There is actually zero evidence in the article aside from the deceased's lawyer saying the following:
“We think it was stress and harassment induced by his job, between him being one of the few African Americans there, working around the clock and the culture of Uber,”
That isn't evidence. That's speculation by the family's lawyer.
There isn't in the article. The article is full of suppositions and what-ifs. There wasn't a single thing pointed out unique to Uber that doesn't occur in any other high-stress job.
Also the addition of racism really muddies the waters. If you say that everything is due to racism, that term rapidly loses all meaning.
What other factors are there? The article has brought up none.
The reasoning of the matter is this: Uber has few black technical employees, one black employee committed suicide, hence racism. Or is there something else that is missing?
You realize that the same argument could be made (and has been made) for female employees? <tech companies> have few female technical employees, one female employee complains, hence <systematic sexism, "bro culture">.
Along with a culture of bro-ishness and clique-iness, hypercompetitiveness and backstabbing, and a sweeping disdain for ethics in general. You forgot those parts.
Noted, thanks. But general principles dictate one should also be more circumspect in addressing the circumstances of persons who have committed suicide (apparently after suffering a great deal of anguish). It seemed the person I was responding to was belittling those circumstances, in this case.
> It seemed the person I was responding to was belittling those circumstances, in this case.
I disagree, the article still contains no indication of fault on Ubers part - it's entirely that Thomas was finding the job stressful, which may have contributed to his suicide.
Further, if by "circumspect in addressing the circumstances" you mean considering that Uber could be at fault is beside the point - I said the article gives no indication of how Uber is at fault, only the fact of the suicide and the implication of blame.
I think a published article should be more circumspect of pointing the finger like this - Uber may have its day in court, but not before the accusation harms its reputation.
As to "evidence" (not all of it necessarily court-admissible -- but certainly enough preponderance of indication that it may have been Uber's fault, enough to warrant further investigation):
But at Uber, Thomas struggled in a way he’d never experienced in over a decade in technology. He worked long hours. He told his father and his wife that he felt immense pressure and stress at work, and was scared he’d lose his job. They urged him to see a psychiatrist. He told the doctor he was having panic attacks, trouble concentrating and near-constant anxiety. All suggested that he leave his job, but he was adamant that he could not.
“He was always the smartest guy in the room,” said his father, Joe Thomas. But while working at Uber, “he went down the tubes. He became someone with very little confidence in himself. The guy just fell apart.”
“It’s hard to explain, but he wasn’t himself at all,” said Zecole Thomas. “He’d say things like, ‘My boss doesn’t like me.’ His personality changed totally; he was horribly concerned about his work, to the point it was almost unbelievable. He was saying he couldn’t do anything right.”
And:
In the case of Joseph Thomas, medical records from two East Bay psychiatrists he visited in the weeks before his suicide show that he reported job-related “high anxiety,” panic attacks, difficulty concentrating and insomnia.
About a month before his suicide, Joseph Thomas disclosed his work stress in a Facebook chat to a close friend of more than a decade, Neil Mirchandani.
“Man words can’t really describe. I’m not dead but I wouldn’t describe myself as ok,” Thomas wrote, according to screenshots of the chat provided by Mirchandani.
“The sad thing is this place (Uber) has broken me to the point where I don’t have the strength to look for another job,” Thomas wrote.
> but certainly enough preponderance of indication
What does that mean exactly?
The only people who are giving the "evidence" or "indication" are the people who stand to profit the most.
Once you get something that says that Uber is either racist or promotes work practices that lead to suicide, by un-unbiased external party, that's interesting.
It's surprising how otherwise intelligent seeming people can get taken in by not understanding inherent conflicts of interests in cases like this.
By definition of what? The adjective you tacked to the beginning of the word 'stress'?
As I said in my original post, The article gives no direct indication that Uber was different from any other high-stress job, other than the fact that Thomas committed suicide. Much like the article, you are just speculating.
And if this is your pet theory, can you account for a person being put under a "life-threatening" amount of stress, but choosing not to quit? Even when his family urged him to seek help?
Blaming Uber rests entirely on whether working conditions at Uber where unreasonably stressful, and there is no indication that this was the case.
The article gives no direct indication that Uber was different from any other high-stress job, other than the fact that Thomas committed suicide.
Right, it gives indirect indications. Given the seriousness of the issue (and the fact that a father of 2 children may have died as a result) -- along with Uber's by now well-established track record for malfeasance (and all-around asshole-ery in general) it's certainly worth looking into what the direct causal factors may have been.
Can you account for a person being put under a "life-threatening" amount of stress, but choosing not to quit?
It's the very nature of high-stress situations that (1) they appear to have "no way out" and (2) people not embedded in those situations have difficulty identifying with the experience of those who are.
And if I my paraphrase your last sentence:
There is no indication [in the article] that working conditions at Uber where unreasonably stressful.
You keep repeating that, but the statements in the article from the deceased's family members strongly suggest otherwise.
> along with Uber's by now well-established track record for malfeasance
aka, prejudice.
> it's certainly worth looking into what the direct causal factors may have been
I don't deny that it "could have been", but it also "could have not been" - you don't know, and have no way to "look into" or otherwise investigate the situation. If the article did have the means, they did not present anything that would indicate fault.
> It's the very nature of...
I disagree - but if you have a psych degree I'll recant. point #2 is pretty much an ad-hom - no one need to "identify" with anyone, I've seen stressful jobs and people fall apart in them entirely separately to the issue of whether the stress was undue or criminal; your statement is circular in that it assumes that this was one of "those situations", when you don't know anything directly about the environment.
This is all a tangent - you are still arguing "it might be this way", when I never argued otherwise. You are attacking a straw man; The point is the article implied one thing, without substance - whether that thing is possible is irrelevant; it is no more likely, given that we've only hear one side of the story from a party wanting to promote that possibility, but with no direct claim of why they believe it it true.
> the statements in the article from the deceased's family members strongly suggest otherwise
FFS! yes, they doimply that, that is what those family members believe and are promoting, but the article gives no credible reason why they believe that - in fact they give good reason why the family might promote that position without any reason to believe it is more likely than not - not only might they gain much-needed money if it is believed, but it is probably easier to believe it psychologically, given they are the family of the man.
The direct evidence/testomony they give, about actual facts are only that Thomas was highly stressed, due to work, and suffering from anxiety - that is not what I take issue with. What I do take issue with, is the conclusion that this must be because the work environment was unduly stressful - they have no reason to believe this.
So after such a tragedy, what does Uber do? They deny the family's benefits claim, of course:
Uber denied the benefits claim through its insurance carrier. In California, workers’ compensation usually does not cover psychiatric injuries until after six months of employment. Joseph Thomas had worked slightly less than five months at Uber when he killed himself.
But there is an exception to the six-month rule. It doesn’t apply “if the psychiatric injury is caused by a sudden and extraordinary employment condition,” according to California law.
That's implying causation. Two children without a father and a widow with a broken heart happened. Why would anybody want to scramble to assume financial liability for such an incident?
Do I feel remorse for people starving in Venezuela? No, as I have done nothing to directly cause the starvation. Nobody's agony should have a claim on your financial resources or your property.
That depends on how you look at the situation. His father and brother, who knew both the deceased and his general situation far better than you do, have made statements that strongly suggest otherwise:
“He was always the smartest guy in the room,” said his father, Joe Thomas. But while working at Uber, “he went down the tubes. He became someone with very little confidence in himself. The guy just fell apart.”
“It’s hard to explain, but he wasn’t himself at all,” said Zecole Thomas. “He’d say things like, ‘My boss doesn’t like me.’ His personality changed totally; he was horribly concerned about his work, to the point it was almost unbelievable. He was saying he couldn’t do anything right.”
This could happen in any profession or culture. Uber are just the ones in the spotlight right now.
The real issue here is unfortunately ONCE AGAIN, a lack of mental health awareness and services.
A psychiatrist has diagnosed someone with "high anxiety"...why aren't they are being subscribed treatment in the form of therapy or medicine? He went to ask for help, and was told something wasn't going well...let's do something to remedy that!
If assistance was in fact prescribed and Thomas denied that it would help him, the fault then is placed on social awareness and acceptance regarding men receiving mental health care.
As someone who has gone through my own suicidal thoughts and had therapy and medication literally save my life, this infuriates me to no end.
And what happens if you feel you have to leave your job? You lose your insurance, or go on disability and have a target on your back for the next 10 years of your career.
It could happen, but there are many factors at Uber that make it much more likely to happen there. Amongst other issues, the piss-poor management there seems to cause all kinds of problems.
Despite that this is a heartbreaking story, there's really no evidence to suggest that Uber is responsible for his suicide. We've all had shitty jobs where we felt overworked and perhaps discriminated against, but our actions are our own responsibilities.
Just last night some tech workers were talking about what a friend had said of working at Uber. The culture there allows "toe stepping" so that for example if someone is on vacation it is okay to take over work that had been assigned to them. Also they practice "always on" which means that any time of any day maybe required to meet company goals. These two features alone are damning enough, but when combined with a culture of back stabbing among high level managers the results are atrocious. This cannot end well.
> Uber denied the benefits claim through its insurance carrier.
That seems like an extremely terrible move, even if Uber might be technically correct. Deciding to do that makes them look awful, and I think that's what matters most, given everything else contributing to their public image right now. It could have been a great opportunity to look magnanimous.
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[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 69.6 ms ] threadThere's just too much. Companies will always make someone angry, but there's just TOO MUCH.
I will never use Uber, and I'll encourage everyone I know to avoid it as well. Do we REALLY want this company getting a monopoly?
Is the racism claim based purely on lack of hiring diversity? If Thomas was given unforgiving or impossible tasks, why would he refuse to quit?
There is in the article. That is, if you actually read the article.
“We think it was stress and harassment induced by his job, between him being one of the few African Americans there, working around the clock and the culture of Uber,”
That isn't evidence. That's speculation by the family's lawyer.
Also the addition of racism really muddies the waters. If you say that everything is due to racism, that term rapidly loses all meaning.
Given the various factors at play, I would investigate further before offering such a blanket dismissal. But that's just me.
The reasoning of the matter is this: Uber has few black technical employees, one black employee committed suicide, hence racism. Or is there something else that is missing?
You realize that the same argument could be made (and has been made) for female employees? <tech companies> have few female technical employees, one female employee complains, hence <systematic sexism, "bro culture">.
Along with a culture of bro-ishness and clique-iness, hypercompetitiveness and backstabbing, and a sweeping disdain for ethics in general. You forgot those parts.
2) HN guidelines specifically prohibit questioning whether someone read an article.
2) HN guidelines specifically prohibit questioning whether someone read an article.
Noted, thanks. But general principles dictate one should also be more circumspect in addressing the circumstances of persons who have committed suicide (apparently after suffering a great deal of anguish). It seemed the person I was responding to was belittling those circumstances, in this case.
I disagree, the article still contains no indication of fault on Ubers part - it's entirely that Thomas was finding the job stressful, which may have contributed to his suicide.
Further, if by "circumspect in addressing the circumstances" you mean considering that Uber could be at fault is beside the point - I said the article gives no indication of how Uber is at fault, only the fact of the suicide and the implication of blame.
I think a published article should be more circumspect of pointing the finger like this - Uber may have its day in court, but not before the accusation harms its reputation.
Well, we disagree then.
But at Uber, Thomas struggled in a way he’d never experienced in over a decade in technology. He worked long hours. He told his father and his wife that he felt immense pressure and stress at work, and was scared he’d lose his job. They urged him to see a psychiatrist. He told the doctor he was having panic attacks, trouble concentrating and near-constant anxiety. All suggested that he leave his job, but he was adamant that he could not.
“He was always the smartest guy in the room,” said his father, Joe Thomas. But while working at Uber, “he went down the tubes. He became someone with very little confidence in himself. The guy just fell apart.”
“It’s hard to explain, but he wasn’t himself at all,” said Zecole Thomas. “He’d say things like, ‘My boss doesn’t like me.’ His personality changed totally; he was horribly concerned about his work, to the point it was almost unbelievable. He was saying he couldn’t do anything right.”
And:
In the case of Joseph Thomas, medical records from two East Bay psychiatrists he visited in the weeks before his suicide show that he reported job-related “high anxiety,” panic attacks, difficulty concentrating and insomnia.
About a month before his suicide, Joseph Thomas disclosed his work stress in a Facebook chat to a close friend of more than a decade, Neil Mirchandani.
“Man words can’t really describe. I’m not dead but I wouldn’t describe myself as ok,” Thomas wrote, according to screenshots of the chat provided by Mirchandani.
“The sad thing is this place (Uber) has broken me to the point where I don’t have the strength to look for another job,” Thomas wrote.
What does that mean exactly?
The only people who are giving the "evidence" or "indication" are the people who stand to profit the most.
Once you get something that says that Uber is either racist or promotes work practices that lead to suicide, by un-unbiased external party, that's interesting.
It's surprising how otherwise intelligent seeming people can get taken in by not understanding inherent conflicts of interests in cases like this.
As I said in my original post, The article gives no direct indication that Uber was different from any other high-stress job, other than the fact that Thomas committed suicide. Much like the article, you are just speculating.
And if this is your pet theory, can you account for a person being put under a "life-threatening" amount of stress, but choosing not to quit? Even when his family urged him to seek help?
Blaming Uber rests entirely on whether working conditions at Uber where unreasonably stressful, and there is no indication that this was the case.
Right, it gives indirect indications. Given the seriousness of the issue (and the fact that a father of 2 children may have died as a result) -- along with Uber's by now well-established track record for malfeasance (and all-around asshole-ery in general) it's certainly worth looking into what the direct causal factors may have been.
Can you account for a person being put under a "life-threatening" amount of stress, but choosing not to quit?
It's the very nature of high-stress situations that (1) they appear to have "no way out" and (2) people not embedded in those situations have difficulty identifying with the experience of those who are.
And if I my paraphrase your last sentence:
There is no indication [in the article] that working conditions at Uber where unreasonably stressful.
You keep repeating that, but the statements in the article from the deceased's family members strongly suggest otherwise.
> Given the seriousness of the issue
Is exactly why we should not speculate.
> along with Uber's by now well-established track record for malfeasance
aka, prejudice.
> it's certainly worth looking into what the direct causal factors may have been
I don't deny that it "could have been", but it also "could have not been" - you don't know, and have no way to "look into" or otherwise investigate the situation. If the article did have the means, they did not present anything that would indicate fault.
> It's the very nature of...
I disagree - but if you have a psych degree I'll recant. point #2 is pretty much an ad-hom - no one need to "identify" with anyone, I've seen stressful jobs and people fall apart in them entirely separately to the issue of whether the stress was undue or criminal; your statement is circular in that it assumes that this was one of "those situations", when you don't know anything directly about the environment.
This is all a tangent - you are still arguing "it might be this way", when I never argued otherwise. You are attacking a straw man; The point is the article implied one thing, without substance - whether that thing is possible is irrelevant; it is no more likely, given that we've only hear one side of the story from a party wanting to promote that possibility, but with no direct claim of why they believe it it true.
> the statements in the article from the deceased's family members strongly suggest otherwise
FFS! yes, they do imply that, that is what those family members believe and are promoting, but the article gives no credible reason why they believe that - in fact they give good reason why the family might promote that position without any reason to believe it is more likely than not - not only might they gain much-needed money if it is believed, but it is probably easier to believe it psychologically, given they are the family of the man.
The direct evidence/testomony they give, about actual facts are only that Thomas was highly stressed, due to work, and suffering from anxiety - that is not what I take issue with. What I do take issue with, is the conclusion that this must be because the work environment was unduly stressful - they have no reason to believe this.
Uber denied the benefits claim through its insurance carrier. In California, workers’ compensation usually does not cover psychiatric injuries until after six months of employment. Joseph Thomas had worked slightly less than five months at Uber when he killed himself.
But there is an exception to the six-month rule. It doesn’t apply “if the psychiatric injury is caused by a sudden and extraordinary employment condition,” according to California law.
Do I feel remorse for people starving in Venezuela? No, as I have done nothing to directly cause the starvation. Nobody's agony should have a claim on your financial resources or your property.
Because it's the right thing to do (in this case).
Please explain how it's the right thing to do. Somebody committed suicide, was not covered by life insurance, didn't get life insurance.
There's more to "doing the right thing" than simply "doing the bare minimum that the law requires you to do."
“He was always the smartest guy in the room,” said his father, Joe Thomas. But while working at Uber, “he went down the tubes. He became someone with very little confidence in himself. The guy just fell apart.”
“It’s hard to explain, but he wasn’t himself at all,” said Zecole Thomas. “He’d say things like, ‘My boss doesn’t like me.’ His personality changed totally; he was horribly concerned about his work, to the point it was almost unbelievable. He was saying he couldn’t do anything right.”
What are you advocating for?
As another poster said, you seem to be implying fault.
In your opinion, uber obviously disagrees. Why is life insurance tied to a company in the first place?
Again, my focus is on the suffering that has been caused. Not statutory or contractual liability.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
The real issue here is unfortunately ONCE AGAIN, a lack of mental health awareness and services.
A psychiatrist has diagnosed someone with "high anxiety"...why aren't they are being subscribed treatment in the form of therapy or medicine? He went to ask for help, and was told something wasn't going well...let's do something to remedy that! If assistance was in fact prescribed and Thomas denied that it would help him, the fault then is placed on social awareness and acceptance regarding men receiving mental health care.
As someone who has gone through my own suicidal thoughts and had therapy and medication literally save my life, this infuriates me to no end.
I really hope this means it's okay to do that with discussion before the employee goes on vacation. If not, holy crap that really does sound awful.
That seems like an extremely terrible move, even if Uber might be technically correct. Deciding to do that makes them look awful, and I think that's what matters most, given everything else contributing to their public image right now. It could have been a great opportunity to look magnanimous.