To reiterate, the social cost discussed is the inability for people to form relationships at work. I acknowledge all of the costs of people being harassed at work. That's bad. I hope you read this comment and understand that I am not disagreeing with you.
1.) Meetoo did not meaningfully changed peoples ability to "form relationships" in work.
2.) Meetoo did not even meaningfully changed ability to abuse, abusers even had their own backslash.
3.) Pre-metoo, while people sometimes formed relationships at workplace, it was not the primary way to form relationships. Plus, companies did not wanted the drama from predictable breakups anyway (which is the primary source of issues with workplace dating).
4.) This is triple funny on HN, where most men work in male dominated or male only teams.
> Meetoo did not meaningfully changed peoples ability to "form relationships" in work.
You are confidently incorrect. [People widely reported a stifling effect on office relationships.](https://legacy.vault.com/blogs/workplace-issues/2018-vault-o...) More than 1 in 4 said #metoo made them less accepting of workplace romance. 43% considered relationships between workers at different levels unacceptable - 15% higher after #metoo.
> Meetoo did not even meaningfully changed ability to abuse, abusers even had their own backslash.
This has nothing to do with what we are discussing. I understand you have strong feelings about this but I need you to understand that from the bottom of my heart, I do not care about your feelings.
> Pre-metoo, while people sometimes formed relationships at workplace, it was not the primary way to form relationships. Plus, companies did not wanted the drama from predictable breakups anyway (which is the primary source of issues with workplace dating).
No one claimed it was the primary mode of forming relationships.
> This is triple funny on HN, where most men work in male dominated or male only teams.
This is one step removed from, "men are stupid, am I right, ladies?" Your disdain for men, the users on Hacker News, or whatever villain you've concocted in your mind prevents you from having a normal conversation like a normal person.
This has been a thoroughly uninteresting waste of time. I suspect you became lost on your way to some protest or /r/Politics.
This survey is weak evidence based on a small number of self-reports. Population was not representative of the American work force c. 2018. Their call for submissions heavily primed the pump:
https://vault.com/blogs/general-articles/take-vaults-2018-of...
> Have you ever had a fling with a colleague, hooked up with a coworker, or met your significant other through work? We want to hear about it (anonymously, of course!) in our latest Office Romance Survey, our most popular study which has been featured by Forbes, Newsweek, and NBC.
So of course the people with strong opinions are overrepresented; the survey was more or less clickbait for marketing purposes. I suggest you find better data to support your own degree of confidence.