In retrospect, that whole period was pretty clearly Elliot trying to propel himself to international activist. IIRC he (or someone close to him) essentially solicited RFCs and memos like Damore's in order to start a purge and force political change. Or am I completely off-base on that?
Now that you say it, I am starting to think so too.
In those days the were a lot of people at google that were advocating for social causes, equal opportunities and to help remove any systematic inequalities.
This is not inherently a bad thing. Everyone wants equal opportunities.
But you can go about this in two different ways. You can, if you are intelligent, try to understand the nuances and some of the root causes leading to the inequalities.
For example, like the late Kirk used to say that a big reason for the problem with crime and violence in black communities were due to the destruction of the black family unit.
Too many young men growing up in broken homes with no father or male role-models.
Fix the family unit and maybe the other problems will be reduced too.
Many of the "thought-leaders" at Google at the time tried to understanfd causes and nuances in a similar way. And also tried to talk about social issues in a nuanced way.
I won't name any of their names, but some of the people I am thinking of were very intelligent. They are still writing articles about reducing social inequalities but they are also extremely successful.
In the last decade one of these people have become a corporate vice president in a very large tech company, another the ceo of a very important comms company. And there are more.
You probably can not directly think of their names because they are not bat-shit crazy and they put more effort into their thoughts than "fire all wrongthinkers". They do this all without creating infinity drama around themselves.
But then there is also the other way you can do "activism". The way that Liz was doing it and the way the lunatics at EthicsInAI at google were doing it.
Not understanding nuance, not understanding cause and causality.
Instead just "identify the enemy, attack them, and all problems will go away".
To them the world is much simpler, black and white, and the activism is not so much
for making the world better than a weapon to use against people you disagree with.
These type of activists are not really all that intelligent. Loud and annoying but not
very intelligent.
Liz is solidly in this area. He was one of the major "thought leaders" but he is actually
pretty thick so instead of writing some insightful essays, Liz was much more combative. There is not so much space for nuanced discussions than "we must use this as a weapon and destroy those who disagree." But if you do not have the intellect to make
a more compelling argument, ...
Liz is also quite unsuccessful. A decade later Liz is still just the "field cto" for a small startup struggling to stay alive, not like the others that have moved on to become corp svp at a trillion dollar company and similar.
I think how the outcomes now a decade later has been so different is something that keeps Liz awake at night.
Another datapoint for the "IQ is a very reliable predictor for future success" theory.
How did our careers end up so very differently? It is unfair.
For them, having a somewhat senior position at google at the time was just a stepping stone to get higher and higher and achieve more and more.
For Liz being an sre-manager at google was the zenith. It has just been downhill from there and there is nothing that suggests that this will improve.
So, yeah. It think it was probably that Liz wanted to become an internationally recognized "activist". But Liz never had the intellect to take it much beyond
"angry troon screaming everyone is a rapist and must be fired".
(Another fun detail now that I think about it. None of the other social justice people at google at the time, who have become incredibly successful now, none of them has offered Liz any support. No couchy job, no statements of support on Twitter or LinkedIn, not even a like on his posts. It is like they have completely forgotten Liz even exists (or they want to pretend Liz does not exist.))