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The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

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Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#51

Post by Spooky23 »

ScottBurson wrote: post #42
AlexandrB wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really hate that the answer offered to many modern social problem seems to be "more surveillance". I'm not saying it wouldn't help or that we shouldn't do it but like police body cams this is only as effective as the people charged with following through on the consequences. If a company retains control of the camera and wants to bury the evidence they'll still do it.

Yes, I think the recordings should be under the control of the employee who requested the camera. It should be their choice what parts, if any, to show the company — and they should have the ability to show them to a lawyer if they choose. Your concern is very reasonable, but that's why I didn't suggest just blanketing the office with surveillance cameras.

You can already do that. In the age of smartphones, it’s trivial to record audio for a whole day.

It’s not necessary either. The downside of capturing everything is that you capture everything. The employee ends up getting canned for claiming a 30 minute lunch when she was gone for 40. A good, factual journal is the best weapon in most cases.

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#52

Post by busterarm »

scarmig wrote: post #9
jeffdavis wrote: post #4

Putting employers and schools at the center seems like the wrong approach. If there is a victim and a perpetrator, why can't it be handled in court between them? Asking the employer/school to handle it is a recipe for injustice. Their interest is to limit their liability and favor their most useful employees, in that order. Justice is a distant concern.

Centering employers and schools in programs to reduce sexual harassment has developed as the consensus approach because it is where relatively privileged women (often rich, often white) are most keenly affected by it. That's despite the fact that, even once age-adjusted, students are victimized by rape at a lower rate than non-students. Why not courts? Courts are constitutionally required to have a higher standard of…

I just want to draw attention to a certain chain of logic in one of your sentences...

    > usual case
    > rape has absolutely occurred
    > evidence often amounts to he-said/she-said
All of these things can't be true.

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#53

Post by busterarm »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #8
jeffdavis wrote: post #4

Putting employers and schools at the center seems like the wrong approach. If there is a victim and a perpetrator, why can't it be handled in court between them? Asking the employer/school to handle it is a recipe for injustice. Their interest is to limit their liability and favor their most useful employees, in that order. Justice is a distant concern.

> ... why can't it be handled in court between them? If you're falsely accused, do you want to have to spend $10,000 to defend yourself? If you're harassed, do you want to have to spend $10,000 to accuse the perpetrator? That's why it should be handled in court only as the last resort.

> If you're falsely accused, do you want to have to spend $10,000 to defend yourself?

Versus losing your ability to receive higher education or an income in your industry (or period?). Seems like a real no-brainer choice to make there.

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#54

Post by jeffdavis »

ams6110 wrote: post #39
jeffdavis wrote: post #4

Putting employers and schools at the center seems like the wrong approach. If there is a victim and a perpetrator, why can't it be handled in court between them? Asking the employer/school to handle it is a recipe for injustice. Their interest is to limit their liability and favor their most useful employees, in that order. Justice is a distant concern.

Reasons why the courts don't handle all these cases include lack of capacity, and because nobody has a right to an education at a particular school or a job with a particular company. As long as they follow a defined process in each case, private organizations can generally adjudicate disputes internally. Because the limit of what they can do is expell or fire you, the stakes are lower and so is the burden of proof c…

Unless the adjudication is secret, it creates a weird problem: what starts out as an unknown ("did the harassment happen or not?") becomes a fact ("he was fired for harassment"). That fact could follow the accused the rest of their life, and others may make judgements based on it, even if the original harassment claim was bogus and the adjudication a charade. Even of the accused finds exonerating evidence later, there would be no process to reverse it.

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#55

Post by gizmo686 »

busterarm wrote: post #52
scarmig wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Centering employers and schools in programs to reduce sexual harassment has developed as the consensus approach because it is where relatively privileged women (often rich, often white) are most keenly affected by it. That's despite the fact that, even once age-adjusted, students are victimized by rape at a lower rate than non-students. Why not courts? Courts are constitutionally required to have a higher standard of…

I just want to draw attention to a certain chain of logic in one of your sentences... > usual case > rape has absolutely occurred > evidence often amounts to he-said/she-said All of these things can't be true.

I don't think point 2 is that we have evidence that rape had occured. Rather, the (intended) claim was that even when a rape occurred, the evidence available would amount to he-said/she-said.

I read "absolutely" in this to exclude cases where the question is not one of facts, but of definitions. Eg. if the victim was somewhat intoxicated, both sides can agree exactly on the facts of what occurred, but disagree if the victims consent was valid.

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#56

Post by busterarm »

gizmo686 wrote: post #55
busterarm wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just want to draw attention to a certain chain of logic in one of your sentences... > usual case > rape has absolutely occurred > evidence often amounts to he-said/she-said All of these things can't be true.

I don't think point 2 is that we have evidence that rape had occured. Rather, the (intended) claim was that even when a rape occurred, the evidence available would amount to he-said/she-said. I read "absolutely" in this to exclude cases where the question is not one of facts, but of definitions. Eg. if the victim was somewhat intoxicated, both sides can agree exactly on the facts of what occurred, but disagree if the…

"Rape Kits", or rather, the standardization of process for collecting evidence after a sexual assault, are surprisingly good at collecting usable (convictable) evidence after a sexual assault.

The biggest problem with them is that roughly half of them go untested. When they are tested, however, they're actually incredibly good at the successful prosecution and conviction of sexual assault cases.

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#57

Post by gizmo686 »

busterarm wrote: post #56
gizmo686 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think point 2 is that we have evidence that rape had occured. Rather, the (intended) claim was that even when a rape occurred, the evidence available would amount to he-said/she-said. I read "absolutely" in this to exclude cases where the question is not one of facts, but of definitions. Eg. if the victim was somewhat intoxicated, both sides can agree exactly on the facts of what occurred, but disagree if the…

"Rape Kits", or rather, the standardization of process for collecting evidence after a sexual assault, are surprisingly good at collecting usable (convictable) evidence after a sexual assault. The biggest problem with them is that roughly half of them go untested. When they are tested, however, they're actually incredibly good at the successful prosecution and conviction of sexual assault cases.

When the rape was reported soon enough for evidence to be collectable; and when it was a form of rape that leaves a distinctive mark relative to consensual sex. I do not know how prototypical these both of these conditions are; but at most, you would reduce the "usual" qualified to "non-negligible", as there certainly are cases that do not meat the criterion to have a usable rape kit.

(Unrelated note, in writing this comment, I tried looking for relevant statistics; but found I have no idea what to even search for. Anyone have anything?)

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#58

Post by AlexCoventry »

> For more than three decades, we have understood sexual harassment to be a form of sex discrimination

A minor derail: In fact checking this, I learned that because sexual harassment is federally treated as a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which forbids discrimination on the basis of sex, it is a defense if you bisexually harass people.

https://www.natlawreview.com/article/trouble-so-called-equal...

It's good that the legal system has found a way to shoehorn a fairly effective discouragement of a vile and destructive societal tendency out of a law which was not intended for the purpose. (I also learned that the CRA amendment prohibiting discrimination against sex was added at the last moment, as a poison pill, in the hope that doing so would make the bill untenable.) I think the country would probably benefit from dedicated sexual harassment laws, though. The current situation is pretty ethically incoherent.

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#59

Post by sheepmullet »

Avshalom wrote: post #49
sheepmullet wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A bankrupt and highly corrupt county does not represent the country as a whole. I do mean it as an honest question - is there evidence of widespread police indifference to rape? I'd like to know how often getting a rape kit done leads to a criminal conviction. Does it double the likelihood?

http://www.endthebacklog.org/backlog/where-backlog-exists-an...

So I've read a few pages of that site and it seems like the main advantage is we can detect serial rapists.

It turns out in certain parts of the country there are a lot of serial rapists.

So now we have realised it is worthwhile and we are spending tens of millions to make sure we go through the backlog of rape kits to detect serial rapists.

Now that there is money budgeted to do the work the police and courts are following through.

That doesn't show police/court indifference or hostility at all.

Re: The Transformation of Sexual-Harassment Law Will Be Double-Faced

#60

Post by existencebox »

groby_b wrote: post #20
existencebox wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I share your aspiration, let me make an inflammatory question for the purpose of prompting thought. (I would hope readers take this as a neutral statement; since obviously the women entering the workforce see it as a net positive, but it may be a line of questioning to attempt to explain why it's so easy to see it as a gender battle) What if it is zero sum, or at least, approaching that? There are two phenomena…

I'm not sure where you're seeing a "somewhat sticky # of jobs": https://www.statista.com/statistics/192356/number-of-full-ti... , https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/employed-persons As for "a brief search": I literally went to Google, typed "number of jobs" with the first suggestion being "number of jobs in us by year". The very first link has the answer. May I suggest that when you ask inflammatory question,…

I was unclear with my "sticky jobs" statement; and referred primarily to the initial rate of change of women entering the workforce. I did try to look at the data for that, but while there is a spike of labor participation rate (per capita/% seems a much better metric than absolute #) during the male/female convergence in the 50's/60s as womens rights progressed, it seemed primarily externality driven. [0]

That being said, I'd try and better make my main point: As a sister post states, there's the intuitive fact that remedying discrimination is by definition going to cause the previously elevated party to lose that. This is the core of what I was trying to get at; that I'm not sure "it's not a zero sum game" is going to convince people who focus on this aspect of it. Maybe there's an argument that you don't need to/can't convince someone that opposed, but that's the heart of my pessimism about the aformentioned togetherness.

(Another sister post made the explanation of the lump of labor fallacy, which I had learned at one point and unfortunately forgotten as it far better responds to the hypothetical I posed)

[0]https://dqydj.com/the-male-female-unemployment-gap/ (Ignoring the writing, the data is from stlousifed)

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