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Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

nytimes.com

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Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#681

Post by qb45 »

JauntyHatAngle wrote: post #166
bdamm wrote: post #144

I have a confession to make. With few exceptions, I cannot work with a woman without thinking about having sex with her. It's not like I'm trying, it's more like the thought is a blinking red light and I can't help but look at the thought. Then I realize the thought is absurd, but it's already happened. This normally doesn't leak out, but for some women, I will give them "eyes" and usually feel bad about it afterward…

>With few exceptions, I cannot work with a woman without thinking about having sex with her. Its fine to think whatever you want, imagine murdering your boss, having sex with the coffee machine, whatever you want, that's happening in your brain, doesn't effect anyone else. It's a bit much for >every >This normally doesn't leak out, but for some women, I will give them "eyes" and usually feel bad about it afterwards.…

> Its fine to think whatever you want, imagine murdering your boss, having sex with the coffee machine, whatever you want

I sometimes have brain farts where I imagine some bad/evil/wrong/painful thing done by me or to me and for a short moment feel almost like it's real. For example, today I thought about stabbing someone's eye with a teaspoon I was holding at the time. It's unpleasant. If I imagine something like that happening to me for longer periods, I probably wouldn't want it.

> Unless you are being creeper and staring like a weirdo all the time then I doubt they notice.

If OP says they notice, they notice. People notice almost everything but consciously act on almost nothing. Sometimes they don't like their own reactions and pretend not to see. One can fall into the trap of trying to find signs of non-noticing only to constantly keep seeing minuscule involuntary signs of noticing. Sometimes feeling like you creep others out makes you behave nervously and actually creep them out.

Maybe it's better to be open that these things happen but yet they absolutely don't communicate any will for serious real-world consequences. Or dunno, ask some psychologist.

Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#682

Post by grey-area »

pluma wrote: post #605
hanspeter wrote: post #509

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But false accusations are possible about anything. By this logic VCs should avoid talking with anyone.

Sure, if you completely ignore the cultural context. Rape and sexual assault (of women) is seen as one of the worst possible crimes[0] a man can commit in most Western societies[1]. These crimes are so heinous that even accusations are enough to destroy someone's career and social status, even if the accusations are dropped or proven false. This is further complicated by these crimes generally being very difficult to…

Since the current president celebrates his past assaults on women with no consequences, and threatens his accusers, again with no consequences, and Cosby was recently freed, your thesis that mere accusations damage prominent men rings hollow. The exact opposite is true.

It is so damaging for the women involved (career, socially, and withstanding the barrage of slander, misogyny and distrust that they always seem to face) that it is very hard to step up and simply tell the truth, and you are part of the problem here, with your needless insinuations about false accusations and talk of a low burden of proof.

Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#683

Post by grey-area »

prodmerc wrote: post #666
zzalpha wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because VCs are all populated by serial harassers who now realize they can't get away with this crap? Or are you saying these will be seen as false accusations and thus it'll scare off VCs who aren't run by mysogynist pieces of sh-t? Because I'm not sure what the alternative is. If a VC is not in the habit of harassing women, they have nothing to fear. In fact, it'll give them an opportunity to court talented entrepr…

Everyone has plenty to fear. Any sexual harassment/rape accusations (no matter how untrue) are incredibly damaging, it's very biased towards the accuser. The people who actually do this shit are scumbags, but there's plenty who will take advantage of this when things don't go their way, and reputation damage is worse than physical for a lot of people.

Do you have a citation of an actual case of a VC falsely accused and then exonerated, or is this all in your head?

Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#684

Post by mikeash »

5thaccount wrote: post #611
mikeash wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The good ol' "I don't want to be accused of a crime, so I'll preemptively commit a crime" defense. I would strongly advise against discriminating against people based on their sex in the course of your business dealings.

You are placing normative (meaning "you should do") moral judgements on a descriptive (meaning "this will happen") moral statement. My prediction isn't what SHOULD happen, but what I think WILL happen. My personal opinion on what is morally right? As I'm not a VC, utterly unimportant and redundant.

Apologies. Consider my ire directed at the people you describe, not at yourself.

Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#685

Post by bt4u2 »

sokoloff wrote: post #669
bt4u2 wrote: post #667

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a very subjective definition of unnecessary risk. Clearly there are potential rewards (ev+ if you're into poker or ai) in starting your own company. Helping a stranger get promoted? At the risk of ending your career (a massive loss for most people)? With the only reward being feeling good for Doing The Right Thing (tm)? Not so much

> Clearly there are potential rewards (ev+ if you're into poker or ai) in starting your own company. That a risk is +EV does not make it a necessary risk.

Surely a more necessary risk than ev-, wouldn't you agree?

Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#686

Post by thehardsphere »

benevol wrote: post #524
epalmer wrote: post #494

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how many people in power or have strong influence are psychopaths or sociopaths. I've had the misfortune to observe a psychopath in the workplace and in this case they touch people a lot. They touch people of the opposite sex more than same sex but they touch a lot of people. I wonder what is being said behind closed doors. I have friend who is an employment lawyer. When I first asked her what she does she s…

It actually goes in both directions: Statistics have shown for a while now that psychopaths or sociopaths are drawn to positions of power and are therefor overrepresented in those positions. On the other hand, excessive power (== money) often brings the worst out of us, as power appeals to our (sick/immature) need to dominate those around us (on a personal or even global scale). Domination can act like a drug. And on…

> Which is why our society should fight any type of inequality until it's completely gone.

I don't think this actually follows from the prior premises you put forth. If I'm the 10x programmer, do I need to have my performance handicapped because some psychopaths exist somewhere in the world? That's a kind of inequality which I would argue isn't relevant.

Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#687

Post by erohead »

ig1 wrote: post #658

I feel deeply uncomfortable on 500 Startups positions on this ( https://500.co/making-changes-at-500/ ) for four reasons: 1) 500Startups considered these issues to be serious enough to remove McClure from his role but didn't publicly disclose this. This meant that he presumably could continue to meet female founders and other WIT while still appearing to be in a position of power. 2) A number of LPs in 500 have state…

How do you know that this didn't all go down in last 72 hours?

Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#688

Post by tripzilch »

ubernostrum wrote: post #460
curun1r wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did I ignore that? I called their behavior reprehensible. I'm just saying that it's unlikely the behavior exists in a vacuum and that things are never as black and white as they're made out to be. Historical oppression doesn't justify questionable behavior. I've seen many instances where women have "dated up" to help their careers. I even saw one instance where a female director dated the CTO and later the CFO…

So if, say, 1,000 men got completely unsolicited propositions, groping, etc. and one man "dated up" at a company with women in high leadership positions, would you argue that those problems are exactly equally important and exactly equally serious and make sure to post comments about how incredibly important it is to ensure some balanced coverage and make sure everyone knows that it's not just solely a one-sided issu…

This is a pretty good argument, or way of looking at it, which I almost dismissed simply because of the hostile tone you state it.

In particular, the last paragraph you could have done without. These discussions already get heated enough, IMO.

Re: Silicon Valley Women, in Cultural Shift, Frankly Describe Sexual Harassment

#689

Post by thehardsphere »

02399diii8d8 wrote: post #653
lawnchair_larry wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know many people like that, and no, they don't derive an enjoyable power trip out of being rejected at all. Theybdon't know they can get away with it. They don't know that they are doing it . These people are rarely evil and predatory. They usually genuinely believe that the behavior they are exhibiting is desireable. They think that this is how the game is played, and these things are a form of peacocking. They th…

Ughh... this becomes so complicated. In my line of work, which involves authority positions, I see this sort of thing happen a lot (not most of the time, but regularly): Junior female supervisee becomes romantically involved with male supervisor. It's consensual, not predatory at all. Two people working closely together in closely related positions (I'm not talking CEO-secretary here, I'm talking something more close…

Then those guys you are talking about need to learn to behave better with responsibility. I am not saying this from a social justice/feminism viewpoint that many other commenters are, but from the point of view of leadership. If you're a man or a woman who gets involved with your subordinates, that's a failure of yours as a leader and it's unethical.

It's unethical, because the superior/subordinate relationship makes a romantic affair coercive even if nobody participating intends it to be.

It's a leadership failure because the superior should behave better than the subordinate as part of providing their leadership function. Yes, you could say the suborndinate started it or whatever, but the superior is supposed to know better than to get involved with that. If you don't want people to be confused, don't add to the confusion by dipping your pen in the company ink.

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