Google is an company that demands extraordinarily high ideological conformance from its workers. Unfortunately for Google it new longer controls the exact specification of what is and is not acceptable thought at Google, and much like the French revolution it’s being pushed into directions that is management may or may not agree with.
What should be a fairly reasonable question – is this person a good employee or not is immediately contaminated by questions they have nothing to do with job performance.
"What should be a fairly reasonable question – is this person a good employee or not is immediately contaminated by questions they have nothing to do with job performance."
There are all sorts of non-performance considerations that are important, not just at Google, but at pretty much every other company.
One of those considerations is ethics. Another is legality. Another is public relations.
Which of these do you think companies should ignore?
Ideological conformance. Google has a particular world view that insists that privacy is not a human right, that certain political positions are verboten and unions are bad.
What should be a fairly reasonable question – is this person a good employee or not is immediately contaminated by questions they have nothing to do with job performance.