Technology

59108 readers

3266 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

Follow the lemmy.world rules.
Only tech related content.
Be excellent to each another!
Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
Politics threads may be removed.
No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

181

My open letter to the tech industry on sexism, HR, and Linus Tech Tips (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 1 year ago by sweeny@sh.itjust.works to c/technology@lemmy.world

40 comments fedilink hide all child comments

The Linus Tech Tips abuse allegations are yet another reminder that something absolutely needs to be done about the rampant sexism in the tech industry. If you haven't heard them yet you can read about them here, but be warned, there is some potentially very triggering abuse and self harm detailed: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1691693740254228741.html

Madison's story is not unique - we have heard stories like hers time and time again. As a tech professional it makes me sick to share an industry with these horrible people, and to know that little is being done to reign them in.

So, what can be done about this? I don't have all of the answers, but one thing that comes to mind is that HR departments desperately need actual unbiased oversight, perhaps even from a governing body outside of the company. It has become common knowledge that HR’s primary purpose is to protect the company, and this prevents employees from speaking out and driving internal change even in terrible situations like Madison Reeve and countless others have faced. The way things are run clearly needs to fundamentally change

Let me know in the comments if you have any ideas on how we as a tech community might be able to address these issues, I am truly at a loss. All I want is for tech to be a safe space for everybody to find their passion and success, and it saddens me that we clearly aren't there yet.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] sweeny@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 year ago

This is needlessly splitting hairs, Linus Tech Tips is absolutely part of the tech industry, and the parallels to other horror stories of the tech industry are too great to ignore. The people working on these videos are tech professionals similar to yourself, they test software similar to what you make, they have a company culture similar to tech startups, and other tech professionals consume their videos giving them influence in the tech community. They may not be doing the same thing in the industry as you are, but that doesn't mean they aren't part of it.