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Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

nytimes.com

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Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#471

Post by [deleted] »

marcusgarvey wrote: post #300
nkoren wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A friend of mine experienced a somewhat worse level of harassment at her job. She lawyered up and quickly received an offer for a non-trivial silver parachute, and a mutual non-disparagement agreement on her way out the door. Seemed like a fine solution, but it soon became evident that she had, in fact, been blacklisted: 18 months passed before anybody would even give her an interview, and that was only after decidin…

I believe that blacklisting is something that happens in cases like this, and I wonder how it gets coordinated. Especially when there's no public record of a court case. Simply that every time her previous employer was called for a reference, they gave her an unflattering one? Or is it more proactive, like some sort of list that's known in the HR world of certain industries?

[deleted]

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#472

Post by sangnoir »

cdr wrote: post #344
sangnoir wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if your anecdote applies here: as Reddit CEO, she made a number of decisions that were unpopular with mods and users alike - entirely not related to her court action.

And you are a case in point; spez (Steve Huffman, CEO) actually made those decisions and used Pao as a fall-woman.

> And you are a case in point

I wasn't aware that spez was co-CEO with ekjp... I thought he only became CEO afterwards. Even if the board/spez forced her to make all of the unpopular decisions (there were many), the buck still stopped with her as the CEO[1], fall-woman or not. Also, why did spez want Victoria gone? He made Ellen Pao fire her too, right?

1. https://www.reddit.com/r/announcements/comments/3cbo4m/we_ap...

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#473

Post by freyr »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #414
nkoren wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When those "true facts" are the personal details of journalists and their families, researched and published specifically to make them fear for their safety. If you think that maliciously doxing people is perfectly fine as long as the dox are true facts , then you are a being a troll. If I have misunderstood your point, then I apologise and would appreciate clarification.

Doxing refers to identifying anonymous writers on the internet. So I'm not sure what you are referring to - Emil Michael was discussing reporting true but embarrassing personal facts about (public figure) Sarah Lacy. Specifically, the idea was to write articles like these, but with Sarah Lacy (founder of Pando) as the subject: https://pando.com/2014/02/27/we-call-that-boob-er-the-four-m... https://pando.com/2014/10/0…

> why it's wrong to write the 4 most awful true things about Sarah Lacy, but it's perfectly fine to write the 4 most awful true facts about Travis Kalanick?

The article highlighted four direct quotes from Kalanick's interview with GQ magazine, not "the 4 most awful true facts about Travis Kalanick."

Do you understand the difference between digging up and exposing embarrassing personal details about a person and his or her family, and quoting what a person said in a magazine interview?

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#474

Post by dllthomas »

brudgers wrote: post #352

As I commented last night[1], the New York Times has cast Fowler's experience as a he-said-she-said story. Unfortunately I was not pessimistic enough: 1. The New York Times spiked the most damning part of Fowler's story: that HR was actively involved in supporting the behavior. 2. It down plays Fowler's specific experience as typical for the industry and marginalizes it by bringing Pao's story into Fowler's narrative…

> It repeats nearly all of Uber's public response verbatim rather than linking to it as it does with Fowler's article.

A single paragraph was included verbatim. A >20 paragraph piece was linked. Similar amounts of text were included from both parties.

It's not a great article, but this particular objection seems overstated.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#475

Post by pyrale »

tlogan wrote: post #411
Joeri wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Were you there when the alleged facts happened? If not, it is definitely he-said-she-said. It is probable that things happened as Fowler claims, but we have no way of knowing without evidence. The article mentions the facts, which are basically who said what, since neither side has shared any evidence. Personally I'm not going to pass judgment either way without knowing more, but this is definitely going into my some…

I just came here to say that. I do not trust Uber and I do not trust her. And without evidence it is "he-said-she-said". I really do not know what to say here. Personally, I'm also worried that girlfriend of my wife working in Uber HR might be accused of "hiding sexual harassment" and subsequently just fired (because they are liability). In these cases kind of cases, "investigation by CEO" will cause low-level employ…

> Just to satisfy blood thirsty "internet lynch crowd".

Certainly, you meant "Just to escape personal responsibility", or "Just to escape the bad reputation earned by bad behaviour".

Honestly, you're talking about a "blood thirsty 'internet lynch crowd'" but really, it's just ordinary people frowning upon poor ethics. Your answer seems to share responsibility equally between someone you yourself describe as willing to do anything to get what he wants, and people criticizing this behaviour.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#476

Post by benchaney »

tomlock wrote: post #430
benchaney wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only thing about a post that is rational to criticize is the content. What else could you criticize? The name of the person who posted it? The time when it was posted?

The blog post it was posted on? How posting it here would make people feel?

"The blog post it was posted on?"

Unless what you mean is that you don't want any comments on that blog post, this is actually a criticism of content.

"How posting it here would make people feel?"

Also content.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#477

Post by pyrale »

tlogan wrote: post #451
geofft wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Personally, I'm also worried that girlfriend of my wife working in Uber HR might be accused of "hiding sexual harassment" and subsequently just fired (because they are liability). In these cases kind of cases, "investigation by CEO" will cause low-level employees to be fired - even if they did nothing wrong. That's a reasonable thing to worry about, but regardless of whether the accusation is true, the worry is abo…

This is conundrum we have. Uber CEO and top-level management will not suffer as much as low level employees :( And nothing nothing will be fixed. I'm saying that this kinda of witch hunt on internet is not helping and just makes us feelgood. Yeah - evil Uber (like people working there do not have kids, boyfriends, husbands, etc.). And nobody will come up with actual actions: the only action taken in action by Uber to…

> I'm saying that this kinda of witch hunt on internet is not helping and just makes us feelgood.

And you boldly offered no alternative.

If keeping sane societal ethics doesn't work to solve this particular problem, at least it may help to avoid making it the dominant, predatory business model. Which Uber got to champion because too few frowned upon their past behaviour, by the way.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#478

Post by jimmywanger »

logicallee wrote: post #462
danaliv wrote: post #425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Maybe the reporter didn't read the blog post, because it was beyond his attention span. I know Mike and I assure you that (1) he has the attention span to read a blog post, and (2) he was not just "assigned." He's on the tech beat. He lives in San Francisco, not New York. And he's paying very close attention to this story. Go look at his Twitter feed if you don't believe me. https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac

EDIT: Mike has responded to me by email. I'm keeping the comment below but as long as the piece is updated over time I'm probably fine with it. Don't read too much into my critique below. ------ Original version of this comment: How do you explain the fact that Mike didn't quote the original instance of harrassment, nor summarize it in his own words, turning away from the highly interesting quote, "On my first offici…

All you're making are editorial decisions at this point, talking about what should and should not be in the article.

As pointed out by many others, right now this is definitely a case of he said/she said. An alternate reading is that he didn't want to get into the details, as it would derail the story to make people read all the unsubstantiated verbiage.

The statements "a lengthy post on her personal blog" and "said. she was sexually harassed" are both true and accurate.

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#479

Post by yummyfajitas »

freyr wrote: post #473
yummyfajitas wrote: post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doxing refers to identifying anonymous writers on the internet. So I'm not sure what you are referring to - Emil Michael was discussing reporting true but embarrassing personal facts about (public figure) Sarah Lacy. Specifically, the idea was to write articles like these, but with Sarah Lacy (founder of Pando) as the subject: https://pando.com/2014/02/27/we-call-that-boob-er-the-four-m... https://pando.com/2014/10/0…

> why it's wrong to write the 4 most awful true things about Sarah Lacy, but it's perfectly fine to write the 4 most awful true facts about Travis Kalanick? The article highlighted four direct quotes from Kalanick's interview with GQ magazine, not "the 4 most awful true facts about Travis Kalanick." Do you understand the difference between digging up and exposing embarrassing personal details about a person and his o…

Do you believe it would be wrong for Gawker or Pando to publish the 4 most awful true facts about Travis Kalanick? E.g., leaked emails he wrote to a fraternity (as was done to Evan Spiegel)? Or perhaps reports by a third party that he was a great big jerk?

These are things that notable journalistic establishments do on a regular basis. I'm asking the same question that Emil Michael asked: why is it wrong to do the same thing to journalists?

Re: Uber Investigating Sexual Harassment Claims by Ex-Employee

#480

Post by brudgers »

acjohnson55 wrote: post #415
brudgers wrote: post #352

As I commented last night[1], the New York Times has cast Fowler's experience as a he-said-she-said story. Unfortunately I was not pessimistic enough: 1. The New York Times spiked the most damning part of Fowler's story: that HR was actively involved in supporting the behavior. 2. It down plays Fowler's specific experience as typical for the industry and marginalizes it by bringing Pao's story into Fowler's narrative…

You should consider taking your issues with the story to the Public Editor [1], who is the point person for feedback on NYTimes' reporting. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/column/the-public-editor

An interesting idea. Conversely, the public editor could make an account here and defend the story. It would be an interesting read.

Now as absurd as that might sound, that's probably something that would fall within the Public Editor's job description and that the Public Editor would be paid to do it. On the other hand, I'm not getting paid to improve the New York Times and the reporters and editors and so forth who are being paid, all felt the story was fine and dandy. So the odds that my efforts will change the institutional character of the New York Times are proportional to the degree to which it actively is soliciting my opinion...which it does not need to do since I have stated it here.

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