Comment by bccdee | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bccdee | Hacker News Reader

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> You don't tell or demand another company do something with their own employees.

Depends what they did. Let's check the forum post…

> they had created and promoted hate sites, photoshopped images, and harassment targeting limor, me, and others at adafruit. this was done on company time, shared, promoted.

Ok yeah if a company is sharing bigoted photoshops of my likeness, yes, I'm gonna demand that they discipline the responsible employees. Obviously.

I don't have any reference point for what "hate sites, photoshopped images, and harassment [meriting HR training]" constitute, but if it's anywhere near as bad as it sounds, sure, escalate the situation and air your dirty laundry in public. This is unacceptable behaviour, and apparently it went on for years. When you're being publicly harassed, you have no duty to indefinitely restrain your response to private, polite emails.

It sounds like the allegations are for things that was be illegal in nature.

I think the expected way to handle something like this would be to write the calm factual email. If that goes nowhere then sue them. I don't think the public airing approach is the right one.

Suing is way more expensive and way more hostile than simply airing your grievances in public. And why not? That's what public forums are for. "Do nothing" and "sue them" are not your only options; we are part of a society, not merely party to a legal system.

It’s difficult to prosecute online harassment, and “hate sites and photoshopped images” aren’t illegal. There’s a right to freedom of speech in the US.

Slander is illegal, and while not exactly the same thing, there is a lot of overlap.

Depending on the nature of the site, there also might be rules around unfair competition that might be implicated.

There is a very high bar for slander in the US, especially for public figures.

Further the 'hate-' prefix in an accusation makes it one I immediately tune out.

It's just a manipulative word that lets you incite people while not actually revealing what was said.

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