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Comment by goldenchrome | Hacker News Reader

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We enforce rules in our society because they make that society better. Basic shared rules of behaviour are a precondition for social cohesion and prosperity, _not_ a luxury that we can only afford when everything else has been taken care of. This goes 10x in small groups in rigorous environments.

I wouldn't call resources in the Antarctic winter "incredibly scarce"; expeditions have been wintering South for decades now. We know what's required, and it's available, in quantity, with backups. It's true that people are trapped together for months at a time; we also rely on each other for survival. Under such circumstances, it's entirely backwards to claim "local society can't afford to have such strict standards." Just the opposite; strict standards of social behaviour are _required_ for the group cohesion and trust that's necessary for collaboration and survival.

A candidate who demonstrated this attitude would never get through BAS' hiring process. If, by some mischance, they did manage to make it South, they certainly wouldn't be overwintering.

Source: Wintered in Antarctica. Did not regress to the state of a caveman clad in penguin skins, nor did I become "prone to sexually harassing women."

Yes, you have a personal anecdote but the data suggests that people do indeed become prone to sexually harassing women.

I certainly won't claim that no harassment ever takes place; every wintering team is different, and I have no doubt that plenty of women _do_ experience some form of harassment or unwanted attention. When you live in a small, close-knit community with (generally) a large gender imbalance, there will be tensions.

What I object to is the unsubstantiated claim that Antarctica "brings out the animal in each of us"; that the environment is one of such privation that all those who venture there necessarily regress to some more basic form and that standards of civilized behaviour become something we can't afford, sacrificed on the altar of survival.

This is patently false, and frankly a very limited and limiting view of the human condition.

What you like to dismiss as a "personal anecdote" I'd prefer to call "multiple seasons of lived experience in the environment under discussion."

While I can't speak for the hiring procedures of other nations, the majority of the interview process for the British Antarctic Survey centres around the interpersonal side. If you're sitting in the interview in the first place you're assumed to be technically competent; once that bar is passed they select primarily for people who will survive the isolation and be able to work as independent members of a small society. Are the results perfect? Of course not -- failures happen and bad winters happen. But they are well aware of how important social dynamics are to the overall success of the winter.

So much preventative process and yet so much violence still occurs. The environment must be truly stressful. The concept of the animal within each of us isn’t metaphor—we are literally animals. Our environment strongly affects what sort of behaviors appear in the aggregate. This isn’t to disparage your character. This is to be aware that we are all capable of evil and we must be aware of it. Process alone cannot snuff out our instincts.

Just to recap your argument:

> We enforce the rules in our society because we can afford to. In the Antarctic winter where resources are incredibly scarce and the people are trapped for months a time, their local society can’t afford to have such strict standards. The animal within each of us comes out in Antarctica more than anywhere else. This is of course part of what makes living there so exciting on an elemental level.

And your point brought home:

> Because in those conditions it’s not wrong, it’s adaptive.

You have to be a pretty ignorant person to think "I don't have many resources, so sexual harassment and violence is not only normal, it's a good idea".

Other human societies around the world live in conditions close to those at McMurdo, and they do not have this problem. But amazingly, McMurdo is better equipped with more supplies, with the same seasonal inaccessibility as those other societies. So your argument is factually incorrect. Limited resources and an extreme environment does not implicitly result in a culture of sexual harassment and violence.

Nor it is "adaptive" in any advantageous way. It is much more likely a result of psychological breakdown, combined with a lack of social consequence, and a position of power over trainees who do not anticipate this treatment. Basically, psychos who can't deal with stress and take it out on the most vulnerable to make themselves feel better. In no way does this reflect human society, nor normal human behavior, as even in hunter-gatherer societies, people work together and prevent abuse.

You also have to be pretty morally bankrupt to suggest that this condition of abusing other humans for fun is totally fine. I don't think you would hold this position if you were the one receiving the treatment.

I didn’t say it was totally fine, I said it was expected. Is the violence in ghettos and prisons the result of bad people or a stressful environment?

Othering these people and calling them psychos is a convenient way to excuse yourself. We are all human and we are all capable of evil. It is the environment that dictates our behavior.

> "The animal within each of us comes out in Antarctica more than anywhere else. This is of course part of what makes living there so exciting on an elemental level."

It's supposed to be a science station, not some kind of wild survival game. I don't think any of the women scientists signed up for "excitement on an elemental level."

That’s a fine goal but it doesn’t take away from the fact that Antarctica is a hostile environment which makes it hard to establish civilization.

I’m describing reality, not my own personal wishes.

We don't "establish" civilization. We take it with us.

The soldiers who go abroad and commit murder and rape are also taking their civilization with them. Civilization is vital for our species’ continued success but it requires specific conditions to maintain. Each of us is capable of atrocious things.

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