Google distances itself from email decrying diversity efforts

When a solitary employee pounds out an internal memo at most organizations, it seldom elicits Twitter hashtags and category-five news coverage.

But when that organization is Alphabet Inc.’s Google, and the topic is gender inequality in the tech industry, the ensuing worldwide fireworks forced the organization to respond.

In the memo—which is drawing furious pushback on social media and the press—a male software engineer questioned Google’s diversity efforts and suggested that biological differences account for the lower level of women’s representation in the industry.

Alphabet’s new vice president for diversity, Danielle Brown, released a statement saying the employee “advanced incorrect assumptions about gender.” The writer’s views aren’t endorsed or promoted by the organization, she told employees in a memo that was also released to the public.