Google’s Anti-diversity Manifesto is Intellectual Misogyny at its Finest

Claire Zhong
Aug 9, 2017 · 4 min read

The hype surrounding Google’s anti-diversity Manifesto has a silver lining. It exposes, in its purest and most archetypal expression, the otherwise obscured phenomenon of intellectual misogyny: we have a male engineer from Google, intelligent and equipped with society’s most coveted skill sets, writing eloquently and convincingly against the company’s diversity policies. The aftermath? He get’s fired, but not without a resounding echo of defence -”poor guy!”, “Google had to do it for public opinion.”, “The left!”.

A few weeks ago, a friend wrote an article for the New Statesmen on how to identify an intellectual misogynist. Intellectual misogynists are misogynists, but guised with intelligence, authority, and fact-backed arguments against the feminist movement. They claim an understanding of feminism and gender that your garden-variety misogynists don’t. Their misogyny won’t manifest in a blatant sexist slur, but will, perhaps, in a microeconomically-sound explanation of why the wage gap doesn’t exist. They use science, fact and empiricism to make their arguments, and identify themselves against an angry, irrational, radical feminist polemic. They are calm, they are right, and they are “neutral.”

James Damore’s manifesto typifies intellectual misogyny all too perfectly. Albeit lacking actual research, James cites biological differences between men and women as reasons to scrap STEM inclusion schemes. He lays out both leftist and rightist biases in an ostensibly balanced “suggestion” to Google that they in fact could hire better employees if diversity wasn’t on the fore of its priorities. He attacks efforts to “socially engineer” women to fill tech positions, indicting natural preferences and lower stress tolerance as reasons for Google’s misguided focus. Essentially, he invalidates the feminist effort to grant historically disadvantaged groups equal opportunities in systematically male fields, on the basis that it would not yield the best quality engineers. He eschews the political contentiousness of such a claim, however, by using statistics, science, and a calm, balanced tone to express his argument. For many, his argument is compelling.

It’s ironic that the manifesto was named “Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber,” given that the patriarchy is the God of all Echo Chambers, spanning space and time in unthinkable magnitudes. Regardless of whether you believe females are given equal opportunities today, the history of female oppression is undeniable. Such a history, given its length and universal scope, undoubtedly has ramifications on structures today. The fact that scientists, historians, writers, politicians, artists and scholars have historically been white and male means that the way we view truth, success, and “right”ness, will naturally be biased. The same way echo chambers of liberalness, conservativeness, political correctness and safe spaces arise today, the patriarchy has over time selected its successors in its own image, perpetuating structures and metrics that favour “maleness” naturally and unwittingly. Google’s diversity policies are but a small effort to correct for this, raising disadvantaged groups to positions where they were historically absent.

Intellectual misogyny is scary because it legitimises and reproduces itself. On one hand, you have the calm, level-headed critique against diversity. James only wants the best for Google! He doesn’t hate women — simply thinks he can do the job in tech better than them! What an innocuous claim! On the other hand, you have the paranoid, screeching left. Google firing him immediately, the emphatic feminist backlash. Google, and other tech companies hot on its heels, will probably bolster their diversity and inclusion schemes. For those who agree with James, all this will only make them believe in their claims more strongly. The left comes off looking more radical and irrational and ever, and the men, merely wanting the best for tech companies worldwide, silenced, once again.

Intellectual misogyny distracts from real discourse. These appearances — the fact that men can talk calmly, relying on facts and figures, about a career in STEM, and that women have to shout, impassioned, just to be heard — are themselves a manifestation of patriarchal “echo chamber”. The fact that I am sitting at my tech internship, angered and writing this article, while my male counterparts are coding away at their desks, proves only a fraction of the contextual burdens women face because of their gender. James’ employment of intellectual misogyny had dangerous consequences for the feminist movement. Google’s response fuels claims that feminism endangers free speech. The fact that many males probably found their views articulated and validated in Madore’s words is also damaging.

James doesn’t really say anything we haven’t heard before. Bar noting a few of its dubious statistical claims, the point of this article is not to debate the truth of James’ statements. It’s to merely draw attention to the dangers of intellectual misogyny, its guise of neutrality, and the way it casts the leftist agenda. Intellectual misogyny is insidious, rampant and persuasive, but being able to identify it is the first step to resisting its rhetorical charm.