I hate the public shaming. If you're in a position like this, two choices:
1) Leave and get a better job
2) Leave and sue
I've been in companies with claimed harassment. It's gone both ways -- about 50/50. In about half the cases, the victim perceived something that was clearly not there, ranging from:
* Complete delusion, in the case of one person with severe emotional problems
* A case where we had an someone with autism who would treat everyone in the same inappropriate way -- not understanding eye contact, personal space, etc., and one person who interacted occasionally felt targeted and harassed).
* A case where someone was just an asshole and hard-ass. Equal opportunity. But one person felt targeted.
People aren't perfect. This kind of accusation, even unsubstantiated, can ruin a career. I wish people wouldn't pull this shit.
In case of public shaming, it is important to note that it is a public defamation. If your point wasn't proven (=recognized by a court), then the company can ask for damages, so you may have to go for a trial anyway. Moreover, too many male's careers were broken by illegitimate morale accusations, which doesn't do any good for peace with women. So I agree wich cpks, either sue and prove your point or don't say it.
Edit: klodolph is correct, I didn't think laws of US could be that much opposite from Europe (France in my case).
No sensible company is going to sue an alleged victim of sexual abuse whose only complaint is that allegations were not probably dealt with. It is more a fault of Google for not resolving the issue in a way that left her not feeling like she needed to leave.
And I am sorry but if you think this will result in some "war with women" then I fear for the IT industry. Professional conduct is what should be expected. It works for every other industry.
> If your point wasn't proven (=recognized by a court), then the company can ask for damages
This is so far off the mark it's ridiculous. US defamation law is much less friendly to plaintiffs compared to most European countries, especially the UK (for example). This may surprise you, but in the US, it is not enough for the plaintiff to prove that a defamatory statement is false. You have to also prove that the defendant knew the statement to be false, or you have to prove negligence by "clear and convincing evidence". This is for private plaintiffs, the standard for "public figures" is higher.
I can recognize the attitude that "if you can't prove it in court, then shut up", but there are always going to be a few really important things that you want to say that can't be proven in court. I'm not saying this is one of those times (it really isn't) but those times exist.
And I'm not taking sides on this particular case, just to be absolutely clear.
If Ann calls Bob a cheat and a liar she has the defences of:
1: truth
2: fair comment (eg, Bob isn't a cheat or a liar but has behaved in a way that would make a reasonable person to think he is)
3: protection (eg Ann could have said it in the House of Commons and is thus immune from prosecution).
To get damages Bob (if he's a public figure) has to show that Ann was malicious -- that Ann knew the comments to be untrue or she recklessly disregarded the truth; if Bob is a private individual he only needs to show Ann was negligent in obtaining the truth. (That's compensatory damages. For punitive damages malice has to be present.)
In the case of a claim of sexual harassment, proving the claim false is that first step, sure. But the second step is almost a fait accompli. Barring a psychotic break, it's pretty hard to made the original claim, about what happened to themselves, didn't know it was false.
For clarity, too, I'm speaking in the genetic, not specific to this incident.
It's not a question about whether you speak out. It's a question of whether you do it through proper channels.
And yes, I'd much rather accusers speak out only through proper channels, at least when those channels work pretty well. In the US, they're not perfect, but they do work pretty well.
I too think that twitter shaming is an incredibly stupid way to solve those kind of issues. People mistake feeding the mob for speaking out. We've already seen the consequences with Adria Richards.
I don't know. That SV diva Marc Andreesen does it all the time, lashing against the old establishment on Twitter right and left, apparently with no bad consequences.
Just chatted about this to a bunch of (very) feminist friends. They agreed that this is a poor move, and leaves her open to defamation lawsuits, however, in the case where something cannot be proven it's exceptionally problematic - anyone can say anything to anyone, and effectively get away with it as if nobody else heard anything, there's no proof at all.
Essentially it's a difficult problem, as we need to protect peoples' reputations, but at the same time vindicating victims.
You don't realize what's going on at Google these days, do you?
Victoria Lease was the first to talk about it. She had to leave Google because of how she was treated. HR didn't do shit to help her. Last week it was Narelle, citing similar reasons. Now this.
All we get at TGIF is some vague excuses from Laszlo Bock but no action is taken. So let me be the first to say: Fuck Rod Chavez and everybody who helped him!
That's how we manage things in a civilized society. It's precisely why we have a court system. We want:
1. For Google to follow standards we've agreed upon as a society. There are extremists on both sides for what constitutes harassment. We don't want them duking it out with vigilante violence (whether physical, as 100 years ago, or over Twitter, today).
2. There to be due process before action is taken. It's imperfect, but it's a lot better than going vigilante. For a company like Google, if there is a pattern of sexual harassment, with over 50,000 employees, at least some of them will have an open-and-shut case.
3. In the context of something like sexual harassment, the typical damages are set at a level where only a small minority need to win lawsuits before it is financially painful.
I don't care how bad things are at Google. The way to settle this is within the legal system.
By the way, HR's job is to protect the employer from liability. Going to HR is the last thing you want to do. HR will almost never do anything to help the employee -- that's sometimes seen as tantamount to admitting guilt. Once you go to HR, their primary strategy will be whatever minimizes liability. That's often something not great for the employee. A common strategy is to set you up to fail, destroy your credibility, and work you out of the company. If a lawsuit does come up, they can play the disgruntled worker card.
The way the system is set up, suing your former employer is your civic duty, and does a few things:
1. Applies financial pressure to fix the problem.
2. Is generally confidential, protecting both your reputation and your former employers'.
3. If you have a credible claim, rewards you financially for doing your civic duty.
Until you're ready to file a law suit, you want to act professionally at work, and play the role of a good employee. There is absolutely no upside to doing anything else -- whether to your career, or to your odds of winning a law suit. Think about it. You're on a jury. Case 1: There's a clear rockstar employee, who loves the work, and leaves because of alleged harassment. Case 2: An underperforming employee gets fired after bitching out their employer. They claim harassment. How does that bias you? You're upper management. You get similar claims. How do you behave? You're a future employer, co-worker, etc.
This stuff ain't rocket science. You're not in kindergarden anymore.
If it is true, that engineering manager had another option - don't say something like that. Simple, and the responsibility would be where it should be.
Issues like this generally deserve more attention though, not less - for every issue that is vocalized, there are usually many that are handled in silence, or harassment dealt with by silence. It is not a good environment to be in, where serious problems are swept under the rug.
In the US military, if you are found guilty of sexual harassment/assault, you get hit with a double felony - one for the action, and one for the bad conduct discharge as a result. It still happens, but everyone knows to keep things professional in interactions with the opposite sex since the threat of a discharge under dishonorable conditions hangs high - it is more than a career finisher for the person charged. The mantra in the military for this sort of behavior is zero tolerance, and punishments reflect that - that behavior wrecks havoc on morale, trust in leadership & peers, and overall ability to get the job done.
Unfortunately, the tech industry does not take this issue seriously enough to impose this sort of punishment. What do you do when the company comes to a conclusion that turns out to be incorrect? Suing is not a good solution since you're fighting against a company with a lot of money that can lawyer up easily (and in this case, has lots of internal lawyers). The person in this case did leave and get a different job a little while ago, and only now is making it public after there was an investigation internally. Even worse, I have been told by Googlers that if there is any doubt, Google will not promote a candidate - by following that logic, the person should not have been promoted due to strong allegations of improper behavior towards a subordinate, and apparently he was.
It is a difficult problem for women to have to deal with, and we as men seem to have a problem empathizing with it because we can't understand what it is like to live in a world like that where we don't have control of our destiny because the institutions are set up against us.
The real problem seems to be that women do not have a way to seek recourse against this bad behavior in our industry, and the brutes/bros take advantage of it. Our industry is failing them.
Hiding and sweeping under the rug is exactly the best way to manage something like this. In any conflict negotiation, you want to minimize value destroyed. Swept under rug == no reputations are ruined == minimum value is destroyed.
The way you sweep this under the rug is roughly:
* Victims file law suits. Unfortunately, not all do (but it is their civic duty).
* A portion of the law suits have settlements. A typical one might be a few million. The settlement includes a non-disclosure.
Perpetrator is punished in proportion to the level of crime, and has reason to stop. If you get hit 10% of the time, your expected cost per harassment might be a few hundred thousand. That's expensive.
A random selection of victims get big payouts, and a random selection get nothing at all. Damages are big enough to account for this ($5 million is far more than the damage in a single case, and is set to account for the cases lost or not filed). That's not perfect, but nothing at all is still better than less than nothing (which is what happens with public shaming).
It sounds like reporting the harassment ruined this woman's career at Google, so if that's what you meant, then yes. I doubt the man she named will suffer any consequences. Certainly he's never going to suffer the hateful abuse she's currently getting on Twitter.
It destroys the accuser -- I don't want to hire a liability. She may make a similar accusation at my company.
It destroys the accused -- again, I don't want to hire a liability. He may harass someone at my company.
Quite frankly, in a situation like this, I personally wouldn't take a risk hiring either of them. I have a lot of job candidates, and there's no reason to take a risk. Googling someone before you hire them is universal, and a news story like this basically kills careers forever.
It also hurts the employer -- I don't want to work for for a company where this stuff happens -- but much less so.
Ellis' new employer hired her before this happened.
Some people will hire her, mind you. It just reduces the set of opportunities perhaps ten-fold, or reduces the level of those opportunities by one or two rungs on the corporate ladder.
I would be happy to hire someone like her! She's shown she has guts, and is not afraid to disrupt a stagnant institution. Basically, everything you could wish for in a startup. But I can see why some in the old Silicon Valley establishment might be hesitant; they have very a conservative mindset, and, in general, don't like rocking the boat.
This. We need equal opportunity and chances for everyone. It doesn't matter that a group doesn't have enough women yet, as long as all women and males today have equal chances of getting a nice career.
As long as they put in equal effort into their career and don't go taking a few years out to look after their offspring or whatever else takes their fancy. (Men are capable of doing that as well as women these days aren't they?)
This opinion has been shown time and time again to be wrong by countless studies and real life examples. Having an imbalance of gender, age, race etc causes problems as it skews the corporate culture.
So long as everyone is professional I personally don't see it being a catastrophic problem. But it is a major problem that the IT industry needs to continue to work on. More females in SME is something we should all strive for.
How exactly would you achieve that balance? Rejecting good male candidates in favor or worse female ones? Creating make-believe positions for women?
If the percentage of females working in IT reflects the percentage of females with IT studies or interested in IT, I don't see a problem. Or at least I don't see a problem in the workspace. Maybe it's a problem of education, but I'm not sure even if this is the case or just a simple matter of different preferences between men and woman.
It definitely starts with education and universities all around the world do work hard to encourage women into SME. So I can't imagine there is much low hanging fruit from that aspect.
With regards to a quota system I do believe at the senior levels in particular directorships and board appointees they are essential. Other companies have been done for this a long time and it works well. The hard part is at the engineering level. I don't believe rejecting good candidates based on gender helps anybody. It just makes things worse.
There are problems in the workplace though. But it has to do with the culture of IT rather than something specific. We tend to argue the idea rather that the person more often than not far too strongly. This is something that needs far more subtlety.
> With regards to a quota system I do believe at the senior levels in particular directorships and board appointees they are essential.
Why only there? The fact that there are more people in board appointees is a result of men being more prominent at both ends of distribution of psychological properties.
- more males than females in the top and bottom of the IQ distribution
- males are generally more likely to display aggression than females and when any endeavour is successful, aggression is likely to enhance success, and when it is unsuccessful, it is likely to aggravate failure
- men may have evolved to be more risk taking and socially dominant and sometimes taking risks pays off, sometimes not
- etc - the general idea is that there are more men at both ends of the distribution in various things.
This results men in being entrepreneurs, executives and board members more often than women, but it also results in men being homeless, sick and dying prematurely more often than women.
It also has the result that men pay more taxes, and contribute more pension payments, but use less public services and are paid much less in pensions.
Therefore, if we set quotas for senior levels in particular directorships and board appointees, shouldn't we also set quotas for the homeless, jobless and poor?
I.e. if we apply quotas in some areas to disadvantage men, shouldn't we apply quotas in other areas to disadvantage women? For instance, reduce pensions to women after the age where men on average don't get any (i.e. are dead), and make a suitable percentage of old women homeless?
(You must realise I'm intentionally quite provocative and not entirely serious, but I think these are valid points to discuss before setting gender quotas.)
Equal chances != perfect employee ratio. You can clearly see this in other fields, as shown by @imaginenore. I'm all for equal opportunity, but imho framing the real problem as "the gender percentage" brings wrong solutions.
Again. This has been shown to be wrong. Fixing the percentage tends to fix the issue. Look at racial profiling of poor blacks by police. Adding more officers from similar backgrounds has been shown to reduce problematic incidents.
Likewise adding females to boards through quota systems has been shown to improve governance and quality of decision making.
Saying 'strength in a social construct' as that article does shows a massive ignorance of strength and is an insult to female strength athletes who work much harder than men for gains.
I sometimes think men and women need to be careful for what
they wish for. Right now Programming is portrayed glamorous.
People saw the Social network and said wow that's cool. They
hear about how fun and stimulating it is to get the opportunity to work at Google. They hear about college dropouts making billions.
That all might be somewhat true now, but will change. I don't see unions making any headway into the industry, and
when the bubble bursts--why do I have a feeling the industry
will go back to people staring into monitors, complaining about pay--long hours, vitamin D deficiency, and Coding will go back to Programming?
(I hope this doesn't happen. I have met too many homeless former programmers that were hot in the 80's-90's)
You've missed the point. Women WANT to do SME. They are spending years at university, going through the lower stages of employment, making it to a certain point and then leaving the industry.
And bringing up the straw man of "feminists" hardly adds to the conversation.
Many people get into programming for the money only to discover it's actually harder than it seems. Most people don't realize you have to keep learning just to stay relevant in IT. How many professions require that?
I'm yet to see any evidence that women leave IT because they are harassed on a mass scale.
Maybe they do now after it was pointed out. Take the bottom 20 positions from that list and see how many of them feminists talk about. It's pretty much non existent.
You hear a lot less about calls for more males into nursing or primary teaching (lower paid generally than male dominated professions, like engineering).
I hear a lot less of it, not only on HN but on general newspapers and sources that are not focused on tech. Does that make the point more valid to you?
There is. Women want to be software engineers, and get scared when stuff like this happens.
It's a problem, and we work in this industry, and can fix it. That's why I care about this and not so much about "women in roofing." I can't do anything to fix women becoming roofers at a higher rate. Technology I can fix.
I wonder how she expects to deliver a believable message with such a claim on top. Or how she expects to get a job in a company where there are also man...? I mean, who would hire such a person?
This article is another symptom of journalism becoming sensationalism. The fact that this snippet was included, and that the public shaming was made into an article at all, is extremely deplorable.
Because of the way this article was presented, I've reserved forming an opinion of Ellis or her alleged harasser. It's skewed to make both parties look bad, and based off hearsay. The article did not reveal Ellis' overreaction to her harassment until after the allegations were repeated multiple times. It's ridiculous they didn't present everything at once, instead of attempting to lead our opinions.
Whenever there is a he-said/she-said situation without objective proof there really isn't a lot of options. All that is really left in terms of options for the victim is to leave whilst the perpetrator continues their life. This leaves public shaming as the victim's only way to fight back.
The only way to solve this is basically to limit social activities in which incidents like this can happen e.g. drinking or going to the beach.
You're right, but some dangerous situations can be tolerated if the benefits outweigh the negatives.
But anyway, what happened to keeping a work diary, building evidence, and then creating a court case? It's not a perfect system, but filing a lawsuite has way less chance of creating blowback than starting a social media battle. Plus it can be useful to keep a work journal for many other reasons.
I think it's terrible when people who appear to be neurotic get a platform of attention by misusing a system that is supposed to protect legitimate victims. If they are the worst claims that she can come up with, she is making a mockery of people who have actually been harassed in the workplace.
> 'It's taking all of my self control not to grab your ass right now,'
That's not sexual harassment to you? Is there anything you would consider inappropriate enough to merit a "legitimate" complaint?
I'm frankly shocked by how many people on HN seem to think this is no big deal. I guess I've been spoiled by always working at companies full of responsible professionals, but if HN is reflective of attitudes in the wider industry, then things really need to change.
I think the main problem is we have a set of unsubstantiated claims. HN is avoiding rushing to judgement on the situation ... while simultaneously rushing to judge this woman's mental state.
I get the feeling a couple people have an ax to grind and the majority are just following along because it looks like reasoned discourse.
Even if the events took place as she claimed, where's the harassment? Two guys found her attractive and told her so, what's the drama? Pretty sure if this went any further (i.e. they had power over her and tried to coerce her into something), she wouldn't hesitate to tell. So far, it looks like tumblrina with a mission.
Her attitude and what happened are two separate things.
Given that she isn't lying, it doesn't matter what her opinion on interacting with strange men are (radical as they are). It doesn't change what happened to her.
Your wording suggests there's a universally accepted standard of what exactly constitutes harassment. As noted in comments below, courts tend to disagree. Personally, I believe that one radfem with agenda and no real proof should not be able to ruin careers and lives by twitter.
I dont live in US, so it is rather strange from an outsider prospective seeing US as being "open" with sex. (Must have been largely influenced by US TV series )
"You look amazing in that bathing suit, like a rock star"
Why does that, count as sexual harassment? May be he said it with his tone, eyes and looks?
It makes her uncomfortable and it has nothing to do with her job. In the workplace, you don't blurt out everything that comes to mind even if you feel a certain way or even if you mean it with good intentions. She wasn't hired by Google to look good, she was hired to be a good developer. Vic G telling her that she looks good in a bathing suit makes her question why she's there and what her bosses motivations are. Everyone has a right to feel comfortable in the workplace.
He is judging her on her appearance. That she is in a bathing suit means he is judging, essentially, her naked body. It is an insanely creepy thing for your boss to comment on and is sexual in nature.
"This is why any man who is a stranger and tries to talk to me when I’m minding my own business is likely to be met with defensiveness and/or aggression. [...] If you are a strange man trying to talk to me on my way to or from work, when I am commuting alone, you are a harasser, pure and simple. You are threatening. And you need to leave me the fuck alone."
I can see why you might say that superficially, but the difference is that feminists believe in empowering women to decide for themselves who they chose to interact with, whereas Saudi religious authorities believe in dictating to women who they can interact with. So in fact, they're almost polar opposite positions.
You are constructing a model from a short essay that was written to convey a certain point of view and then insisting that the model you have constructed must be 100% accurate. It's a strange exercise.
If she literally means that even glancing in her direction is harassment, that is pretty extreme, but if you glance at someone and they don't seem to notice you, it's probably not the right time to hit them up for a conversation.
> You are constructing a model from a short essay that was written to convey a certain point of view and then insisting that the model you have constructed must be 100% accurate.
That's quite a leap from my question. And not an answer.
It is an answer! Your question is based on the premise that "If you are a strange man trying to talk to me on my way to or from work, when I am commuting alone, you are a harasser, pure and simple." is complete and accurate description of what she believes. That premise is difficult to prove in either direction.
It happens all the time that an essay exaggerates a message in order to make that message stand out.
Why? What message do you read in the blog post? I see someone explaining that they have actually been mistreated by people 'just trying to make conversation' and that this makes it difficult for them to have any desire to ever 'just make conversation'.
Sure, it's a miserable outcome if she sees the world of strangers as a hostile place, but it seems it might be based on experience.
She is making the point that she no longer sees people in those situations as anything other than potential harassers.
Maybe it would be fair to put a bunch of qualifiers in there to make it clear that in spite of this attitude, she knows that there are many nice people out there and that the essay isn't meant to apply to them, but I don't think it's obvious that it would improve the essay (which I see as an attempt to convey how she feels about the interactions much more than I see it as an attempt to besmirch the men of the world with the label 'harasser').
If I were female and I had two superiors in my chain of command treat me the way Vic Gundotra and Rod Chavez allegedly (and IMO probably) did, I'm pretty sure I'd start to see all men as potential harassers in the same way cops start to see everyone as potential perps after dealing with a minority of scumbags.
I don't blame Kelly Ellis one bit. Don't blame the victim.
I blame these two idiots, their co-workers covering their butts, and Google HR.
Curious that you chose the cop analogy. Overzealous cops who go into any situation with the assumption that someone might be a perp (and especially certain races) are a problem in certain parts of the world. And they aren't looked at favourably. Or sympathetically.
You're right in one sense, a cop usually becomes a cop by choice and the cop ought to own his outlook. In Ms. Ellis's case however, her douchebag superiors made the decision for her. So what's your point other than (I'm guessing) to cast aspersions on her for speaking out?
> So what's your point other than (I'm guessing) to cast aspersions on her for speaking out?
Cast aspersions? I haven't faulted her for speaking out at all[1]. Nice try though, just try another smear-angle next time.
The point is that prejudices stop being OK or "understandable" when you take them out on other people. A person can think that all men are potential harassers if she wants. She can even hate all men if she wants to. But what is not cool is to take it out on other people.
But as long as prejudice stays only in the mind, it's fine really. But it can be hard to not let it seep through.
Sure, in an ideal black spherical world, I'd agree with you. But this is reality, no? And sucky people suck and they leave big stinky turds in every punchbowl they squat over.
For it's not like Vic Gundotra and Rod Chavez are nervous naive 20somethings just out of college and awkward around g-g-g-g-girls wherein I might actually cut them some slack in exchange for some critically needed enlightenment. No, these are alpha jackasses with over a decade of experience getting to that position, enjoying their power in an unchecked manner, making their entire gender look bad.
If she spends some time around men who don't suck, her opinion of the gender is likely to change. Otherwise, she's just speaking truth as she sees it IMO. And more power to her. Any woman I've dated would have poured a drink over Rod Chavez's head (or worse) for that remark about her ass and I salute her for doing so.
Let me make a suggestion for budding Googler Masters of The Universe: if you'd like to learn how to hit on women, why not just approach random women on the street, say in the mission in SF, and try some of these maximum genius pickup lines that come to your head? Be sure to wear kneepads and a truss to avoid permanent injury.
But to my knowledge, if a strange man approached strange woman in SA, he could get in trouble for that. There are expectations and restrictions on both sexes, which ultimately leads to the situation where strange men and women can't interact. If I'm mistaken and men can interact freely with strange women in SA, then my bad.
And obviously she wouldn't be the one who laid down the law in that country. But the eventual outcome would have been the same.
> , but the difference is that feminists believe in empowering women to decide for themselves who they chose to interact with,
So, a strange man should just hold his peace unless spoken to? That sounds familiar.
Either that or none of the sexes are allowed to initiate contact with another. Which again leads to the comparison to SA.
EDIT: Imagine if a woman from non-SA thought "I want to live under Sharia Law" (for whatever reason). She could then make the free choice to move to SA. Now, while in SA, she would have the same (lack of) woman rights as other women in SA. But it was her own choice to put herself in that situation. In the same sense, women are freely able to express that they want something like sex segregation in "our" society. That is a free choice on their part. But if that somehow comes reality, they might not have so much free choice any more, if SA is any indication. But those two moments in time are different with regards to freedom of choice.
What she describes in the first few paragraphs of the article is obviously horrible, but the closing paragraph, which you quote, is also totally insane.
I was in London a few weeks ago, meeting some clients; my aged iPhone had run out of battery and, not being blessed with a watch, I had no way of telling the time (yes, this is a stupid situation and I felt like an idiot). I was loitering outside my client's offices and knew it was roughly the right time because the coffee shop I'd been in just before had had a clock, but I didn't particularly want to arrive overly early. A person, who happened to be a woman, walked past me, and I stopped her, politely, and asked her for the time, which she duly told me. I thanked her and she went on her way.
Does that count as harassment or threatening behaviour? After all, I'm a white male, a little over 6ft tall, with a shaved head and often a beard, and she was a woman, alone, probably walking to or from her office.
No, it doesn't. If you had scanned the woman up and down very slowly as she walked towards you, then offered a creepy smile saying "hi" then yes I would most certainly call that threatening behavior.
Hmm, if you are a harasser by trying to talk to someone... then when & where will you meet the man of your dreams? After a while, most people exhaust the dating options within their friendship circles. Many girls welcome these sorts of chances to talk with a man.
Maybe the general problem being a woman in tech is that you just have way too many men around & so through the normal course of male -> female flirting women feel overwhelmed and overburdened.
Thing is, I'd guess most techie guys are super shy.
"You look like a rockstar in that bathing suit. "
Isn't that just a compliment from a shy, probably very sweet, Indian boy?
Well it's hard to say without actually being there in that situation.
Are you suggesting that individual women being (justifiably) suspicious of strange men hassling them on the street is analogous to police officers and other agents of the state disproportionately arresting racial minorities? What would make you think is a sensible or illuminating analogy?
As with your other comment in this thread comparing feminists with Saudi Muftis, this is a shallow and superficial analogy that obscures more than it reveals.
My bad. I thought "racial profiling" was more generic and not about law enforcement in particular. I meant "racial profiling" as in all everyday racism that is motivated by other people being suspicious, cautious and actively hostile towards people because they associate them with, or have bad experiences with, other people of the same race.
If you want to talk about "justifiable", then we can also talk about how "racial profiling" can be very pragmatic and not just blind racism. Maybe being extra suspicious around a black man keeps you from being mugged? Maybe you have lived in a bad part of town and "racial profiling" has helped you keep out of trouble?
And although it might be pragmatic, it's a disturbing practice in itself, and it's not really fair either. It's not simply "justifiable", end of story. It has wider implications. But people like you have too much tunnel vision to see the similarity, and the common hypocrisy around this subject. "Schrodinger's rapist"? Nice hate speech, if I'm allowed to use that as a more generic term.
Whether or not an argument is popular or not[1] has no bearing on whether it is correct or well-informed. But it's cool of you to dismiss my arguments by implying that I would be a social pariah.
[1] I'm guessing you are implying that my opinion would be unpopular among women.
There are women who have a deep dislike of men. Can be caused by not that great fathers, or maybe a string of horrible boyfriends. Maybe watching too many of the wrong sort of movie or reading the wrong sort of books. Who knows!
So... it's not the woman's fault. Everybody starts out wanting to be good.
But women that do not like men really do exist! (Speaking from some experience here)
I'm just as much pro-women's rights as anybody, but a few things I was thinking while reading this:
1) "grab your ass" comment happened in Maui, which I'm assuming is not on work premises or during a work-related event. In cases like this a simple "please keep your comments to yourself. I don't feel comfortable with you saying this." would be appropriate and I think respected. It nips the issue in the bud. Pouring a drink on someone is not necessarily the best way to communicate that. And next time don't accept the invitation if you don't feel comfortable around them. In my experience it's not common that this sort of comment will be made without some level of prior assurance (flirting?) that the comment wasn't entirely inappropriate.
2) claims "let me be in a position where I couldn't be promoted" but without details. This sounds like paranoia to me. I have never heard of a company explicitly denying promotions to people in certain positions. Google is in the internet business, but most importantly they're in the business of making money. If you prove that you're valuable to them making money, then you're valuable to the company. Bottom-line.
As a side-note, Google has just as much of a responsibility to the other employee to get the story straight. Allegedly nothing was done to reprimand the perpetrator. This is likely because 3rd party observers (also Google employees?) probably provided 3rd party testimony that it was no big deal which would likely help as a deciding factor. Of course they likely told the guy not to let it happen again. If there's no 3rd party testimony and it's not on premises or at a work-function what do you expect your employer to do about it?
Another point I would make is that the paranoia could be because people stopped interacting with her as often or inviting her to social gatherings. What you don't think about necessarily is that people will stop talking to you if they think you'll accuse them of something or if you're overly sensitive. It's human nature. I don't want to offend someone if they're overly sensitive, and it's less fun being around people like that, so if I'm just socializing I'm going to be considerate and NOT invite them to social gatherings because I don't want you to be offended. After all I can't control what others will say or do when we're out having a drink.
3) "you look amazing in that bathing suit" seems like an attempt to flatter someone. I didn't know they wear bathing suits to work at Google :) It's what guys do to girls. They compliment them. And girls generally accept the flattery and say thank you. If you don't like that it's fine, just let people know and they more than likely will be happy to oblige.
4) "drinks after work". This is again a situation outside of work. You're not required to be there. If you find that it's not a social circle you want to be a part of you don't have to be. I do get that social settings is where you can establish deeper levels of trust with people within an organization, and so that can be perceived as a roadblock to advancement. In this case I can't see how Google the organization can legally control this, except to work on balancing the ratios. But that is also not necessarily a gender-related issue. Girls don't get along with girls in social settings also at comparable ratios if not more often. But if the organization you're a part of is controlled by people with personalities you don't mesh well with, and you can't be moved laterally within the organization then it's time to move on. If someone finds it hard to get along with most people within an organization it is always worth the time it takes to self-reflect to determine if it's your issue and not theirs. Especially in a company as large as Google.
On a slightly more personal note (to fend off what may be perceived as a male-oriented view of this where we're always the aggressor). After work one night when I was younger, a large group of co-workers went into town to a bar for some drinks. We were all pretty much lit up by the end of the night and decided to split a taxi. I ended up sitting next to a female co-worker. In no particularly suggestive way I asked if I could lay my head down in her lap for the ride because I was tired. Moments later when I was comfortable (head facing straight up) she proceeded to lean over so as to smash her breasts into my face and then started making out with me. I didn't want to make a big scene at the time, and we were pretty drunk, so I went with it.
This, obviously, is far more suggestive and invasive than words. But I'm a heterosexual guy. This actually happened. I didn't feel violated. I didn't feel I needed to address it. I couldn't breathe for a second, but other than that I was fine. We continued to be friends and co-workers. She was embarrassed when I told her the next day that I didn't want to pursue things, but everything was fine. I continued to respect her just as if nothing had happened between us. No need to get our company involved. I don't know about her, but for me everything was just as normal as before but it didn't happen again because we were on the same page after that.
> 3) "you look amazing in that bathing suit" seems like an attempt to flatter someone. I didn't know they wear bathing suits to work at Google :) It's what guys do to girls. They compliment them. And girls generally accept the flattery and say thank you. If you don't like that it's fine, just let people know and they more than likely will be happy to
Do not "flatter" people on their appearance unless they are a family member or close friend.
I agree to a point. I think the general rules of thumb would be more along the lines of, "don't flatter someone in a suggestive or inappropriate way". Some people work very hard on their appearance. I would go so far as to say it (their looks) is, to a large extent, who they are. That's not to say they are necessarily shallow people either. They find pleasure and take pride in keeping up with their looks and overall aesthetic. So if you're out and meet someone who might be a friend of a friend / co-worker, or a co-worker from another department who you may not have met before, if they look like they've gone above and beyond to look good, they more often than not will appreciate the compliments. If you don't look like you've put all that effort into your looks (which is not to say you purposefully try to look ugly) more often than not you will not receive those compliments.
You are wrong. It is not appropriate to comment on another person's appearance if that person works for you, or works with you. (Unless their appearance falls below whatever minimum standard your company has).
Women do not appreciate those comments. By making those comments you are being creepy and unacceptable.
At work yes. I was under the impression we were talking about social settings outside of work with co-workers. Since none of the scenarios from the OP appeared to have happened at work. Or at least that's the case with all the scenarios I cited in my original comment.
I don't see why compliments of one's appearance outside of work must be off limits. As long as they're not inappropriate or suggestive. It's a common courtesy in some social circles. And I'm also not against women complimenting men on their appearance, or women complimenting women or men complimenting men. I'm an equal opportunity complimenter :)
Now if they report directly to you yes I agree it's inappropriate and boundaries need to be in place. But I didn't get the impression that was the case.
And for the record I'm not talking about "cat calls". That's inappropriate in all cases.
After further reflection, in some sick perverted way, I can see how some people might interpret all forms of flattery / compliment as having some ulterior motive or inextricably linked to a man's desire to conquer or take advantage of females.
I just see compliments and flattery (if done right) as an attempt by one human to bring a little joy to another human's day by saying something nice to them. Why does it have to be more than that? Even if you're not family or close friends. If you're with a group of people and you think someone has gone above and beyond to put themselves together for the evening, I see no harm in that.
Let's see, Twitter shaming and a Twitter history of feminist trolling...
From the article, more disclosure of the possible events:
> She then added "full disclosure. I'm not proud, I poured a drink on him. It became about that."
Seems to me when you combine beaches and alcohol while on a staff getaway, things may get slightly out of hand. Not exactly sexual harassment in the office kind of stuff...
121 comments
[ 6.0 ms ] story [ 221 ms ] thread1) Leave and get a better job
2) Leave and sue
I've been in companies with claimed harassment. It's gone both ways -- about 50/50. In about half the cases, the victim perceived something that was clearly not there, ranging from:
* Complete delusion, in the case of one person with severe emotional problems
* A case where we had an someone with autism who would treat everyone in the same inappropriate way -- not understanding eye contact, personal space, etc., and one person who interacted occasionally felt targeted and harassed).
* A case where someone was just an asshole and hard-ass. Equal opportunity. But one person felt targeted.
People aren't perfect. This kind of accusation, even unsubstantiated, can ruin a career. I wish people wouldn't pull this shit.
Edit: klodolph is correct, I didn't think laws of US could be that much opposite from Europe (France in my case).
And I am sorry but if you think this will result in some "war with women" then I fear for the IT industry. Professional conduct is what should be expected. It works for every other industry.
This is so far off the mark it's ridiculous. US defamation law is much less friendly to plaintiffs compared to most European countries, especially the UK (for example). This may surprise you, but in the US, it is not enough for the plaintiff to prove that a defamatory statement is false. You have to also prove that the defendant knew the statement to be false, or you have to prove negligence by "clear and convincing evidence". This is for private plaintiffs, the standard for "public figures" is higher.
I can recognize the attitude that "if you can't prove it in court, then shut up", but there are always going to be a few really important things that you want to say that can't be proven in court. I'm not saying this is one of those times (it really isn't) but those times exist.
And I'm not taking sides on this particular case, just to be absolutely clear.
If Ann calls Bob a cheat and a liar she has the defences of:
1: truth
2: fair comment (eg, Bob isn't a cheat or a liar but has behaved in a way that would make a reasonable person to think he is)
3: protection (eg Ann could have said it in the House of Commons and is thus immune from prosecution).
To get damages Bob (if he's a public figure) has to show that Ann was malicious -- that Ann knew the comments to be untrue or she recklessly disregarded the truth; if Bob is a private individual he only needs to show Ann was negligent in obtaining the truth. (That's compensatory damages. For punitive damages malice has to be present.)
For clarity, too, I'm speaking in the genetic, not specific to this incident.
And yes, I'd much rather accusers speak out only through proper channels, at least when those channels work pretty well. In the US, they're not perfect, but they do work pretty well.
Essentially it's a difficult problem, as we need to protect peoples' reputations, but at the same time vindicating victims.
Victoria Lease was the first to talk about it. She had to leave Google because of how she was treated. HR didn't do shit to help her. Last week it was Narelle, citing similar reasons. Now this.
All we get at TGIF is some vague excuses from Laszlo Bock but no action is taken. So let me be the first to say: Fuck Rod Chavez and everybody who helped him!
Disclaimer: I work for the Google hypocrites.
1. Compile evidence in your existing job.
2. Find a new job
3. File a lawsuit.
That's how we manage things in a civilized society. It's precisely why we have a court system. We want:
1. For Google to follow standards we've agreed upon as a society. There are extremists on both sides for what constitutes harassment. We don't want them duking it out with vigilante violence (whether physical, as 100 years ago, or over Twitter, today).
2. There to be due process before action is taken. It's imperfect, but it's a lot better than going vigilante. For a company like Google, if there is a pattern of sexual harassment, with over 50,000 employees, at least some of them will have an open-and-shut case.
3. In the context of something like sexual harassment, the typical damages are set at a level where only a small minority need to win lawsuits before it is financially painful.
I don't care how bad things are at Google. The way to settle this is within the legal system.
By the way, HR's job is to protect the employer from liability. Going to HR is the last thing you want to do. HR will almost never do anything to help the employee -- that's sometimes seen as tantamount to admitting guilt. Once you go to HR, their primary strategy will be whatever minimizes liability. That's often something not great for the employee. A common strategy is to set you up to fail, destroy your credibility, and work you out of the company. If a lawsuit does come up, they can play the disgruntled worker card.
The way the system is set up, suing your former employer is your civic duty, and does a few things:
1. Applies financial pressure to fix the problem.
2. Is generally confidential, protecting both your reputation and your former employers'.
3. If you have a credible claim, rewards you financially for doing your civic duty.
Until you're ready to file a law suit, you want to act professionally at work, and play the role of a good employee. There is absolutely no upside to doing anything else -- whether to your career, or to your odds of winning a law suit. Think about it. You're on a jury. Case 1: There's a clear rockstar employee, who loves the work, and leaves because of alleged harassment. Case 2: An underperforming employee gets fired after bitching out their employer. They claim harassment. How does that bias you? You're upper management. You get similar claims. How do you behave? You're a future employer, co-worker, etc.
This stuff ain't rocket science. You're not in kindergarden anymore.
Issues like this generally deserve more attention though, not less - for every issue that is vocalized, there are usually many that are handled in silence, or harassment dealt with by silence. It is not a good environment to be in, where serious problems are swept under the rug.
In the US military, if you are found guilty of sexual harassment/assault, you get hit with a double felony - one for the action, and one for the bad conduct discharge as a result. It still happens, but everyone knows to keep things professional in interactions with the opposite sex since the threat of a discharge under dishonorable conditions hangs high - it is more than a career finisher for the person charged. The mantra in the military for this sort of behavior is zero tolerance, and punishments reflect that - that behavior wrecks havoc on morale, trust in leadership & peers, and overall ability to get the job done.
Unfortunately, the tech industry does not take this issue seriously enough to impose this sort of punishment. What do you do when the company comes to a conclusion that turns out to be incorrect? Suing is not a good solution since you're fighting against a company with a lot of money that can lawyer up easily (and in this case, has lots of internal lawyers). The person in this case did leave and get a different job a little while ago, and only now is making it public after there was an investigation internally. Even worse, I have been told by Googlers that if there is any doubt, Google will not promote a candidate - by following that logic, the person should not have been promoted due to strong allegations of improper behavior towards a subordinate, and apparently he was.
It is a difficult problem for women to have to deal with, and we as men seem to have a problem empathizing with it because we can't understand what it is like to live in a world like that where we don't have control of our destiny because the institutions are set up against us.
The real problem seems to be that women do not have a way to seek recourse against this bad behavior in our industry, and the brutes/bros take advantage of it. Our industry is failing them.
The way you sweep this under the rug is roughly:
* Victims file law suits. Unfortunately, not all do (but it is their civic duty).
* A portion of the law suits have settlements. A typical one might be a few million. The settlement includes a non-disclosure.
Perpetrator is punished in proportion to the level of crime, and has reason to stop. If you get hit 10% of the time, your expected cost per harassment might be a few hundred thousand. That's expensive.
A random selection of victims get big payouts, and a random selection get nothing at all. Damages are big enough to account for this ($5 million is far more than the damage in a single case, and is set to account for the cases lost or not filed). That's not perfect, but nothing at all is still better than less than nothing (which is what happens with public shaming).
It sounds like reporting the harassment ruined this woman's career at Google, so if that's what you meant, then yes. I doubt the man she named will suffer any consequences. Certainly he's never going to suffer the hateful abuse she's currently getting on Twitter.
It destroys the accused -- again, I don't want to hire a liability. He may harass someone at my company.
Quite frankly, in a situation like this, I personally wouldn't take a risk hiring either of them. I have a lot of job candidates, and there's no reason to take a risk. Googling someone before you hire them is universal, and a news story like this basically kills careers forever.
It also hurts the employer -- I don't want to work for for a company where this stuff happens -- but much less so.
Some people will hire her, mind you. It just reduces the set of opportunities perhaps ten-fold, or reduces the level of those opportunities by one or two rungs on the corporate ladder.
That's a career killer in most cases.
On a side note, I'm tired of high percentage arguments, I've seen it in countless articles. There's NOTHING inherently wrong in the ratio itself.
So long as everyone is professional I personally don't see it being a catastrophic problem. But it is a major problem that the IT industry needs to continue to work on. More females in SME is something we should all strive for.
If the percentage of females working in IT reflects the percentage of females with IT studies or interested in IT, I don't see a problem. Or at least I don't see a problem in the workspace. Maybe it's a problem of education, but I'm not sure even if this is the case or just a simple matter of different preferences between men and woman.
With regards to a quota system I do believe at the senior levels in particular directorships and board appointees they are essential. Other companies have been done for this a long time and it works well. The hard part is at the engineering level. I don't believe rejecting good candidates based on gender helps anybody. It just makes things worse.
There are problems in the workplace though. But it has to do with the culture of IT rather than something specific. We tend to argue the idea rather that the person more often than not far too strongly. This is something that needs far more subtlety.
Why only there? The fact that there are more people in board appointees is a result of men being more prominent at both ends of distribution of psychological properties.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_psychology :
- more males than females in the top and bottom of the IQ distribution
- males are generally more likely to display aggression than females and when any endeavour is successful, aggression is likely to enhance success, and when it is unsuccessful, it is likely to aggravate failure
- men may have evolved to be more risk taking and socially dominant and sometimes taking risks pays off, sometimes not
- etc - the general idea is that there are more men at both ends of the distribution in various things.
This results men in being entrepreneurs, executives and board members more often than women, but it also results in men being homeless, sick and dying prematurely more often than women.
It also has the result that men pay more taxes, and contribute more pension payments, but use less public services and are paid much less in pensions.
Therefore, if we set quotas for senior levels in particular directorships and board appointees, shouldn't we also set quotas for the homeless, jobless and poor?
I.e. if we apply quotas in some areas to disadvantage men, shouldn't we apply quotas in other areas to disadvantage women? For instance, reduce pensions to women after the age where men on average don't get any (i.e. are dead), and make a suitable percentage of old women homeless?
(You must realise I'm intentionally quite provocative and not entirely serious, but I think these are valid points to discuss before setting gender quotas.)
Likewise adding females to boards through quota systems has been shown to improve governance and quality of decision making.
https://espnfivethirtyeight.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/chal...
In terms of physical strength, there are obvious and clear differences between men and women: http://www.powerliftingwatch.com/records
That all might be somewhat true now, but will change. I don't see unions making any headway into the industry, and when the bubble bursts--why do I have a feeling the industry will go back to people staring into monitors, complaining about pay--long hours, vitamin D deficiency, and Coding will go back to Programming?
(I hope this doesn't happen. I have met too many homeless former programmers that were hot in the 80's-90's)
And bringing up the straw man of "feminists" hardly adds to the conversation.
Many people get into programming for the money only to discover it's actually harder than it seems. Most people don't realize you have to keep learning just to stay relevant in IT. How many professions require that?
I'm yet to see any evidence that women leave IT because they are harassed on a mass scale.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1soIYek-YEIvqtu9brv3ecdPb...
So it's not harassment.
So basically they leave for the same reasons men leave.
I've never been promoted, ever. I got a salary raise once, I think. I increased my pay by switching jobs, just like 95% of the IT people out there.
This point has come up on HN so many times that anyone continuing to repeat it is at best willfully ignorant, but probably deceitful.
A simple websearch [boilermaker women] shows you're wrong with plenty of sites calling for more female boilermalers.
You hear a lot less anout it because you don't read any nursing or teaching magazines or blogs or message boards.
This is now a great dogwhistle -- anyone saying things similar is clearly dishonest.
It's a problem, and we work in this industry, and can fix it. That's why I care about this and not so much about "women in roofing." I can't do anything to fix women becoming roofers at a higher rate. Technology I can fix.
Stopped reading here.
Because of the way this article was presented, I've reserved forming an opinion of Ellis or her alleged harasser. It's skewed to make both parties look bad, and based off hearsay. The article did not reveal Ellis' overreaction to her harassment until after the allegations were repeated multiple times. It's ridiculous they didn't present everything at once, instead of attempting to lead our opinions.
The whole article was crap.
What to Take on Your Bikepacking Trip
Man Beaten While Boozing in Washington Square
The Bay Area Is Full of Skinny People
Unruly Patron Gets Booted From Bar, Returns and Shoots Out Window
Whenever there is a he-said/she-said situation without objective proof there really isn't a lot of options. All that is really left in terms of options for the victim is to leave whilst the perpetrator continues their life. This leaves public shaming as the victim's only way to fight back.
The only way to solve this is basically to limit social activities in which incidents like this can happen e.g. drinking or going to the beach.
But anyway, what happened to keeping a work diary, building evidence, and then creating a court case? It's not a perfect system, but filing a lawsuite has way less chance of creating blowback than starting a social media battle. Plus it can be useful to keep a work journal for many other reasons.
The submitted link is different there, but the link on this submission is cited in the comments there.
That's not sexual harassment to you? Is there anything you would consider inappropriate enough to merit a "legitimate" complaint?
I'm frankly shocked by how many people on HN seem to think this is no big deal. I guess I've been spoiled by always working at companies full of responsible professionals, but if HN is reflective of attitudes in the wider industry, then things really need to change.
I get the feeling a couple people have an ax to grind and the majority are just following along because it looks like reasoned discourse.
"If you are a strange man trying to talk to me on my way to or from work, when I am commuting alone, you are a harasser, pure and simple."
Given that she isn't lying, it doesn't matter what her opinion on interacting with strange men are (radical as they are). It doesn't change what happened to her.
If you mean the legal definition, consider that even different courts often disagree.
My wording was "considered harassment". How does "considered" imply a universal standard?
> Personally, I believe that one radfem with agenda and no real proof should not be able to ruin careers and lives by twitter.
And I think you are discrediting her based on her professed beliefs and background.
I totally agree that no one should be able to ruin other people's lives based on their word alone. They should be able to show some proof.
"You look amazing in that bathing suit, like a rock star" Why does that, count as sexual harassment? May be he said it with his tone, eyes and looks?
https://medium.com/@kellyellis/commuting-by-myself-714e6dc47...
Directly from the article:
"This is why any man who is a stranger and tries to talk to me when I’m minding my own business is likely to be met with defensiveness and/or aggression. [...] If you are a strange man trying to talk to me on my way to or from work, when I am commuting alone, you are a harasser, pure and simple. You are threatening. And you need to leave me the fuck alone."
She didn't say "Leave me alone if I ask you to." She once wrote that a man is a harasser for trying:
"If you are a strange man trying to talk to me on my way to or from work, when I am commuting alone, you are a harasser, pure and simple."
If she literally means that even glancing in her direction is harassment, that is pretty extreme, but if you glance at someone and they don't seem to notice you, it's probably not the right time to hit them up for a conversation.
That's quite a leap from my question. And not an answer.
It happens all the time that an essay exaggerates a message in order to make that message stand out.
I hope she's not doing that. Sincerely.
Sure, it's a miserable outcome if she sees the world of strangers as a hostile place, but it seems it might be based on experience.
I'm sympathetic, but harasser is a serious word.
It's not something that should be exaggerated in order to make a message stand out.
Maybe it would be fair to put a bunch of qualifiers in there to make it clear that in spite of this attitude, she knows that there are many nice people out there and that the essay isn't meant to apply to them, but I don't think it's obvious that it would improve the essay (which I see as an attempt to convey how she feels about the interactions much more than I see it as an attempt to besmirch the men of the world with the label 'harasser').
I don't blame Kelly Ellis one bit. Don't blame the victim.
I blame these two idiots, their co-workers covering their butts, and Google HR.
Cast aspersions? I haven't faulted her for speaking out at all[1]. Nice try though, just try another smear-angle next time.
The point is that prejudices stop being OK or "understandable" when you take them out on other people. A person can think that all men are potential harassers if she wants. She can even hate all men if she wants to. But what is not cool is to take it out on other people.
But as long as prejudice stays only in the mind, it's fine really. But it can be hard to not let it seep through.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9166504
For it's not like Vic Gundotra and Rod Chavez are nervous naive 20somethings just out of college and awkward around g-g-g-g-girls wherein I might actually cut them some slack in exchange for some critically needed enlightenment. No, these are alpha jackasses with over a decade of experience getting to that position, enjoying their power in an unchecked manner, making their entire gender look bad.
If she spends some time around men who don't suck, her opinion of the gender is likely to change. Otherwise, she's just speaking truth as she sees it IMO. And more power to her. Any woman I've dated would have poured a drink over Rod Chavez's head (or worse) for that remark about her ass and I salute her for doing so.
Let me make a suggestion for budding Googler Masters of The Universe: if you'd like to learn how to hit on women, why not just approach random women on the street, say in the mission in SF, and try some of these maximum genius pickup lines that come to your head? Be sure to wear kneepads and a truss to avoid permanent injury.
Clearly it isn't serving her purpose, in this case. "Make that message stand out" just comes off as alienating in this case.
But to my knowledge, if a strange man approached strange woman in SA, he could get in trouble for that. There are expectations and restrictions on both sexes, which ultimately leads to the situation where strange men and women can't interact. If I'm mistaken and men can interact freely with strange women in SA, then my bad.
And obviously she wouldn't be the one who laid down the law in that country. But the eventual outcome would have been the same.
> , but the difference is that feminists believe in empowering women to decide for themselves who they chose to interact with,
So, a strange man should just hold his peace unless spoken to? That sounds familiar.
Either that or none of the sexes are allowed to initiate contact with another. Which again leads to the comparison to SA.
EDIT: Imagine if a woman from non-SA thought "I want to live under Sharia Law" (for whatever reason). She could then make the free choice to move to SA. Now, while in SA, she would have the same (lack of) woman rights as other women in SA. But it was her own choice to put herself in that situation. In the same sense, women are freely able to express that they want something like sex segregation in "our" society. That is a free choice on their part. But if that somehow comes reality, they might not have so much free choice any more, if SA is any indication. But those two moments in time are different with regards to freedom of choice.
I was in London a few weeks ago, meeting some clients; my aged iPhone had run out of battery and, not being blessed with a watch, I had no way of telling the time (yes, this is a stupid situation and I felt like an idiot). I was loitering outside my client's offices and knew it was roughly the right time because the coffee shop I'd been in just before had had a clock, but I didn't particularly want to arrive overly early. A person, who happened to be a woman, walked past me, and I stopped her, politely, and asked her for the time, which she duly told me. I thanked her and she went on her way.
Does that count as harassment or threatening behaviour? After all, I'm a white male, a little over 6ft tall, with a shaved head and often a beard, and she was a woman, alone, probably walking to or from her office.
See also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9165486
No one here is claiming you can't talk to women.
Maybe the general problem being a woman in tech is that you just have way too many men around & so through the normal course of male -> female flirting women feel overwhelmed and overburdened.
Thing is, I'd guess most techie guys are super shy.
"You look like a rockstar in that bathing suit. "
Isn't that just a compliment from a shy, probably very sweet, Indian boy?
Well it's hard to say without actually being there in that situation.
EDIT: Here's a good elucidatory comment[2]. And another thread of stories[3]. And another[4].
If you react with venom to statements like the one quoted, then you are not listening.
[1]: http://www.metafilter.com/85667/Hi-Whatcha-reading#2777344
[2]: http://www.reddit.com/r/offmychest/comments/15kix9/im_tired_...
[3]: http://www.reddit.com/r/AskWomen/comments/2ij22p/what_was_th...
[4]: http://www.metafilter.com/143994/10-hours-of-street-harrassm...
EDIT: So many downvotes, such lack of rebuttals.
As with your other comment in this thread comparing feminists with Saudi Muftis, this is a shallow and superficial analogy that obscures more than it reveals.
If you want to talk about "justifiable", then we can also talk about how "racial profiling" can be very pragmatic and not just blind racism. Maybe being extra suspicious around a black man keeps you from being mugged? Maybe you have lived in a bad part of town and "racial profiling" has helped you keep out of trouble?
And although it might be pragmatic, it's a disturbing practice in itself, and it's not really fair either. It's not simply "justifiable", end of story. It has wider implications. But people like you have too much tunnel vision to see the similarity, and the common hypocrisy around this subject. "Schrodinger's rapist"? Nice hate speech, if I'm allowed to use that as a more generic term.
[1] I'm guessing you are implying that my opinion would be unpopular among women.
So... it's not the woman's fault. Everybody starts out wanting to be good.
But women that do not like men really do exist! (Speaking from some experience here)
1) "grab your ass" comment happened in Maui, which I'm assuming is not on work premises or during a work-related event. In cases like this a simple "please keep your comments to yourself. I don't feel comfortable with you saying this." would be appropriate and I think respected. It nips the issue in the bud. Pouring a drink on someone is not necessarily the best way to communicate that. And next time don't accept the invitation if you don't feel comfortable around them. In my experience it's not common that this sort of comment will be made without some level of prior assurance (flirting?) that the comment wasn't entirely inappropriate.
2) claims "let me be in a position where I couldn't be promoted" but without details. This sounds like paranoia to me. I have never heard of a company explicitly denying promotions to people in certain positions. Google is in the internet business, but most importantly they're in the business of making money. If you prove that you're valuable to them making money, then you're valuable to the company. Bottom-line.
As a side-note, Google has just as much of a responsibility to the other employee to get the story straight. Allegedly nothing was done to reprimand the perpetrator. This is likely because 3rd party observers (also Google employees?) probably provided 3rd party testimony that it was no big deal which would likely help as a deciding factor. Of course they likely told the guy not to let it happen again. If there's no 3rd party testimony and it's not on premises or at a work-function what do you expect your employer to do about it?
Another point I would make is that the paranoia could be because people stopped interacting with her as often or inviting her to social gatherings. What you don't think about necessarily is that people will stop talking to you if they think you'll accuse them of something or if you're overly sensitive. It's human nature. I don't want to offend someone if they're overly sensitive, and it's less fun being around people like that, so if I'm just socializing I'm going to be considerate and NOT invite them to social gatherings because I don't want you to be offended. After all I can't control what others will say or do when we're out having a drink.
3) "you look amazing in that bathing suit" seems like an attempt to flatter someone. I didn't know they wear bathing suits to work at Google :) It's what guys do to girls. They compliment them. And girls generally accept the flattery and say thank you. If you don't like that it's fine, just let people know and they more than likely will be happy to oblige.
4) "drinks after work". This is again a situation outside of work. You're not required to be there. If you find that it's not a social circle you want to be a part of you don't have to be. I do get that social settings is where you can establish deeper levels of trust with people within an organization, and so that can be perceived as a roadblock to advancement. In this case I can't see how Google the organization can legally control this, except to work on balancing the ratios. But that is also not necessarily a gender-related issue. Girls don't get along with girls in social settings also at comparable ratios if not more often. But if the organization you're a part of is controlled by people with personalities you don't mesh well with, and you can't be moved laterally within the organization then it's time to move on. If someone finds it hard to get along with most people within an organization it is always worth the time it takes to self-reflect to determine if it's your issue and not theirs. Especially in a company as large as Google.
5) Unrelated, but similar ...
This, obviously, is far more suggestive and invasive than words. But I'm a heterosexual guy. This actually happened. I didn't feel violated. I didn't feel I needed to address it. I couldn't breathe for a second, but other than that I was fine. We continued to be friends and co-workers. She was embarrassed when I told her the next day that I didn't want to pursue things, but everything was fine. I continued to respect her just as if nothing had happened between us. No need to get our company involved. I don't know about her, but for me everything was just as normal as before but it didn't happen again because we were on the same page after that.
Do not "flatter" people on their appearance unless they are a family member or close friend.
Women do not appreciate those comments. By making those comments you are being creepy and unacceptable.
I don't see why compliments of one's appearance outside of work must be off limits. As long as they're not inappropriate or suggestive. It's a common courtesy in some social circles. And I'm also not against women complimenting men on their appearance, or women complimenting women or men complimenting men. I'm an equal opportunity complimenter :)
Now if they report directly to you yes I agree it's inappropriate and boundaries need to be in place. But I didn't get the impression that was the case.
And for the record I'm not talking about "cat calls". That's inappropriate in all cases.
I just see compliments and flattery (if done right) as an attempt by one human to bring a little joy to another human's day by saying something nice to them. Why does it have to be more than that? Even if you're not family or close friends. If you're with a group of people and you think someone has gone above and beyond to put themselves together for the evening, I see no harm in that.
From the article, more disclosure of the possible events:
> She then added "full disclosure. I'm not proud, I poured a drink on him. It became about that."
Seems to me when you combine beaches and alcohol while on a staff getaway, things may get slightly out of hand. Not exactly sexual harassment in the office kind of stuff...