An Investor Wanted to Give Me $50,000. Here’s Why I Said No | Hacker News Reader

An Investor Wanted to Give Me $50,000. Here’s Why I Said No

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122 pointsemmatessler188 comments

It might be hard for guys to believe that men would do something like this (except in the movies) but consider this:

Do you believe the stories of how many people fail the "fizzbuzz" test in interviews? Yes, as wild as the idea is, the phenomena is very real.

Not being an interviewer and not having any incompetent programmer friends it blew my mind that someone could be a developer for years and still not know how to code.

I've don't remember seeing sexism any place I've worked but being married to a female software developer opens your eyes - it's very real.

Just because as guys, we haven't experienced it, doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

The other thing to think about: if the author hadn't written a blog post about this, would any man have known about the incident? If a guy puts his hand on your leg under the dinner table, are you going to interrupt the meal to tell everyone else at the table? Are you go back to work and tell all your male coworkers?

It's not just software developers, by the way. A law firm where a friend works had an incident recently where a male partner coerced a young female associate into performing sexual favors. One day she couldn't take it anymore and rage-quit, and he just got sent to sexual harassment training.

Plus of course, if only "being polite" at the dinner table over a hand on a leg was all that was going on...

I recently spoke with a fellow lady friend involved in the Cocoa community on the topic of harassment, and between the two of us, we came up with a list of men in the community we knew that crossed the line in some fashion or another. It sadly added new information to a list I already had in my head from other conversations and personal experiences. Everything from cheating and STIs to physical assault and rape. We don't speak out because people don't care, people wouldn't believe us (no level of proof is ever enough), and sometimes we try to speak out but those people in question are loved no matter what shit gets thrown their way. It isn't worth _our_ ruined reputations and huge emotional toll for telling the truth.

And yet some people still manage to express surprise that I'm actively working towards leaving the industry... tech is special, people don't even get sent to sexual harassment training. :(

Wait, he coerced a coworker into sexual favors, and has to do to sexual harassment training but wasn't fired? I can't even imagine the full extent of liability an event like that might open the company up to. Not to mention how demoralizing it can be to other employees.

Not to defend the SOB, but it's never black or white. It will be just "he says, she says" and nothing concrete could be proven. Here's another story that's closer to Silicon Valley:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/magazine/the-stanford-unde...

For what it's worth, I'm a guy and I know of at least one VC in the NYC area who has a habit of, um, blurring the lines with female founders. Which I've learned about just through casual conversation with friends in the biz who are women. So this news does get out there, even if not through overt channels.

I have no doubt stuff like this happens but it's kept pretty well under wraps. The other day, a female salesperson was moved across the office, some kind of conflict with a male salesperson. No one who knows will say why, but the guy has a reputation as a lech, so one can only imagine. No jobs appear to be at risk either.

That said, I also recently read about Joe Lonsdale, and the crazy episode he's being put through. It's worth keeping in mind people do make stuff up, particularly when there is an incentive do so so.

I don't think it's hard to believe. There are sleazy people out there. They have guys and gals encourage them over the years by either explicit or implicit approval.

These are the kinds of guys who have been at it since their youth and it has been accepted by their peer group who look the other way. For a few it might be afforded by some new found power that comes from wealth and they feel 'cavalier' enough to express it without fear of repercussions.

Whatever the source, these guys are nothing but lithe predators. And they don't only pray on women, some pray on other men as well -tho they are less common.

In retrospect you want to ask, why didn't I protest at the time? It's hard. You freeze, you can't believe it and you want to give the person the benefit of the doubt, even when you know that there is no doubt.

I worked in manufacturing before getting into software development and always had one or two female coworkers (sometimes even as my superior) and never experienced sexism among my coworkers. My girlfriend drives semi for a living and in the first 3 years of driving truck never experienced it either until recently when a store owner at a place she deliveTA to said something along the lines of "they let women drive trucks blah blah". I was completely floored that someone could think and say such things. It was the type of situation like you described where you wouldn't think that a business owner could say such things but it happens and it's terrible that it does.

I reread your post a few time but I'm a bit puzzled. Can you explain the connection between the fizzbuzz test, being a real developer, sexism and the article?

He's saying that just because you don't have first-hand experience with something, or can't fathom how something is possible, doesn't mean it can't happen.

Thank you ssharp, that's exactly what I was trying to convey.

Huh. I read your comment more as "you can be perceived as an expert in your trade and still suck at it." Groping a potential client's boobs is a clear sign of sucking at being a VC.

Many more people fail the fizzbuzz test than you would expect. Likewise, more women are treated in this fashion than you would expect.

Summary: it might be hard to believe that things like these happen, but they do. Just because you have not personally experienced it does not mean you should generalise your experience to all people. For example, many programmers fail the fizzbuzz test, despite the parent's inability to find such people amongst his friends and associates.

I think he is inferring that just as there are outliers in terms of programming competency, there are also outliers in terms of ethical behaviour.

I believe the OP is saying that while it is often difficult to believe that events like fizz buzz fails or overt sexual misconduct could even be possible because they seem so unlikely and outside of the realm of expectations in our personal daily experiences, that does not mean that they don't happen or are even all that rare given a broader sampling of human interactions.

I like your example quite a bit, but to make a side point:

Do you really think it might be hard for guys to believe?

I absolutely don't. There is a tiny loud minority that might argue this disingenuously but even they don't actually believe it, they are just engaged in a political battle in an attempt to protect themselves from a perceived potential threat. Or they fully endorse identity politics and feel they need to do some PR for their "side".

Everyone knows this happens, the issues are specific facts in individual cases and the prevalence overall. This rhetorical technique is consciously being used to avoid the actually issue as it's messy and difficult.

"I like your example quite a bit, but to make a side point: Do you really think it might be hard for guys to believe?"

That is a good point. In my world view, even the jerks are "nice people trapped in an a-hole's body". I guess I was trying to speak to the "inner nice person" that resides in those guys who don't "get it" yet.

That makes sense, I have a different world view and wouldn't think in terms of an "inner nice person" (or "inner evil person" for that matter).

You've made me think I have ignored another class of people who automatically disbelieve this kind of thing: people who's world view is naively optimistic and have a lot of emotional pressure to believe the world is too fair for this behaviour to be going on regularly. Seems like you saw that reason for disbelief more easily than I did.

FWIW I do believe sexism exists in tech. My displeasure seeing stories like this one centers around the comments.

1. Commenters seem to be attributing the actions of the investor to character traits, rather than circumstance (ie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error)

2. I don't think the situation is as cut and dry as failing a fizzbuzz (ie there is likely another side to this story)

3. Commenters seem to want the penalty for the investor to be immediate and large (public shaming, ban from YC investment opportunities, etc). I'll basically never support something that can majorly impact a person's livelihood which lacks due process.

This is the second time on this thread you've suggested there might be "another side to the story". When the "other side" would belong to an anonymous abstraction, the suggestion that we dig for it is disingenuous: it comes across not as truth-seeking, but as a mendacious attempt to discredit the account.

The moral of this story wasn't "here is a person who is evil", or even "here is an event that doesn't do a good enough job to keep stuff like this from happening" (is the event even named?).

The moral of the story is "this stuff happens, and this is what it is like for people who experience it".

You may just have to live with the fact that there's no way to interrogate her account without sounding like a creep.

You may just have to live with the fact that there's no way to interrogate her account without sounding like a creep.

Similarly, there's no way to question satanic cults without sounding like you don't care about the children being ritually molested. Or no way to criticize MADD without sounding like you support drunk driving. And there's no way to question accusations of witchcraft without sounding like a witch.

The blind acceptance of a moral panic is definitely scary. I'm pleasantly surprised to see you calling it out on this topic. getting

When the best example you can come up with of someone being railroaded by outrage is this guy:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/rw50uko2nl5aoj2/Screenshot%202015-... --- which, seriously, is actually the last example you provided of someone getting railroaded by outrage ---

... I think it's fair to call shenanigans on the idea that we're in a "moral panic".

Of course, your comment wasn't germane to mine, either; it was an attempt to change the subject. The comment to which you responded doesn't even engage gender --- it doesn't even mention it. It's a smokescreen, which you're throwing up as another attempt to discredit the story.

You keep citing that quote of Dickinson without acknowledging the context:

"You look like a fucking pig in heat, and if you get raped by a pack of niggers, it will be your fault." - Mel Gibson, Director of "Passion of the Christ", shortly before Pax Dickinson's tweet

See also Justine Sacco, who mocked clueless attitudes and was assumed to be supporting them.

I stand by my example. All Pax Dickinson did was express views and mood affiliation that goes against the dominant narrative. You haven't even claimed he did anything else. Justine Sacco didn't even go against the dominant narrative, she was just misinterpreted as doing so.

Just so we're clear that your model of a person victimized by the attention being paid to sexual harassment and gender parity is Pax Dickinson.

I'm not sure your best rhetorical strategy here was "doubling down", by the way. And also: I don't think I've ever mentioned that quote before.

What about the UVA rape case? Fabricated story, targeted a fraternity, lots of extralegal unpleasantness. Throughout, the hounding of those young men was carried out by people serenely confident that they were acting to protect young women's sexual freedom.

Julian Sanchez has a nice write-up of a similar discussion:

http://www.juliansanchez.com/2015/01/27/chait-speech/

Chait if anything benefited from the hyperventilating response his piece on political correctness got. (I nodded along to most of that piece, by the way.)

I'll repeat for a third time: I stand by my characterization of Dickinson as a person who hasn't even been accused of sexual harassment, harming gender parity or anything else at all besides disagreeing with our politically correct elites.

You are right that it wasn't you who mentioned that particular quote. We were thinking of the same discussion, though it was someone else who brought that one up: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8169903

Both there and here, you seem to have this unwavering belief that Pax Dickinson has done something horribly wrong, yet you seem unwilling to state what that is. It's a bit confusing. I have absolutely no idea what argument you are trying to make.

I do not think Pax Dickinson did something "horribly wrong". I think he was fired for cause, and that firing was legitimate: as a public-facing officer of a relatively PR-dependent company, he exhibited gross incompetence. Being fired is not the end of the world.

Which is, of course, my point: your best example of someone railroaded by outrage is someone fired for incompetence. The point is that you don't have much evidence for there being any kind of moral panic, because there isn't much evidence of any kind of panic.

As I said above, my displeasure seeing stories like this one centers around the comments. (which to be clear is not a problem with the story).

I agree the moral of this story wasn't "here is a person who is evil". The commenters calling for OP to name the investor don't seem to have grasped this.

"People seem to want the penalty for the investor to be very high (public shaming, ban from YC investment opportunities, etc). I'll basically never support something that can majorly impact a person's livelihood which lacks due process."

Well this is a tough situation.

I'm not sure she could take this fellow to court for touching her sideboob, so there absolutely will not be due process. With that being the case, he should just be allowed to do the same over and over and the victim shouldn't be allowed to say anything?

I think it's a difficult moral judgement to make. If she were to out his name, he would likely have to face extreme consequences. The internet justice mob is relentless and often over-prosecutes. However, by staying silent, she feeds into his power and does absolutely nothing to stop this type of behavior from him or anyone else.

I actually think her strategy was good. She is raising awareness without alerting mob. Since this story hit HN, and will likely be circulated outside of it as well, the investor is more likely to come across it, and any other investors or persons in a position of power in technology are also much more likely to read it.

In today's age, there is an unfortunate balance between what can be responsibly shared online and what cannot. Once you put something out there, it's no longer in your hands. By not naming the investor publically, she also still has power to let individuals like her peers, colleagues, YC, etc. know of his specifics.

Two Sundays ago, a woman flirted with my friend and got him to buy her a drink. She was uninterested in him, merely thirsty. Should the victim spread her name far and wide, publicly shaming her? If unexpected and unwanted physical contact is the dividing line, that same day a different woman kissed me without my permission. Should I publicly name and shame her?

I suspect most people's demands for a public naming/shaming are merely knee-jerk emotional responses rather than principled positions.

Did this happen in a business setting? Did either women try to use a potential $50k investment as a tool to gain sexual access?

If not, your friend should probably just be more careful who he buys drinks for.

As for the kissing, you don't provide many details, so I'm going to assume you're talking about your grandmother. In which case, absolutely name and shame. Grandmas have been getting away with that crap for way to long.

A similar event did happen in a semi-business setting last year. I met a woman at a bar, discussed work and personal travel, and decided to meet up another time. I thought it was a sale, she thought it was a date. She did touch me in a manner far better suited to a date, at which point I figured out that we talked past each other. Should I name and shame her?

If you've actually got some set of abstract principles you are willing to use across the board, I'd love to hear them. But I don't think that's where most of the commenters here are coming from.

If you feel like that person was exploiting a power dynamic to coerce you into accepting her advance, and that the world would be a better place if you "named and shamed" (note your misdirection here, since the person we're discussing didn't "name and shame" anyone), then yes.

I know the OP didn't name and shame, I'm referring to the comments here asking for them to do so - this comment thread is about whether or not that should be done.

I don't know what "power dynamic" means, but feel free to provide a clear definition for it. If you've actually got some set of abstract principles you are willing to use across the board, I'd love to hear them.

From my vantage point, I don't see much of a problem here. Offering investment is a beneficial act. So is offering romantic or sexual options. It's hard to see why offering both together suddenly becomes a bad thing - worst case the recipient can decline and is exactly as well off as before.

I'm not sure where to start with this. Is it the idea that you find the act of a stranger putting their hand on a bodily location that would trip the statutes in several US states governing sexual assault "an offer of romantic or sexual options"? The idea that such an "offer" of "options", were we to stipulate that there was any optionality involved, would have been benign? Your statement that the "worst case" is the recipient declines and is "exactly" as well off as before?

But then I reread your second graph, where you cordially invite me to litigate the meaning of the term "power dynamic", and I realize you're just going to draw me into a fake debate where you play the nerd trump card of discrediting a straw man notion of social science instead of engaging the actual issue. And it's not like I'd lose that argument, just that it would be an enervating experience for both of us.

By your logic (which I don't agree with), it would have been okay ONLY IF the side boob were written into terms of the contract, stipulating that there must be tit for tat. And then we can assume that there would also be an article double d: "$50,000 will be left on the dresser."

You're fishing for events in your life that are superficially similar to the events in the article -- drinks at a bar, some kind of unwanted touching, etc -- but are substantively quite different.

And you're trying to draw parallels with extremely vague language. Someone kissed you. Who? A child? Grandma? A bus driver? Your boss? Why? Where? Someone touched you "in a manner far better suited to a date." What does that even mean? Did she hug you? Caress your cheek? Slap your ass?

You'll have to use your own best judgment as to whether it's appropriate to name and shame.

It's hard to see how they are substantively different without actually stating some moral principle and then observing that the two situations live on opposite sides of it.

As I said, I'm pretty sure most folks here are following knee-jerk emotional reactions, and the events I'm relating don't trigger the same emotional reactions.

If it was an honest misunderstanding, those things can happen. There is some room for leeway. But even on a date, you don't immediately grab the other in the crotch or by the breast. There are generally some stages you go through to check for consent, starting with simply touching/holding a hand or arm.

And in the case discussed in the article, it was very explicitly not a date, and yet the guy went straight for the boob while making a business proposition. There's no way that's not way out of line.

Well, no. That's just a case of bad communication that I hope you both were able to transcend. And that sounds like it could have been a fun date. Smart, non-asshole men and women are fun to date.

> Two Sundays ago, a woman flirted with my friend and got him to buy her a drink. She was uninterested in him, merely thirsty.

Flirting is flirting, and doesn't necessarily imply intent to go any further. Some people enjoy flirting and find it fun in itself. You and your friend are likely in the wrong for expecting it to go any further.

> If unexpected and unwanted physical contact is the dividing line, that same day a different woman kissed me without my permission. Should I publicly name and shame her?

"Unwanted kissing" is sexual assault under most definitions (including many legal ones). I wouldn't see an issue with publicly naming this woman. It's your choice, though, and strongly depends on what you feel about it.

Yeah, that's a shitty thing to do. It's called Pussy Privilege. If a man did this, it'd be screamed at from mental abuse (drink) to rape(kiss).

It sums up to : I'm a woman, get me something because I "might" have sex with you. But not really. And those that realize this to its full potential can screw their way to the top.

> It's called Pussy Privilege.

On Reddit, maybe, but not when speaking with adults.

That sort of thing only works on men who think they can trade something for sex. If you buy a woman a drink (or bring a deer to her cave) with the expectation that she now "owes" you, be prepared to be disppointed.

Suppose someone of the same sex bought you a drink, would you feel obligated to have sex with them? How about if they implied that they would love to invest in your company?

Yes, blame the victim, a young college kid who didn't know any better. But I suppose even a college kid from a village with less than one lac people should immediately know all the subtleties of picking up women, right?

FYI, it's a dick move to accept a drink from someone who you don't want to continue interacting with. I wouldn't accept a drink from a man I didn't want to at least hang out with either.

Yes, it's totally a dick move to misrepresent your intentions in order to exploit someone. I agree with you. (BTW: I'm from a small village!)

My comment was aimed at those men who feel "entitled" to things because they somehow imagine that every woman is a prostitute and it's just a matter of price. It's a question of respect and empathy. When someone tries to use the "law or reciprocity" for gain instead of being genuinely generous, they shouldn't be shocked when someone sees through their attempt and shuts them down.

But that was my initial point. It's verboten that a man does it at all. He may accept a drink offered to him, but would never prompt a woman for a drink.

It is a bit different in male gay bars, having been to a few. Then the rule changes to "I'm interested in you, wanna drink?", in the implied consent that there will be communication and a showing of sexual interest.

A woman can prompt a man for a drink, and have no intention at all of anything else, including communication. And by using social mores, the man looks bad to his peers if he refuses. This is what I meant.

> I'll basically never support something that can majorly impact a person's livelihood which lacks due process.

Thank you. If we can manage to learn something from the many Justine Sacco's with ruined lives due to misinterpreted words and actions, it's that due process has value.

Taking the time to process incidents properly is more important than expressing our (appropriate) outrage at the alleged actions. Doing so honors the victim as well, as today's victim is tomorrow's alleged perpetrator.

"I'll basically never support something that can majorly impact a person's livelihood which lacks due process"

You realize in practice this means you are against nearly all public discourse and, even more insane, are proposing a stance that linearly scales protection from being mentioned in public with wealth.

What about a journalist impacting a politicians livelihood by printing a sourced story? That's out. Whistle-blowing of any kind? Obviously out. Filing a law suit? Well that goes public before the due process so that's out too.

This is simply a restatement of a very old school defense of the strictly hierarchical society. One should know their place and not question or impugn the integrity of their betters.

We are social animals, your livelihood will be affected by what people think about you. Get over it. There is no solution to this that respects the concept of freedom.

> You realize in practice this means you are against nearly all public discourse

I don't believe this to be the case. IMO due process is scalar not binary, and responsible journalism includes many due process protections... for example, the other side of the story has been considered and presented in most news stories, and if the central claim is proven false the story is usually killed.

> even more insane, are proposing a stance that linearly scales protection from being mentioned in public with wealth.

I didn't mention scale / I'm not sure how you came to this conclusion.

> This is simply a restatement of a very old school defense of the strictly hierarchical society. One should know their place and not question or impugn the integrity of their betters.

Not at all. I'm saying that before you punish people you should consider the idea that they are innocent and limenting that most of the other commenters don't seem to agree with this position.

I'm not sure to what extent you are arguing with me, and to what extent you are arguing with cached thoughts from other discussions. https://squid314.livejournal.com/329561.html might help with that.

> I didn't mention scale / I'm not sure how you came to this conclusion.

I am assuming that the more wealthy someone is the more likely it is for a bad public reputation to impact their livelihood. I was unclear about that. To be more clear the correlation is extremely messy but exists.

The rest of it we covered in the other thread (yes, I recognized the username). There is no punishment going on, the person in question is anonymous. We are considering the actions and how unethical they are. You keep saying there is some way this person could be innocent, what could that be? Put your cards on the table, come up with a hypothetical where you were an investor at a business event and you combined an offer of money with making a pass and should be judged to be innocent.

I can't see that this is down to fundamental attribution error. That is the fallacy of assuming that because someone acts in a particular way, its because they are always that way, or that its because they are a member of a group that is always that way. However this kind of sexual harrasment is unacceptable no matter how many times you do it. Even if its just once because he was feeling lonley/sad/drunk/whatever, its still showing that the guy is an asshole.

So in your case, the FAE is "guy is an asshole" rather than "acted like an asshole". I'm pointing this out because I thought it was interesting that you still at least sounded like you were committing the FAE, even in a comment explicitly talking about the FAE.

> However this kind of sexual harassment is unacceptable no matter how many times you do it. Even if its just once because he was feeling lonely/sad/drunk/whatever

I'm sorry to hear that OP had this experience, but I'm not willing/able to draw conclusions about the character of the other party w/o hearing the other side of the story. For example, you're assuming that the actions were intentional on his part and that he understood OPs wishes/desires/state-of-mind.

To put that another way: conditional on the assumptions you're making being correct, I agree the guy's a complete asshole :p

While FAE is a common bias, I think this is misusing it. This is not the cliche example of "driving like an asshole", which everyone does at some point for a variety of reasons. FAE requires an alternate explanation where the behaviour is justified and the assumption it's the result of a character flaw is the error. You can drive like an asshole because you are racing to the hospital or late to a big job interview or something similar.

At the very least he was being sexually aggressive in a business context with a person over whom he had substantial power. There are no charitable explanations based on unknown circumstances we can reasonably assume here.

Your character is determined by the totality of your actions, not by some imaginary inner version of yourself - although that's a very common delusion we all use to avoid acknowledging our character flaws.

> FAE requires an alternate explanation where the behaviour is justified and the assumption it's the result of a character flaw is the error

No. FAE is pointing out that no one internally says "I'm an asshole, therefore I should drive faster." ie FAE points out that character determined action is a mode of reasoning that's guaranteed to misunderstand the other person.

For a different classic example, consider a negotiation where you determine the other person is "greedy". If you catch yourself committing the FAE, you might instead determine "the other person seems to want money for something", and inquire. Perhaps by making sure they get the thing they think they need (which may or may not require as much money as they thought), you can cause them to no longer be "greedy" in your eyes. It's very rare that a person actually wants as much money as possible to be spent on nothing in particular (ie is actually greedy)

> Your character is determined by the totality of your actions, not by some imaginary inner version of yourself - although that's a very common delusion we all use to avoid acknowledging our character flaws.

I think the point of FAE is that human action is context dependent, and not some enduring trait. How someone acts in college basically isn't predictive of how they will act when they have grandchildren. If character traits really existed, this wouldn't be the case.

> There are no charitable explanations based on unknown circumstances we can reasonably assume here.

As I already said:

dlss> For example, you're assuming that the actions were intentional on his part and that he understood OPs wishes/desires/state-of-mind

I think if you assume the hug's outcome was not intentional, or assume the investor was mistaken about OPs wishes/desires/state-of-mind it's quite easy to come up with charitable explanations. Did you try this?

The opposite of FAE is the actor-observer bias, were we overestimate the role of circumstances and underestimate the role of personality traits in our own behaviour.

Both of these biases are defined in a framework where actions are the effects of a personality operating in specific circumstances. We tend to misunderstand other people a little in one direction and ourselves in the other direction.

> I think the point of FAE is that human action is context dependent, and not some enduring trait.

That is a view people have, it's just not one I find convincing, and it's not the one in which these types of cognitive biases are defined or studied. Personality/Character evolves, often quite a bit, as people age but still exists.

> I think if you assume the hug's outcome was not intentional, or assume the investor was mistaken about OPs wishes/desires/state-of-mind it's quite easy to come up with charitable explanations. Did you try this?

I considered it for quite a while. Did OP not notice he had a prosthetic arm? Did he have severe nerve damage from an old motorcycle accident? Has he left his hand resting on his mothers or grandmothers breast when hugging them? Like I said, nothing we can reasonably assume here.

And I'm a bit disgusted by the second part of your statement. He was being solicited for investment money at a business event, and offered it. It doesn't matter if she was flat out propositioning him, it doesn't matter what the genders involved are. There was a large power differential, it was a business event, he combined making a pass with offering her 50K. There are no circumstances which defend this. And those facts are not in dispute. I an now having a really hard time not making the fundamental attribution error in evaluating what type of person you are. But I assume if you thought about what you just said you would realize the mistake.

> Personality/Character evolves, often quite a bit, as people age but still exists.

If it evolves, why is it preferable to circumstance when explaining things? To my mind, the benefit of character traits vs circumstance was that distinction.

Also: do you believe that character primarily evolves based on circumstance?

> I considered it for quite a while. Did OP not notice he had a prosthetic arm? Did he have severe nerve damage from an old motorcycle accident? ... nothing we can reasonably assume here.

Hmm, I find reasonable examples very easy to come up with: he might have been jostled by another bar patron, been surprised by OP rotating, been surprised by how slender OP was, or simply failed a dexterity check. In these hypotheticals he either didn't notice (he was distracted by having been jostled for example), or did notice but was too embarrassed to apologize / allowed OP to quickly change the subject.

> I an now having a really hard time not making the fundamental attribution error in evaluating what type of person you are. But I assume if you thought about what you just said you would realize the mistake.

Your position, if I'm understanding you here, is that there exists no reasonable set of circumstances on the part of the investor where he genuinely believes he didn't try to proposition OP. Based on you including OP not noticing the touch of a prosthetic arm as your most likely alternatives, I'm guessing you think he's 99% likely to be guilty.

My position is that, given the evidence at hand, the chance the investor is guilty is less than 50%. This is also the view taken by US civil court -- if this was an employer/employee situation, OPs statement on its own wouldn't satisfy the preponderance of evidence requirement for a harassment claim (aka greater than 51% chance of guilt).

And the fact he combined "we should get drinks frequently" and "i'll invest 50K" and physical contact that you conveniently keep leaving out? You keep concentrating on one part that you have an accidental narrative for, I already granted it to you, I left it out completely and the evidence is still clear.

Anyway, this has gone on long enough you think? We aren't getting anywhere.

To be clear, I wasn't focusing on any part in particular, I was giving better examples based on the examples you gave.

I also believe that saying you'd like to get drinks frequently with someone doesn't mean you'd like a sexual relationship with them (you might want introductions, information, friendship, or might have expressed as much to be polite). Even if you give them a hug. Even if you'd like to give them money as an investor.

I also think the question of power dynamic isn't settled, as the standard fundraising tactic is to imply there are a lot of investors interested in investing. (That it's a seller's market). OPs final reply to the investor is in line with him having been mislead about how much the $50,000 meant to OP / what the power dynamic was.

But yeah, I agree this is as good a time to part ways as any. Let's close by wishing no one ever incorrectly judges either of us. Cheers!

the next day, I sat down and wrote the investor an email. I told him that while we appreciated the offer, we were being very strategic about which investors to partner with. It felt pretty gutsy at the time...

This doesn't seem gutsy to me; it seems downright timid. Now, I'm writing this from the position of not needing or wanting investment in my startup; but if you've decided to turn down an investor because he's a creep (which makes perfect sense to me), why not call him out on his behaviour?

Sending a polite reply about being strategic in how you select investors sends the message that you've selected against this guy because he's not a useful angel investor; the message he needs to receive is that you're selecting against him because he's a crappy human being.

Because it wouldn't accomplish anything productive. At best it makes her feel a little bit better, but at worst it backfires and burns some bridges that don't need to be burned.

At best it makes her feel a little bit better

No, at best it might prevent a sexual assault.

What did she accomplish then? If naming him burns bridges does telling this story help?

It is not her job to fix him. Her job is making payroll.

I think it's everybody's job to take reasonable steps to prevent anyone else from experiencing the type of assault she describes.

In that spirit, let me take it upon myself to remind you not to heap additional responsibilities on victims of harassment. She wrote it up, which is already more than she owed the world.

I'm not trying to heap additional responsibilities on victims of harassment. I'm just saying that I think there are certain responsibilities everybody has, whether they're victims or not. If one of her co-founders had been writing that email, I would have exactly the same comment.

None of her responsibilities involve sending "the message he needs to receive". His needs are not material to the conversation. It is not her job to fix him.

I think we'll have to agree to disagree here. I have a more expansive view of "duty to society" than you.

By this logic it isn't anyone's duty to do anything about abusive behaviour. That's certainly a valid opinion, but I disagree.

I think that it's everyone's duty to take reasonable steps to fix these problems. It's arguable whether the specific step in question would be reasonable and productive, but dismissing it because it's "not her job" is wrong imho.

See what's happening here? She didn't do nothing. But what she did do snapped two nerd tripwires:

* she didn't "name and shame", and so managed to suck a lot of the personal drama out of the story, making it less fun to discuss on a message board, and so now us nerds will bitch about that --- but from up on our high-horse, so as not to have to concede that we're looking for a soap opera to distract us from our unit tests and CSS tweaks.

* by not naming the person who did this, she interrupted the flow of first-principles logic (the one that goes from "distilled raw facts in her narrative" to "preferred conclusions"), and the crudded-up plinko machines our brains use to evaluate these stories therefore lead us to doubt her narrative instead of just accepting the painful conclusion that sometimes good faith requires us to stipulate things and accept incomplete information.

I think you're getting subthreads confused. Nobody in this subthread has said anything about naming this individual.

Dude you need a break from unit testing. Also stipulate doesn't mean what you think it means. Lastly I'll never accept "painful conclusions" on "good faith" because of "incomplete information."

Using your logic then she should've taken the money.

Maybe she's not 100% sure she correctly interpreted his actions. And there's a difference between turning down investment, and actually making an enemy out of him.

Maybe she's not 100% sure she correctly interpreted his actions.

That is possible. It doesn't sound like it from the way the article was written, though.

See, here it is: the point in the conversation where we nerds manage to discredit an account through our perverse attempts at first-principles interrogation. "She didn't even try to correct the guy? Maybe it didn't really happen like that, because I don't have a state machine transition that represents the alternative".

This is toxic nerd logic. Fight that urge.

I agree. Perhaps my skepticism didn't quite come through in the words "that is possible".

Imagine yourself as an douchey groper - maybe you thought that the friendly pitcher was into you? You throw an offer and do a small grab imagining a solid yes followed by night of good sex. Instead, the lady immediately takes distance and then sends you a polite "thanks but we don't want your money for this politically correct reason."

You will not feel like a sexual tyrannosaurus, but realise you just got dumped. She was not into you, and walked away from your awkward sexual advances. She even ditched your money after jumping through hoops to pitch you into doing the offer you did. Of course she dumped you because you were you, not because they suddenly didn't want the money they wanted.

You're right, the context might have made this sufficiently clear. I haven't gone through the angel-investment-courting game (Tarsnap is bootstrapped) so I have no direct experience here; but given everything I hear about the importance of finding the right investors and "hot" startups going from desperately seeking money to turning investors away overnight, I assumed that the "politically correct reason" was plausible enough that the investor in question would have believed it.

I apologize if my lack of understanding of the context meant that I didn't recognize what would have been an obvious subtext to everybody directly involved.

Sometimes things change only when people start sticking their necks out, but ... that's her business and not mine, and I can understand if this is not the place and time for her to get involved in something like that.

In a professional relationship, even the one-armed hug is crossing the line.

We have ritual patterns for opening business relationships. You can perform a symmetrical handclasp, pump twice, and release. You can do equal-depth bows, with hands at your sides, and then do a business card exchange ceremony. You can do the namaste gesture. You can, with the right sort of business, even pull off a fist bump.

But even adding another hand to the handshake is overly familiar, in my opinion.

If you're looking for a different sort of hook-up at an investment meet-up, you perhaps need to be pulled aside and informed that the dating events are held on a different night of the week. Just turning down the money is not sufficient.

It should be clear, "We decided to refuse your generous offer of investment because our company has a clear policy against sexual harassment, and it wasn't clear whether you wished to buy a portion of the business or a portion of a founder."

$50000 is not enough to hire an engineer when it comes from someone lacking basic business ethics. Professional employees do care where the money comes from, and if they figure out that the bankroll originates from assholes, the salary expectations will go up, your equity offers will be valued at zero, and their resume will never be removed from circulation. (Not that it would for a startup, anyway, but there's a difference between just keeping your eyes open and pre-planning the exit strategy.)

>it wasn't clear whether you wished to buy a portion of the business or a portion of a founder.

This is pretty unprofessional and unnecessarily aggressive. The email could simply say "We appreciated your offer, but you made one of our founders uncomfortable with your physical touching and we don't believe we'd have a productive professional relationship that started off in this manner. We understand if the touching was unintentional, but we must decline regardless."

It makes the same point, doesn't accuse him of doing anything intentionally, and is hopefully actually conducive to making him not do it in the future.

How much unprofessional and unnecessarily aggressive behavior would be necessary to warrant a response in kind?

An overly diplomatic response would only allow him to rationalize his own behavior.

It's worth noting that Dating Ring is YC W14, which is significant in light of Y Combinator's public stance on sexual harassment. (http://blog.ycombinator.com/a-reminder-to-investors)

This reminds me of my first ever job interview. I was enrolled in tech+management program at a decent university and as a part of the curriculum you're required to do an internship over summer. Our career counselor advised us to get informational interviews with people working in organizations we liked. Excited to learn about a particular organization and how they function , My class mate and I decided to schedule some time with a person in the senior management . After a few email exchanges We set a time for 3pm in the afternoon on a weekday. On said day my friend and I were waiting outside his lobby by 5 minutes to three to create a sincere impression. He wasn't in his office. As we waited for him to come , we chatted about how it would go and asked each other about a list of questions we had for him . I was slighty nervous as it was my first ever interview. He walked the corridor towards his office and As soon as the three of us made eye contact I introduced myself and my friend. The first thing immediately after that he said to me was "you reminded me of my ex wife Alicia, the mistake I almost made and how his current wife wouldn't like him telling me this". My mind was like what the hell is going on? Is this normal small talk. I was studying abroad so wasn't sure about the culture and it being my first interview in life didn't help either. I just let his comment slide and brought back the focus to his organization. He did end up offering us internships but i decided to work with someone else. He is since promoted to a more senior position in that organization. I just don't get why grown adult men behave in such ways.

My wife is constantly getting comments at the hospital where she works about her looks. Mostly, these are from men, and mostly they are in the form of "Well, aren't you a pretty young thing." Now, most of them (though by no means all) are, it seems, trying to be nice. She works in cardiology, so she sees an older population so this behavior is not exactly surprising.

Now, yes it may be a compliment, but it is an unwelcome one because it does two things. First, it puts her on the spot. How do you respond to that in an appropriate and professional manner? What if they are straight up inappropriate? [1]. What if they are addressing another person in the room and not you directly? ("Wow doc, you have such pretty ladies taking care of me here!"). This is an extremely uncomfortable position to be in, and one that most men never experience.

Second, this diminishes her professional qualities. With more or less clarity, lots of these men say things like "you are so pretty, do you even know any medicine?". Some basically, say that straight up.

And the biggest problem with all this? These are incidental occurrences. If your boss pinches your bottom every day, you go to HR, complain and your boss gets to take sexual harassment training or gets fired. When patients make you uncomfortable, it's always a question of whether it's worth it to try to correct their behavior at the risk of being unprofessional. Remember, the patient can easily complain that you were rude to them. Make a habit of it, and like it or not but your job will be affected. This is especially bad since most of the people that make these comments don't even realize that they are making her uncomfortable, so to call them out on it would be even more of a shock.

[1] One particularly bad incident was when she asked a patient about his sexual function and he responded with "Well if you were my girlfriend, I wouldn't have any issues, trust me."

Meta question, but why is pitch events located in bars? It is a place associated with dating, mixed with free booze, and apparently used as a place for professionalism and critical business decisions?

Professionals can go to an event in a bar (and, yes, even consume a drink in a bar) without sexually harassing people. The problem here isn't the environment. The problem is the culture.

There will always be people who commit crimes. However, people under the influence tend to do act slightly less professional than others, and as such, professional work place tend to have a ban against it. Drinking on the job is the firing offense in most place, and for a good reason.

A few conferences ago, I walk passed a drunk woman who turned around and hit me out of the blue. I could attribute that to conference culture, or I could attribute this to a woman who was so drunk she could barely stand and was talking to herself. If this had been at the work place, I would react very different, as in this case I just continued walking.

Bars and free alcohol is not something I associate with a place of professionalism. I am not sure why so many people try to combine the two, which is why I ask.

There's a marked difference between "drinking" and "being drunk". It's perfectly acceptable where I work to "have a beer", but I would fully expect to be, at least, reprimanded for anything more than that.

EDIT: It's a context thing. If I was in the middle of a difficult problem and wanted a little "mental lubricant", I don't think anyone would question it. Drinking for no reason, or when being even slightly tipsy could affect performance, makes for perfect grounds for punishment.

I understand the professionalism argument, but we're all adults here. If having a drink completely obliterates your sensitivities, you didn't have very many in the first place.

I think you're misunderstanding a broad question due to the narrow context of the article. The question here wasn't about whether people can drink without harassing people; the question was about whether the presence of alcohol is ideal for events which require professionalism and critical business decisions.

This to me is analogous to those gender norm conversations in which people suggest that the problem is that tech is too competitive and aggressive, and that to be amenable to gender equality tech needs to tone itself down and become more collegial and cooperative.

Which, when you think about it, is just a backhanded way of disqualifying women.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. Leaving sexism out of the picture entirely, do you think people consuming alcohol is conducive to making good business decisions? Because I certainly don't.

I think adults routinely navigate this situation without melting down, and so am very wary about attributing the author's experience in any way to alcohol. If you choose to consume alcohol in a business setting, you remain entirely responsible for your behavior.

I'm not sure how to make this any clearer: The question on this subthread has nothing to do with the article except for the location.

I know you think it doesn't, but I think you're wrong. I think this "business shouldn't happen in bars" talk is used by people to disqualify others. "Forget about fixing sexual harassment. Fix business happening in bars, first."

OK, I don't know what belorn had in mind when he asked his question. But I know what I have in mind, and it has nothing to do with disqualifying concerns about sexual harassment and everything to do with the fact that I don't drink alcohol and really don't understand drinking culture.

So, with that established: Why do people make critical business decisions in bars?

For at least two big reasons:

* A social outing lets people pretend to be friends, and to act like friends, while skipping the months and years of effort it takes to actually become friends. It's an "act the part, be the part" trick.

* Intoxicants create a polite fiction that allows people to be direct and blunt in a way they can't in a formal business setting, which expedites dealmaking.

A person under the influence is always entirely responsible for their behavior, be that assaulting a stranger or driving a car into someone else. Being drunk doesn't remove the responsibility if you cause a crash, it makes it worse.

I do however think it make for a bad move if a taxi company has a open bar for cab drivers who is on the job. Its a design for disaster. The taxi company would have made a bad decision, and the drivers are still 100% responsible if they drive drunk. The one do not exclude the other.

The problem here isn't the culture. The problem is the individuals.

It is absolutely the individuals, but it's also the culture that allows someone to write a blog post saying "this investor assaulted me while dangling $50k in front of me" and a sizable minority of the comments are some variation of "there is probably another side of the story" or "she didn't do enough [before|after]."

Edit: To clarify, I agree there might be another side to this but until/unless the person the post's author is referring to makes a statement there is almost nothing to be gained by dismissing the author's account as some sort of half truth.

Would you rather have a culture of 100% agreement? There are many different reasons why someone would write something like that in bad faith (mental illness, attention-seeking, etc.), it might be worth exploring such aspects (some stories fall apart under scrutiny, e.g. the UVA rape case). Also, I see nothing wrong with saying "she should loudly say 'did you just touch my boob?'", I think it would be beneficial if jerks were called out on shitty behavior more often.

Why should anyone ever be put in such a position where they even have to think of saying something like that? Your entire framing of the situation is exactly why it is a cultural issue. Why does sexual harassment have to devolve to physical interaction before it can be called out? Why is it "worth exploring" potentially discrediting aspects of the victim's stories, but not worth exploring the events that lead up to the story with good faith interpretations?

> Why should anyone ever be put in such a position where they even have to think of saying something like that? Your entire framing of the situation is exactly why it is a cultural issue.

IMO, saying "it's a culture issue" is just wishful thinking, based on an assumption that there can ever exist a culture where all members are completely conformist and nobody is a "jerk". In reality, people will be selfish, and you will be put into positions where you need to stand your ground (in some way). The only thing that "culture" can do is exactly this - call out the jerks (in person or online), and other members of the "culture" agreeing that the behaviour is shitty.

> Why is it "worth exploring" potentially discrediting aspects of the victim's stories, but not worth exploring the events that lead up to the story with good faith interpretations?

I didn't say that. I just said that it's worth exploring both.

Would you rather have a culture of 100% agreement?

About some things? Yes. A culture of 100% agreement about people of European descent not being superior to other races, for instance, is a good thing. There is such a thing as an unproductive disagreement, and even of toxic disagreements. An attempt to disagree about the role of Jewish people in international banking conspiracies, for instance, would be unwelcome.

What happens if these ideas are actually correct? Is it your desire for us to never learn certain truths?

It's interesting that you openly acknowledge this, as well as what I now realize was support for shaming people who ask naughty questions (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9057857). Most folks refuse to openly admit to this sort of anti-intellectualism, I'm glad to see it out in the open.

It's nice to know that there will always be someone around to ask the question, "But what if [insert superficially homogeneous ethnic/religious/race/gender/etc. group here] actually are inferior?", because that's typically what "naughty questions" boil down to. Dumb ideas backed by questionable science.

That's hardly the extent of them. Others relevant to this conversation: "By what moral principle do we condemn the actions of the VC in this story?" "Do we find the story told by the OP to be plausible and a fair description of what happened?"

It's easier to call something a "dumb idea" and attack those discussing it than it is to actually refute it. Particularly when, as is the case here, there probably isn't much of a moral principle beyond "it makes me SOOO ANGRY".

It's a bit of a sleight of hand to conflate "other relevant" questions with the one that tptacek posed above re: Jewish people and banking (which is the one that you replied to). I agree that the relevant questions you add are ones worth exploring in this scenario; however, they shouldn't come at the expense of ignoring the experiences of she who actually experienced it. The author of the article stated that she felt uneasy about how business was going down, and that she amended her plans so as to better reflect her sensibilities. What is implausible about that? Seek the answers to your questions all you want, but overlooking the answers to them in the submitted article is willful obstinacy.

Going back to the issue at hand, your so-called easy way out is exactly what tomp was doing upthread. To paraphrase both you and him, "It's easier to put forth reasons why someone would write something like that in bad faith (mental illness, attention-seeking, etc.) and attack those discussing it that it is to actually refute it [the ongoing marginalization of the experiences of women in tech]." Underhandedly calling into question the veracity of the author's retelling overlooks the larger gender issues in the work world and sidesteps the issue at hand. It's much easier to throw out the idea that she has a mental issue, than to realize that many on-going social norms make a swath of the tech population feel unwelcome. EDIT: The moral principle that you seek is between the lines of her writing.

I don't have to agree with tomp's specific claims to disagree with tptacek's anti-intellectualism and demands for blind faith in his world view. They can both be wrong.

I can't tell if you're trolling, or if you really do think my refusal to entertain the idea of a worldwide Jewish banking conspiracy is alarmingly anti-intellectual.

I do find a desire for 100% agreement and 100% certainty on any topic anti-intellectual. Your first example is more troubling than the second, given that this assumption forms the basis of many logical chains [1].

Throw in things like "there's no way to interrogate her account without sounding like a creep", an unwillingness to define your terms, and generally calling anyone who disagrees with you a "nerd" (3x in this thread!), and yep - I stand by anti-intellectual.

[1] E.g., no racial group can be better at something than others, therefore any statistical disparity must be caused b pro-Asian discrimination.

You're too smart not to know how fallacious this is. I think you're full of it.

I wouldn't particularly enjoy or appreciate a diligent effort to argue that women were inferior to men, but I would respond to its existence on some random page on the Internet by simply not reading it. At issue in this thread is an attempt to litigate issues like that in response to a complaint about sexual harassment.

It's not anti-intellectual to point out that there's a time and place for different discussions, and to point out the subtext that animates your decision to try to have that discussion here. You and 'tomp intrusively introduce this fake debate into threads like this, and I think you do it on purpose (albeit for different reasons).

If you want to act like a creep and demand that people consider that the author of this story might be irrational, unreasonable, or dishonest, you can do that. Just don't whine about it when you're called out for doing it.

So you are unwilling to intellectually evaluate certain positions and want to lower the status of people ("creep", "nerd") who do. How is that not anti-intellectual? What, if anything, would qualify as anti intellectual in your view?

If you scroll up you'll see that I dont share tomp's skepticism. Stuff like this happens all the time, in and out of tech.

"Nerd" isn't an attempt to lower people's status. I'm a nerd too.

That aside: your comment isn't responsive to mine. You're just repeating the same point you made upthread.

yummyfajitas, I just wanted to chime in and say that even though historically I've disagreed with you on most issues, I have actually as of late begun to appreciate your vehement defense of your viewpoints (which more often than not go against the HN herd mentality). You make exchanges on HN fun and mentally interesting. Please keep doing what you're doing.

Personally I find his exchanges tedious and draining, but to each their own.

Thanks for your (public) support. Most people write such things to me privately, since they don't want the downvotes.

I think that's just a question, as a meta-question would be a question about somebody else's question(?)

Honest question, but as a male, what can we do to stop this? I've seen much more subtle things in previous jobs that drive me nuts (men overtalking women in meetings, assigning lower tasks, etc..). It's usually not very overt and when I pick up on it, I usually try to help, but never know how far to go.

I'm sorry if I'm derailing the main topic, but after dating a female developer for a while now, I see things in a much different light. This stuff makes me sick; We always talk about how this is a collective industry problem.. but I'm left wondering what I can do about it personally when I see it.

> I usually try to help, but never know how far to go.

As far as you would go to help any male colleagues who were being systematically excluded or bullied. Or farther.

There are a number of resources at the Geek Feminism wiki.

http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Resources_for_allies#Men:...

I think you might be surprised at how quickly things can change if you do speak up. An extreme example: I used to think that it was a waste of time to tell men not to rape, because obviously a rapist doesn't care about social norms. But here's the weird thing. This result is controversial, but some social scientists have found that rapists think that every man rapes. I bet that $50K sideboob guy probably thinks that every guy with money acts that way. So being vocal about social norms matters more than you would think. When someone is being an asshole to the women in the office he should be socially excluded by the men (instead of the more sadly common outcome, being celebrated for it).

Codes of conduct are similarly about stating the obvious sometimes (do we REALLY have to say that this is a safe space for everyone?) but apparently it does send a message. Because so frequently people dismiss a sexist interaction as being a problem between him and her. It should be clear it's also a problem between him and the company.

Also, one of the big ways you can affect your workplace is through hiring. Most programmers (at least those influenced by SF hacker culture) participate in hiring their peers.

I've personally worked with zero female, American developers in 10 years of professional programming (I've primarily worked for smaller companies and startups). I don't think much will change unless programming is pushed as a possible career path for young girls early on. In fact, now that I think about it, I've only worked alongside one female American developer total (academically and professionally) and she changed majors after a few weeks in her first year.

I agree its the subtle stuff that is a problem. I've sometimes said things along the lines of "Sorry Jane, what were you saying just now?" after Jane has just been talked over. I'm not sure how much it helps though, and I'm nervous in case it comes over wrong if I do it too much.

Its a minefield.

As a male, nothing. I can no more end sexual discrimination at work than I can lower the deductible on the health insurance plan, or increase the match on the 401k. You need leverage to make change happen, and simply being male does not provide any.

The culture will not change without some form of advocacy group, such as a professional association or labor union. What you can do alone, as an individual, is to seek alternative employment in a better working environment. Or you could scuttle your career by filing a lawsuit for hostile working environment against your employer.

Edit: I can't quite tell if this post is being down-voted for being pro-union or anti-whiteknight, so to be clear, I intended it to be pro-union. Noble intentions are always praiseworthy, even if they are ultimately useless due to a lack of coordination with like-minded individuals.

You're right that no one is going to come up to you with a big red button that you can press.

The actual changes that would help are probably more subtle than that (assuming that your workplace is somewhat reasonable -- aka not the scenario discussed in this post). Make sure you don't talk over people or otherwise belittle their contributions. If you see someone else doing that, you can say something like, "hold on, I wanted to hear what A said", or "yeah, isn't that what B just suggested we do?". Etc.

I'm not quite sure how a professional association (which typically has little or no bargaining power with employers) or a labor union (which as a primary or secondary effect, makes it harder to fire people, even shit people) would have helped here.

Can you explain how uncoordinated individuals could have helped, given that they have even less bargaining power, and many of them are "at-will" employees and can be fired for any reason, including having an opinion or being married to someone with an opinion?

The tactic does not have to be objectively good. It just has to be subjectively better than the status quo. If you can think of something that would be both, please share it.

I never said it would have helped, I'm simply saying I don't see how either of your two suggested solutions (a professional association or a union) could have.

I honestly don't see how at-will employment status has anything to do with a VC sexually assaulting a startup founder.

Ancestor post explicitly apologized for being slightly off topic in asking how an individual could effect change within the workplace.

Both professional associations and labor unions have historically been successful at influencing workplace conditions within their industries. While that does not guarantee a change for the better with respect to this particular issue, it does imply that such a change is possible. It seems odd to me that an apparent majority of employees agree that sexual harassment/discrimination is unacceptable behavior, and the industry still has a problem with it occurring. I suggest that is because those who oppose it lack the power to enforce their will upon their employers.

The other historically effective solution is lobbying for government legislation, but the bad behavior is already illegal when certain lines are crossed, and uniform enforcement is by no means guaranteed.

When a person with no money and no power elects to fight someone with both, he will lose, unless he can convince a lot of friends to stand with him. Employers and investors alike have the money advantage. How else would you counter that advantage, if not with superior numbers?

I'm not really sure why hugs would be given at an investor/pitching session, so maybe this is kinda moot, but I've certainly given a couple of half-hearted one armed hugs which turned into sideboob grazing and I definitely wasn't trying to feel the other person up. It's kind of like when you go to shake another person's hand and they grab your fingers instead of your palm and then it becomes a totally awkward handshake because you didn't get your hand in there far enough.

Anyway, I have no idea if this was the case, but you probably don't want to pillory someone unless you're absolutely sure the guy is a complete d-nozzle.

These type of guys need to be named and shamed so they don't think they can simply get away with this behavior

I would definitely have given this an enthusiastic Yes a few weeks ago, but after reading the details of the Justine Sacco incident (http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/magazine/how-one-stupid-tw...) I am more reticent to start off with public outing. Of course what he did was unequivocally wrong; not saying anything else here. It would certainly have been appropriate to let the event organizers know, if not YC (if they weren't the same).

One hopes that even if it's not public, she was able to share the name with YC.

"while most one-armed hugs result in a hand resting politely on your ribcage"

I'm sorry? I would expect that any unsolicited hugs like thT could only result in a polite end to the conversation, rather than making a difference between ribcage and boob. In which world is it OK to hug someone you're supposed to have a business relationship with?

I've lived and worked in latinamerica for years now and I cannot imagine a scenario where one would hug or side hug a potential business partner. An existing business partner alright sure -- but one you're just meeting? I just can't picture it.

I mention this because latinamerica is much more relaxed socially than the US.

US male here. I've been hugged by many women I've just met at multiple events and conferences. I'm no male model, nor would I initiate a hug with someone I'd just met (or generally in a business context unless I knew them extremely well), however there seem to be a large number of women who are "huggers" and hug instead of a handshake.

Just saying this isn't a male-on-female only thing. Women do this on a pretty regular basis in my experience.

EDIT - In NO way defending groping, by any gender.

"Just saying this isn't a male-on-female only thing."

My point exactly -- I can't imagine myself allowing any potential business partner, male or female, giving me unsolicited hugs unless we knew each other for years. Note, this includes people I find attractive and might otherwise be interested in.

Pretty screwed up but the NO is totally deserved -- nobody wants an investor like that.

(And there I was, prepared to discuss the benefits of VC vs bootstrapping)

Bugs me that this is a story in 2014/15. You guys are awesome and shouldn't have to deal with this nonsense.

Nobody should have to deal with this nonsense.

News flash: all it takes to be an investor is money and time spent hanging around in the right crowds. You don't have to be particularly smart, savvy or even a good person.

It shouldn't shock people that any random scumbag with a few hundred grand in the bank can style themselves as an "angel" and get fawned over by the best and brightest entrepreneurs in the country. This type of dynamic will attract unpleasant types of people who pull these kinds of stunts. As an industry we should be more realistic about fund raising, and perhaps slightly more cynical about the types of people we're trying to pitch ideas to.

This is a very sensitive issue, but frankly men will always try to hit on women. However, right now this is completely ignored. It looks like everyone is trying to sweep this under the carpet and hopes this way, sexism in tech will go away. It won't.

A major reason for that is, because right now, men are only told what is NOT okay, without telling them what IS okay. This makes a lot of men behave very strangely in towards women. Firstly, because they don't want to appear sexist for the woman's sake and secondly, because they don't want to be accused of sexual harassment. Women feel this and for that reason feel unwelcome in tech. It seems like no one tries to reference any gender study researxh even though this is such a huge problem in tech and is holding up our industry.

A way to solve this, would be starting to create an open culture about how men and women can work together in tech, NOT leaving out the whole dating aspect.

A first step into this direction would be to clarify what IS okay and not only what is NOT okay.

For instance, telling a woman she is gorgeous without asking for anything in return is okay. Then the woman can make up her mind if she is interested or not. This is how it works and it will happen anHowever, basing a business transaction on sexual favours is not tolerated.

This has to be more specific of course, however, the only guideline being "inappropriate behaviour won't be tolerated" is just not enough to solve sexism in tech and to get more women into tech.

>without telling them what IS okay

This issue I would have, if I weren't married and didn't have to worry about this, is that if you talk to enough women about "what is ok" you come to learn that nothing is. Talking to or interacting with a woman in any way, as a man, is not acceptable unless that interaction is wanted by the woman. And there's no way to know whether it is wanted since you can't read minds. Many women claim that they should have the right to be left alone and not talked to, even if someone is attempting to do it 100% out of friendliness because the woman has no way of knowing he's only being friendly.

    This is a very sensitive issue, but frankly men will 
    always try to hit on women.

I don't usually take part in these conversations because I don't think I have much to add. However, a comment like this doesn't do anything constructive. The problem here wasn't even "men hitting on women". The problem is men hitting on women in an inappropriate context.

To your credit you go on to touch on this a little by sort of obliquely asking the question "what contexts would be okay?" But you completely ignore the truly easy first step. Which would be: Don't assume you know what contexts are okay until you've gotten to know the other person a little better than a few drinks and a couple conversations.

There is no "framework" for this other than taking the time to learn about the other person before you make any kind of move in the romantic/sexual arena.

Let's take your example:

    telling a woman she is gorgeous without asking for 
    anything in return is okay.

How do you know that is okay? You actually can't. Not until you've gotten to know them first. You can't be sensitive to what how another person will feel about a comment like that without gathering some background information first.

Your whole proposal starts with a flawed assumption that there is such a thing as a one size fits all framework for men and women to work together and date.

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I'm sorry, but that's ridiculous. It's bloody obvious when your hand is on a breast. It doesn't tend to happen by accident, and if it does, the usual reaction is to pull the hand away suddenly and profusely apologize.

I'm not sure what kind of accidental contact you're referring to, but if your hands are frequently coming into contact with breasts by mistake then you need to sit down with some trusted friends and discuss this issue. I assure you that accidental hand contact is not common. This is body language/physical contact 101, and it's something you need to address.

Note that I am not usually this strident in Hacker News comments.

This is not a way to change the industry or the world, and shows a lot of the courage she has (which is nothing).

There should be zero tolerance for these kind of things if we actually care about them, but see how she pretty much protects this person just because he has money.

You guys (people in power) make me sick.

Great to hear you turned him down.

$50,000 for big a share? TBH $50,000 doesn't sound like that much money. I guess that doesn't even pay for one engineer year in NY?

Aren't investors supposed to be investing millions? Or are those "angel investors"?

For any man wondering what he can do about this: Keep your eyes and ears open.

I think a broken windows theory applies. Small comments can signify larger issues. Addressing small, offhand comments can help create a culture that doesn't tolerate this stuff.

I work alone, so I don't get many opportunities to have any impact on this kind of thing. But if you're in a group culture, you may be in daily contact with men who treat women poorly.

That was the right decision. Not only because of the grotesque incident itself, but because it reflects very poorly on that guy's personality. One can only imagine how badly future interactions might have turned out, or what he would have done in retaliation if he encountered resistance.

People do this because (unfortunately for some) it works.

I am going to advance something here, but before I do this and offend many, let me first state clearly that this type of behavior is absolutely impolite.

Now the problem is not the investor, it is society in general. No man is going around dropping their pants hoping to be liked simply because it has never worked. That is to say if a man or woman touches another in a certain way, it is very likely that it is something that has worked in the past, and that continues to work for many.

I am just stating a fact here, and again apologies for offending anyone: you can go out nowadays meet people and sleep with them within hours of your very first interaction. I am not talking about a bar, I am talking about anywhere.

It goes further, many people who are in committed relationships (and I am not judging anyone) are openly flirtatious with co-workers.

The list goes on and on. So people see this, and follow accordingly.

When people see these things and do not stop to think is this right or wrong, they just follow suit.

In short men and women act this way because many other men and women allow it, and it works, and unfortunately those who do not like it end up being the offended.

Specifically to women: the mistake many make (at work) is to think they can act a certain with one person, and not expect other men to follow with their attempts.

My little advice is to behave in a way that tells everybody that this kind of behavior is not acceptable from the get go. Have your SAME limits set for everyone.

It is very sad that you have to do this, and unacceptable, but until both men and women understand what lines should not be crossed, you have to look out for yourself.

Kudos to Emma for being brave enough to speak out. I'm a guy, and never used to understand why I hear so many stories of victims keeping silent and doing nothing to prevent this kind of abuse from happening to others.

But something similar happened to me, and I was shamed and pressured to keep quiet. And this happened to me when I worked at Google, which probably has a better culture and environment than most other places.

I wasn't sexually harassed, but I was mistreated by my boss in many other ways. On several occasions, he asked me to fabricate data when he was under a deadline or wanted to impress someone, he pressured me to write glowing reviews for him and negative reviews for people he didn't like, and he told me I was acting "like a pussy" when I said no. He also threatened me with negative performance reviews if I didn't comply, and banned me from meetings where I presented my work.

What hurt even more was what happened when I tried to get help.

I talked to my coworkers. A few of them had similar things happen to them, but were afraid of looking like tattletales and what would happen if our boss found out. A few said this hadn't happened to them, but although they believed it given other experiences with him, he was our boss so I should suck it up. Another person said he had already spoken to my boss's boss about it, and that boss had told my boss what he had said.

I tried talking to my VP. I asked for a meeting in an email, and explained the situation. My VP said he was busy for the next month, but we could meet later... When we eventually met one month later, he said I should talk to my boss's boss about this instead of him, and immediately asked if I had anything else to discuss.

I talked to HR. The HR representative said she would look into it by talking to some of my coworkers discreetly. When I talked to her again a month later, she said she'd had the chance to work with my boss on some projects, he'd happened to mention his "intuitive sense as a leader" about issues in my life and that I hadn't been performing well recently, and she asked if I was sure I wasn't retaliating for other reasons? She told me that if I was unhappy, I should leave the company. (I asked my coworkers, she hadn't talked to any of them.)

Other people I talked to were skeptical that this could happen, despite concrete evidence I had of my boss's abuse. (I heard responses like "maybe there's a reason for it we don't see.") I can understand caution around my claims (we should all be "innocent until proven guilty"), but that I was so blatantly ignored and met with distrust made for a dark time.

I see a few people in this thread accusing Emma of not doing even more. Given what's happened to me and how it's only hurt my career (I get questions when interviewing for new positions about why I left Google, and while I could tell the truth, I'm pretty sure it would only make me look like a paranoid troublemaker), and how I've seen others remain silent, it's far more than I and most people ever will.

kudos to you for sharing this and standing your ground. This behaviour is simply unacceptable on all counts and we should collectively check this here. I wonder if the OP is open to naming this investor.

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Am I reading right that you're sticking up for the abstraction of the person who would harass a woman at a pitch event?

Sticking up for the possibility that maybe the guy didn't realize he was touching her breast seems like a worthwhile endeavor to me.

You can avoid any possibility of touching someone's breast by not putting your arm around them in a business meeting.

Without getting into uber-pedantry, I completely agree.

That said, if I had a nickel for every time I saw two completely platonic persons hugging in a business meeting, workplace, etc., I'd have a lot of nickels.

Some people prefer to hug. My wife, for example, finds handshakes creepy, and the myriad of rules surrounding them even more so. As a woman, she (thankfully?) has never had anyone complain, but nobody knows if anyone has ever been weirded out by it.

Still, it's premature to break out the pitchforks and take the word of one person we don't know about the insidious actions of another person we don't know without having at least heard both sides.

I really don't want this to come across as sarcastic or mean, I'm genuinely curious.

What you say is true of the retelling of any event at all. But I feel as if this kind of "two sides" post comes up particularly often on posts about women suffering discrimination. I wonder if that is just my own personal biases showing through, or this is a common pattern.

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s/date/lesson in how to not sexually harass people

if you are physically assaulted but do not involve the police immediately, I have very little sympathy. clearly you want some level of emotional vengeance, not justice, and I have no interest in listening to you complain. direct your energies properly.

You're obviously unfamiliar with gutsybroads.com

I think you overlooked the benefits beyond $50,000

Like unsolicited groping?

That site has as much credibility as Brian Williams. I'll take a drubbing for this but her story has zero proof and is completely one-sided.

Yeah, but it’s not a big deal. I mean, it was only the side. $50,000!! That’s a lot of money!

When did $50K become a "lot" of money? I live in a country which has a 1/10 of the US gdp per capita, and $50K is certainly a nice amount but not really a "lot" of money. Is a 0 or 00 missing here?

So the question then is why not name names? Or better yet why not confront the person (in writing) to see what there reaction is to what they did?

Her coinvestors/partners were portrayed as completely apathetic to her being groped. Some of you wanted the groper named and shamed, which she didn't, but then she turns around and publicly casts a bad light on her _partners_ (who i suppose are known)? I think that's crummy.

That's a pretty gymnastic attempt at victim-blaming. 9.4 from the East German judges.

Huh?

> My two co-founders, who are also women, were standing together. I immediately blurted out: “Some guy just touched my sideboob! For a pretty long time! But he offered us $50,000!” They stared at me dumbstruck. “What the hell?” they said.

> It was a big decision to make, and I couldn’t stop questioning whether I was exaggerating what happened, or being too sensitive. But my cofounders immediately assured me that that wasn’t the case, and that we could not take the money. They said it was ridiculously inappropriate, that our relationship with him would only get worse, that we should hold out for better investors to partner with.

That's not them being apathetic, that's them clearly stating that the contact was inappropriate - in response to her saying "well maybe it wasn't a big deal".

Please, read the article again, the author was the only one thinking about brushing it off while the cofounders were adamant that they should cut off the gropey investor.

For someone identifying as a 'gutsy broad', I'm not sure why there wasn't a mention in the email about the specifics as to why the money was being turned down. I know there's loads of potential reasons, but the ones I can think of tend to center on timidity/boatrocking, not being gutsy.

The reaction was very reasonable (generous, in fact): A bit of denial followed by a very discreet "no thanks."

The unfortunate thing is that the conclusion was "we probably just shouldn't take the money." For someone who clearly considers herself proactive and professional on matters of sexuality, this a rather profound failure in terms of sexual equality.

Don't get me wrong: This is exactly what I'd do. But it's not what I'd expect from someone selling a brand called "gutsy broads" and boasting credentials including "sexuality specialist."

Standing up to sexism isn't easy. But this isn't even an attempt, from someone who should at very least be making an attempt, not selling anecdotes that do little more than pat the author on the back for... what, exactly? This is very tepid commentary on what would otherwise be a fairly significant incident to someone in such a position.

You call her out for not "making a stand"[1] but don't say much about the actual problem: some sleazy guy sexually assaulting her.

That kind of attitude is sub-optimal.

[1] A move that could be considerably negative for her.

Agreed. And as an another commentor noted above, hopefully she was able to privately name this investor to YC. They're well positioned to take effective action in a way that doesn't put the author at risk.

We've unfortunately seen far too many cases where "being a woman on the internet" has led to harassment. Posting about this publicly and putting her name on it is already plenty gutsy.

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