He Was a World Renowned Cancer Researcher. Now He’s Collecting Unemployment
bariweiss.substack.com
bariweiss.substack.com
Removing a well-sourced article that aims to exonerate someone who's been cancelled seems like a preemptive capitulation to fear that even by allowing discussion, HN could be tarred with the same brush. Upholding the flag demonstrates and amplifies the chilling effect on reasonable speech that's central to the article, by not-so-subtly telling users that it's verboten to even discuss it. HN shouldn't be afraid of allowing discussion around such an article.
>> “It’s impossible to be honest about this and preserve your own skin,” says a scientist who recently worked under Sabatini.
The fear exuded in this kind of statement is terrible for society, for academia and for science; whoever is right or wrong in this particular case. Whichever way the conversation evolves, the expectation must be maintained, even among people who want to silence others, that civil conversation will be allowed. That's why it's wrong to flag this and leave it flagged.
This is probably why I’m not “the boss”…
Unfortunately it's not just about how you react to the situation, if everyone else believes the story you'll just be viewed as an 'enabler'.
That relationship violated MIT's policy on employee relationships (and generally would violate most workplaces' restrictions on employee relationships), and he would have been fired from MIT on those grounds even absent any claim of sexual harassment. (It's not clear what Whitehead's policy on this was and it's not clear whether the relationship or the alleged harassment was the driving force behind his termination there.)
EDIT: massive edits.
For starters, it names the alleged victim of sexual harassment, which journalism organizations do not do in the U.S. And then gets personal about her sex life, including allegations of promiscuous sex. And then claims that she was actually sexually harassing him. (Yeah, sure. A twenty-something with multiple partners is sexually harassing her fat 50-year-old boss for...reasons. Uh huh. And Elvis is still alive in Las Vegas selling condos.)
And this "article" actually gets a lot of things very wrong, which I didn't realize until I read other reporting: the alleged victim of the sexual harassment was not "the head of her own lab" as this article claims, but was a fellow (i.e., the lowest paid position) at the institution and left the fellowship early due to the alleged harassment. And the relationship actually started before she was a fellow/coworker; it began while she was a student applying to the fellowship and he was in a position to have input over her getting the fellowship.
Also, this "article" fails to reveal that the woman was not at Whitehead at the time of the investigation and did not initiate the investigation. Other sources note that the investigation was actually prompted by the new director initiating an institute-wide survey on sexual harassment which uncovered multiple allegations against Sabatini by multiple women. The woman named in this "article" was merely interviewed as part of that investigation.
And here's the kicker: this article conveniently leaves out that multiple subordinates reported being threatened by Sabatini not to participate in the investigation.
All in all, Sabatini may be a genius, but he's also a disgusting pig, and the investigation found multiple things for which he could have been terminated, and there's a reason 3 separate organizations terminated him and his own companies chose to publicly dissociate themselves from him.
She was a Whitehead Fellow, which is a prestigious award that lets the awardee set up their own independent lab.[0] That means she probably would have been hiring her own students, postdocs and lab technicians. This was hardly a low-level position.
I'm getting the feeling that you're just making this up as you go along.
She had an independent lab at Whitehead. That's the entire point of the Whitehead Fellowship. It even says on her own lab's website that she established an independent lab at Whitehead.
You can look at old versions of her lab's website and see that while she was at the Whitehead, she did indeed hire several people into her lab.
From her own bio at MIT (which presumably she wrote herself)
In 2018, she established her independent laboratory as a Whitehead Fellow at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research and was honored with the NIH Director’s Early Independence Award.
To me, it looks like her tenure at Whitehead was 2018-2021, through the end of her fellowship. Then she became head of another MIT-affiliated lab.
I do not think your comment reflects the truth of the matter.
I feel this is the most critical mistake he made. There are stories that those who fought back actually got to keep their jobs (and reputation). The university investigation never gave him due process and was totally biased. He might had a chance.
I'd like to know why he regretted that decision. Perhaps he felt it was an admission of guilt.
> “It’s like working for Steve Jobs. He can be brutal,” said one scientist. “But why would you want to work for anyone else?”
And then the rest of the article argues how he was not brutal-- a consensual relationship, fun office parties, etc.
Why didn't Weiss ask a simple follow-up to the one scientist to give a few examples of what 'brutal' means in this case?
Compare:
"Oh, I mean he demands excellence at every turn professionally, both of himself and his colleagues, to such a degree that it's difficult to keep up with him."
"Oh, I mean he is a megalomaniac who speaks with complete confidence about things he is just plain wrong about."
Edit: clarification
Sadly, our hyper-outrage culture makes all this possible.
Jesus, government science organization explicitly violating freedom of association principles.
It’s getting harder and harder to decide which branch of political Nazis are less appealing, and I’m not exaggerating when comparing both poles to fascists.
FWIW, I’m not involved in the sale of matches in any way.
>“While we have not found any evidence that Sabatini discriminates against or fails to support females in his lab, we find that Sabatini’s propensity to praise or gravitate toward those in the lab that mirror his desired personality traits, scientific success, or view of ‘science above all else,’ creates additional obstacles for female lab members,” the report concluded.
Is this implying that the belief of the writers of the report is that "female lab members" struggle more than others to achieve scientific success or to view 'science above all else'?
What other reason would they consider a scientific lab leader favoring those who are committed to science and scientific success to be a hindrance to "female lab members". Or is that entirely relying on the vague first term: "personality traits".
It's a general believe now that woman struggle more because of permanent discrimination from society, and they deserve more support because of this. This is a complicated topic, but certain people simplify it, leading to these results.
>A few weeks later, Knouse filed a counterclaim that accused Sabatini, among other things, of sexual “grooming.”
I find it interesting that we don't put as much weight when it's women countering abuse allegations. Yes I know that's no guarantee that he didn't do anything, but some of the claims in the article are questionable. Like is it really grooming for a 50 year old and a 29 year old to date? Doesn't this imply women of all ages are easily-influenceable and vulnerable?
It's my opinion that when people allow things like this to continue unchallenged, it affects not only men but women. Eventually people start treating women differently. This is because while women may be equal to men, their ability to fraternize isn't treated that way-- it's implied in this judgement that their decisions might not be their own but the result of trauma or manipulation. It almost sounds like old fashioned misogyny. I should say I'm totally against office relationships in general, it's almost always a bad idea in my opinion. But I also understand that's how many men and women have met their spouses. This will certainly have a chilling effect on a society that already struggles to connect men and women together romantically.
Edit: The entire post just got flagged. Sad that there can't be a discussion about these matters. Well there's not much I can do, eso si que es.
This is less about age and more about the difference in power. He was the fancy successful guy at top, she the small nobody at bottom. The grooming is more about him abusing his position of power to prey on someone whose weakness does not come from their personality.
> It almost sounds like old fashioned misogyny.
This is actually not so far off from the younger generations toxic woke-culture. It's quite disturbing how some of them have twisted the fight against discrimination onto a foundation of sexism and racism, calling it justice and such. We will see how this will unfold, but I fear for the next 10-20 years it will only become worse.
She's really going on the grift.
I assume she must, to appear on HN so often. But every time I see her blog, it's because she's complaining about the persecution she suffers as a conservative. Does she actually do anything relevant to HN? Or is she just popular here because so many tech people enjoy the persecution complex?
Seriously though, in most countries, have his employer tried to enforce the "consentual nonsense whatever" act, they would be reinstating him while paying for all the missed opportunities and the legal fees also.
Like research? Curing cancer? Understanding the Big Bang, gravitational waves, black holes, dark matter, dark energy? Etc.?
Well, for a career doing such research, nearly always need money, financial support. Then, remember
"He who pays the piper calls the tune."
So, the source of the money has a lot of power over the research, the researcher, etc.
So, the source of the money is interested in the research? Right? What they want is good research? They want to see good research? They will be thrilled by good research?
101 Lesson: Nope. In simple blunt terms, they don't care about the research. (1) They don't look into the research in detail -- likely wouldn't understand it even if they tried. (2) Similarly, they don't understand the value, especially the long term value, of the research. (3) Their view is that the research is all in the papers -- they want to see published papers. (4) But they don't read the papers, or even the abstracts of the papers, or even the press releases about the research or the papers. (5) For the papers, mostly they just count them, maybe with more weight for papers in highly respected journals. (6) They don't really like to count papers but prefer to look at prizes. Sure, the Nobel prize. An Abel prize. Etc.
In simple terms, the people funding the research don't care about the research itself.
So, what do they care about? How 'bout luster, status, prestige, good publicity. In simple terms, what they care about is close to just good politics. The researcher, then, has a career mostly in the service of politics.
Then there is the role of the media: Good politics needs good media and can be killed off by bad media. The media, however, also isn't interested in research or the researcher. Instead the media wants ad revenue. For that they want eyeballs. For that they want shocking headlines. One of the best sources of shocking headlines is scandal. One of the best sources of scandal is anything about, I dare not say the word, it's a very dirty word, it's for adults only, S.E.X.!!! Don't say it out loud or in public!!!!
So, for Sabatini, his career was ruined by the media that pushed a sex scandal. Then he had bad politics. Then the sources of the funding didn't get the good politics which was the real goal of their funding. So, no more funding.
For the media, there is no effective due process. The people attacked by the media can't even get a Stalin Communist Party show trial. For a media attack, there's no effective appeal or ability to respond. Might be able to proceed with a long, expensive, high risk, low expected payoff legal effort. But even if win, and win big, there's no effective way to repair the damage done.
In a basic sense, anyone in academics or research is a beggar. "Beggars can't be choosers" or beggars have very little power or financial security, etc.
So, at least in the US, a career in academics or research is, in just two words, financially irresponsible. Or, don't do that.
Nonetheless, the police arrest the male as the perpetrator in over 80% of IPV cases.
Embarrassed at being regularly beaten by his female domestic partner, the male IPV
victim commonly says nothing in his defense. He is likely to cover for his abuser, quietly
taking the blame for the offenses she projects upon him.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Male_Studies/comments/uokuto/what_m... The truth is if you study empiric studies on gender inequalities and misandry, that men are becoming more and more abused and miserable. This is amplified by many things such as the women are wonderful effect, and the hypergamification of women via the use and abuse of artificial image enhancers (e.g. makeup) and their current gatekeeping from men, and the male condition cannot currently defend itself against those worsenings, given that masculinism nor the more relevant egalitarianism are represented online. In the modern feminimisandrist rethoric male suffering is because, you guess it, of the patriarchy, indeed a very logical (it's not) assertion. https://www.reddit.com/r/Male_Studies/comments/usi1ao/relati... TL;DR women and most men care about women issues/suffering, almost no women (publicly) and few men care about men issues/suffering.
>Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.
>Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something.
...and if you happen to live in Sweden those cases will be reported as men's violence against women [1] (mäns våld mot kvinnor) by the Swedish Jämställdhetsmyndigheten (gender equality authority, an organ which itself is criticised for only allowing women in the upper echelons and for studiously ignoring honour killings and related violence). When they were caught in falsifying the statistics in this way they tried to explain it by stating that "men's violence against women" is to be seen as an overarching term for all types of domestic violence [2] which includes those cases where women molest men.
They have not changed their definition, when a women molests a man it still causes the statistic on "men's violence against women" to be raised which in turn is used by activists and politicians for their ideological purposes. Something is rotten in the state neighbouring Denmark.
[1] https://kvartal.se/artiklar/jamstalldhetsmyndigheten-kvinnor...
[2] https://kvartal.se/artiklar/svenska-myndigheter-producerar-a... (see 'Alternativ fakta: Made in Sweden')
P.S username checks out
Guys like this one are not easy to take down either, there are plenty like him out there.
>So what exactly had those 248 pages said? What had David Sabatini been found guilty of that merited this kind of punishment? Chiefly, failing to disclose his consensual relationship with Knouse. On top of that, the report found that Sabatini, in his day-to-day administration of the lab, violated the Whitehead’s Anti-Harassment Policy, since his “behavior created a sexualized undercurrent in the lab.” Sabatini’s relationship with Knouse exacerbated things, given his “indirect influence” over her, which violated the Anti-Harassment Policy and ran afoul of the “spirit” if not the letter of another of the institute's policies. True, he didn’t supervise Knouse. He didn’t work directly with her. He never threatened her or proposed a quid pro quo. And he certainly didn’t have the power to fire her. But, according to the report, he had “experience, stature, and age” over her. Knouse’s apparent desire to continue their relationship only served to confirm his influence: “That she felt the need to act ‘fun’ to impress Sabatini underscores how Sabatini’s words and actions profoundly impacted her,” the lawyers wrote. Nor did the lawyers care for the happy hours and whiskey tastings that Sabatini sometimes hosted in his office, which betrayed his “apparent ‘friendliness’ and general propensity to have ‘fun.’” (Knouse, in her counterclaim, says the events were “drunken,” and “conversations quite frequently veered to the sexual.”) “While we have not found any evidence that Sabatini discriminates against or fails to support females in his lab, we find that Sabatini’s propensity to praise or gravitate toward those in the lab that mirror his desired personality traits, scientific success, or view of ‘science above all else,’ creates additional obstacles for female lab members,” the report concluded.
Not sure I understand what is damning about his behavior based on this summary.
I'm not a court to decide who is wrong here, but this does not look like a clear example of cancel culture. Going against this guy must have been a huge risk for these women.
It sounds like the way to "succeed" in the lab was by an amalgamation of personality + merit, which sounds pretty reasonable. This is one of the very common modes in which people get ahead.
If you are one of many researchers in the lab, equally capable, but you could gain an edge by flirting, sleeping with the head, etc, it behooves one to gain that advantage. And it can develop into a subtle, but insidious toxicity. It's the elephant in the room that no one points out, but also impossible to ignore, if you're considering how one's social dynamics play into career prospects.
The problem is that many men are incredibly smart and nuanced in being capable of hitting just a bit too low, glancing just a moment too long, stepping just a half-step too close, insinuating with just a teency amount of overstepping boundaries, while maintaining the illusion that everything is above board and with plenty of plausible deniability. And to be subjected to that type of environment, as a woman, is this subtle non-verbal gaslighting that feels impossible to criticize or pinpoint without coming away as being perceived as delusional. However, women all around feel it, but this behavior hasn't necessarily been labeled yet.
Even more challengingly, these slightly lower bids, are a built-in "feature" of human relationships and connection. It's a part of this dance we use to renegotiate relationships. But there's also unspoken and hidden contracts at play, where temporary advances, while not welcome with enthusiastic consent, won't be punished as long as they are temporary and ephemeral.
Sabatini, likely never grossly crossed certain boundaries, but it seems that his behavior, choices and the air of his presence was just underhanded enough with enough women, with enough persistence, that finally multiple women would step forward.
I'm willing to speculate that there was likely an unspoken contract between Sabatini and Knouse, where Knouse may have believed herself to be a much more serious connection to Sabatini, while Sabatini, over time, unveiled a growing disinterest in her. I'm also willing to bet that Sabatini had a seduction playbook of some sort that Knouse likely realized, either on her own, or in concert with other women, and finally retaliated to "protect" other women in the lab.
Confounding this is that it's also very likely, that he had plenty of excellent and non-underhanded relationships with other female researchers who are quoted to vouch for him and his excellence.
With the given story, it's impossible to pronounce judgement that he should have lost his career or that he was assaulting women per se, but when there is a pattern of women #meToo'ing to a person of power, there's a tremendous amount of signal pointing to something more underhanded going on.
The article states “Knouse […] had ongoing flings with men […] and she wanted to keep it that way.” When Sabatini’s interest in her faded, he is suddenly accused of harassment by her. Peculiar timing. The article writes, “It would also pacify Knouse, who wanted to see Sabatini fired publicly. ‘Part of me just wants to organize a protest […]’ wrote Knouse to a friend during the investigation.”
Sounds very much like revenge of a scorned lover that is enabled by an a lynch mob environment.