- When someone takes valid facts and observations and distorts (or appears to distort) them in a way that reaches a flawed conclusion — especially one that was perhaps informed by the agenda-driven pseudoscience that permeates the deepest dregs of Reddit and 4chan — shouting them down and exaggerating the negative impact of the opinion is rarely effective. Damore’s memo was not a “screed,” as headlines claimed it was. His words were not “violence” as some critics claimed they were, nor was he advocating for female engineers to be fired or suggesting that they were biologically unsuited to a career in computer science (he suggested that they were perhaps less interested in pursuing it, which is very different and which I’ll address shortly). I’m no advocate of engaging with attention-seeking nutjobs (or in popular parlance, “feeding the trolls”), but Damore’s memo was underpinned by tones of curiosity and a desire to engage in dialogue. The backlash to it, however, pushed him squarely toward the camp of the crazies, adding fuel to the fringe of alt-right and men’s-rights-activist arguments. Dissent can be productive; it became clear that this dissent became unproductive.
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