Since he was fired for authoring a memo that suggested women are biologically ill-suited to working in tech, former Google engineer James Damore has had plenty of free time to elaborate on his views. First he spoke to notorious alt-right YouTuber Stefan Molyneux, then to The Wall Street Journal, and now to Business Insider, where he made some interesting claims about the way women reacted to his ideas.
In a lengthy interview with Steve Kovach, Damore was asked how he’d respond to women at Google who felt “attacked” by the ideas presented in the memo. “Obviously, no one should feel attacked,” he replied. “I was simply trying to fix the culture in many ways. And really help a lot of people who are currently marginalized at Google by pointing out these huge biases.”
“And how do you think that made women feel within Google?” Kovach pressed. To which Damore replied:
Damore: There were many women who were empowered and that agree with me.
Kovach: You heard from women who said they were empowered by what you wrote?
Damore: Yes. Because they are tired of this narrative that puts them as a victim and that constantly acts as if women are different coders and that we should treat them differently, when really everyone is a coder and we should just treat people as individuals and not concentrate on what their race and gender is.
He went on to say that Google “stereotypes” women, pointing to “women-only programs that are specifically for some of the traits that I mentioned,” such as agreeableness and a tendency to cooperate. “Yes it does help the women that have those traits, but many women don’t, and there are many men that do have those traits that don’t get the support that they need,” he added.
And in case you were wondering, yes, Damore is planning to file a lawsuit contesting his firing. “I have a lawyer, but we’re still at the beginning stages,” he said. “We’re evaluating stuff.”
