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Former Mixer employees details the racism & Toxicity while working at Mixer [Update: the offending manager is no longer employed at MS]

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Mike Double U

Mike Double U

Member
Oct 25, 2017
414
Kalamazoo, Michigan
Fieran said:


Phils getting involved
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Good news, but he did e-mail Phil about this while he was still at Mixer. That said, I'd give him the benefit of the doubt because I'm sure his inbox isn't possible to check completely. Sad to see this can still be something that can happen to any company let alone a company like Microsoft. Hopefully an appropriate resolution can be found.

Side note, platform warring shouldn't be a part of a thread like this, yet here we are.
 
Filipus

Filipus

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Dec 7, 2017
5,162
Someone correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the Mixer team incredibly small and the boss a person of color? How many people would be involved in the hiring process when you have a small team? How can this things happen?

Mixer definitely needs a restructure and to clean it's place up. Racism and discrimination is never acceptable.
 
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Precious Tritium

Precious Tritium

Member
Oct 25, 2017
9,614
Yaaaaaaaaikes

Just goes to show only way to get eyes on a problem is to bring it up in public because if it's all internal all anyone is going to get is a slap on the wrist.
 
Somnia

Somnia

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Oct 25, 2017
2,978
APOEERA said:


So Milan Lee told Phil about it when it happened -- yet Phil Spencer didn't do anything? That just make it worse.
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As someone said earlier someone at Phil's level doesn't read all their emails. Most likely HR took it over and if the incident was already opened that Milan mentiomed this would have been attached to that incident investigation, which sadly as we know nothing came to be from it.

Not making excuses for Phil here or anything if he did see said email that's for sure though.
 
Minthara

Minthara

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Oct 25, 2017
8,237
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This is absolutely disgusting and higher-ups in the chain who oversee Mixer need to have their heads (job-wise, not physically) roll. The fact that he tried to flag the racism in every way he could and still got treated like shit is a massive problem.

Especially if he e-mailed higher-ups at Microsoft directly outside of the Mixer team. That's even uglier.
 

Deleted member 70824

User requested account closure
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Jun 2, 2020
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I think about this story and then imagine how many other companies have hidden cultures within them i.e. the beliefs of one person or group that goes against what the company stands for. Every company, not just Microsoft, should be very swift in dealing with racial prejudice. And it's not always about color of a person's skin either.
 
Anti

Anti

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Nov 22, 2017
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Mike Double U said:
Good news, but he did e-mail Phil about this while he was still at Mixer. That said, I'd give him the benefit of the doubt because I'm sure his inbox isn't possible to check completely. Sad to see this can still be something that can happen to any company let alone a company like Microsoft. Hopefully an appropriate resolution can be found.

Side note, platform warring shouldn't be a part of a thread like this, yet here we are.
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Obviously he is replying because now it is public.
 
OneBadMutha

OneBadMutha

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Nov 2, 2017
6,059
Executives at that level have their emails filtered. Something like that typically gets forwarded to HR. It is an example of why this is a problem that persists in most corporations. An email like that is forwarded by HR. HR makes it go away. For anyone else here who's sent a racism and sexual misconduct complaint to a high level executive, it's in some HR person's workbasket and their goal is to protect the corporation. Hence the cycle continues.
 
Kerotan

Kerotan

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Oct 31, 2018
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User Banned (Permanent): Platform Warring in a Thread on Racism; Numerous Prior Bans for Platform Warring and Inflammatory Behavior
Final nail in the mixer coffin?
 

Deleted member 17676

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
2,454
Weird at MS. We had the fiasco with the Brazilian nut job last month. It took Phil to respond and act again. So the management team need to be questioned. Either why aren't they doing anything about it or did they bring it to Phils attention.
 
Vex

Vex

Member
Oct 25, 2017
22,213
Wow. I actually lost my cool reading that op. Hmmmm. Interesting. I am pretty mad.... Yup.

I'll just say I hope Phil actually does something. He needs to get on this asap. Too much time has passed already.
 
atomsk eater

atomsk eater

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Oct 25, 2017
3,859
She can't be racist because she hired a black person? The same black (former) employee that made the complaint? Make it make sense!
 
eyeball_kid

eyeball_kid

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Oct 25, 2017
10,343
This does not speak well of Mixer's culture at all, and possibly Microsoft culture in general. I add the latter because if HR and the legal team both couldn't deal with this properly then their issues may extend beyond the Mixer group. Good on him for speaking out, and I hope something positive comes of all this for both him and change that is obviously necessary at Microsoft.
 
Method

Method

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Oct 25, 2017
1,447
First... She needs to be fired. But 2nd. Who else was in that meeting and was OK with the slave comment? They all would have heard it too. If I heard that type of shit at work in a meeting, I'd tell that person that was not an acceptable comment, manager, executive etc... In the meeting itself. (I understand not everyone could or would be able to do so. But I'd hope they at least support me off line and let that person/HR know that comment was unacceptable)
 
Outrun

Outrun

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Oct 30, 2017
5,787
I was talking to a friend about the racism that I experienced growing up today, and commented how my kids wouldn't have it as hard.

I was wrong.
 
OneBadMutha

OneBadMutha

Member
Nov 2, 2017
6,059
So lesson learned friends...when people say go through the proper channels...all they're telling you to do is go straight to the department thats there to protect the corporations ass, not yours. Emails get forwarded to HR who make shit go away. Unfortunately social media is one of the few avenues we have because corporations are terrified of brand damage. You get quick action that way. But handling this one situation isn't enough. There's a systemic problem which will continue to exist with the way the systems are set up. The system has to improve. There has to be an evenue for employees. A place to go that doesn't have a conflict of interest. How do you make that happen?
 
DanteSparda504

DanteSparda504

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Nov 2, 2017
4,505
Birmingham, AL
APOEERA said:


So Milan Lee told Phil about it when it happened -- yet Phil Spencer didn't do anything? That just make it worse.
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This kind of comes down to if Phil saw it or not too. He likely gets a ton of emails from so many people, it's not at all surprising if he never even knew he got the email. I'm always having to re-forward emails I sent to people at my company because they never read it the first time and I work for a fucking TINY company compared to MS.

He is aware of it now that people who do care have gotten it to him rather than cover it up, and appears to have an opportunity to take care of the problem now.
 
Somnia

Somnia

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DanteSparda504 said:
This kind of comes down to if Phil saw it or not too. He likely gets a ton of emails from so many people, it's not at all surprising if he never even knew he got the email. I'm always having to re-forward emails I sent to people at my company because they never read it the first time and I work for a fucking TINY company compared to MS.

He is aware of it now that people who do care have gotten it to him rather than cover it up, and appears to have an opportunity to take care of the problem now.
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I work for a company with 270,000 employees world wide and I ALWAYS have to do follow up emails with anyone even remotely high but yet not even close to Phil in level. High level people filter and ignore emails unless its people they specifically filter for or are looking for. The sheer amount of emails they get is staggering.

I wish it wasn't that way but it is unfortunately.
 
Method

Method

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Oct 25, 2017
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Somnia said:
I work for a company with 270,000 employees world wide and I ALWAYS have to do follow up emails with anyone even remotely high but yet not even close to Phil in level. High level people filter and ignore emails unless its people they specifically filter for or are looking for. The sheer amount of emails they get is staggering.

I wish it wasn't that way but it is unfortunately.
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I agree that execs and high level managers do filtering but... If you're not getting emails about Racism complaints in your company because they are filtered out or straight to HR, that's a huge Fuck up. No excuse to miss that email imo.
 
DanteSparda504

DanteSparda504

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Nov 2, 2017
4,505
Birmingham, AL
Somnia said:
I work for a company with 270,000 employees world wide and I ALWAYS have to do follow up emails with anyone even remotely high but yet not even close to Phil in level. High level people filter and ignore emails unless its people they specifically filter for or are looking for. The sheer amount of emails they get is staggering.

I wish it wasn't that way but it is unfortunately.
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Correct.

Hell, I have people in my corporate office come at me for never emailing in invoices, despite the fact that I had submitted them twice in the past. I always fire back with the exact date and time stamp. People in any position of power do not read their emails like they should.
 
KernelC

KernelC

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Aug 28, 2019
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Mass Effect said:
Honestly, this isn't something I expected from a Microsoft company. I thought they were much better about this than other tech companies?
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Mixer has never been successful, so I'm guessing even Microsoft didn't pay much attention there. I have a girl friend who just got in (Microsoft) and she says it's pretty awesome and inclusive (she is from a somewhat rural side of Mexico). So I'm guessing Mixer was a shitshow from the start, because yes. As far as I'm concerned, EA and Microsoft are supposedly some of the better places to work for
 
Kthulhu

Kthulhu

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Oct 25, 2017
14,670
This really sucks. Just because all the big companies are in SF and Seattle doesn't mean they don't have a long way to go.

Fortunately there's no need to boycott Mixer, as their numbers seem to indicate everyone was already doing that.
 
Kthulhu

Kthulhu

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Oct 25, 2017
14,670
OneBadMutha said:
So lesson learned friends...when people say go through the proper channels...all they're telling you to do is go straight to the department thats there to protect the corporations ass, not yours. Emails get forwarded to HR who make shit go away. Unfortunately social media is one of the few avenues we have because corporations are terrified of brand damage. You get quick action that way. But handling this one situation isn't enough. There's a systemic problem which will continue to exist with the way the systems are set up. The system has to improve. There has to be an evenue for employees. A place to go that doesn't have a conflict of interest. How do you make that happen?
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Unions can help.
 
headspawn

headspawn

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Oct 27, 2017
14,681
"She can't be racist... she hired you and you're black"

Whew. Brings me back, this whole story sounds like something I would've wrote about my older job though my dumb ass stuck around way longer than I should have.
 
Landford

Landford

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Oct 25, 2017
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With the way Xbox and Microsoft tolerated and even partnered and awarded that absolute piece of shit channel Xbox Milgrau, Its no surprise something like this exists.
 
Justsomeguy

Justsomeguy

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Oct 27, 2017
1,721
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Mass Effect said:
Honestly, this isn't something I expected from a Microsoft company. I thought they were much better about this than other tech companies?
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I worked there in the UK for ten years and it's an incredibly diverse company which places huge importance on diversity and inclusion, including explicit training on the topic. I worked with colleagues from across the lgbt spectrum, of all sorts of races and religions from around the world (I had a project with a fully remote team covering 6 countries), physically disabled people, and as I left, MS were proactively recruiting non neurotypical people. It was great. So, organisationally, they are awesome.

Which is why this is even more awful to read. It's just so unexpected. I'm shocked and appalled at what was said to this poor person, it's just disgracefu, and sounds like an absolute failing in that management chain.

I imagine there will be repercussions from the ms org now this is more widely known.
 
TheHunter

TheHunter

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Oct 25, 2017
25,774
Not to get off topic but MS is known for its diversity and progressive stance on things like this.

Doesn't mean there won't still be racist shitheads. It does mean I highly doubt Phil Spencer saw it and just laughed.
 
spam musubi

spam musubi

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Oct 25, 2017
9,412
TheHunter said:
Not to get off topic but MS is known for its diversity and progressive stance on things like this.

Doesn't mean there won't still be racist shitheads. It does mean I highly doubt Phil Spencer saw it and just laughed.
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Their PR talks about it, but there are many public incidents about stuff like this. Being in the industry, I've heard some horror stories about Microsoft as well. Goes to show yet again how hollow corporate messaging about inclusivity is. This is like the third incident with Microsoft over the past year or so. And this one says that Phil's Xbox organization is one of the worst:

www.theverge.com

Microsoft workers shared dozens of sexual harassment stories on an internal email chain

Demeaning comments and requests for sexual favors
www.theverge.com www.theverge.com
 
Dokkaebi G0SU

Dokkaebi G0SU

Member
Nov 2, 2017
5,922
We need leadership to fuck that shit up. Wtf!? Hell no! Better be some swift action and investigation on this for real. Karen holding the throne for mixer?

is this a reason why it's been so silent for such a long time??? What's been going on there
 
PianoBlack

PianoBlack

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May 24, 2018
6,837
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OneBadMutha said:
So lesson learned friends...when people say go through the proper channels...all they're telling you to do is go straight to the department thats there to protect the corporations ass, not yours. Emails get forwarded to HR who make shit go away. Unfortunately social media is one of the few avenues we have because corporations are terrified of brand damage. You get quick action that way. But handling this one situation isn't enough. There's a systemic problem which will continue to exist with the way the systems are set up. The system has to improve. There has to be an evenue for employees. A place to go that doesn't have a conflict of interest. How do you make that happen?
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Seems like a mostly solved problem in other fields. Why don't companies have inspectors general or ombudsman? Somebody hired directly by the board with no or very little compensation in stock, and a directive to root this kind of shit out (and also corrupt business dealings or whatever else).

I don't have any business background or executive experience but it seems like a basic step they could take if they were serious.
 
Landford

Landford

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Oct 25, 2017
4,678
People trying to rationalize ways to make sure Phil has no blame in this. Believe victims. He sent Phil and email and he ignored it. Taking notice now that things are public does not make it Ok.
 
Cranster

Cranster

Prophet of Truth
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Oct 25, 2017
9,788
Landford said:
People trying to rationalize ways to make sure Phil has no blame in this. Believe victims. He sent Phil and email and he ignored it. Taking notice now that things are public does not make it Ok.
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You are assuming he even noticed/read the email, let alone received it. Obviously nothing being done isn't ok, but I don't think this is something Phil would ignore if he knew about it.

I have a feeling we will know more after this meeting though.
 
Aisod

Aisod

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Mar 21, 2020
474
Landford said:
People trying to rationalize ways to make sure Phil has no blame in this. Believe victims. He sent Phil and email and he ignored it. Taking notice now that things are public does not make it Ok.
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I mean there is a pretty good chance Phil never even saw the email. He probably gets 100s of emails a day. He's the head of Xbox, not some random software developer.
 
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