Writing love letters to 17 year olds who work for you? Come on. You should know/do better.
Careful with this. IME, everything you feel gets expressed eventually. You either make some choices about that expression, or it leaks out of you - usually in toxic ways (passive aggression, overly controlling behavior, snipe-comments, etc.)
Have close friends (and a therapist!) that you can talk to about just about anything. A lot of times, feelings are signals for exploration; "here be learning", as it were.
Aubrey even names it, without realizing it (IMO) when he says "could treat [me] as an equal on every other level". I'm betting that if Aubrey had taken the time to feel and understand, he'd have realized that Deming (at that time) wasn't someone he could actually treat as an equal on every level. (And, probably, that he had a need for more people in his life that he could).
> "Laura references an email I wrote - inadvisedly, for sure, and which I unreservedly regret - to her when she was 17"
We know she felt uncomfortable over it, but we do not know if he wrote it innocently-but-stupidly or if there is more to it.
I dunno. Ill-advised, sure. Inappropriate, maybe. I've had all kinds of personal conversations with coworkers and bosses, there was never anything more to it. Yes, that she was 17 means he should have been more professional about it, but in and of itself, without knowing the contents of the email, I don't think its any more strange than perfectly normal but personal conversations I've had with people I've worked with.
Without seeing the email and the context around which it was sent, I don't think we can judge in either direction based off the existence of the email alone.
Expressing romantic interest in a co-worker or classmate is not de-facto inappropriate. Your advice is solid for folks in positions of power, but for the rest of us, not so much. The idea that young men and women who work together should be forbidden from exploring relationships with with classmates or coworkers is a kind of bizarre neo-puritanism. (Your human nature? That's bad! Ignore it!) And for what? To prevent the occasional, momentary discomfort of rebuffing a respectful advance?
Of course nobody should have to endure sexual harassment, socially inept creepiness, or blind persistence from unwanted suiters. And people who engage in these behaviors should be paid a visit from HR (and eventually receive a pink slip). But the vast majority of adults are capable of tactful communication, and should not be prevented from exploring the full possibilities of their interpersonal relationships simply because the relationship began at work.
If every female co-worker gets multiple unsolicited advances per year, that could be a problem, even if the advances are tactful, between equals, and listen to rejection.
At some level you just want to go in to work, not be spammed with advances all the time. It's different for most guys we don't get nearly the amount of interest, even if we're attractive. So it would be crucial to try to understand what women experience and what they want out of a workplace instead of just going on abstract concepts.
The problem with that is, what happens if the relationship goes south as relationships tend to do over time. Then the two of you have to work every day with someone they hate. It's just more sensible to keep things professional to begin with.
It certainly minimizes the potential drama that comes with being in a romantic relationship with a colleague.
I've witnessed many beautiful things happening between people that met each other at a workplace. I've also witnessed a lot of shit shows as a result of that same thing.
Not playing the game excludes both of the situations, and while you can't win and have a beautiful thing in the end, you also can't lose. I personally chose not to play that game.
Norms have changed, and in 2021, it is inappropriate. That's kind of what #MeToo meant.
Think about this from the other side- do you want to finely parse the harassment quotient of flirtation and dinner invitations forever, or do you want to just ban it?
In practice, I think you'd have to be insane to mix romance and work, supervisory relationship or not.
To be absolutely clear (and play devils advocate to a degree), he did not admit to that. What he actually says is:
Laura references an email I wrote - inadvisedly, for sure, and which I unreservedly regret - to her when she was 17, but she explicitly states that "I wrote it off as a mistake"
He notes she initially wrote it off as a mistake, and the email was inadvisable. He's walking a fine line here, where he's not outright saying she was correct in thinking the email was a mistake (it's also a bit unclear what this means from her, a mistake on his part or a mistake in her interpretation, but I assume the former), and he regrets is, but the reason for that regret is left for us to intuit. You assume (as I do) that it's because he actually was attempting to solicit a relationship, but it's left such that it could plausibly be explained later as him regretting that he was so loose with his words that it could be interpreted that way.
I mention this not because I think he's innocent of that specific accusation, but because he's worded this very specifically, and while I think the implication is that yes, he did hit on her, he hasn't actually admitted that, and make statements that he has just confuses the issue to some degree and causes backlash in those that see statements like this and then read the source later, and notice the discrepancy and side with the person in question because "people are obviously out to get him by twisting his words". His words are fairly damning when laid out exactly as they are, so better to use them that way, IMO.
The only defense against things like that are to stick to the facts and be clear and correct based on what other people have said and what we think that actually means. e.g. "I think the implication is clear, even if it's not outright admitted." Anything else helps them by giving them ammunition to lob back later.
But that's really not the point, everything else you said is.
And just because it's legal doesn't mean that it's socially acceptable, for all those reasons.
It's not as if there weren't accuser pre-Lewinksy either.