zlacker

>>tech-h+(OP)
I don't really understand why it's surprising to anyone that they would face "internal retaliation" after exposing their employer as evil and boycott worthy to the entire world. By publicizing it to the degree that they did and attaching their name to it, they were putting their interests over the company. If my company started doing business practices that I didn't approve of, I would try my hardest to change the direction from the inside out or I would leave and then criticize. I don't understand the desire to stay with a company and accept paychecks while simultaneously publicly denouncing and leading protests against them.

>>charli+Cf
This should be obvious to anyone, but people are for some reason having trouble understanding it.

It's completely expected for a company to get rid of individuals on the payroll who are badmouthing the company they work for.

Why would anyone willfully employ people to work against the company's interest?

>>snvzz+ri
I don't think people are having trouble understanding it. I would rather say some of us have a broader view of it.

It's the same old discussion about whether something is right just because it's legal or allowed. Just because a company has a right -- and an incentive -- to do something, doesn't mean that's a morally or ethically right thing to do.

In my opinion, what Whittaker is doing is, in a way, analogous to civil disobedience. And, just like with civil disobedience, reprisals are expected. It's worth keeping in mind that those reprisals aren't automatically right by virtue of being expected, just as her actions aren't automatically right by virtue of being similar to civil disobedience.

In other words, some of us feel we can't afford to, as another commenter put it, "leave your politics at home and let me do my job in peace". I believe this attitude -- that science and engineering should somehow remain orthogonal to and decoupled from ethics and morality -- to be downright pernicious to the society.

>>CodeMa+Zx
>It's the same old discussion about whether something is right just because it's legal or allowed.

It's actually not about legality. I didn't even suggest that.

>Just because a company has a right -- and an incentive -- to do something, doesn't mean that's a morally or ethically right thing to do.

As I said, it is expected to do it. Because companies have their own interests. The interests of the shareholders in Google's case. And Google is expected to act to protect them.

This includes getting rid of employees that act to sabotage the company, in this case by publicly badmouthing it.