Comment by standupstandup | Hacker News Reader

Comment by standupstandup | Hacker News Reader

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From the article linked below:

A former Pixar employee requesting anonymity says Lasseter's leave of absence statement is "ridiculous" and "trivializing this behavior." The employee adds, "To sum this up as unwanted hugs is belittling and demeaning. If it was just unwanted hugs, he wouldn't be stepping down."

I am baffled by this bizarre logic. Belittling and demeaning who, exactly? And how on earth can you derive guilt from observing punishment? In today's Hollywood culture it is easily believable that the man who built the company could be forced out - even if only temporarily - for simply hugging people. Or is this anonymous person trying to imply Lasseter is actually a horrible rapist and nobody is willing to anonymously say so? Seems deeply unlikely at the moment.

How many successful companies are going to self-destruct by giving in to this sort of collective madness? Lasseter liked hugging people? 15 years ago he put his hand on a woman's knee? What message does it send that vast success for huge numbers of employees counts for nothing when put against people who are offended by this?

This is an easy trap to fall into. Try to think from the victim's perspective. Countless women had to suffer mental and emotional distress due to Lasseter. Who knows, without such stress, some of these women could have been even bigger than Lasseter himself.

The ends never justify the means.

I think it’s probably an exaggeration to say that ‘countless’ women were personally harassed by Lassiter personally, but countless women have been harassed by people like him and continue to be today.

I think people are focusing too much on individuals and missing a very important question: Why are we relying on journalists for this? Presumably all of these people work at corporations with HR departments. Why weren’t there consequences sooner?

Something is fundamentally broken with the incentives around harassment in the work place — HR departments exist to protect the company and its executives from lawsuits. They don’t exist to protect employees from the company. Until there are serious financial consequences for failing to act on harassment complaints sooner, nothing is going to change.

Every newspaper on earth can’t exclusively commit itself to uncover sexual harassment. Eventually this is going to die down— and then what? If Jane Engineer is harassed by Joe Manager today— where does she go? The media only cares about celebrities. Are HR departments changing their policies to stop the ongoing harassment today? I seriously suspect not.

In another ten years we’ll be seeing another round of these stories.

> What message does it send that vast success for huge numbers of employees counts for nothing when put against people who are offended by this?

“Don’t touch my fucking knee or you’ll get fired. It doesn’t matter that people like you. It doesn’t matter that you are in a position of power.”

Of course, he has to get fired to send this message. Soon, hopefully. Remember, rape culture isn’t just about raping.

>15 years ago he put his hand on a woman's knee?

It seems like he has a history of groping women. I'm not sure why anyone should put energy into defending that behavior.

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