No, it is not a valid point. A company must take responsibility for its employees or contractors. It hired them. It is responsible for them. It must be held accountable for them. Why? Because a company is its employees. And yes, a few rotten apples will spoil the party. You judge a company by its worst employees, not its best. That's the way you judge any group. That's why a group worth admiring has the highest standard for membership and mercilessly purges its ranks of bad apples.

No one is saying Google should not take responsibility - they should, and appear to be. Continue being angry at Google as a whole about this incident if they try to sweep it under the rug and do not get rid of those responsible.

I'll also continue being angry until they come up with a better response than a half-assed paragraph on a social network by some guy that doesn't even bother introducing himself or his function within Google.