Careless People

I read all the Silicon Valley stories and these sociopath tech bros and their creepy misogynist squads are all the same. Nothing surprised me, except one attention-getting anecdote about Sheryl Sandberg that seems too childish to be real.

What stuck with me the most is how important it is to do the inner work to deal with your own demons. To learn how to value yourself, stand up from yourself, and say no.

I understand the dynamics in these places and that things slowly get worse, but I’m still amazed how much the author tolerated. She was young, and I tolerated way too much shit in my 20’s too, but I still can’t fathom flying across the world while still dealing with massive blood loss and near death after having a baby. I also can’t imagine demanding that of an employee in the first place. The failures of “leadership” all the time, on every level, is mine-boggling.

This woman has had TWO near death experiences, and that’s not including the scary situations she was in while representing Facebook.

She opens with a horrific story from her childhood that kind of explains why she perseveres when she shouldn’t, and I found that part heartbreaking. I hope she’s been able to heal from all that now.

In terms of the dirt about Sandberg, I have never trusted what I’ve heard about her and am proud to have never read Lean In. There were signs. She’s like the female version of Elon Musk: somehow had great PR and no one listened to all the people dropping hints until the stories hit some sort of tipping point. You don’t align yourself with and clean up the messes of the world’s sleaziest company and somehow have — or retain — any integrity.

The fact that the author so deeply believed in Facebook and is single-handedly responsible for getting Zuck to care about (and be involved in) politics… is wild. At the end, she realizes it backfired, but wow. That throughline, of her seeing the coming regulation and potential and need for someone to steward it was insightful, but at the end of the day Facebook simply does not care about the harm they cause, blatantly lie about everything, and collaborate with dictators if it pads the bottom line. Why anyone is on any of their platforms in the year of our lord 2025 is beyond me.