Voices: The 1960s return to Silicon Valley
SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Demonstrations in the streets. Cries for racial justice. A unionization movement.
In Silicon Valley — and across the USA — social unrest has become part of the national conversation, a confluence of images tied to race and entrenched organizations and attitudes.
"It feels like 1962 and 1862," says Janice Mathis, a civil rights attorney in town to attend a diversity workshop here hosted by Intel and Jesse Jackson's Rainbow PUSH Coalition. "We keep fighting the same war over and over, and can't get it right. No doubt things are better, but the same issues are recast."
Is this 2014 or the turbulent 1960s?
With Jackson leading the charge for high-tech to become more inclusive, the Teamsters Union beseeching Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to improve pay and benefits for shuttle bus drivers, and more than 100 people braving a severe storm Thursday to protest Apple's treatment of service workers, it's easy to flash back to the earlier era.
"We are deeply concerned about income inequality, the growing disparities between rich and poor," Jackson says. "That's why we're so committed to the low-wage workers in Silicon Valley and the tech industry, not just the engineers and computer scientists. They deserve fairness, equity and economic justice."
Of course, if civil discourse doesn't work, there are other options. Hackers this month unleashed a coordinated cyberattack on Sony Pictures on political grounds, making mincemeat of the company's computer systems.
The revolutionary leitmotif — in the shadow of violent city clashes — hearkens to the 1960s, when the tranquility of America's post-World War II economic boom was disrupted. In Nixonland, Rick Perlstein's sweeping narrative on Richard Nixon's ascent to the presidency in 1968, racial tensions are meticulously documented. Given today's combustible climate, inserting "2014" for "1966" is not far-fetched.
The difference today, says CNN commentator Van Jones, is the ubiquity of social media. It is capturing, via smartphone videos, Twitter and the like, images of injustices that are immediately pinged around the world.
"Something major is happening," Jones says. "The Rodney King video was extraordinary (in 1991) because it was caught on film. This is happening every month, and we don't need a network to broadcast it. Individuals do on their own social networks."
While protesters snarled traffic, tangled with police and damaged stores in Berkeley and Oakland last week, holiday tech parties in San Francisco served up handmade sushi, cocktails and stunning vistas of the city. Welcome to different worlds only miles apart.
The topics of stratospheric market valuations and uncanny venture-funding rounds were not discussed at Wednesday's workshop at Intel. Instead, inclusion and diversity were the buzzwords of choice.
Tech diversity "is this era's civil rights' imperative," Jackson said, comparing it to baseball's pre-integration days in the 1940s.
"Can you imagine baseball without (Juan) Marichal, (Willie) Mays, (Willie) McCovey and (Roberto) Clemente? Imagine technology being the best it can be."
Says Wayne Sutton, an adviser for Women Who Code, "I'm excited about the challenge and looking forward to changing the culture of tech to one that represents the growing diverse population of America.
There are encouraging signs.
On Monday, Jackson met privately with Apple CEO Tim Cook to discuss closing the racial gap in tech. On Thursday, he met with Intel CEO Brian Krzanich. Visa plans a panel on diversity in tech on Wednesday.
"We are free, but not equal," Jackson said. "We don't need a conversation about race, but a plan to fill the gaps."
Indeed, reshaping such a well-established industry won't be easy.
"We're trying to do inside of our walls what has not happened outside them" in society, says Rosalind Hudnell, Intel's chief diversity officer. "This is not an excuse. It's just difficult."
Swartz is USA TODAY's San Francisco Bureau Chief.