Statistics, we have a problem
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While I have you: if you're commenting here, please keep this guideline in mind too: Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.
I hereby advance my theory that it is rather simpler than that. 'If you are in a position of power over the other party, then you should keep some social distance'.
Don't smack their bum, don't message them about their holiday photos on FB. If they come to you tired and emotional, sit them down on the other side of your desk and ask them what is wrong. Tell them you are sorry they feel that way. Talk for hours if you need to...at work. Keep your trousers zipped up.
Is it that hard? If your team socialize, then by all means go with them. If you find there is only two of you left, then go home.
I think it is very easy for a decent human being to avoid.
Even if people don't follow the platinum rule, they should surely recognise that there are interactions they would have a problem with. The people happy handing out "hugs" to people they are attracted to are surprisingly unwilling to receive them from people they find unattractive.
Everyone should be given social space until a mutual agreement that something else happens. This is especially important if there are significant cultural differences between people.
It's far less common, but it certainly does. You just won't hear about it if they find each other attractive.
Here are two points I consider interesting:
* In academia, the only time when you have no power over anyone else is when you are an undergraduate student. After that, almost everyone can be thought to wield some power over anyone, either directly (professor -> student, full professor -> junior professor, senior/accomplished PhD student -> new PhD student) or indirectly (almost everyone you meet is a potential reviewer of your papers, many professors sit on boards which decide postdoc/faculty positions).
I would say that the power is more perceived than real -- having a bad name with one professor outside your university likely does not kill your career -- but I would consider it natural to feel uneasy if such a professor expressed intimate interest in you and you had to turn them down.
* I have a feeling that for many people, already a single bit of information -- namely knowledge that an person with some amount of power considers you attractive -- is something that would cause them uneasiness (in academia or otherwise). And this uneasiness would be permanent and is not dependent on how this bit propagates to you; from the most innocent (an invitation for coffee that is turned down, a smile in a professional discussion that never veers off-topic) to the most inappropriate (as described in the original post).
If that is true, the only solution I can think of is to make sure no such information is shared among any people in your organization -- I abide by that rule personally, but I can understand people opposing such a dehumanization of the work environment.
> If you find there is only two of you left, then go home.
This seems dangerously close to the Pence view of not socializing alone with women.
Is your view actually stronger? That a person should not socialize alone with anyone they have power over, rather than just women?
tl;dr
For me, it's a matter of risk tolerance. I have a very low tolerance for the risk of cheating on my wife. So based on my best understanding of the circumstances that tend to increase the likelihood of infidelity, I try hard to avoid those circumstances.
> Doesn't this attitude perpetuate the harmful stereotype that men are not in control of their own sexual urges?
First, "stereotype perpetuation" isn't something that just happens to people. A person has some ability to accept or reject adopting belief in a stereotype. So I'll let other people take responsibility for what they believe regarding this topic.
Secondly, what you're seeing is a male being in control of his sexual urges. My post was simply giving insight into one of the mechanisms by which I do it.
> Shouldn't someone in a committed relationship be able to control themselves better?
Well ideally, yeah. But I didn't design the human condition.
> Do you really not trust yourself?
I try to have an accurate understanding of my strengths and weaknesses, and to plan accordingly.
It’s a little inhumane to make individual men responsible for the weight of western civilization’s treatment of women when they’re trying to do right by their partners. I determined years ago that I’m some combination of unwilling or unable to maintain monogamous relationships, so I stopped making that commitment. Even without that constraint, being romantically engaged with people is at best distracting and at worst destructive, and so structure my life so as to avoid engendering those feelings. When I spend time with members of the sex I find attractive, I inevitably want to escalate.
It’s my unsubstantiated conjecture that this is why traditional societies had separate gender roles. Same sex groups take so much less emotional energy.
Which brings in all the problems with the Pence view. It reinforces the glass ceiling / old boys club, because friends talk about business on the golf course (or at the LAN party), and then women get excluded from that.
Worse, it's a policy adopted only by the self-conscious people who wouldn't otherwise have crossed the line anyway, and not the bastards going around groping people left and right, which increases the proportion of interactions with the latter category.
The problem seems to be that there are obvious benefits to standing right on top of the line (increased probability of friendship/romance) but nobody wants anybody to cross it, and that can't happen. If you tell everybody to stand as close as they can to an invisible line that nobody can quite agree on the exact contours of, every time a moderate person actually draws their version of the line you'll find a whole slew of people standing on the wrong side of it, because it's everyone even slightly less moderate than that. Ask a conservative (i.e. puritan) person to draw the line and everybody will be standing on the wrong side of it.
Rejection sucks. Nobody wants to get rejected, so nobody wants to be thrust into the position of the villain who has to reject someone. But the world where nobody ever has to reject someone is the completely sterile one.
The uncomfortable no is the price of the opportunity for yes. Nobody who internally knows that the answer is no wants that "opportunity" thrust on them, but how is the other party supposed to know that ahead of time?
And it's no help to point out the obvious cases. There are things that 99.99% of people agree are over the line. The problem is the things that 75% of people agree are over the line, because then 25% of people are doing them.
Some might, I don't. Some crap people do crap things. I discuss work issues in work. Out of hours work discussions exclude all kinds of people, people with families, women (again in particular) with children and those who prefer work situations to social ones. I occasionally meet male and female colleagues one-to-one in coffee shops during work hours, to talk things through, but I don't drink alcohol with them.
I haven't studied Pence's view, but I am a married man and I rarely meet women socially one-on-one. I socialize very occasionally with my team . I have seen so many times where a manager socializes with his team, then they do a bit of texting, then one hits on hard times and needs a shoulder to cry on, then they fall out and the company has a sexual harassment case to deal with where maybe it is just a 'lovers quarrel'.
I agree with the other poster that said that having sex with close colleagues is wholly unprofessional. There are plenty of people on earth.
What is so bad about talking business outside of work?
Yeah, and I feel bad about that. Hopefully things like professional societies, meetups, etc. can mitigate those factors.
And realistically, in my experience as an experienced software developer, the whole golf course / LAN party thing just doesn't happen. Or if it does, I'm certainly not benefiting from it either. Maybe for CxO's or people in sales, I wouldn't know.
It tends to be much more subtle than most people expect. The boss asks your coworkers about you and people say nicer things about people they're friendlier with. Or you're hanging out with someone outside of work and end up talking about work for a minute, and having the extra information makes you look good. Or your friend gets a job at a better company and then you have inside information and someone to put in a good word for you if you want to do the same thing.
It's a damn shame, too. But the reality for me is that apart from making sure my kids stay alive, my most important commitment in life is remaining faithful to my wife. If that commitment prevents me from personally helping to shatter the glass ceiling or even means I'm unintentionally upholding it, then so be it.
People have agency over who they have sex with, you're saying they don't.
So, if you are misogynistic, following this policy saves you from career suicide and harming others, and if you are not misogynistic, then the price is small. Therefore, it's best to follow this "no socialization with subordinates" policy.
At least in that way, one gender isn't staying away and keeping away the other, thus potentially exacerbating the problem of gender stratification.
But then again, now we're in the murky territory of privacy, and how many jurisdictions are 2(all) party consent.
Back and forth, round and round. Pence's answer does seem to be the logical, if completely ugly, solution.
I didn't say don't socialize, I said keep some distance. The example of being in a bar together is the start of many sorry tails, and yes you should go home.
But the answer is yes, I have a different relationship with my workmates to my friends, deliberately. I do the majority of my business in business hours. I don't find after hours drinking clubs healthy at all.
What the medium post reports is not just a gray area, it is clear sexual assault and unwanted creepiness. I'm starting to wonder if the people upvoting these posts that suggest people dehumanize themselves in order to keep from being accused (!) of sexual assault are doing as some sort of reverse psychology in order to push back against the #metoo movement. That's because such an attitude is exactly the wrong take away from this.
If you cannot find the line between assaulting someone and being their friend, I think the problem might lie with your interpretation of people and their feelings, and not with "being too friendly" whatever that means.
And it's easy enough to separate these actions from benignly asking someone on a date.
No it is completely obscene. I hope it is severely dealt with, and all of the people who were around and didn't criticize, and promoted even tough they knew are dealt with too.
What I was commenting on is that every time the subject comes up a load of people start the 'you can't even talk to women any more' nonsense.
> dehumanize themselves
It is not dehumanizing to not fuck your colleagues. I see it as extremely unprofessional to get too close to them. I see my self as an extremely kind, thoughtful and empathetic manager. My female staff have brought me issues from menopause, menstruation, man trouble to money problems and I try to give them all a sympathetic ear. When I have dealt with something in a way that has upset them it pains me. I care very strongly for a number of my team, indeed I have one away on secondment and I miss them. I ask them about their weekends, and their families. We even throw the odd innuendo around. One is very flirtatious, and I laugh it away. However at 5.30 they went their way and I went mine. We are colleagues not Fuck Buddies.
Your post sounds exactly like the "you can't even talk to women any more" that you claim to not like - you are literally saying that men need chaperones ("If you find there is only two of you left, then go home.").
I wasn't saying that at all, you have removed the context reductio ad absurdum. The context was at the end of an evening of socializing. Now we have two drunk people, boss and sub-ordinate, in a bar together after a night and everyone has gone home but them. Presumably everyone else exercised their good judgment that it was time to leave.
I'll tell you what you can take literally, I literally saw that on a sexual harassment claim. In this case it was withdrawn, and my best guess of what happened is that it was consensual, but lead to an awkward situation which they found uncomfortable in their small team.
None of what I am talking about is relevant to the sexual predator scenario. However strong guidelines on professional conduct do help stop predatory behavior hiding behind 'just being playful'
For instance- it's very good sense to remember that the people who are under your management are employed to do as you say and don't just freely decide to grant you their time and attention. When the social context is of communication between work colleagues, you are very likely to make a mistake if you interpret it in the same way as communication between friends.
Consider for instance the situation where The Boss Made a Joke. A sensible boss will recognise that people aren't necessarily laughing at their jokes because they consider them funny- but because it is polite to laugh at colleagues' jokes, and you are expected to be polite to your boss. So a manager who keeps on cracking jokes, thinking that everyone finds them so funny, is not acting sensibly and is making a social mistake. A boss who keeps the jokes to a minimum required to keep morale high, is actually keeping morale high.
At the end of the day, what everyone must realise, managers and reports alike, is that your colleagues are not your friends. To the extent that you don't make the decision who to work with (because someone else hires them, or they hire you) you are also not choosing to socialise with them. You are obliged to socialise with them in the context of work.
Btw, I recognise that the OP is actually totally treating his (?) employees as friends- but there you have it. I think that's inappropriate and can only lead to tears.
You can be friends with your workers if they are friendly. If not, just be professional. There should be no reason to either have to a) force employees to be friends or b) force employees to be robots.
For fuck's sake, the issue here is sexual assault and harrassment, it's a far cry from misinterpretation of comments or intent, which for some reason, people think is a bigger deal than the abuse women and men have faced in the workplace. How about you respect people as people? That seems like a better prescription than forcing people to be cold to each other.
I do agree some of the rules are different with bosses, as the maxim goes, with great power comes great responsibility. But your conclusion that colleagues are not your friends seems ridiculous to me. It ignores the organizations where people are friends and there are no issues.
So I am being a little combative, but please tell me how this opinion is still problematic. I am genuinely open minded and want to discuss this.
For what it's worth, I consider "being friendly" and "being friends" two distinct categories. You can be friendly to people (or polite, corteous, respectful etc etc) without actually being buddy-buddies with them.
On a personal note, I have been lucky to have had some strong working relationships with (male) colleagues who offered me valuable mentorship. They were great teachers to me and helped make me the professional I am today. Still- we were not friends, in the sense of slapping-the-back, rude-joking, buddy-buddies. I'm not saying that sort of relation (a colleague who's your mate) can never work. All rules are made to be broken etc etc. But I do believe that unless you carefully compartmentalise your professional relationships from other kinds of relationships, you run a very significant risk of making a mess of all your relationships.
Edit: as to ignoring organisations were people are friends and the sky doesn't fall- that's just the survivorship fallacy, innit. Just because you can swim with sharks without being eaten doesn't mean swimming with sharks isn't dangerous, in general.
I propose an alternative theory: "Socializing", "getting to know each other outside of work" and even "flirting" are sets of activities strictly disjunct to "discussing your sexual fantasies", "acting out your sexual fantasies" and "showing around pictures of your dick".
Maybe there is mutual interest between colleagues to do more outside of work. That's fine. Go with it, but make sure it's actually mutual. Maybe you get new buddies or friends, maybe (very unlikely) more - but look for clues how the other are feeling and - unless you're already far, far beyond a work relationship, don't ever assume they want sex.
Anyone outside your field and/or occupation. It's that simple.
I actually don't understand this line of reasoning at all. You propose it as a bit of a strawman, but there's always at least one earnest comment in such threads to the effect of "well, now you can't flirt with ANYONE at work!"
That's correct. You can't flirt with anyone at work.
The problem isn't the set of social guidelines that say you don't try to fuck your colleagues. The problem is the people who seem to think that because their personal inclinations make it unpalatable to seek romantic encounters outside of work, that they're entitled to seek romantic encounters at work.
They/ you are not. Find hobbies; ask friends for friends-of-friends that are looking; hit up OKCupid or Tinder or what-have-you. There are any number of ways to seek romantic entanglements that completely divorce you from the issues of power dynamics that occur when courting professional colleagues.
Just stop.
Work celibacy is not the answer, and it often leads to keeping sexual relationships clandestine, which enables further bad power dynamics.
Discouraging a rapey dickhead enabling culture is a far more successful investment of effort. Policies against inappropriate supervisor relationships are a good idea though.
Amusingly, using tinder isn't enough to avoid dating within the company for many.
If you are a person of social standing in academia, it shouldn't be hard to figure out what a poster session is for - and it's not flirting or criticising people's dress styles, which hardly counts as "socialising". People are there to talk about their work (and have no good options for getting away from you).
If only life could be so nicely compartmentalised as anglosaxon cultures dream...
The whole distinction should be in the abuse of such relationship for coercion (e.g. Weinstein style) -- as opposed to the mere presence of such relationships...
I am a professor of statistics, and have encountered lots of issues surrounding relationships and harassment involving colleagues as well as once myself.
Based on these experiences, I agree with you for the most part, but am not sure even that is workable advice, unless you want to create an cold, inhuman environment. And even then it raises lots of thorny issues that you might not anticipate.
I can say from one, personally impactful experience, for example, that "talking for hours if you need to" at work, with someone you work with one-on-one for hours daily, can lead to, say, a mentee declaring feelings for you. Maybe this talking started under pressure from other colleagues and students to help the mentee feel more comfortable because of concerns about how they're feeling in general. And because that individual might be a brilliant, amazing individual you've found you share a lot with, after enough time, you might develop feelings for that mentee too, even if you never started out with an inkling of that when you started reaching out to them. The immediate response, you think, is "well, tell them these kinds of things are inappropriate and leave it at that." Ok, but then, without any further context, does that shame the mentee and lead them to believe that their feelings are abnormal? Do you tell them that it's normal, you have feelings too, but nothing can happen as a result, it's inappropriate to pursue a relationship? In that case, even if nothing physical happens, it might lead to severe complications later, purely emotionally, as both of you deal with the consequences of knowing you have strong feelings for each other but nothing can happen as a result. Do you say nothing at all? After all, the mentee confessed feelings for you without you saying anything to them of that sort, and that didn't stop them from telling you that they have feelings that way. Will they try to escalate things if you don't say anything? Do you reach out to colleagues? Will that shame the student or damage their reputation?
Take this a step further. Let's say you do somehow prohibit males and females from becoming close. Do you prohibit purely platonic same-sex relationships from being close? Is it say, sexual discrimination when a female faculty member has her (non-romantically involved) female, but not male, students over for dinners regularly, to chill and watch movies or have small gatherings, shares hotel rooms to save on costs (for cash-strapped students at expensive conferences)? That is, after all, discriminating against male students on the basis of gender. Or are they just being caring and friendly with their students, and careful in avoiding complications with members of the opposite sex? What if a female faculty member never takes male mentees? What if it were a male faculty and male students? Isn't that the "old boys" network? Where do you draw the line? When does differences in closeness of relationships become gender discrimination?
Unlike you, I do think there's lots of gray areas, and I see it as an unavoidable consequence of humanity. I kind of agree with you that ideally, you should just keep work relationships impersonal, but I think that's really unrealistic in practice. What worries me is this kind of blanket idea that any feelings or sexual behavior or relationships between coworkers or supervisors and supervisees is always the result of some maliciousness or failing or something on someone's part. It seems there needs to be a more nuanced approach to these things, or some more realistic discussion that recognizes people do have feelings for one another, especially those they are in regular contact with, platonic or otherwise.
I've heard of all sorts of stories in this area involving other students and faculty, from advisors basically sexually assaulting students, to advisors who end up marrying their students and ending up in very happy, healthy marriages. There's also things like students and advisors who are close and end up having sex at a conference when they are both completely intoxicated and both regret it later.
I guess what I have difficulty relating to in the published story is making physical sexual advances on people who you aren't close to, out of the blue. I have difficulty relating to that, but then again, the workplace context doesn't matter. I wouldn't do those things at a bar or someplace else either.
Every time I have had to look into a situation where somebody has been accused of inappropriate behavior I find that nothing grey has happened at all, in fact the manager has been stupid. The manager has started texting at weekends, turning up at their house uninvited, plying them with alcohol, commenting on their Facebook etc, right up to 'she offered, and never look a gift-horse in the mouth'. I think these are REALLY easy boundaries not to cross.
> I can say from one, personally impactful experience...
Thank you for sharing, this is a touching story and I'm sure is not an uncommon one with academics. Mentoring must be one of the most rewarding parts of the job. A mentor finding that their feelings for a mentee are strong, or finding the mentee feels strongly for them is going to happen sometimes. I'm sure some heterosexual advisors have very strong feelings for their same-sex mentee's which are above the normal boss/colleague dynamic. Managing it well is going to be very difficult and take some skill, if you are going to continue to work together. Sometimes the difficult choice is going to be that you lose your mentee, but retain the moral high ground.
If however you end up sleeping together, then you have crossed my line, I'm afraid. If you simply have to be together then you need to restructure your professional life so you are not their boss any more.
>There's also things like students and advisors who are close and end up having sex at a conference when they are both completely intoxicated and both regret it later.
And 100% this is misconduct on behalf on the advisor. 100% it is their fault.
> ideally, you should just keep work relationships impersonal
That is not what I said. I said to keep some distance, not to be a robot.
Sexual and romantic relationships among people in direct supervisory relationships are too close to sexual harassment, and prohibited by most HR departments, as they should be. That should be a big no-no. Notice nothing precludes people from acting on romantic feelings after the supervisory relationship ends.
I think talking about gray areas and splitting hairs when we have accounts of horrible behavior is detrimental to solving these issues. Let's get rid of these a-holes, and then we can discuss shades of gray when we have gotten rid of the horribly abusive behavior.
Right before I ever attended my first conference, one of the women who was a year ahead of me in my program pulled me aside to warn about him. She told me to do my best to avoid him at the conference but “every woman has a story about him, so it’s only a matter of time.” Of course, she was right. Months before my defense, while at a poster session to present my dissertation work, he touched me on the leg and told me that my dress was “way too sexy for a poster session.” I remember feeling deflated.
In the years since, he’s sent me several inappropriate private Facebook messages. In the first, he responded to a Facebook post I had made asking for people’s experiences with Lasik eye surgery with a message that some activities would become much better. Trying to deflect what I thought was going to be an awkward interaction, I responded that I was looking forward to better bird watching. He followed up with a private message that “the activity [he was] thinking about was sex, but bird watching would be better too ;)”. I ignored him. On another occasion, I posted about some data visualizations using data from a medical journal that involved the relationship between age and pubic hair. He sent me a private message explaining how the data is corroborated by his own experiences watching a certain genre of porn. What his personal preferences regarding porn are is something I definitely did not want to know. Perhaps I shouldn’t have posted about the data given the racy topic, but I thought it was in-bounds since it was a comment on data in a medical journal. I guess I was wrong. I responded but tried to end the conversation quickly. On another occasion, he sent me a private message out of the blue to let me know that there was another researcher with a name very similar to my own who published an article that “is even about sex, broadly defined (fecundity). You guys related?”
...and it goes on.
This seems to have been their first interaction. Touching her was plainly a dumb-ass move. Plus his consistent deafness to her repeated "I'm not interested" feedback.
But his comment about professional dress could have been made far more constructively. When I encounter provocatively-dressed women in professional contexts, I'm immediately suspicious. Are they stylishly clueless? Are they trying to manipulate others? Are they making a point about women being free to dress as they like?
I mean, I invite you to log about outfits worn by your male and female professional colleagues. Assess overall tightness, especially legs, butt and breasts. Estimate percentage of bare skin, especially cleavage.
For example, you may see women in tight sleavless tshirts aka wifebeaters, plus short skirts. How many men will be wearing tight wifebeaters with short pants and sandals? Not many, I bet.
It's not at all clear from her blog post that she was dressed provocatively, or that he was sincerely commenting on the appropriateness of her appearance. This could just as easily have been a scenario where a man thinks a woman looks good and lets her know that he thinks so, while simultaneously criticizing her for his advantage, ie, negging.
But with the information we have, we just don't know. It's like an ambiguous personal email that one can project attitudes onto; if you're feeling defensive or threatened, then it's easy to read a perfectly neutral message as being hostile or even sarcastic.
Most of your complaints seem to be that men and women have different standards for work-appropriate clothing. If bare arms are too provocative for you, that is a personal problem that you need to work on.
But the problem is that people gossip. And they judge. Covertly. As in "I don't trust this woman. Why does she dress like that? She'd be disruptive. I'd better not hire her."
So . . . burqas for everyone, then?
Seriously, if you can't recognize that fashion norms for women and men are different, and can't tell the connotative difference between a sleeveless shirt on a woman and a tank top on a man, I cannot help you.
Please say more about "the connotative difference between a sleeveless shirt on a woman and a tank top on a man". I don't see much substantive difference. They're both an assertion of physical power.
I actually do think that "burqas for everyone" might be a good fashion trend. For privacy, given that there are cameras everywhere. But in professional American culture, it's actually men who are more constrained to dress modestly.
1. Close friends/family.
2. Professional designers/fashion experts.
As to his dumb-ass move, I wonder what would be your reaction if he'd done that to you, because that's what she felt. I think it would be a bit different from, "that's a dumb-ass move".
If someone had done that to me, I would have gracefully fended them off, verbally and physically.
As for these conferences I always think not allowing alcohol is the best solution for avoiding the pack of idiots the author ran into with one loudly bragging about 'banging smoking hot chicks'. You could have behavior police there kicking out the people acting like they are in a frat party or you could just not have alcohol and at all times push this is a professional conference not a nightclub. You'll still run into creepy predators because that is a fact of human life. The advice I was given a long time ago when in pretrial lockup for bogus charges of violating the CFAA is never let anybody get to level 2 of the punk test, always make it known their behavior is not acceptable by directly telling them or use banter, which is how males typically interact with each other in these situations. With banter you also establish a rapport which makes it easier to tell them to cut out unprofessional behavior. The girl in this story when the drunk creep threw weak banter at her after she gave him the look for his loud creep comments could have responded with her own bantz instead of feeling humiliated, as that was a prime moment for a joke about him being at the wrong conference as it wasn't a fictional story writing con or stats joke on inaccurate analysis, with a direct reminder to keep their frat antics down. No humiliation, and message gets received the behavior isn't appropriate and the creeps will respect that you can keep up with the banter so usually won't persist. This sounds like victim blaming but predators are also good con artists who can insulate themselves with other powerful people to retain their status and deflect discipline so reality must be checked. A large accounting firm here that a friend of mine worked at in HR discovered they had a manager with numerous settled sexual harassment lawsuits none of the employees knew about they tried to keep secret. The company was more willing to keep paying settlements than they were willing to fire the harasser.
Also, this idea that you should respond with chuzpah to every idiot who bothers you puts the burden on the person who is being harassed to protect his or herself from the harasser, when really the harasser is the one who should be controlling their behaviour.
Finally- some people are just not good with banter. What about them? They just get harassed and it's their fault if the can't come up with a zinger to put the creep in his place? I don't think that's resonable.
Describing "S"'s behavior is one thing, describing the behavior of a Senior Researcher at Google is another.
Maybe I just don't understand the other perspective enough.
Is that flirting or a joke? Would you want that?
He's not guilty by law, he's been accused, and it's very possible there is enough evidence behind the accusations to make it warranted. Most people don't want to go out of their way to pretend to be the victim (not great word, but nothing more appropriate) of sexual harassment or assault.
To me, it seems to be "harassment" if the female isn't interested, but that can be a very fine line between the natural relationship between men and women that almost always requires the man to make an advancement and put himself out there.
This doesn't seem to be a case of a good man being dragged down by an angry mob. This is a well known jerk being shown the door.
If you are a phisically attractive man, women WILL make advances at you and try to have sex with you. I don't know about the U.S., but here in Europe and in Canada it certainly is the case.
Try to think of men and women as exactly the same, just with different genitals and bodies. This might be an oversimplification, but it is nearer to the truth then our common preconceptions about men and women. Before I got to that conclusion I used to have only male friends and I didn't get along well with women. Now my closest friends are women.
If you seriously believe this "natural relationship" stuff, you might be part of the problem. Also, you're restricting yourself to a certain kind of relationship to women and you're probably missing out on some great experiences, including sexual encounters.
When women start asking men out at a similar rate as men, then maybe there isnt a "natural relationship" anymore. A large preponderance of data from places like Tinder, OK Cupid, etc completely contradict you in a very statistically signifiant way. Call it cultural all you want. I'm just going to call it common sense.
Despite your shrill protestations, there is no "mob filled with righteous hatred" going around. Where action is being taken, it is with a preponderance of evidence.
Only those who have actually indulged in such behavior need to worry.
Do you have an example of that?
Which is why there are documented murders that people who were in danger of getting hit with academic sanctions committed to prevent those sanctions. Even if secret, the people imposing those sanctions are the ones deciding over the future career of the targets of those sanctions, so secrecy does not matter.
What I mean to say is that, firstly, there will be extreme reactions from individuals to any academic action against them. Truly extreme. At the very least they will blow up any cooperation there might exist. Second, everybody else will understand these extreme reactions, because they are justified by the ridiculous cost these sanctions impose on them. Addendum to the second one: often the supporters of people getting accused will threaten imposing sanctions on students of the professors going against their students, if they consider them valuable enough, for the more vague accusations (like plagiarism. Since technically having a single formula in a presentation unattributed is plagiarism, and everybody constantly does that, ... What I mean to say is that there is a LOT of "usual" plagiarism for more basic things and also a lot of accidental plagiarism, which results in that if you're a member of an academic board, you can bring this charge against virtually anyone at almost any time. Add to that that a lot of professors also have cases of less-than-accidental-but-currently-unpunished plagiarism to their name. Things that they committed where the victim couldn't bring a coherent case, but any of their colleagues certainly can construct a coherent case on behalf of their victims. So with one supporter in an academic board, you can get away with a lot. Without a supporter in an academic board, you're career can and will be torpedoed as soon as anyone in that board thinks it'll help them in some way to do that)
There are 100 academics, minimum, for every position available (which is one reason why so many "little positions" exist, like board members of conferences). That means one flaw essentially means you don't have a shred of a chance to achieve anything.
This means there are no "light" academic sanctions, and the result is that like the medival and muslim punishment for stealing, it causes extreme responses. It means that a thief in the middle east will shoot up a market rather than be arrested for petty theft, and it means a grad student will sue a university for millions to avoid a little note on their diploma saying he got suspended for a week for destroying some university property.
If lives are ruined, it is the harrasser's own doing. It is precisely the fact that such incidents are routinely shrugged off that harrassers feel emboldened to continue. Perhaps if they realized their careers were on the line, they would check their hormones and act more appropriately.
Furthermore, this line of thought completely ignores the lives and careers that the harassers have already ruined. By treating junior colleagues as sexual opportunities, this robs the field of future talent by pushing them out.
I would disagree that an isolate incident of inappropriate touch or a suggestive comment or attempt to initiate a sexual relationship with an underling would ruin the victim's life or career. It is a different story if it is proven that the harraser also ignored the rejection or if they used their position of power to pressure the victim for example by threatening to ruin their career. Not differentiating between these two scenarios would not be fair to the harraser in the first scenario and it wouldn't be fair to the victim in the second scenario.
That's a dangerous question to ask. By framing it that way, you turn a clear cut matter of overstepping professional boundaries into a personal question.
I interpreted it more as asking people to think about how they would feel in that situation. That's dangerous, because it opens the door for people to say, "it wouldn't be that big a deal to me."
That would be fine if personal feelings were relevant, but they're not. It's unacceptable for someone to treat others this way, regardless of whether they accept others treating them the same way in return.
Obviously we can only ever speak for our personal opinions, but at a professional conference, during the working hours of that conference, I want professional behaviour. I'm there to hear and talk about my profession; some dickhead who sees it as an opportunity to cheat on his wife feeling me up? I take a dim view. Even some tosser trying his luck with a "cheeky" remark (and those tossers always know just how to pitch it for plausible deniability - I know when I've heard someone being out of line, but they act so hurt and so innocent when you bring it up) ruins the mood, and not just for the target.
Frankly, you should just avoid interacting with women in a professional environment unless it's strictly about work.
That coworkers sometimes show interest in one another? Or, that HR complaints sometimes arise from coworker relationships?
Here's a nice article from WaPo if you'd like to read about a deluge of new complaints at HR departments and social media.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2017/11...
That article is paywalled.
Edit: Since I can't reply to your comment, I'll just say: You're asking for something impossible to provide. I can't post formal HR complaints on the internet. But HR should be taking social media complaints about coworkers or managers seriously and just as valid as any formal complaint. If you disagree with that, you should consider reflecting on just how serious this matter is to anyone that has felt harassed by "locker room talk", comments on their looks, and other crass speech in the workplace.
You've twice now given me examples of things that aren't "an HR complaint filed for someone showing interest." That's all I'm interested in. Can you back up that assertion, or not?
Interesting that you've managed to twist "a tweet" into being equivalent to an HR complaint. Perhaps that's the bigger issue.
But I also just scrolled through a few hundred or maybe a few thousand #metoo tweets. I didn't see a single example that fit the definition of "complaining that a co-worker expressed interest".
Can you give some examples of those tweets? I feel like that at least should be possible.
Get enough of that and a larger number of people will view the ends of dethroning these types as a justifying the means of trial by publicity. But if this bad way of solving things continues, eventually there will be a counter-counter reaction.
However, rather dealing with the situation, "sht storm to sht storm", what would be nice would be to have a process that allows bad behavior to be dealt with immediately and effectively and clear standard letting any potential bad-behaver know they're going to face consequences. The reason for companies to have strong, clear policies on this sort of thing is to prevent events of this sort from causing more chaos.
It seems reasonable that X person who's moving into a position that is going to make them irreplaceable to the company should be investigated even more.
Also, applying strong pressure on a subordinate for sex may seem like "just flirting" but it is actually abusive and illegal because it puts the subordinate in the position of fearing retaliation if the refuse. It's different from a person being offensive to a person that don't have a lot of leverage over.
In order to deal with any a systemic problem, you first need allegations to be made. Presumably Google's investigative team (which I've heard is very good) will be able to check the veracity of those allegations, and make a recommendation to his manager.
That said, one would hope that if virtually all universities, corporations and VCs put sufficiently strong policies in place, bad behavior would occur less to begin with and be dealt with quickly when an individual does so behavior rather than having a given individual engage in a long streak of behavior that only stops when a large number of people go public.
For any mods reading, it might be better to point the link to the primary material here.
It reminds me very much of behavior my girlfriend has experienced as a public high school teacher. I could give you an entire laundry list of comments and advances male coworkers have made to her, ranging from mildly questionable to pretty creepy. It really makes me sympathize with Lum, and I find what she's describing here very believable.
""Google is investigating the matter," Gina Scigliano, a company spokeswoman, said."
...
""I would like to defend myself against her accusations, but the matter has already been referred to my university’s EEO team, which I’m told will be conducting a full investigation into the matter," Carlin wrote in an email to Bloomberg, referring to the University of Minnesota’s Equal Employment Opportunity department. "So I’ve been instructed not to say anything more publicly pending the results of that investigation."
"Evan Lapiska, a spokesman for the university, said the school is "aware of public accusations" involving Carlin but declined to comment further citing privacy protections."
http://www.vulture.com/2017/12/matt-damon-shares-all-his-bad...
How is this not outright assault? Why are the police not involved and why is this guy not being charged with anything? Why is anyone concerned about protecting his privacy?
The trouble with both offenses is that 1. They are broad, 2. They are hard to prove criminally
Broad isn't a problem per se. What I mean is that the system is set up to make the offense as wide as possible, but not to prosecute every case.
This occurs with regular assault, not just sexual. For example, I'm sure most people reading this have had someone shove them at one point. I'm also sure that crime was not reported to the police. Even most cases of punching probably aren't reported.
Next, the proof. The problem with both types of assault is that generally there is no evidence other than the words of the victim. Convictions can happen, but it makes it hard to do so in the less serious cases, which leave no mark.
So apart from non-seriousness, that's why shoving isn't prosecuted. Whereas attacking someone and leaving cuts, bruises or broken bones provides definite evidence something happened. It both increases the gravity of the case and the provability.
I've used examples from regular assault to show that low rates of prosecution/conviction aren't merely an issue of sexism. Assault/sexual assault are fundamentally hard offenses.
However, this absolutely has a disproportionate effect on women. Generally speaking, people don't go around assaulting people, and so low rates of prosecution for assault is not really a problem in most cases. (What I mean here is that not enough people commit unprovoked common assault for it to be a common experience on the receiving end. Domestic abuse is likely the biggest place our system has a gap in this regard.)
But, enough people sexually assault women that it is a common experience, especially for offenses which fit the category of: 1. Leaves no mark or lasting physical harm, 2. Has no outside evidence, 3. Is nonetheless psychologically traumatic.
I don't know what to do about this. I think the solution probably starts by recognizing the nature of the situation, which is why I've spelled it out.
Which is terrifying, because it undermines the notion of a jury trial.
But, if something does go to trial, it's still up to the jury to decide.
If you make the offense definition broad on the assumption that not every instance will be prosecuted, then you take the power of conviction from the jury and hand it to the state prosecutor.
If the state prosecutor elects to prosecute, the conviction is guaranteed because the law is not specific. It varies nation by nation as to whether a jury is allowed to directly ignore the letter of the law when passing a judgment, but even in nations where it is not, jury nullification is uncommon.
Thus, the conviction rests on the prosecutors decision to move ahead or not, not on the judgment of a jury of the defendants peers.
>I imagine most cases of assault in the middle ages were not brought to trial either.
Fuck me dead buddy, I hope you're not seriously attempting to use the middle ages as an example of how a justice system ought to be?
>But, if something does go to trial, it's still up to the jury to decide.
In Canada, it is considered the duty of the presiding justice to attempt to prevent the jury from performing jury nullification[1].
So yes, it's up to the jury, but the jury is under pressure from the justice to not consider the ramifications of this system you seem to like so much too deeply. Since we all know very well that humans are easily manipulated by perceived authority to harm their peers[2], I stand by my statement: that sounds like a terrifying way to write laws.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification#Canada [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment
This has nothing to do with jury nullification. That's a situation where conviction is certain, unless the jury finds the law unjust. Assault is far more likely to be a situation where there is reasonable doubt and no conviction, because of the lack of evidence typically associated with the offence.
In short, I think you're believing me to be saying something quite different than I am.
It's possible that you /meant/ something different, but everyone can read what you said. What you say matters my friend.
>This has nothing to do with jury nullification. That's a situation where conviction is certain, unless the jury finds the law unjust.
Nonsense, jury nullification is inherently intertwined with this topic, because if we're writing laws that may be unjust in order to ensure that they cast as wide a potential prosecutorial net as possible, the only defense that the citizenry has against a corrupt bureaucracy is consistent defiance via jury nullification. The problem is, consistency is incredibly hard to achieve across a whole population, which is why we should not be writing laws that can be abused by the corrupt.
You've broken the HN guideline that asks: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize."
Please read https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and take them to heart. We need that in order to preserve the container for discussion here, which is under constant pressure.
He has executive power by dint of the admin controls, but for the health of community driven sites it's important to ignore people like him, or no discussion can be had.
Your opinion and words still stand visible, I'm afraid.
That can't be the right distinction, because with that broad a definition of assault, people do go around assaulting each other all the time.
To clarify, in high crime jurisdictions, lack of prosecution for common assault or petty robbery actually does become a societal problem. It's still not the case that most people commit crimes, but enough do that all people worry about it.
In most parts of North America, crime has dropped enough that common assault and muggings aren't realistic worries for most people, most of the time. Sexual assault is still done by enough people that all women have to worry about it on a regular basis.
So I think the distinction depends on how many people commit the offense, which affects the percentage of the relevant population which is a victim of the offense or realistically has to worry about it.
Later on, cooler, more egalitarian heads seem to prevail, but things are always pretty dirty during the first hour or so one of these stories is on the front page. I can only be thankful that the folks doing the upvoting are not the dominant voice in the direction that we're taking as a society r.e. respect for women in the workplace and elsewhere.
Er, James Damore, anyone?
Even progressive Hollywood, as progressive as they are, have not even scratched the surface. I don't doubt there is a reason for the "casting couch" cliché/meme/stereotype. I'm sure there is a lot of housecleaning to be had that's yet to begin.
This is a new consciousness and it will take some time to work things out and figure out how we go forward without going overboard.
Maybe you're saying they only talk the talk... That might be fair to say.
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_projects_supported_by_...
Hollywood is somewhat unique in that (a) it is located in a region with center-left politics relative to the USA, and (b) it has a concentration of rich celebrities who come from an arty background rather than a business background, and therefore have different values and priorities, and use their personal public stature to promote those. That doesn’t mean that it is politically monolithic, or that local businesses and other institutions are particularly “progressive”.
My point about Soros is he's considered progressive or representative of it.
HN has hosted many previous threads about sexual harrassment and sexual assault in the tech industry, and most haven't had the quality you rightly object to.
If this were a free woman, she would have raised her voice, made a scene, and possibly even delivered a well-deserved slap to professor creepy. Instead, there was "struggling", "humiliation", "embarrassment", etc. She didn't even name names in the Medium post!
As to why she is not free, I do not know. Escalation of commitment? Prestige? Financial insecurity?
What I do know is that this is a terrible example for the ladies out there. Saving it for a cryptic blog post and waiting for some godless HR department to mete out justice is a shit plan, even if it did work this time. If this were a rougher crowd than a bunch of stats nerds, this could have ended very badly...
It's pretty clear that any organization is gonna have some powerful men (people?) in it who sexually harassed people. I don't think any industry is free from it, though some industries may more conducive to it (hollywood and academia for example are industries with cults of personality, and a lot of people desperate to be involved in it).
Now I think he might have been on to something. Is it really common to go swimming at a conference with others attendees of a different sex? Crazy parties with booze et al at a conference like NIPS? What is going on here? Why even have these non-professional outlets, distracting from the professionalism of the conferences themselves?
It's an argument that informal aspects to career success need to be minimized in general. It has other aspects beyond that...all the bullshit of placating or being a puppy dog for your founder or boss in the name of networking, or success too often being who can put a good word in for you rather than a good record sucks.
I don't think the Pence rule is necessary or helpful, I would say avoiding sexual relationships in work situations is probably a good idea in industries with highly skewed gender ratios, but many people complain that just doing that is too high a burden.
It isn't necessary for most people in most industries, but it is a rule that some men may need more than others. That is a matter of personal judgement.
It is also a rule for a man who wields significant power, which requires stronger boundaries to be put in place. Pence is wise to take extreme steps, but most people aren't the US Vice-President, and don't need to go to the same extremes.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/09/upshot/as-sexual-harassme...
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/upshot/members-of-the-opp...
I don't see how Pence's comment makes any good sense. If you do what he says, you either:
- Don't trust yourself (or don't care) to demonstrate appropriate behavior
- Don't trust women to respect you if you respect them back.
Also you have presented a classic example of the fallacy of false dilemma. There are other options, such as:
- Worry about false accusations, particularly when you are a person of high power where political stakes are high (and politics bring out the worst in people)
- Are big into risk reduction/minimization. It is undeniable that it is less risky from an allegation standpoint to follow the "Pence rule"
That said, I think the "Pence rule" isn't all good because it has room for unfairness. For example, much business is conducted over meals while traveling. Meals and other outings can be great ways to get to know your boss, subordinates, and other coworkers. If one goes out to dinner with only male coworkers, that is unfair to women in the workplace, particularly when that person is the boss. For that reason I think if one follows "the Pence rule" they need to have the same standard with people from all genders, so never go to dinner one-on-one with another man if they wouldn't do so with a woman. I'm really whipping a dead horse here, sorry.
Right now, socially-wise, women have the upper hand on making claims of sexual harassment. The same power does not go to men.
This imbalance makes the "Pence Rule" make more sense.
The other side of why this makes "good sense" is the temptation angle - you can't get tempted if you don't have an opportunity. Unlike what the lefties think, Christians are people too and they get tempted just like other people, especially when drunk. Men are like recovering addicts when it comes to mating (all heterosexual or homosexual men with regular levels of libido are like that, if you say this doesn't apply to you, you are a liar). Resisting a beautiful woman/man flirting with you is like being a heroin addict trying to not shoot up a dose in front of you. Of course you can resist, but it's hard, requires a lot of self control and most people are incapable of doing it without first experiencing the drawbacks. Is there another option? Don't put yourself into that situation in the first place... if you're married, there's no reason for you to be alone with likely sexual partners when alcohol is involved. All the cries about "sexism" of what Pence said are absolute nonsense and probably stem from the left's disrespect of traditional family values and marriage (they don't see having 50 partners in a year as a problem and an "open relationship" is almost a goal for them). There were multiple cases this year (not two, but like a dozen) of self-proclaimed male feminists who supposedly "trusted women" and "trusted themselves to demonstrate appropriate behavior" who should be the beacons of proper behavior when it comes to "respecting women" who ended up being sexual harassers, rapists or even murderers in one case. Does this prove anything? No, but it illustrates that "trusting yourself" is easy to say and hard to do even if your stated goal is exactly that.
Not that it matters, but since this accusation is very likely - no, I'm not a Christian... or a Republican... or an American.
Do you have any specific examples of "a random accusation ending people's careers"? As far as I know, all of the recent media activity has had confirmative evidence and Damore 1) was never accused of anything other than being none-too-bright, 2) is a significantly different case, and 3) was hardly a random accusation.
P.S. The sexism of Pence's statement probably has more to do with the part about requiring any aides that work late with him to be men. Rather limits the career of any female aide, no?
P.P.S. Don't forget that lefties don't have blood like normal humans; they have a thick, black tarry substance that smells of sulphur.
"Marxism" is actually really out of style in modern left leaning academic and social justice activism circles, since it focuses on exactly one axis of oppression.
Citation needed.
From TA: "During his 12 years in Congress, Pence had rules to..."
- Are concerned about potential damaging baseless accusations/rumors/gossip from third parties that you don't trust?
Necessary disclaimer, because internet discussions are great:
Do not interpret this as an endorsement of Pence's policy. I am not interested in arguing about the character of Pence. I am simply pointing out that there are other valid reasons that someone could adopt such a policy.
If you don't invite them you're being "exclusionary." If you do invite them, then 7 years later when you're about to be appointed to the board of directors she writes a blog post about how you drunkenly grabbed her waist and told her she had nice tits.
Tech companies encourage it too... because they want us all to have our entire social lives wrapped up in the company. Oh - you don't want drinks with coworkers after-hours? Maybe you're not a cultural fit? F--- you, I do the job you pay me for, let me keep work and social life completely separate.
(Not that I am implying the person in the article is not guilty or it was an unfair accusation, just commenting on what Pence is doing).
That is pretty common in pretty much any kind of society where water is present. Swimming is normal social accepted activity and swimming pools ceased to be gender segregated years ago.
"Crazy parties with booze et al at a conference like NIPS?"
Crazy parties are not common, but booze at conferences is common pretty much everywhere except in Arab countries.
"Why even have these non-professional outlets, distracting from the professionalism of the conferences themselves?"
Conferences were always largely networking and socialization - even years ago. Even when they were male only. And they will always be that way - you all could have just exchange papers otherwise.
new objective rules for the 21st century
Are all rules equally good?
Why even have these non-professional outlets
Not only are they human, many of them young. And humans like to have fun, which include boozing, dancing, socialising, and -- for many -- hooking up (a surprising number or researchers end up marrying other researchers, in my department probably about 1/2). Presenting a paper is great pressure, and once that done ... time to celebrate. Conferences are a great opportunity to see old friends. In 20 years of being an academic, I've never once been to a conference that didn't have social events of some sort. Official events are often followed up by private socialising.
Indeed, making friends is in some sense the most important function of conferences. Who wants to work with somebody they don't like?
This is one of the intangible yet insidious impacts of harrassment that men really need to stop and take notice of. As a man, I've been fortunate enough never to have been put in a situation where I've had to doubt that interest in my work was merely a ploy to get me in bed. Think of the massive impact such a doubt can have on a young scholar, struggling to prove onesself, fighting self doubt and imposter syndrome. Then when senior colleagues pay attention to your work, and you find out that their interest was more salacious than professional, it must be hugely demoralizing. I'm sure this accounts for at least some of the gender disparity in technical fields, how many women simply vacated the field after people would only use their work as a pick-up line?
> We need to start holding prominent individuals accountable for how their inappropriate behavior negatively impacts the careers of their junior colleagues.
Holding them accountable is not enough, we need to ruin them. Everyone in S's group at Google should submit their resignation, conferences should blacklist him, editors should reject his manuscripts, grant money should be withdrawn, and the entire field should shun him and his kind until the message is clear that science will not tolerate this behavior.
I don't care how good of a researcher he is, how much of a "Bayesian expert" he claims to be, I could never read a paper of his or hear him talk without feeling disgust that here's yet another ego-consumed hyper-nerd who exploits his talents to gain power that he can use as leverage to satisfy his lust. Screw you, S, and the Bayesian prior you rode in on.
No you were not. You are full in line with fascists when writing:
> Holding them accountable is not enough, we need to ruin them.
Um, this kind of thing happens quite often to men.
I’d argue anyone with something to give experiences this to greater and lesser degrees too. People write songs about this phenomenon and its complement (“Nobody knows you when you’re down and out”).
1. A certain type of man who has developed highly problematic habits in regards to repeated, if not very frequent inappropriate (sexual) harassment, and who essentially has been rewarded for this for a long time.
2. A type of person (mostly women, but as far as my observation goes, this general trait is common regardless of gender) who has failed to speak up and push back, often for many many years - who only now that everyone does it, feels "comfortable" enough to speak up.
As a man I am frustrated about group 1) because they are a pain in the ass to women and fuck it up for all other men, and I am frustrated about persons from group 2) who selectively deny their personal ethical/moral responsibility as adults and their ability to use free will ("I was too feared to speak up")- which they of course in all other scenarios would insist in - when it suits them - but still now, that they finally tell their stories, ask for full retribution.
Fear of losing a job/allies/opportunities for not having spoken up over long amounts of time is not a valid excuse, in my eyes. It's more a sign of lack of integrity. And lack of integrity seems to be the big problem here anyway, for everyone involved.
How many of those misbehaving men could have been stopped from doing what they have done over decades if they'd have received clear, unambiguous feedback on the inappropriateness of their actions, instead of "rewards" for their bad actions? Many of these might be better men today (as long as you don't think they are born that way), and there would not be a need to publicly shame all those men (which will probably come at a cost to society in some form of backlash, making everybody worse off).
Julia Galef just did a podcast interview with Timur Kuran about "preference falsification" which touches on this topic . http://rationallyspeakingpodcast.org/show/rs-198-timur-kuran...
I know men who have an extremely hard time to speak up when things happen that they disagree with, and I know women who are very good at clearly, ambiguously showing boundaries as soon as someone attempts to overstep them (note: I am writing here about these sexual harassment cases related professional environments, not about physical attempts of rape). So as far as I can tell, the root of this mess is not a gender-related problem, but a general problem of learned social behavior and compulsive conflict aversion.
This is not how the world looks like, however, even if some are working hard in painting it that way. You are disqualifying yourself with your simple-minded approach of using a label instead of actual arguments.
"Victim blaming" is one of the most problematic labels that are being thrown around nowadays, but it also is a nice way to filter out the people who are not able to have a rational, fact-based discussion.
But to factually approach your accusation: Saying "It's the person's fault that she/he has been attacked" would possibly be justified to be called "victim blaming" (although even then I personally think there are better ways to challenge a line of argumentation than these highly charged labels. They make people lazy and to disengage with nuanced view points).
In my comment, I wasn't doing anything close to that, though. My point is a completely different one.
I’m not trying to be controversial, but from my perspective this is the actual definition of victim blaming - do you agree with this assessment? Not in the sense that a victim is responsible for their own attack, but rather the victim is responsible for every subsequent attack. Do you believe initial victims bear some culpability in their aggressors later attacks?
From my perspective you’re suggesting it’s the onus of victims to reorient their lives and potentially suffer in their professional career in order to police the voluntary actions of another person. Is this accurate? Would you agree the victim has that responsibility?
“”” 2) who selectively deny their personal ethical/moral responsibility as adults and their ability to use free will ("I was too feared to speak up") “””
Again, not trying to be controversial - but have you ever been the victim of a physical assault? Have you ever put your career on the line to get justice for something? I’m curious because from my perspective you’re treating this issue quite flippantly, and with a very narrow minded viewpoint. I suspect that many men who haven’t been in violent situations have a hard time understanding feelings of physical vulnerability. And they have an even harder time understanding why even seemingly mild cases of verbal inappropriateness can cause the same feelings of physical vulnerability.
“”” So as far as I can tell, the root of this mess is not a gender-related problem, but a general problem of learned social behavior and compulsive conflict aversion. “””
I think your position sounds perfectly reasonable to people who don’t have any experience with it, but breaks down when actually applied in real life. Specifically, I think youre proposing that women just shut down situations they feel unease about, which sounds perfectly logical and may happen most of the time.
But it ignores the other outcome, those which Hollywood is famous for - women that decline the sexual advances of men find themselves labeled as ‘frigid’, ‘uptight’, or ‘difficult to work with’, and watch their professional lives suffer as a result. In my opinion, the conflict aversion is the optimal strategy for when one potential outcome is neutral (the harasser is sorry, and otherwise won’t hinder victims livelihood or career), and the other outcome is highly damaging (the agressor escalates, or the aggressor is sorry but feels the need to harm the victims career to protect their own).
"Do you believe initial victims bear some culpability in their aggressors later attacks?" Definitely not. If this is how my comment can be understood, then I failed to express what I meant, although reading it again and again, I am a surprised about this. However, it's just a reminder how different the same statement can be interpreted.
My reference was to what I see as a moral/ethical responsibility of an individual to the society at large to do something against a negative phenomenon.
I see everyone carrying a responsibility to make a society work. That means speaking up, that means giving feedback, that means helping people to improve - and yes, sometimes that means giving up or at least risking an opportunity, because sometimes, doing these things which I just described is not received well.
Which brings me to your second point and your question. "But have you ever been the victim of a physical assault? Have you ever put your career on the line to get justice for something?" I have been putting my "career" (in the sense of opportunities and professional relationships) on the line multiple times due to me disagreeing with various terms, or based on certain principles, or simply because I felt that what I was asked to do would not be true to myself, and I have expressed clear and loud disagreements to the extend that I wasn't sure whether voicing this would get me fired. I am generally a person who rather says "no" to something than to say "yes" just to avoid the conflict. This probably impacts the way I look at the whole topic. I wouldn't have written what I wrote if this is not how I try to act myself. For me, my integrity is more important than money, career, power, status.
However, I have not been physical assaulted in that context that we are talking about here (even though I have been physically assaulted in a violent non-sexual context, but I guess that's not really what you are looking for).
Having said that, I have a hard time with this idea of extreme human vulnerability in cases such as the one's we are talking here though. I am a human being myself. Even though I am not a woman and have not had a colleague trying to kiss me at a party or sending me inappropriate text messages, I have had plenty of stressing, uncomfortable, potentially threatening "real life experiences" to state t hat, while everything can leave (psychological) scares , essentially describing women (or individuals in general, as I - as mentioned before - consider the underlying motivator of action or not-action being not gender-related) as completely helpless in these situations is the wrong approach, no matter how "right" it feels.
I'm saddened that this topic even needs to be part of our discourse in our culture today. Perhaps this is a sad old story. Yet we see this all the time of people in power in the news. I hope that we can come to a collective realization that this is doing no one any good to behave irresponsibly.
Imagine this: You are John Smith and since you were young, you have been taught that as a man, you have to get laid as much as possible, that women are sex objects, that your self-worth depends on your success as a sexual predator. Your friends happened to think the same (you maybe picked your friends even based on these value, subconsciously), and so, while you grew up, this is how you lived and acted. And it worked. You had sex with a lot of women, you received praise and acknowledgement from your peers, you felt like a real man and so on. And you gt comparatively little push back. Sure, there was something in you which might have told you that you over and over again hitting on the same girl must have been annoying for her - but as every human, you saw things from your perspective, and from that one - which you have learned and internalized over decades - this is what women wanted, and how it was supposed to be.
Couldn't this be how the men from group 1 became those who there are? And wouldn't this mean that what they in fact would have needed was to learn a different way of behavior, through feedback when they stepped over the lines?
Following your logic, decades of social conditioning would automatically disappear. You are using the word "need" multiple times. Of course. But what if they actually really didn't get the memo? Because this is more likely than these men sharing your value set (or mine, for that matter) but violating it constantly and deliberately.
Some would call this behavior "toxic masculinity". And it is. But exactly like the social conditioning that other groups were exposed to doesn't just fall off of people in a second, toxic masculinity does neither.
Now the question boils down to whether a perpetrator considers the victim to be a human with a standing equal to his/her own. The answer to that question has been a resounding no, whether it was slavery or war crimes or sexual assault.
To summarize, lack of feedback cannot be the reason, willful ignorance and dehumanization perhaps is and that is something the victim cannot be tasked with rectifying.
This of course is a re-occuring theme of the past year(s). People not making the effort to understand why others act/behave/vote radically different. It seems to be unbelievably hard to acknowledge that what might be despicible from one’s own viewpoint might appear completely reasonable from someone else’s in their specific context. Which doesn‘t excuse their actions but explains why they have not been seeing/noticing the obvious damage of their behavioral patters.
In order to change that person’s viewpoint requires work from the ground up.
Laurie Penny writes very well about all this sort of thing: https://longreads.com/2017/12/05/the-consent-of-the-ungovern...
For instance, you question the ethical and moral responsibility of (alleged) victims who did not speak up at that time. I can easily imagine being one of those people, and I think that most of the time in other situations which are not sexual we see that most people keep their mouths shut and try to make the best of a bad deal: it's why there have been fewer violent revolutions. People with strong, clear ethos who make the choice to "speak truth to power" are rare, everywhere, in every time.
I would ask you also to consider that there were probably more non-victims who were passive observers, privy to at least some of the bad behavior who also did not speak up. Perhaps they should be the main thrust of your comment, rather than people who may already be so psychologically weakened that a brave act is the last thing that is likely?
All, that said, I find the #metoo hashtagging irritating. I do not know why, but something grates about it.
I fully agree with you. I tried to account for that by pointing out that this is a pattern that can be observed irespective of gender, but I guess my striving for brevity meant that this point didn’t come across clearly enough.
I believe that most people in group 1, are in fact aware of the problem of their behaviour and are willingly ignorant of it. This is because if they made any unwanted advances against women, even if the women didn't tell them to stop or publicly humiliate them, they surely ignored or tried to get away from the situation. At the very least the victim did not enjoy it and that is feedback enough.
Now the question boils down to whether a perpetrator considers the victim to be a human with a standing equal to his/her own. So as far as I can tell, it is the general problem of dehumanizing victims. The blame does not lie with Type 2 people who did not feel "comfortable" enough to publicly speak up.
Take any crime which doesn't take in public view, let's say child abuse. Is it the responsibility of the victim to give feedback to the perpetrator, or is it the responsibility of the perpetrator to view the child as a human being?
PS - I made a very similar comment down the thread to another commenter as well.
I also like to use analogies. But this one really is misleading.
We are not speaking about juridical crimes here and not about children but adults. It’s one if the main differences between children and adults that society expects the latter to communicate, to express their thoughts, and to take responsibility for their actions or lack of action.
But nowadays in debates like these I see the emergence of a devaluation of these features that until now clearly differentiated children from adults. The individual of age is described like a helpless, voiceless child.
I find this seriously worrying (which is why I spent hours this Saturday in this comment debate, which I rarely do).
Since, I didn't realize you were the same person, here's my response for the other comment (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15942520) you made. I think I understand what you mean by saying that what appears unwanted to one party might appear playful and wanted to another party based on their mindset. But then what guarantee is there that if the victim escalates the issue, that the escalation isn't considered playful either. Note that escalations can come in increasingly severe degrees and can also have equally "playful" connotations from the perpetrators perspective. If a victim tells her close girlfriends about the sexual assault, to the perpetrator it can sound as "I made such love that she couldn't stop talking about it". If a perpetrator has violated many victims, who have tried to warn their female colleagues, it can sound as "I'm so good that, some women want me for themselves and are spreading rumors about me to prevent others from getting close to me". I feel vile coming up with legitimate sounding sentences such as these, but I believe putting the onus on victims to give feedback need not make the perpetrators realize that boundaries have been crossed.
In my opinion there is an objective measure of whether a person is welcome or unwelcome. Now perpetrators might have a different viewpoint about it in which case no matter what the victims do to escalate the issue, it need not necessarily mean feedback for the perpetrator. On the other hand from the victim's perspective there is a cost to be paid in terms of engaging with the perpetrator apart from other costs which you already mentioned.
Finally, a few perpetrators might have such a removed world view that nothing below public shaming opens their eyes to the harassment, which is the only time we come to know about it. We might assume that no feedback was given by victims, but it might just be that the feedback wasn't nearly enough.
To summarize, the victims do not have nearly enough incentive to give feedback and perhaps many did and the harassment didn't stop until public shaming. It is definitely not the case of victims not having enough integrity to overcome costs to of giving feedback.
The question will become more difficult when people who are essential to the success of a company or product become entangled in allegations (and perhaps eventual convictions). But let's forget the high bar of convictions, for a moment.
If we soon begin to embroil anyone and everyone who may have said something inappropriate or who had someone interpret something as inappropriate, we'll end up including people who are _essential_ to a company or companies.
When that time comes, I think companies and society will have to reach a consensus on how to deal with borderline cases (things uncouth but not illegal). Will society ostracize and black ball all cases, or pursue ways to rehabilitate people --like they rehabilitate drunk drivers, etc.
Else, a less discerning competitor could scoop up problematic talent.
You mean like Weinstein, Spacey, and Singer?
When that time comes, I think companies and society will have to reach a consensus on how to deal with borderline cases (things uncouth but not illegal). Will society ostracize and black ball all cases, or pursue ways to rehabilitate people --like they rehabilitate drunk drivers, etc.
I haven't seen people get fired for just saying the wrong thing. These cases are mostly way beyond that. Some people have gotten accused (Affleck) but they have been brushed off as either not having evidence or not being serious.
This isn't "oops I made a mistake" behavior, it's predatory behavior and predators are hard to rehabilitate.
Most people call it flirting (I mean the touching of a thigh).
Let's not make guys stupid romantic attempts out to be like rape.
If in a professional context, it's definitely inappropriate and must be called out.
Folks: someone touched someone on the thigh at a conference (inappropriately), and it's making international news? This is ridiculous.
My point isn't that this case isn't bad behavior, it's that we will get closer to a grey area or undefined area and will have to have a more nuanced response to those (mis)behaviors.
Never the less, I think we will come to a time when companies will have to come up with something beside "zero tolerance". It's not a forgone conclusion, but I think we will come to a more nuanced approach as more people get caught up in these scandals.
Certainly the likes of Weinstein and Spacey have very little redeemability (However, we see Polanski had some abroad if not at home) but there is another class of people who do act "ungentlemanly/unladily" whatever, but not all the way to sexual harassment. For example, if we take Dustin Hoffman at his word, yes, it's uncalled for, but is it beyond the pale, given the times it took place?
I think companies and society have always had a clear consensus on these issues; the recent events have merely been pointing out that 'ignore and suppress' isn't a very good response.
https://www.facebook.com/Pinegroveband/posts/101557485055597...
Musician cancels his band's tour because of non-public accusation of "sexual coercion" in a relationship. What were his other options when someone presented this claim to him, presumably with some probability of the claim going public?
One reason we have such a guideline is that it takes time for the community reaction to actually become clear. The downvote situation usually rights itself, as it has—quite decisively—above. Only a single downvote affected that comment to begin with.
There's already a big precedent. It's Mark Hurd at HP. He was basically asked to resign for less severe incident than what these guys are facing, even though he did spectacular thing to HP stock price after years of Fiorina mismanagement.
That's a myth. People leave companies all the time and they continue to exist. Executives are not paid high salaries because they contribute anything special other than what any other person would do. It is just that they, as a group, have the power to give themselves high compensation. If I were part of a group of people who decided their own salary levels I would also increase it!
I presume he was too mission critical to get rid of as long as they could keep it quiet.
By using the word predisposition on sex, are you implying that men and women aren't equal?
What you state is a true scientific fact. However, it is immoral because it implies that men and women aren't equal. Thus because it is immoral, the fact cannot be true. Women are equal to men in both intelligence, aggression, height, size, strength, ability and penis length. To imply otherwise is to be sexist.
Read the bottom.
The orthogonal issues are
1) Non-consensual unwanted advances
2) Curbing avenues for sexual attraction
I call them orthogonal because,
- A person with enough avenues for sexual attraction at workplace or otherwise and choose not to do anything non-consentual and to recognize the people he/she feels attracted towards as equal humans even if they are his/her superiors or juniors.
- A person with few avenues for sexual attraction can choose to be non-consentual and delegitimize the humanity of his/her victims despite the lack of abundance of opportunity.
Mixing up these issues ends up confusing infidelity and sexual harassment. A person who seeks and engages in consensual sex outside his/her marriage is guilty of infidelity but not guilty of sexual harassment. A person who makes unwanted advances towards a married partner is guilty of sexual harassment irrespective of the fact that the victim is a married partner.
Note that I would categorize anything that makes the other person uncomfortable as an unwanted sexual advance. If a person talks about his/her pornography fetishes, but the other isn't interested, it is unwanted. If a person grabs the other other by the waist, while the other does not like it and tries to wriggle free, it is unwanted. If a person asks a subordinate for drinks and the subordinate is unwilling but pressured into accompanying, it is unwanted. Being unwanted is a clear signal for a person to not engage in a certain activity in the future and the victim should not be expected to create a ruckus in order to reject unwanted advances.
I mean, that's a start, but maybe the most general solution in this case is to make sure S doesn't actually try to rape anyone?
On the other hand, I still remember Donglegate, so this trend towards more men being accused of sexual harassment makes me nervous.
There were some important changes in societies which made women in many modern countries much more emancipated. This is no doubt was very positive change for economies (more educated workforce) and live in general (free love versus arranged marriage).
In recent decade or two, third wave-feminism took off and ballooned to the point when it became pretty ugly and full of systemic-hate towards males. What I mean by systemic-hate is that under the flag of gender equality, feminists try to explain any disparity between men and women as systemic oppression and discrimination driven by men.
So now, we can see overstretched definitions of rape and harassment and absurd claims that 25% of women experienced sexual assault etc (so called "rape culture", a bizzare term on its own). Just making sexual harassment allegations is enough to consider a person guilty. So any woman can forever destroy carrier of any man just by making such allegations. I can easily imagine situation where socially awkward male tries to make awkward flirt with female and, in response, she will easily destroy his career and life.
I can imagine that sexual self-esteem of young males could be massively degraded in hostile environment created by third-wave feminists. I'm so glad I lived my 20ties in Russia and not being influenced by this bizarre new leftist culture.
As one friend of mine called - horizontal totalitarianism: anyone who question third-wave feminism's dogmas would be crucified/banned and fired for being sexist, supportive of rape (what an absurd!!!!), and against gender equality, considering women as inferior to men etc
When I lived in Russia, I romanticized western world based on movies and politics of 80s and 90s. I imagined western world as individualist and free-market paradise free from government's heavy hand. I imagined that people in the west are open minded and I looked at feminism positively. Now, I'm deeply disappointment by what I see...
That still happens in some societies today https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qatif_rape_case
> So now, we can see overstretched definitions of rape and harassment and absurd claims that 25% of women experienced sexual assault etc
You need to get to know some women.
>One night after the conference talks were over, a bunch of conference participants and I went for a swim in the ocean. While I was swimming around, S repeatedly grabbed me under the water, putting his hands on my torso, hips, and thighs. I tried to play it off and swim away. He picked me up and pulled me into his chest. He then started to carry me away from the rest of the group, presumably to have some sort of private moment with me that I had absolutely no interest in sharing with him. I struggled, gently at first and then more forcefully, and he let me go.
Serious question, is that (a quote from OP) something you'd call overreach?
[0] https://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2017/11/daily-...
These men who abuse their positions are repugnant creatures.They are worthless animals incapable of controlling their instincts. Grown ass men, who haven't yet learned to control their mind. Somehow they achieved success without any significant strengthening of their mind. Pathetic.
But I don't think this portrayal of all women as innocent angels who these evil men are out to abuse isn't right. There are pathetic men, just as there are pathetic women. It might not be the case here, but women use these powerful men, give them sexual favors, so that they can accumulate power for themselves.
In the case of Weinstein, so many famous actress, kept quiet and let him do what he wanted, simply for the pursuit of fame, money etc, and now when it became safe to accuse him, after they acquired their fame, they did.
Of-course, these creeps are repugnant, but the women who keep quiet, use them and enable their behavior are pretty immoral too.
So kudos to this women for speaking out.
Some posters where saying, that any scientific progress he makes should be ignored, that is pretty stupid. I think the women should name him, so that their will be atleast a social cost for him, if not legal.
A large majority of harassing is probably done by men, but it's not 100% men.
Even though it's not 100% about men, it still being almost entirely about men and the culture among men which equates sexual aggression with status and power still makes the discussion worth framing in those terms.
We cannot know that. It has not been researched, and the victims don't talk about it.
There was a time, in Finland, when everyone assumed that domestic violence is "almost entirely about men", research proposals were ridiculed and not funded. When they eventually studied the topic, 20% of the perpetrators turned out to be women, and in aggravated assaults 50%.
P.S. I recognize that California generally requires two-party consent for recording.
Doing so has saved me not once, not twice, but three times from blatantly false allegations regarding my speech/behavior.
I HATE living my life this way...but what choice do I have?
..after I wrote that, I remembered I do know something about that. A few years ago, I was arrested and lost my relationship and was made homeless etc when the police believed false allegations about my behaviour, made by my partner's 11-yr old daughter. (Nothing sexual or too terrible, just that I'd done overly threatening things one night, enough to make her feel afraid.) But I still wouldnt record everything. Sometimes in disagreements with my current partner we wish we had recorded the whole argument; that would be very useful.
All of this requires a lot of context.
But first step should be proving it, not blackballing someone because of allegations. I think we can all agree that removing someone who harassed is a good thing, while removing someone who is only alleged to have harassed is a bad thing. And that distinction probably needs to be made by someone qualified, not an activist or the general public.
As we've seen over and over, very often there's no investigation unless the matter is broadcast publicly. So much easier to sweep things under the rug.
Still, maybe we should publicize that allegations have occurred without specifying against who? And making it public if an organisation refuses to investigate. That should give the same public result without the need to attack someone who is only alleged.
Are you saying you'd be fine with it if they weren't brilliant? Or that touching the thigh of a junior in your organization, who you are also hitting on in texts, should just be OK in general, for both brilliant and non-brilliant managers?
I mean either way I think you were born a few decades too late, but for clarity's sake, I'm curious what you're getting at.
That said, I do fear we may take it too far. Unwanted touching is never OK, and abusive/hurtful language is not OK either. However, I saw a poll the other day where a significant number of respondents said that asking someone on a date was sexual harassment.
There have also been a lot of cases where sex was consensual, but later on one of the parties had regrets, and now it was considered rape (even though it was consensual at the time it was happening). This sort of thing is what happened with Louis C.K. What he did was sick and weird IMHO, but the women actually consented to watching him pet his monkey, but then later after the fact had regret, and what in the moment was fine suddenly became a heinous act. If this is the standard, I think we're all screwed, because we have all undoubtedly "raped" or at least "sexually harassed" somebody.
Sure, "a lot". But it is a very small percentage of all rape reports (obviously not counting the millions of rapes that are never reported).
> This sort of thing is what happened with Louis C.K
No it's not. Not in the least.
> the women actually consented to watching him pet his monkey
No they did not.
Fair enough, "a lot" is most likely not accurate. It's probably a small percentage of all rape reports.
> No it's not. Not in the least. > No they did not.
Yes, they did. His mea culpa was essentially a statement that he believed that his asking for and receiving consent wasn't valid because he didn't realize that the women's respect and admiration for him would cause them to feel pressured to consent. I don't fully disagree with his analysis there, but if the standard is that anybody who has respect for you cannot consent, we are in some trouble.
Between 2% and 8% according to the numbers I can find, similar to the rates of false accusations of other felonies.