Y Combinator Takes Public Stance Against Sexual Harassment | Hacker News Reader

Y Combinator Takes Public Stance Against Sexual Harassment

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25 pointscanguler40 comments

It's reached a point now where I'm pretty much never going to publicly post my opinion on anything related to sexism in tech. It's not because I've been flamed before - I haven't. And it's not that I secretly think my viewpoint is extreme or would be one that is going to offend. I'm pretty sure I actually hold a really friendly perspective on this matter as considered by any reasonable, rational person.

But the voices in this game aren't reasonable and rational anymore. I've seen people online harassed and abused for even the slightest of statements that are very often misconstrued and interpreted in the harshest possible light. Before you know it, you'll be getting death threats over Twitter. Maybe you'll even get fired from your job too? Ask PG how quickly things can get out of hand - his public image took a heavy beating and in many circles he still seems to be considered a sexist.

This isn't a discussion reasonable people can participate in anymore. Mission accomplished?

It isn't just that. I have opinions on the subject (which tend to get me attacked but not flamed -- I dunno, maybe I am oblivious to the flames). But to the extent that my opinion is informed by cross-cultural experience it does come across as extreme and probably not very friendly to the YC/HN crowds.

> But the voices in this game aren't reasonable and rational anymore.

Part of the problem is that the assumptions that underlie the discussion are flawed and so this leads to shrill argument. Maybe the sexism in tech is far more systemic and far less individual than folks would like to think. But if we admit to that we have to stop blaming individuals and direct the effort instead to reforming the system.

A nice parallel to this are the discussions of abortion and gun control. These discussions, too, end up being discussed solely in terms of individualism and individual rights in the US. But this leads to very narrow possibilities regarding solutions. Would the NRA approve of the Swiss approach to gun control (widespread gun ownership along with mandatory military service, mental health checks, and so forth)? Probably not. And imagine how angry both sides would be if the US followed Denmark and banned second trimester elective abortions but publicly funded first trimester abortions. I am not speaking to the wisdom of such policies (which is off-topic here) but just making an observation about how individualism narrows the discussion and scope of possible solutions.

The discussions of sexism end up a lot like these other discussions. These are seen solely as individual issues, rather than questions of community structure. Since we can't discuss the latter, everything becomes name-calling.

What the discussion needs is for a large number of voices to come together and discuss "why I am making the decisions I am making." Only then can we even have a clear view of the issues.

Agreed.

What I observe is that there is more discussion about the discussion. There are more conversations and emotions raised about the tone than the actual content. This a) does not contribute to the discussion and b) discourages discussion even more.

> What I observe is that there is more discussion about the discussion.

Maybe that's because people keep arguing about the discussion itself, instead of contributing opinions about the subject? 41 comments up and almost all of them focus on the tone of conversation rather than the problem at hand; the only thread so far* is the one commenting about the workaholic culture as a possible cause.

To avoid contributing to that trend, I'll do my part and introduce some meat to the discussion. In the Wired story linked from the article[1], someone complained that she was redirected to a gender-specific investor specialized in funding female-founded companies.

Now I think that when there's a problem of cultural bias, having support groups of similar-minded people that may work as safe havens and counter the bias is a good thing. But I agree with her that it should not be the only way to participate, and that the mainstream group should have some minimum requirements of professionalism and treat people from the targeted group in the same way as any other professional. It remains to be seen whether that can be achieved without such groups exerting pressure.

[1] http://www.wired.com/2014/07/gender-gap/

[edit] - *updated to acknowledge einhverfr's contribution above too.

It is even more unnerving that such click bait can have a chilling effect. Really fox newsy type coercion happening in that article with heavy uses of metaphors and unbacked examples.

"runs directly into the deep, dark waters of moneyed (and largely male) gatekeepers."

Why is it dark except to push an 'evil' type of image.

Everything you say here is smart and rational, except:

> the guy literally got dragged around town

Only if you think "literally" means consistent with actual facts and events, which IMHO it should, but often doesn't:

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/literally

Agreed. Changed the text to better reflect what I was trying to say.

Who is PG?

Hacker News - created by Paul Graham in 2007

> Y Combinator has a zero tolerance policy for inappropriate sexual or romantic behavior from investors toward founders.

One subtle thing to notice is that her main point doesn't specify any behaviors, and instead just uses the word "inappropriate." Presumably this leaves open the possibility of some sexual or romantic behavior from investors toward founders being considered appropriate. The reason this could be a problem is that most people agree that "inappropriate" behavior is bad, because that's baked into the definition of the word, but people disagree on what specific behaviors are inappropriate.

> One subtle thing to notice is that her main point doesn't specify any behaviors, and instead just uses the word "inappropriate."

Another possible reading is that it's trying to assert that any such behavior is ipso facto inappropriate. It's not clear which meaning is intended.

It's 2014 and I think "How the hell can this be news?" but I turn to HN to read the comments and sure enough - same old idiotic hateful views.

That's a rather impressive observation as there were only a few comments at the time you posted this and none of those are "idiotic" or "hateful".

"Great, let's turn people into puritan asexual blobs of political correctness. What a glorious goal!"

"This 'ugly gender problem' is so blown out of proportion."

I stand by my comment. Those comments are hateful and idiotic.

Why? What makes that comment hateful or idiotic. It's a perfectly valid opinion albeit expressed in a less than tactful way. I'll be the first to admit that some opinions do make people sound hateful or idiotic but you're putting that bar extremely low. Either way I prefer people sharing their honest potentially objectionable opinions over righteous political correctness. At least in the former case you can have a discussion with them and possibly change their views on the topic.

> It's a perfectly valid opinion albeit expressed in a less than tactful way.

"Less than tactful" is key here. You go ahead and show my an opinion that isn't valid while I question why someone in the right mind would comment that way on the subject of taking a stance against sexual harassment for any other reason than out of spite.

So what you're saying is that you either have to agree or be considered someone not in their right mind that only says things out of spite? Perhaps you've touched on the problem the top commenter mentioned; namely that this topic can no longer be discussed reasonably. I don't agree with the comment but the responses aren't exactly healthy discourse either.

> but you're putting that bar extremely low.

It's the 21st century. "Please don't people in the workplace" is not "please become an amorphous asexual blob".

I find your comment pretty hateful and idiotic...

Haha yeah, YC has never had any problems with sexism. Why, I can barely remember the days when YC claimed that getting women into technology was not their problem, then backpedaled and organized a female founders' ghetto.

This was linked in the post: Forbes published the anonymous account of a female founder who said if women want to lean in, they better “armor up.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2014/07/01/iac-sus...

It is worth reading, it hard enough running a start up and then having to deal with this kind of thing is a real shame!

i don't get the photo they used for this article. it seems to invite you to objectify the person in the photo (presumably a founder)?

I also don't get it. I think models (men/women) on stock photo's don't represent reality. To me the picture looks very unnatural.

One of the sources of sexual harassment is the very unnatural image of men/women created by unnatural (movie) pictures. Not everybody is looking very slim. Not everybody is looking fresh all day. Not everybody likes to have sex every moment at the day. Not everybody likes sexual harassment...

So in the context of this article they should have gone for a more natural picture. Or just a picture of Jessica (http://cdn.ycombinator.com/images/partners/jessica-a1fd7421....).

I'm not sure I understand what you mean here, is that photo supposed to be considered provocative? Putting aside the possibility that's it's most likely just stock photography -- she's fully dressed in respectable business attire, and even her facial expression is completely normal for someone in the middle of a meeting. Is it a negative thing to display images of women at all now?

why? She looks like a female at workplace. Nothing more/less.

I want to work where women wear shirts that low cut.

Well, bonus points for a context appropriate username.

This 'ugly gender problem' is so blown out of proportion.

The way you laid out a rational and logical argument, supported by evidence, instead of just displaying your unexamined privilege through an argument by assertion, was very impressive.

Wait, no, the other thing.

Great, let's turn people into puritan asexual blobs of political correctness. What a glorious goal!

Some people meet each other at work.and go on to'romantic activity' I bet more so in the workaholic startup scene.

This is a key point. While I might disagree with the parent's phrasing of the issue, we are in a workforce that's increasingly 'workaholic' (as you said), prides itself on working late nights and weekends, yet we still hold all the same social pressures of finding mates -- at this rate, it's basically inevitable that at some point the main place to arrange these sorts of things will be the workplace. That doesn't mean literal harassment is ok by any stretch of the imagination of course, but we should really be mindful of how we're defining these social 'rules' in light of our changing social climate...

To view it from a slightly different perspective, just look to Japan and their current problems with an increasingly disinterested/romantically-jaded population -- their entire culture is based around their work ethic, and now their population rates are dropping: http://theweek.com/article/index/254923/everything-you-need-...

Perhaps the solution is to not agree to the set of cultural rules that would keep you at work rather than doing other things you might want to be doing as well.

That would be ideal, but trends don't seem to be heading in that direction currently, and no party is even acknowledging the very real possibility of these issues happening.

It'll be a long time before we get to the basic-income/work-optional utopia that will probably be needed to fulfill the entirety of the world's population, and Japan-style workaholism/social issues already seem to be around the corner, so it's really about going with what's the most practical and/or quickest to implement in the meantime.

It's not a big ask to require a minimum amount of professionalism.

Except that 20% of couples met at the work place. But I guess these days people could resort to online Dating instead.

The blog post warns about "inappropriate sexual or romantic behavior" and parent equates that to becoming "puritan asexual blobs of political correctness".

Everyone has the own idea where the line should be drawn but I think you can be professional and still find someone.

How about we turn people into asexual blobs when it comes to business/work environment.

Because sex doesn't sell...

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