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Comment by zaroth | Hacker News Reader

Where does this line of thinking lead? I mean it's one thing to limit any attempts at intimacy in the workplace, but if you're just 'influential enough' then you expand this definition to include anyone in the entire tech sector? This seems clearly illogical.

Again, if there was assault it's a totally different matter. But sexual harassment is a lower bar specifically because of the idea no one should have to work in a hostile work environment. You can't create a hostile work environment if you're not actually working with someone or exerting direct influence over their career?

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I believe you are looking at this problem the wrong way. Part of that is the fault of the media and all of us on social media that focus on the heinousness of Harvey Weinstein's actions and our immediate move to dehumanize and vilify him. Weinstein was so far past the line that it might cloud were the line actually is. It is only natural for men to look at him and go "I'm not that bad, I didn't threaten anyone, I didn't rape anyone, I didn't proposition anyone I have direct control over, I didn't do any of this at work, etc.".

However the line isn't people being sexually harassed at work, it is people being sexually harassed at all. This isn't limited to drunkenly groping women at tech conferences or asking women you might potentially hire to shower with you. The problem is that your first romantic move with someone shouldn't be a grope or an offer to get naked. Simply don't behave in that manor until you know your actions will be received positively by the other person. It really isn't that difficult to simply treat people with empathy and think of their responses to your actions before you make them. If you do that you will never even get to the point of unwantedly groping someone.

In a perfect world, no one's feelings get hurt in love, and there is no war. We do not live in that world, and as mere mortals we are incapable of creating such a utopia.

It's a strawman that "your first romantic move with someone shouldn't be a grope or an offer to get naked." The reality is that ham-fisted proposals and hurtful rejection are rampant 'out there on the dance floor' and the purpose of sexual harassment policy is not, in fact, a idealized manual on how to behave in love and romance, but rules which apply exclusively in the workplace in order to ensure equality in the workplace.

If you're talking about sexual harassment outside of the workplace, then you're Doing It Wrong. If you're conflating poorly executed romantic endeavor with what is actually assault, that's even worse.

Please understand I'm engaging in the debate not to defend some asshole who I don't know and couldn't care two shits about, but I think there's a deeper meaning & understanding to be had here...

It seems to me, only from what little I've read about the man, that Scoble quite clearly is a jerk and an ass, and he owes quite a few people quite a few apologies. That much I most certainly am not debating!

I feel like we're on the cusp of a great wave of progress in the area. But I think if mere jerks and assholes are the new target, the inevitable backlash could set the whole movement back a decade.

I was not referring to sexual harassment in the legal sense. I was referring to it in the literal sense of harassment of a sexual nature. For example cat calling a woman on the street might be legal, but that is still literally sexual harassment and shouldn't be acceptable. If you use empathy as your guideline for your own personal behavior, the actual code of conduct for your employer or whatever professional environment you are in is irrelevant because you will already be abiding by a higher standard.

This is what entirely missing the point of sexual harassment policy looks like. Sexual harassment policy is a workplace equalizer. It's literally not about men acting like gentleman or having a higher standard.

If you're talking about harassment in general, umm... people are obnoxious to each other constantly and perpetually. Kumbaya let's make it all better? I don't think so!

Agree to disagree then. I think this is a symptom of a larger issue and I think it is a disservice to only try to remedy the symptom rather than looking for larger change.

> You can't create a hostile work environment if you're not actually working with someone or exerting direct influence over their career?

Quinn's story was not at a 'work environment' so does it have any less impact? Why are you letting him adjust the narrative to define what he feels is harassment?

Let's also not forget that it was a conference. A very laid back-camping kind of conference, but a conference. In today's standards - where you can't join a project or visit/talk to a conference without accepting a CoC - this would still be considered an extension of the workplace, or at least be classified as a "professional setting". We are not talking rocket science: if you are in a professional setting, getting overly drunk, make out in public and then proceeding to random groping - is NOT ok. You can have him redefine the narrative however he wants, he still a serial sexual offender.

Read back to the context of my question. Two drunk people coming together to "make out" at a camp out -- this is a "conference" like Burning Man is a conference -- if this is in and of itself is creating a "hostile work environment" I think that words are losing their meaning.

I don't really care what kind of narrative Scoble is trying to make. I have no knowledge of the specifics of his situation or his encounters, and couldn't care less about passing judgement on him.

But I was very curious about this idea that, which seems to be stated throughout this thread, someone can become so influential in an industry that any non-professional contact they have industry-wide could be sexual harassment.

And again, and again, I have to say, if there was assault that is just a completely different issue entirely.

I don't know where you're getting the idea it's not a conference. Here's a link to a photo set from Foo Camp 2010, where the incident occurred:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/deanputney/sets/72157624362235...

Burning Man it ain't.

Quinn's story sounds like assault and has nothing to do with sexual harassment. To me that just muddies the waters.

Surely he doesn't intend to say "I'm not guilty of sexual harassment but rather sexual assault."

Not at all. Sexual harassment describes different behavior than assault, and is not a crime. The same behavior which may be sexual harassment in one context could be entirely appropriate in another context. And all that is to say, there is a necessary context to sexual harassment.

Scoble claims that any sexual advances he made lacked the necessary context to be considered sexual harassment. He may not even be wrong.

I referenced the UN fact sheet on "What is Sexual Harassment" in another comment but perhaps I should quote it directly;

Unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature _when_ (emphasis added):

· Submission to such conduct is made either explicitly or implicitly a term or condition of an individual's employment, or

· Submission to or rejection of such conduct by an individual is used as a basis for employment decisions affecting such individual, or

· Such conduct has the purpose or effect of unreasonably interfering with an individual's work performance or creating an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment.

To me, hairsplitting about whether the conduct technically counts as sexual harassment is more or less beside the point and even getting into it makes the allegations sound more, rather than less, credible.

Maybe I misunderstood the purpose of this thread. I didn't think this was about assessing the specific allegations at all, but precisely about understanding the definition of sexual harassment.

It's the willingness of so many men to split hairs in order to defend a pig that is so offensive and threatening to women.

If you are the keynote speaker of a conference, DO NOT flirt with other attendees or other coworkers, regardless of the line of report. There are code of conduct left and right for a reason. Saying "they were not my employees" does not excuse you from using your influence, in a work-related setting, to approach someone else for sex matters.

Focusing on the conference aspect is not particularly helpful in understanding the expected framework here...

I assume there's nothing magical about a conference environment. In some cases the alleged harassment is occurring at bars where everyone is drinking alcohol. In another case it's a long-standing online chat relationship.

Where is the Harvey-esque influence peddling? I mean in that case is was more like straight-up blackmail.

Sometimes a guy will flirt with a girl and the feeling is not mutual. This happens quite frequently and it's not illegal or even wrong. Being an influential or powerful man (or woman!) doesn't make this wrong or illegal unless there is something more to it...

Even simpler than that, really: treat a conference and the outside social stuff that rides along as a work environment regardless of your status or role. You’re not at a knitting convention. You’re meeting professional peers. I had to fuck up to learn this, and I think it’s extremely important.

Q: Would I do $thing if this were at my office?

A: No.

Done.

I think I might be misunderstanding you. People absolutely should not be expected to live their whole lives like they are at the office. What defines outside social stuff that rides along as a work environment?

How far outside your social sphere are you supposed to be meeting or getting introduced to actual people who are interesting to you as a peer and potential romantic partner?

So it sounds like it's back to what I said earlier -- there's basically no social environment related to the tech industry where you think it would be alright for someone who happens to be influential in the tech sector to flirt with someone? But this seems to absolutely not be the definition of sexual harassment under the EEOC.

To try to remove some of the moral righteousness from it, lets assume we're talking about a single male, no wife or girlfriend, who is a well-known tech executive and blogger.

I don't think anyone here is talking about "flirting." Although I think it's also fair to say that the closer you get to being "in the office" the more caution is probably called for.

> I don't think anyone here is talking about "flirting."

Literally three comments up from your own comment:

> If you are the keynote speaker of a conference, DO NOT flirt with other attendees or other coworkers, regardless of the line of report.

Fair enough. I did not see that and would actually disagree with it for appropriately non aggressive values of flirting. (If you’re a high profile keynote speaker specifically though, caution is increasingly called for.)

Greer's account of Scoble flirting with her at a hotel bar (drinks in both hands, touched her leg) is quite the counter-point.

It appears like that moment had a lasting and significant impact on Michelle. [1] The repercussions as Michelle tells them are certainly terrible. I feel badly for Michelle and want to understand better what she experienced from her perspective.

That was certainly unwanted sexual contact. Was it sexual assault? Possibly. Was is sexual harassment? Possibly! All unwanted sexual contact is not actually automatically sexual harassment. [2]

[1] - https://www.buzzfeed.com/doree/woman-accuses-robert-scoble-o...

[2] - http://www.un.org/womenwatch/osagi/pdf/whatissh.pdf

I think that goes way beyond casual "flirting" in most people's book. Obviously people differ, signals get misread, and tolerances vary. I'm aware of one "code of conduct violation" report based on a Tshirt that made me roll my eyes--as well as the eyes of quite a few women I know. But that doesn't seem like a particular edge case as reported.

Touching someone's leg is considered flirting, is it not? Honestly, I did not mean to mis-characterize it.

No. I would not have said so Clearly it varies based on how well you know and your relationship with a person. But randomly in a semi-professional context?

It was clearly inappropriate, that's not what I'm asking. Inappropriate flirting is a thing. If I read in a book, "she touched his leg" I would call that flirting.

I feel like there's something I'm missing because, as recounted, his actions had such a strong and lasting impact to Greer.

Maybe this Scoble dude is just a nuclear style creep and just having to sit next to him is torturous. But that seems highly unlikely. I've never met the guy! I don't recall ever hearing him speak or watching a video of him even. So...

If I'm understanding the story, 4 people at a hotel bar drinking, one touching someone's leg. And what that led to, or possibly even caused -- I think it's fair to describe it as incredibly damaging? Obviously we want to avoid people being hurt like that. So, we construct social mores and civil law to try to prevent it from happening, and punish a small subset of offenders very harshly.

I'm a little stunned by all of it.

Let's go even more simple: Just be a decent human being

What you do and don't do should not be tied entirely to work relation situations.

Decent human beings make unwanted sexual advances all the fucking time. We can't read each other's minds after all.

This is why we go to the trouble of defining a "sexual harassment" standard in the workplace, which holds coworkers to a higher standard of care than what is expected outside of the workplace.

Obviously we are not supposed to live our lives interacting with every other human purely professionally.

Wow. Mind reading is not required. You've watched too many movies that go from strangers to married with children in 90 minutes. How about spending weeks, months, and even years building a relationship? Talking->dating->holding hands->... Spend more than 5 minutes on each stage. I know it seems old-fashioned, but it can really reduce the degree of offense when you misjudge the stage of a relationship.

Very condescending reply and ad hominem isn't necessary, but I think is reflective of the strength of the argument.

Dating is messy, complicated business. People get hurt. There is no magic ritual or length of time that will prevent that.

But I think the ivory tower condescension that if only men would follow this or that prescriptive approach is extremely damaging and even perpetuates the problem.

Harassment is a pattern of undesired behavior. One advance is OK, but if you're turned down you DO NOT MAKE ANOTHER to that person. Just accept it and move on.

Really that's it. It applies everywhere. It applies to non-sexual harassment as well.

Does your office serve alcohol? Does your rule of thumb extend to what you eat and drink? What kind of clothes you wear? Whether you stay or leave?

I think it would be great if it did. But then you would have to significantly restructure conferences to conform. Many of the official events of a conference are blatant violations of workplace behavior.

Since drinking an unspecified amount of alcohol can render a woman (but not a man) incapable of consenting while possibly also giving the outward appearance of consenting, no absolutely don't serve alcohol at the workplace when women are present.

Now of course this is an absurd statement, but are their elements of truth in it? Quinn's account is Scoble and another woman were "making out" and that both were drunk. There was no question at all of Scoble's capacity to consent but Quinn felt she or her friend was able to determine the woman (who she doesn't know and apparently didn't talk to) was not able to consent, and claim that Scoble was minutes from raping her.

So, in short, a dumpster fire.

Three other witnesses have come forward and said that they were concerned the woman was too drunk to consent. Artur Bergman's account: "Me and my friend realized we had seen Scoble appear next to her repeatedly during the evening. Pouring more and more alcohol for her. After seeing this for a while we felt we had to intervene and help her get away."

https://twitter.com/crucially/status/921317876169977857

It leads to professionals treating their work as if it was a profession.

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