People Are Creating Their Own Google Doodles To Protest Google’s Firing Of James Damore

Google’s Doodles are one of the company’s most recognizable oddities. Google regularly changes the logo on its site to commemorate important occasions, and these whimsical logos are much-loved and much-shared. But now, ordinary people are creating their own Google Doodles to protest its firing of an engineer who aired his views on diversity.

Google today fired James Damore, who’d written a 10-page memo on diversity in tech. Damore, who has a PhD in Biology from Harvard, in addition to stints at MIT and Princeton, had argued that biological considerations meant that men and women were different, and lower representation of women in tech and leadership roles was not necessarily because of discrimination. Damore had argued that candidates should be hired only on their ability, and Google’s hiring programs, which selectively take in women and people of colour, were bad for business.

Damore had gone on to say that this was an unpopular opinion to express, and Google’s monolithic culture meant that the company was intolerant of views that the majority of its employees didn’t agree with.

Google seemed to prove him right after firing him today morning. This hasn’t gone down well with sections of the internet, which is now using Google’s own Doodles to protest against the company.

This particular Google doodle showed the communist symbol, the hammer and sickle, within the Google logo. It also included the feminist logo, implying how Google was biased in favour of women.

Yet another logo simply changed all words within Google to Boycott. The hashtag #BoycottGoogle has been gaining steam today on social media.

 

 

Yet another logo replaced Google with Gulag, which was the Russian government agency that administered labour camps during Stalin’s rule in the 1930s. 

Another another logo mocked Google’s stance, calling Damore’s firing an assault on freedom.

Another compared Google to the infamous “Uncle Sam is watching you” poster, with Google portrayed as the all-powerful authority body.

And it being the internet, comparisons with Nazis started soon after. This Google doodle replaced one o in the Google logo with the Nazi logo.

Another doodle went a step further, calling Google thought and opinion Nazis.

Google might’ve fired an engineer who didn’t believe in its groupthink, but it’s got a bit of a PR crisis on its hands.