• The James Damore Google Tech-Bro Meme Stating that Women are Biologically Unsuited to Work at Tech Professions (Part 2)

The James Damore Google Tech-Bro Meme Stating that Women are Biologically Unsuited to Work at Tech Professions (Part 2)

(( Part 1 ))

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I believe, it is my view, that the thing that really motivated this guy, Damore, to write this entire memo was this part of his memo (for more on who this guy is, and what my posts are all about, please see Part 1):

In highly progressive environments, conservatives are a minority that feel like they need to stay in the closet to avoid open hostility. We should empower those with different ideologies to be able to express themselves.

(end)

I am a conservative – and yes, I agree, often times, liberals use P.C. to silence dissenters by using fear.

I’m sympathetic with this guy to a point, but the way to correct some over-bearing P.C. beliefs or practices of liberals, or a P.C. work culture, is not to argue, as he’s doing essentially, that some sexist views should be openly practiced or embraced.

Damore wants to openly believe sexist things about women, and wants to argue for corporate policies that would hold women back, but he doesn’t want to be held accountable for any of this – because holding him accountable would be, in his view, “political correctness” or a case of liberals picking on a conservative.

I’m a right winger, I am a conservative myself, and sorry, dude, but I’m not buying this.

I may be anti-P.C., and I’m not fond of all things liberal, but I am opposed to sexism, no matter who, what, where, when or why it’s being championed or allowed.

And the fact that you, Damore, keep insisting in your memo that your sexist views really aren’t sexist because biology!, and because you really aren’t sexist, doesn’t really change the fact that those views are in fact… sexist. They’re still sexist.

• The James Damore Google Tech-Bro Meme Stating that Women are Biologically Unsuited to Work at Tech Professions (Part 1)

The James Damore Google Tech-Bro Meme Stating that Women are Biologically Unsuited to Work at Tech Professions (Part 1)

(( Part 2 ))

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I am a conservative and never have been a supporter of P.C. (political correctness).

Do liberals sometimes create a climate of fear and dread such that any one who does not support their views feels too afraid to speak up and disagree?

I’d say yes, most definitely. Even this one liberal tech lady admits to that, and she’s not okay with it.

A young Google employee named James Damore wrote a ten page memo (memo? That’s more like a research paper) explaining why he believes there are not more women working in STEM- related fields.

Some of Damore’s views supposedly hinge on biology: he believes there are biological reasons that explain women’s career choices, or how women are treated in technological based careers.

I am going to hit this point home off and on in this blog post and the next, should I break this up into more than one post:

If Damore had written that he’s seen studies that suggest that black people are biologically superior than white people at picking cotton on plantations and not as biologically adept at working on computers as whites, and should therefore not be employed at coding with a tech firm, your reaction to those views would be, what? Would you be just as angry or sad that he was fired by his employer?

Damore does not cite the research, if he used any (not that I saw, and I looked several times on a site that copied his memo).

He just states things as fact, things such as,

Women, on average, have more:

• Openness directed towards feelings and aesthetics rather than ideas. Women generally also have a stronger interest in people rather than things, relative to men (also interpreted as empathizing vs. systemizing).

(end Damore quote. Source)

Edit:

…Many of Damore’s controversial conclusions rest heavily on one recent study and much older, now-discredited research, ignoring reams of data that tell a very different story. (source here, and excerpts in Part 2, at bottom of page)

He also states (and I will return to this later)

…Women, on average, have more:

• Extraversion expressed as gregariousness rather than assertiveness. Also, higher agreeableness.
• This leads to women generally having a harder time negotiating salary, asking for raises, speaking up, and leading. Note that these are just average differences and there’s overlap between men and women, but this is seen solely as a women’s issue. This leads to exclusory programs like Stretch and swaths of men without support.
• Neuroticism (higher anxiety, lower stress tolerance)…..

I have no idea where he is getting these ideas from.

What research is he referring to? I did not see book titles or URLs listed. There is no “works cited” page under his memo anywhere that I could see.

Damore has a section in his memo entitled, “Non-discriminatory ways to reduce the gender gap” with bullet points of suggestions.

Damore later says, “I strongly believe in gender and racial diversity…”

If he truly means he wants greater diversity, he has a strange way of going about it.

• A Critique of the Seneca Griggs Blog ‘Wartburg Whiners’ (Part 2)

A Critique of the Seneca Griggs Blog ‘Wartburg Whiners’ (Part 2)

Part One 

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I never meant for this to be a series of posts. I initially wanted to make a single post critiquing one Griggs did in regards to TWW’s post about pastor Todd Wagner’s teaching about working mothers. But here we are at Part 2.

Seneca Griggs, also known as James Brown or Megs48 or Buzz English, is proprietor of the horribly named and horrible blog Wartburg Whiners, where he criticizes TWW (The Wartburg Watch) blog, its owners Deb and Dee, and their commentators (which has included me) and anyone who is less than thrilled over any and all doctrines or practices of conservative evangelicalism.

In Griggs’ world, you are to be a mindless automaton who unquestioningly goes along with any false doctrine, or dishonest or perverted pastor, and must attend a church, no matter how spiritually, financially, or sexually abusive its members are to you.

In the purview of Griggs, criticism or questioning of any church or pastor or conservative doctrine is verboten. If you dare to question or criticize as such, you are automatically assumed to be a feminist or a liberal.

Jesus Christ Commits a Big Seneca Griggs No-No

Jesus, who I take it Griggs would claim to respect, would be in for a scolding by Griggs, because Jesus is fine with criticizing the church.

See, for instance, how Jesus criticizes various churches:

Revelation 2

Here are some excerpts from Rev. 2, where Jesus is doing what Seneca Griggs believes nobody should do: criticize any church ever!

• A Critique of the Seneca Griggs Blog ‘Wartburg Whiners’ (Part 1)

A Critique of the Seneca Griggs Blog ‘Wartburg Whiners’ (Part 1)

Part Two

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I am mystified at Seneca Griggs’ on-going obsession with, and hatred and venom at, TWW (The Wartburg Watch) blog.

Judging from Griggs’ Archives section, his blog was started in 2014, and he continues to post there as of 2017.

Griggs, also known as James Brown or Megs48 or Buzz English, has a blog, called “Wartburg Whiners,” where he regularly criticizes or nit picks almost every post Deb or Dee publish on their blog, TWW.

I have had my differences with TWW myself.  I don’t see eye to eye with the blog owners or all of the regular commentators there on every topic.

I’ve written before that, to my displeasure, the general flavor at that blog, and at ones like it, leans liberal, left wing, at least in the comment section. (You can read my thoughts about that here if you’d like.)

But how is it that anyone can so vehemently resent and object to a blog by people that are seeking to protect the vulnerable, the hurting, and the wounded, or to call churches to start preventing child molesters from victimizing church children?

“WHINERS”?

Why is a group of people, (some Christian, some not), who are concerned with aiding victims and seeing justice done, being characterized by Griggs as being “Whiners”?

Is it really charitable to call a group of people who want to help the marginalized and the abused, “whiners”? Or could Griggs simply not come up with a snazzier name for his blog, and that was all he could think up?

Not only do many of the participants at TWW blog speak up on behalf of the victims, but many of them have also been hurt by pastors, churches, some Christian doctrines, or by other Christians.

I guess Grigg’s blog title of “Whiners” would include me as well, since I was a regular participant there for a few years, and I still drop by on occasion. Thanks so much, Griggs, for casting me as nothing but a “whiner.”

Do you know how Jesus referred to the same types of people who Griggs is calling “Whiners” on his Whiners blog?

Jesus called them, or compared them to people or things such as, Prodigal Sons, Lost Coins, or, he said he would leave the 99 sheep to go in search of the One Lost Lamb.

• Regarding Grief, Sickness, and Depression: Hold Your Tongue and Offer Your Heart Instead by Heather Plett

Regarding Grief, Sickness and Depression: Hold Your Tongue and Offer Your Heart Instead by Heather Plett

This is a topic I’d like to see addressed more often on some of the other spiritual abuse blogs out there. The link to the Plett-authored essay is much farther below. I wanted to say a few words first.

Many Christians are either too lazy, too selfish, or too inept at assisting someone who is walking through grief.

After my own mother died a few years ago, no Christians were there for me, and it still shocks and saddens me to this day.

When I did muster the courage to phone or to open up to Christians (some church people, some were relatives, all of whom were ages 45 and on up), I was not met with compassion and empathy.

Rather, I was met with cliches,  sunny-sounding platitudes, criticism, judgmentalism, people who downplayed my grief (by comparing it to someone else’s pain in life and saying my grief was nothing).

• When Your Spouse is Mentally Ill, from Christianity Today

When Your Spouse is Mentally Ill, from Christianity Today

I was just saying in another post on gender complementarianism a few days ago that out of all the complementarianism coverage I’ve ever seen manufactured by complementarians, they never factor in situations where a woman’s husband dies, or develops dementia, becomes mentally unstable, becomes physically incapacitated so that he can no longer be the “head of the household,” and of course, they rarely discuss what to do with or about women who never marry or who divorce.

Here we see a post where a woman’s husband developed severe mental health issues to the point she had to divorce him. She had to learn to take care of herself and her children on her own.

When Your Spouse is Mentally Ill, from Christianity Today

Snippets:

by Anonymous

My husband’s schizoaffective disorder devastated our family. Here’s what I’ve learned in the years since he was first diagnosed.

[Her husband began exhibiting signs of mental illness. He was hospitalized.]

…My pastor, to whom I turned for counsel, didn’t have answers either, but he and his wife listened and loved my family well. I looked for secular resources for spouses of the mentally ill.

…A delusional partner

My husband and I had been true partners in our home. We parented together and shared the weight of responsibilities. I was dependent on him financially but also in a thousand other ways.

• The Semantic Games of Gender Complementarians

The Semantic Games of Gender Complementarians

The following post relates with another topic that shows how flawed gender complementarianism is.

I may in the future do a separate post about that other, closely related topic, which is: complementarians cannot agree with each other on exactly what complementarianism is, or how it should be lived, so there ends up all sorts of inconsistencies and contradictions among complementarians.

Complementarianism exists on a scale or contiuum from “soft complementarianism” all the way to a more “hard core” version that borders on patriarchy, and there are stops between those two points.

I think what I write about in this post may be more common place among soft or moderate complementarians than among the patriarchal variety.