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Comment by mc32 | Hacker News Reader

It's easy for companies to fire people at the lower levels or even top management who are for the most part replaceable.

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.

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You mean like Weinstein, Spacey, and Singer?

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.

" it's predatory behavior "

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.

Touching someone's thigh when they're presenting their poster at an academic conference is completely out of line. They have to be there to present their work to people, not get sexually harassed, and that's even ignoring his other behaviour. You probably shouldn't be flirting with people at a poster session anyway.

I was disagreeing with the use of the term 'predatory', I didn't suggest that what he did wasn't wrong.

Folks: someone touched someone on the thigh at a conference (inappropriately), and it's making international news? This is ridiculous.

The original Bloomberg article didn't make it so clear, but the blog post that's now linked to above describes a lot more than "the touching of a thigh".

Of course, Weinstein, Spacey are pretty clear-cut predatory [I think]. On the other hand someone who "hits on" or "chats up" colleagues because they are single or because they are cads, isn't necessarily predatory --however can become harassment, non-sexual as well as sexual, if boundaries are crossed.

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.

That's . . . not what happened in this article, though. The individual supposedly grabbed her around her waist, torso, and thighs without permission while in a swimming pool. This in addition to his other comments seems reasonably clear cut to me.

You're right. This person did more then chat up and allegedly continued with unwanted physical sexual advances.

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?

Have you got any specific examples of a "zero tolerance" response to something that wasn't "pretty clear-cut predatory"?

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.

This is the closest to a zero tolerance response to something not clear-cut predatory that I've seen:

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?

Who is the party who is imposing zero-tolerance here? The band leader disclosed the problem and also decided the "punishment," such as it was. I understand that you're just one person and are not representing this finding as the maximally bad situation. But I would say that if this is the worst that can be found, it's clear to me that we're in no immediate danger of jump-the-gun, zero-tolerance situations becoming common.

The fact that you're being downvoted shines very poorly on the HN community as a whole.

I understand the sentiment, but your comment breaks the HN guidelines. Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

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.

Despite people's egos, I think everyone is more replaceable than they think they are, and often a person's effectiveness is so tied to a single organization that they would be nowhere near as effective elsewhere.

I think in most cases I agree. Most people are replaceable. But we have exceptions like Musk, Von Braun, Bezos, Hastings,(among many others).

Let's not forget Steve Jobs.

forever irreplaceable :)

Meh, all replaceable too. Pure survivorship bias.

Policy has a way of shaping character. When people get away with a lot, they think it's OK, because experience shows that it is.

There's a limit to the extent to which HR can control basic human urges. This kind of stuff is going to happen no matter what the rules are.

Look at the diversity, globally, of behaviors supported by an equally diverse set of culturally formed ethos. It's about dropping orders of magnitude off the frequency of these situations.

There's a lot of assumptions baked into that cake. The most obvious being what's considered acceptable behavior in a man by his female colleagues. There are a lot of countries where this kind of thing is considered part of the job by women.

It should not be a basic human urge to touch peoples thighs and buttocks without their consent. It has never occurred to me to touch someone sexually without their consent and I’m pretty sure I’m normal in that respect.

If your reputation is that important to your career, you will find a way to control your urges. Either that or men don't belong in leadership because they can't control themselves?

Indeed. Amit Singhal was allegedly fired for sexual harassment after 18 years at Google. I don't believe someone starts harassing women after almost two decades. But as the head of Search, and a guy who rewrote Google's search engine from scratch back in the day... he was almost certainly protected a long time. And even when he was fired, he got to "retire".

I presume he was too mission critical to get rid of as long as they could keep it quiet.

Could you tell/substantiate more on this, because this is the first time I heard anything like that.

Well he was fired from Uber because of sexual harrasments that happend while working at Goole. More than that I don't know.

Source: https://www.recode.net/2017/2/27/14745360/amit-singhal-googl...

"The question will become more difficult when people who are essential to the success of a company or product become entangled in allegations"

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.

Yes, but he's still replaceable. Imagine you have a biotech. The main or _the_ sr scientist there which the whole company's future depends on, gets embroiled in something like this. So they kiss the company good bye, or do they seek to rehabilitate?

Umberto Eco discusses that very issue in his book "How to Write A Thesis". Question: "My advisor is an arsehole." Answer: "Dude, you knew that before."

In its essence, the problem will always exist. What if he/she kills someone? What if he/she has a heart attack? If your problem is depending on a single person for the company to work, then you should count on the fact that you are probably screwed.

True but deaths and incarcerations are not something a company can control (perh some places you can bribe against incarceration) but a company can control when and how they fire or not fire someone for misconduct.

As current events show, companies can't control that either. It is just a matter of realizing the obvious.

> people who are essential to the success of a company

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!

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