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Leaked Video Shows Google Executives' Candid Reaction To Trump Victory (theguardian.com) 558

A number of Slashdot users have shared a leaked Google video from Breitbart, revealing the candid reactions of company executives to Donald Trump's unexpected victory in 2016. The Guardian summarizes: In an hour-long conversation, Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, chief executive Sundar Pichai, and executives Kent Walker, Ruth Porat and Eileen Noughton offered their reflections on the election, sought to reassure employees about issues such as immigration status and benefits for same-sex partners, and answered questions on topics ranging from filter bubbles and political polarization to encryption and net neutrality. The executives' reactions ranged from the emotional to the philosophical to the purely pragmatic. Porat appeared near tears in discussing her open support for Hillary Clinton and her father, who was a refugee. Walker discussed global political trends toward nationalism, populism and xenophobia. Pichai noted that the company was already "thoughtfully engaging" with Trump's transition team. While Breitbart argues the video shows evidence of Google's inherent bias against Republicans, Google says the executives are simply sharing their "personal views" and that it has no political bias. It does beg the question, should politics be discussed in the workplace? Longtime Slashdot reader emil writes in response to the video: [...] Disregarding the completely inappropriate expression of partisan views in the workplace, the video claims that "history is our side." These executives appear to have forgotten the incredible tumult in the distant past of the U.S. The last election was not an electoral tie that was thrown into the house of representatives (as was the election of 1800). The last election did not open a civil war as happened in 1861 when Lincoln took office. The last election did not open war with Great Britain, and will likely not precipitate a new set of proposed constitutional amendments to curb presidential power as did either of James Madison's terms in office (War of 1812, Hartford Convention). There may be a time for tears, and a time for hugs, but that time cannot be in the workplace. Most Fortune 500 employees took the news of the latest president elect with quiet perseverance in their professional settings regardless of their leanings, and it is time for Google to encourage the same. "At a regularly scheduled all-hands meeting, some Google employees and executives expressed their own personal views in the aftermath of a long and divisive election season," Google said in a statement. "For over 20 years, everyone at Google has been able to freely express their opinions at these meetings. Nothing was said at that meeting, or any other meeting, to suggest that any political bias ever influences the way we build or operate our products. To the contrary, our products are built for everyone, and we design them with extraordinary care to be a trustworthy source of information for everyone, without regard to political viewpoint."
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Leaked Video Shows Google Executives' Candid Reaction To Trump Victory

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  • by sabri ( 584428 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @04:39PM (#57309672)
    Political views are part of life. I don't need Emil to tell me what is appropriate to discuss and what is not. In fact, it is inappropriate for /. to push this stupid silencing agenda. As long as a discussion is respectful, it is appropriate everywhere.
    • by RightwingNutjob ( 1302813 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @04:45PM (#57309710)
      Nobody cares what you think either, and nobody cares what I think. When I'm at work, I'm paid to work, not to politick. I'll share my views and opinions gladly with anyone who asks, and I'll make conversation for the sake of conversation. But I'm not going to parade around with a Trump (or Gary Johnson, as the case was) logo tattooed on my forehead and demand that everyone drop what they're doing to listen to my brilliant treatise on life, the universe, and everything. It would distract me, and my interlocutors, from the work we're being paid to do. That's what makes it unprofessional.
    • by c ( 8461 ) <beauregardcp@gmail.com> on Thursday September 13, 2018 @04:57PM (#57309824)

      I have to admit, I'm slightly curious as to how Emil knows so much about the private reactions of most Fortune 500 executives... I mean, that's some NSA level business espionage there.

      I suppose Emil could be full of shit, but that would be highly irregular for a long-time Slashdot reader.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Darinbob ( 1142669 )

      And this really wasn't that political. Dismay at Trump being president has nothing to do with being opposed to Republicans or not. Even many Republicans were dismayed that Trump was elected.

      This sort of thing happened at many companies, there are indeed employees concerned about their immigration status, if their green card was going to get revoked.

      • Per my second comment on this topic, I realized that "dismay" is a key word, but it was only mentioned in a handful of comments on the story, and yours was one of the two moderated as insightful. If I ever got a mod point...

        I do think you raise an interesting new point about the google's dependence on international recruiting. To rise to the level of insight I think you'd need to go at least a step farther on the aspect of physical presence versus Internet-moderated tele-presence.

        However, as I already wrote

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Yup, this is the far right through and through. They cry and piss and moan about their right to free speech, but then they try and shame any opposing opinion into silence and argue that action should be taken against them and/or their company to make it comply.

      I have news for you, sometimes people have different opinions, it's well known that liberalism is prominent in California, especially in tech circles, so what the fuck is wrong with them expressing their liberal opinions? Last I checked despite Trump

  • The last election did not open a civil war as happened in 1861 when Lincoln took office.

    "And Google showed anti-Republican bias then, as well." -- Abraham Lincoln

  • by Octorian ( 14086 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @04:46PM (#57309722) Homepage

    Trump's campaign rhetoric really scared the crap out of many people. And not in a "OMG, Republicans nonsense!" way. In a "Are we going to start having to hide Muslim families in our basements?" way.

    At this point, I think the main thing protecting everyone is the sheer incompetence and disorganization of his entire administration. Its clear now that he's far more interested Tweeting and continuing to hold those campaign rallies than in actually doing the job of President.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      You sure that the ignorance across the populace in how the government actually works wasn't what scared people? It's as of people think the President controls all three branches of government (even those previous ones have tried to legislate through executive order).

      • by Darinbob ( 1142669 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:23PM (#57310038)

        There are people who honestly think stuff like that. I see this a lot in immigrants who assume the US government is just as authoritarian as in the old country But it's even more surprising to me that citizens born and living here for decades still seem to think the same way. The fact that more people show up to vote in presidential years than other years shows that they seem to think that the presidential election is more important than congressional elections.

        • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

          by Crashmarik ( 635988 )

          There are people who honestly think stuff like that. I see this a lot in immigrants who assume the US government is just as authoritarian as in the old country But it's even more surprising to me that citizens born and living here for decades still seem to think the same way. The fact that more people show up to vote in presidential years than other years shows that they seem to think that the presidential election is more important than congressional elections.

          I see immigrants that come here and work to make the place just as bad as the one they left.

          Hell I see people leave blue states because the taxes are killing them, and their livelihoods are under attack and then keep voting for the same people and policies that drove them out.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      Here's the thing though. The democrats ginned up roughly the same amount of fear and apprehension over Romney, W, Dole, Bush 41, and Reagan before him.

      The echo chamber was what was scary. Liberals were psyching themselves out beyond reason. The Atlantic ran an article provocatively raising the question whether Jews counted as white, and people with whom I talked regularly (online) were with a straight face citing that article and telling me that questions were being raised about whether Jews counted as wh
      • by JoshuaZ ( 1134087 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:15PM (#57309964) Homepage

        Here's the thing though. The democrats ginned up roughly the same amount of fear and apprehension over Romney, W, Dole, Bush 41, and Reagan before him.

        This wasn't at al l the same. You had people like George Will, and other moderate Republicans saying that Trump wasn't a normal Republican who they could support. I've spent every election since 1996 telling people on both ends of the political spectrum that it wouldn't be so bad if the candidate from the major opposing party won. There's one exception; this last election, because Trump really did represent a serious threat to the stability and functionality of American democracy and power. That some people cried wolf is not an excuse to ignore when the myriad people who hadn't previously been wolf criers start saying their's a wolf.

      • by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:16PM (#57309972)

        Here's the thing though. The democrats ginned up roughly the same amount of fear and apprehension over Romney, W, Dole, Bush 41, and Reagan before him.

        Bullshit. I know it was called fake news, but I watched the video of Trump saying that if Hillary was elected people should take the 2nd amendment option. Sure, he was probably joking, but you have to really be a right-wing nut job if you think that's like other Republicans. None of the presidents you listed suggested killing (or jailing) their ravels. There are plenty similar examples were I had to look at the videos because I couldn't believe it was possible for Trump to be so awful. I know people legally here who literally left the country after Trump was elected. I've never seen or heard of that before. So, no, something is different this time. Eventually you'll realize who he is and regret your support.

      • by Darinbob ( 1142669 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:25PM (#57310058)

        There's a wide swath of people in any party. In the past I generally ignored what the wingnuts on the far left and far right though, they were in the minority. Lately though, the extremists in both parties seem to have gotten a hold of the controls.

        • There are no extreme leftists anywhere near control of anything.

          Worst thing coming from that side is some oversensitive children screaming on the internet.

          Also BTW, "wingnut" is an exclusively right-wing term. The left-wing equivalent is "moonbat".

      • said he would. He gutted unions, which today any credible economist will tell you is why wages are in decline (they call it "collective bargaining" because Union's a dirty word these days). He was the one responsible for stock buy backs. That was a crime before him. Companies weren't supposed to manipulate their own stock price. That lead to CEOs paid in stock which created the distorted market we see today where companies do mass layoffs and unnecessary outsourcing to get short term bumps to stock that tra
    • by dgatwood ( 11270 )

      Trump's campaign rhetoric really scared the crap out of many people. And not in a "OMG, Republicans nonsense!" way. In a "Are we going to start having to hide Muslim families in our basements?" way.

      This. Among other things, Trump promised a Muslim travel ban. Given that Google has multiple offices in the Middle East (Dubai, Haifa, and Istanbul), a sizable number of Google employees would have been directly affected by that, had it been implemented as promised (and some were probably affected anyway).

      At th

      • by Octorian ( 14086 )

        At this point, I think the main thing protecting everyone is the sheer incompetence and disorganization of his entire administration. Its clear now that he's far more interested Tweeting and continuing to hold those campaign rallies than in actually doing the job of President.

        When he got elected, I said that this would be the truest test of checks and balances to date, but I never imagined he would be checked and balanced by his own staff. This is really turning out to be far more entertaining than I ever would have imagined.

        Indeed, it has been. Its times like this that I'm grateful that the president actually isn't as powerful as all his supporters expect him to be. This episode may also lead to congress reigning in all those executive powers they openly dolled out during times that they liked the president.

        • This episode may also lead to congress reigning in all those executive powers they openly dolled out during times that they liked the president.

          Neither party thinks like that anymore. They both just realize that eventually their turn will come around again and think of all of the "good" that they'll be able to do when they get to be king.

    • by Crashmarik ( 635988 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:42PM (#57310192)

      Trump's campaign rhetoric really scared the crap out of many people. And not in a "OMG, Republicans nonsense!"

      I seem to recall hearing 6 years of BUSH HITLER WORST PRESIDENT EVER

      He got a reprieve for 2 years because even the Democrats weren't stupid enough to attack him right after 9/11

      • He got a reprieve for 2 years because even the Democrats weren't stupid enough to attack him right after 9/11

        ...Bush was warned point-blank that Al Queda was determined to strike the United States, and that they might use highjacked planes to do so. If Bill Clinton was so warned and then sat on his ass while the nation was under attack, he would have been impeached before he could return The Pet Goat to the school library.

  • Meh (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jlaprise1 ( 1042514 ) <j-laprise@northwestern.edu> on Thursday September 13, 2018 @04:47PM (#57309728)

    So what?

    A large group of youngish, diverse, highly educated, intelligent technologists were dismayed at Trump's election.

    I fail to see anything surprising.

    I'd be equally unsurprised by the (likely) positive mood at a morning sales meeting at a southern Indiana John Deere dealership.

    • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      As I remember, there was some dismay among Republicans after Trump won the nomination as well.

      • Re:Meh (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Darinbob ( 1142669 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:29PM (#57310088)

        Some? I saw tons of dismay across the board. It didn't take long though for Republican leadership to start praising Trump.

        I find so many things ironic and hypocritica. Bill Clinton not being good enough to be president because of bad character and poor morals (this was a louder criticism than criticism over his policies). A couple decades later and someone with worse character and morals is being promoted by the exact same people (led by hypocrite-in-chief Gingrich).

        • worse character and morals is being promoted by the exact same people (led by hypocrite-in-chief Gingrich).

          We dodged a bullet when Gingrich didn't get elected.

      • Yeah, that was an outstanding (I mean literally it "stands out") sequence of events. There were, what, a dozen Republican candidates in the primary? A stage FULL of actual Republican Party insiders in every debate. And Trump. No way in hell, right?

        Yeah, they were dismayed at the outcome.
  • Where can one go for true information these days? On the war in Syria, most media reports don't capture the real truth.

    They do not "force" government to tell the truth.

    In fact, this administration, fearing the loss of leverage in Syria, now says it knows Assad will use chemical weapons.

    They do not mention that what Assad will be doing is what the American government did in Mosul, Iraq, or that Aleppo is now in relative peace after Assad established sanity there.

  • by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @04:52PM (#57309778)

    I watched pretty much the whole thing rather than reading excerpts. I thought it was an interesting window into the tech world and Google world specifically right after the election...

    The video is meant to show bias, and it does - but it also shows at that point at least some expressed that there should be a willingness to listen to opposing views, a feel that now seems to be utterly gone from the left and also for Google internally where it is safe to identify you gender as Dragon, but not safe to identify as a conservative.

    One thought that occurred to me as the Google employees and execs were having Q&A was - there was talk about inequality and low information voters. But both of those notions are way too simplistic.

    One of the Google employees even brought to light the contradiction of the supposed "low information voter" by saying they consumed a lot of "fake news". Well that is MORE information, not low. And the reality is that a lot of what was considered fake news by some, was not really fake at all. In fact the reason Trump won was because we live in a high-information world now, where all of the people can understand the political class as a whole are scum rather than believing the truly Fake News that has been pushed on us for decades about all Washington politicians.

    On the subject of inequality, it strikes me that people always refer to this in the financial sense. But most people do not care if someone makes more than them - otherwise why would we idolize music and movie stars? The inequality that is dangerous, is more the inequality of power not money - that is, the power over your own life. So many times we see people at high levels of government or business or really anything, get away with stuff where we know we would be in jail or worse. At the same time rules from those same people control more and more of what we are allowed to do personally. THAT is the kind of thing that leads to true resentment, a dangerous force.

    • by butchersong ( 1222796 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @04:59PM (#57309856)
      What I find amusing about that is that the first time I heard the phrase "low information voter", I was a kid riding in my dad's pickup truck as he listened to Rush Limbaugh. For years I assumed that was one of his coined phrases. I think it's natural whichever side you are on to assume the others on the other side of the line are the ignorant ones.
    • by hey! ( 33014 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:45PM (#57310222) Homepage Journal

      Oh, more data doesn't mean more information.

      Like most words, "information" has many meanings, including in certain contexts entropy. But that's not what "low information voter" refers to. It refers to uniformed voters. You could watch North Korean TV every waking moment and you'd be absorbing plenty of data, but very little information -- in the sense of that which makes you informed.

    • by ras ( 84108 )

      where it is safe to identify you gender as Dragon, but not safe to identify as a conservative.

      As an Australian looking on a US politics, this is something I don't quite get. It's not that we don't have a similar right wing crazy politicians in Australia. We do. It's not that these loud right wing crazies aren't members of our version of your Republican party (who confusingly for Amercians call themselves the Liberals, but it's in reference to the John Stuart Mill definition of liberal). Most right wing

      • I disagree on the direction people are being pushed - I follow a LOT of independently minded people on Twitter, who are not left or right wing, but actually have different views depending on the subject.

        Almsot all of them are way more moved to the right, even to the point of sometimes defending Trump even though they might despise him.

        The left has become the most puritan fascist force I have ever seen. Over my life I have voted for every party but there is no modern Democrat I can possibly hope to endorse,

        • by sjames ( 1099 )

          Strangely, I was going to say the same thing with the polarities flipped. There's a lot of extremism out there and a lot of extremists who seem to delight more in their policies being rammed down "the opposition"'s throats rather than convincing them to compromise.

    • we live in a high-information world now, where all of the people can understand the political class as a whole are scum

      That's an interesting thought.

    • The video is meant to show bias, and it does - but it also shows at that point at least some expressed that there should be a willingness to listen to opposing views, a feel that now seems to be utterly gone from the left and also for Google internally where it is safe to identify you gender as Dragon, but not safe to identify as a conservative.

      People can have their own political views without letting it affect their work.

      Also you need to consider how "conservative" has changed in the last few years - in 2013 the average conservative wasn't openly anti-democratic, openly sympathetic to if not supportive of white nationalism, openly hostile to the idea of an objective reality, and willing to give their party leaders every free pass and blank cheque in the book while they generally act like trashy 3rd-world gangster-politicians on the path to dictat

  • by OrangeTide ( 124937 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @04:55PM (#57309806) Homepage Journal

    The Citizens United ruling gave corporations the right to express political views. If you don't like it, you'll have to overturn that ruling with new legislation (and potentially an amendment).

    I feel like the current administration only likes it when the laws work for them, and want to ignore laws that are inconvenient for them. It's the sort of crap that dictators of a banana republic try to pull.

    (not AC because clearly non-partisan. i.e. hopefully I pissed off everyone)

    • by GlennC ( 96879 )

      I feel like every administration only likes it when the laws work for them, and want to ignore laws that are inconvenient for them.

      FTFY

      • To varying degrees, yes. But it's important not to lose sight of the extreme nature of the current administration.

  • by fahrbot-bot ( 874524 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:00PM (#57309862)

    While Breitbart argues the video shows evidence of Google's inherent bias against Republicans, ...

    Breitbart arguing about inherent bias.

    • by djinn6 ( 1868030 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:32PM (#57310110)
      Just because the teapot called the kettle black, doesn't mean they're not both black.
    • >"Breitbart arguing about inherent bias."

      Yeah, because stuff from MSNBC, Washington Post, NY Times, Huffington, or CNN would be SO much less biased [NOT]...

      Finding relatively unbiased media has never been easy in the last 25+ years. It hasn't gotten better, just worse.... the only REAL difference is that the "mainstream" media is now being ever more pressured by Internet sources that can't be so easily "controlled" to fit their narratives.

  • They look and act like they are nine years old.

    They need to grow up!

  • there's nothing candid about it. This would have been a carefully prepared statement. It would be far more interesting to have a video of them talking about Trump in a boardroom meeting.
  • by Marful ( 861873 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:15PM (#57309968)
    If Google is claiming that this video merely expresses the employee's "personal view", why are they using company assets to make a company video, during company time, during a company review seminar?

    Why do they need to make a company video to "reflect" on the political outcome?

    I'm sorry google, you're full of shit. This isn't a personal view, this is a company view.
    • by Knightman ( 142928 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:51PM (#57310272)

      IDK, it couldn't be that they made the video so other employees that couldn't attend also got the info from the Q&A...

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        IDK, it couldn't be that they made the video so other employees that couldn't attend also got the info from the Q&A...

        That's even worse. Making a company video on company time and disseminating it to everyone not present is not expression of personal views. It's a training technique.

  • by GregMmm ( 5115215 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:26PM (#57310066)

    "For over 20 years, everyone at Google has been able to freely express their opinions at these meetings"

    Right!! What a laugh. I'm sure if someone walked up there and said "I'm so happy, Donald Trump will be our President" they might not have walked out of there alive.

    No way in that meeting could you freely express your opinions.

  • by WindBourne ( 631190 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:30PM (#57310098) Journal
    The far right argues that a non-living businesses has religion and therefore are not subject to various regs.
    Now, they are arguing that a business should not have the rest of first amendment, even when it is just inside of the business.

    I hope that SCOTUS gets a case out of this. It should be interesting to see what will happen.
  • by stomv ( 80392 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @05:38PM (#57310152) Homepage
    It doesn't "beg the question." It raises the question. Begging the question [wikipedia.org] is a logical fallacy that occurs when an argument's premises assume the truth of the conclusion, instead of supporting it. It is a type of circular reasoning and an informal fallacy.
  • by Tailhook ( 98486 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @06:02PM (#57310322)

    Oh. Some people don't share our "values." How awful.

    Best part: we'll use our AI tech to "reach" those knuckle-draggers and educate them. LOL. At what point does such vast ignorance measure intellect?

    Someone leaked this; a secret soul that has to exhibit the necessary group-think but actually despises these weird freaks and their intolerance.

    Imagine the witch hunt that must be under way right now.

  • I mean, not for nothing, but the Google executives turned out to be exactly right about Trump.

    https://theconcourse.deadspin.... [deadspin.com]

    And further, so fucking what if every Google executive later dropped their pants and took a giant shit into a MAGA hat? What's it to you? Go use fucking Bing and stop whining like little bitches just because the people running the most powerful corporations in the world were smart enough to realize that 304 racist electors had just installed the most corrupt president in modern hi

  • I don't get it (Score:4, Informative)

    by Tablizer ( 95088 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @06:23PM (#57310418) Journal

    T is a rude arrogant narcissist (among other things) to a degree that overwhelms his party affiliation. Why the hell should anyone expect people to be happy about such as a President?

  • Showing disgust at the election of a faithless, bigoted womanizer who hasn't a shred of decency is not partisan.
  • by Chas ( 5144 ) on Thursday September 13, 2018 @07:34PM (#57310776) Homepage Journal

    "We want to encourage diversity of ideas."

    JAMES DAMORE

    "Whoopsie!"

    Man they need an AWFUL big shovel for all that bullshit.

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