Please read the article I linked by an employment lawyer, it definitely is a legal issue. Choosing to not fire the employee would have opened them up to serious legal liability. Now, you can believe that the law is disastrously unjust and that a manifesto calling your colleagues' abilities into question based on their gender should not qualify as creating a hostile work environment, but I am curious if you would feel the same if the arguments had all been based on race instead of on gender?

The most eye opening piece of advice I've received on these subjects has been to try and listen to and believe as many people from these disadvantaged groups as possible. Women and minorities all have rhyming stories of being discriminated against. Part of the nature of systematic discrimination is that it is mostly invisible to the majority that benefit from it. It has to be, because when we notice it, it feels wrong.

The vast majority of women I've seen speak on the issue of this manifesto have said similar things: that they recognize the type of man who would write it, that they've had to deal with that type of man their whole careers, and that giving credence to his arguments by airing them in a company sanctioned forum is demoralizing, making their jobs more difficult, and making them feel more like outsiders to the company.

I believe in the paradox of tolerance. In order to build a tolerant environment, there are some things that cannot be tolerated.

"...that they recognize the type of man who would write it..." is the most illuminating phrase I've read from the left, and I'm terrified of it.

That I can choose to have a coworker fired over my projection, from his writing, of his internal psychological state is new to me.

The race to be the biggest victim makes sense to me now. That's awesome power.

Again, according to the employment lawyer I linked, he was fired for the contents of his writing, not some projection of his mental state.

What I'm trying to point out is that people on the receiving end of discrimination in our industry have recognized patterns of behavior that mostly pass beneath my (and perhaps, your) radar. But they are patterns that women across the board, in different companies, in different fields, recognize and can name to one another. This is what structural sexism means, these patterns are built into our society, today. And this manifesto matched perfectly with a number of negative patterns, hence the strong negative response.

(also, writing is inherently a projection of internal psychological state so I'm not sure I really understand the problem you are talking about)