (and in those cases it blows my mind even more that people don't get that it's a problem).

It seems like a lot of people are basing their opinions on logic (fine) but in a perfect world where everyone has equal opportunity, we live in a meritocracy, and people are judged solely on performance. Unfortunately none of those things are true and we need to manipulate things manually to ensure people are given equal opportunity.

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This thread feels like a Breitbart comment section.

That's a nice tactic for discounting people's thoughtful opinions. Cognitive dissonance resolved!

HN Threads on articles unrelated to technology matters tend towards the dumpster-fire end of the spectrum. The aforementioned classification is orthogonal to the (insert leftist news site here)/(insert rightist news site here) axis.

Agreed. Many engineers seem to think if it's true then thry can just say it. To them it makes logical sense -- st least when it suits them.

My favorite explanation of this effect goes like this: You have students in a classroom, sitting in 5 rows of 5 students. The teacher gives each student a crumpled ball of paper. Each ball is identical. The teacher then places a bin at the very front of the class and says "Okay, you each get one throw from your seat. If you hit the bin, you get an A"

Equal opportunity. Everyone is throwing the same ball into the same bin, and everyone gets a chance to throw their ball of paper, hit the bin, and get an A.

But some students are 5ft away and others are 30ft away. Suddenly not so fair.

This comic also explains it well: http://imgur.com/gallery/h82vC

> But some students are 5ft away and others are 30ft away. Suddenly not so fair.

Employers don't know who came from privileged backgrounds and who didn't. Legally, they shouldn't even be asking about it.

The concern isn't about whether employers should help people out. The concern is that the current rubric is too inexact. And that questioning the rubric is considered hateful.

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