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Another day, another white cishet man in Trump’s America trying to defend his bigotry.
James Damore, a former Google engineer, has filed a class action lawsuit against the company claiming that Google unfairly discriminates against white conservative men. Damore was fired in August after posting on the company’s internal message board that women are not equally represented in tech because they are biologically less capable of engineering.
“Google executives and employees condemned Damore, his memo, and his views,” according to the lawsuit, filed Monday. Damore also claimed he was laughed at, personally insulted, and attacked before being fired. He’s joined in the suit by David Gudeman, a former Google employee who was fired in December 2016. Gudeman used an internal forum to question a Muslim co-worker’s account of being targeted by the FBI and tried to say that the FBI was legitimate in investigating his co-worker. Google human resources fired him, saying it was unacceptable to accuse a colleague of terrorism based on religion.
Dhillon Law Group, the firm representing the case, says that it aims to represent all employees of Google who have been discriminated against due to their perceived conservative political views, their male gender, or Caucasian race. The plaintiffs seek monetary, non-monetary, and punitive remedies.
Google seems less than bothered by the lawsuit claim, telling Reuters that it “look[s] forward to defending against Mr. Damore’s lawsuit in court.” Basically, nobody’s checking for Damore, Gudeman, or their salty white cishet man tears. Attention would be better paid to the three former female Google employees who filed a lawsuit in September saying that the company pays women less than men across the board. That lawsuit also claims that Google assigns women to lower job tiers with less opportunity for upward mobility. And the Department of Labor is currently investigating systemic pay discrimination at Google.
Not for nothing, but we’re pretty sure we already know whose lawsuit will be successful. The question is whether Google will make serious changes to its hiring practices.
