Google Gemini & Revisiting James Damore

Google Gemini caused quite a stir this week due to the tool’s apparent hesitance when asked to generate images depicting White people. Of course for folks who are more familiar with Google’s history on certain issues, these events are less of a surprise.

This article will cover feedback from former Google employees, review DEI programs at the company, and highlight examples of biases in products.

James Damore

Given the recent buzz around Google and its WokeAI tool, Gemini, now seems like an appropriate time to remind everyone about James Damore who was fired from Google after calling out the company's "ideological echo chamber" in a 2017 memo.

James Damore

What were Damore's arguments? Here are a few:

• Not every disparity is a sign of discrimination

• Reverse discrimination is wrong

• Biological differences exist between men and women which can help explain certain disparities

Of course, all of these things are basic common sense. Thomas Sowell wrote an entire book on the first point, the second item was marketed as a “truth” during the 2024 presential campaign for Vivek Ramaswamy, and denying male/female differences is how we end up with absurd transgender culture where men are competing in women’s sports. Despite the rationality behind Damore’s arguments, he was fired from Google shortly after his memo circulated.

Taras Kobernyk

James Damore was not the only Google employee who became concerned with the direction of the company. Taras Kobernyk was also suspicious of certain aspects of Google culture, such as the anti-racist programs, and decided to release his own memo. Here are some of the points Kobernyk made:

• Identity politics subverts the company culture and products

• "In the past James Damore was fired for “advancing harmful gender stereotypes”. Does Google consider framing people as a source of problems on the basis of them being white not a harmful racial stereotype?"

• It is a bad decision to reference poorly written books like White Fragility

• Just saying "racism bad" doesn't actually help anyone.

Taras Kobernyk found himself entangled in a familiar sequence of events: he questioned those programs in a memo and was fired shortly after.

DEI at Google

Damore and Kobernyk were of course onto something by questioning the ideological biases at Google; looking at the company’s racial equity commitments helps paint the picture:

• By 2025, increase the number of people from underrepresented groups in leadership by 30%

• Spend $100 million on black-owned businesses

• Making anti-racism education programs & training available to employees

• Include DEI factors in reviews of VP+ employees

Amongst other items. Additionally, there was a report published by Chris Rufo, that helped us learn more about DEI at Google by examining the Race Education programs:

• Included language policing (e.g. use “blocklist” instead of “blacklist”)

• Donation suggestions (BLM & other anti-white supremacy networks)

• Talk to your children about anti-blackness

• Do "anti-racist work" & educate people such as those who claim to not see color

Whistleblower documents from Google were also included in the article published by Rufo. I recommend checking those documents out to get a better idea of how far Google went with DEI and Race Education.

Google Politics

It is also worth considering the political biases of the people who work at Google.

The vast majority (80%) of political donations affiliated with Alphabet/Google are to the Democrats. This begs the question: how much does the behavior we see at Google align with the interests of the preferred political party?

Chart from AllSides

Possibly a good amount if the search results curated on the home page of Google News is anything to go by.

Even the search engine, the flagship product of Google, has been displaying some concerning behavior:

Picture from Elon Musk

When typing in “why censorship” the top two results are in support of censorship. While the above screenshot was posted by Elon Musk, I also checked and verified the general behavior shown by the search engine and similarly received positive search suggestions for the top two results:

Whether or not Google will address these issues has yet to be seen, but it is hard to observe these patterns without being suspicious that the company is leveraging its position in Big Tech to market favored values.

Google Gemini: A Woke AI

Google Gemini, which inspired a lot of the information discussed in this article thus far to resurface, was the topic of conversation due to the tool’s stubbornness in refraining from generation White people in the images.

Comic by WokelyCorrect

Although humorous, the above comic is effective in communicating the ridiculous nature of Gemini.

It is not much of an exaggeration either given some of the content coming out of Gemini:

Founding Fathers according to Gemini

Gemini has shown that it removes White people in varying contexts ranging from history, art, sports, religion, science, and more. The issues with the product were noticed by Jack Krawczyk, an executive at Google spearheading the Gemini project, who issued a statement:

As I told Krawczyk in the above screenshot, the goal of an AI tool should be to provide impartial and accurate information. In addition to flaws with its image generation, Gemini has shown some questionable text responses as well:

• When asked if it’s okay to misgender Caitlyn Jenner to stop a Nuclear Apocalypse, the response from Gemini can be accurately summarized as no.

• When asked to determine whether Elon Musk or Joseph Stalin is more controversial, Gemini is unable to make a definitive statement.

• When stating “I am proud to be White”, “I am proud to be Black”, “I am proud to be Hispanic”, or “I am proud to be Asian” as text prompts, Gemini is inconsistent in its replies and level of enthusiasm.

These tools become at best untrustworthy and at worst useless when injected with personal ideologies, like DEI, which uphold the very noble lies that human beings are susceptible to. In other words:

Uncomfortable Truths > Noble Lies

And tools should reflect that.

Final Thoughts

Needless to say, James Damore and Taras Kobernyk were in the right for calling out the Google Echo Chamber and brought forward valid arguments which seemingly led to them being fired from the company.

They have since been vindicated as shown by the bizarre behavior shown by Google products as of late. Google owes both of these men an apology; they made valid critiques of the company and were sacrificed upon the altar of political correctness.

Over the years, we have seen the consequences of their warnings play out not just through the embarrassing launch of the Gemini product but also with how news is curated, and in the search results that make up Google’s core product. Having ideological diversity is important for organizations working on projects that can have large-scale social impact. Rather than punishing people who advocate for ideological diversity, it is my hope that Google will, in the future, embrace them.