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I Got Catfished by a Candidate

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Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#591

Post by mrbill »

Kenji wrote: post #180
mrbill wrote: post #87

You just never know who might turn up from your past... 1999: I was a sysadmin at an ISP in Austin. One day we had a tour come through, people looking to see if they wanted to colo in our datacenter. In walks in the former CEO and most of the technical staff from the Oklahoma City-based ISP I'd started my career at and left in '96. We laughed, shook hands.. and they headhunted me away a couple months later with a 200…

Question: What is freemasonry about and why did you join it? I read up on them quite a bit but I just didn't find any good examples of actual goals and activities they are pursuing. Do Masons have a hacker mentality?

One of the reasons I joined was that my grandfather (not by blood, but he married my grandmother after my real gramps passed) was a fine outstanding man, a 32nd degree Mason, and well regarded in his community. He provided for my college education, etc.

He had wanted me to get involved with Demolay (the "under-18" boys club that's sort of a Junior Masons) but I'd never had time - and I worked 36 hours a week after school during high school.

I finally started looking into Masonry in 2008, and had a few friends who were members. They helped me with pointers, I joined a lodge here in Houston, and on my birthday in 2009 was finally Raised to the Sublime Degree of Master Mason. It was a proud moment - and afterwards I was able to put on one of my grandfather's Masonic rings with a tear in my eye. I know he would have been proud.

I'm happy to have been able to be that "helpful friend" for a couple more people I know who have since joined the fraternity.

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#592

Post by BigChiefSmokem »

jmspring wrote: post #318
Kenji wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Question: What is freemasonry about and why did you join it? I read up on them quite a bit but I just didn't find any good examples of actual goals and activities they are pursuing. Do Masons have a hacker mentality?

The path to becoming a mason is first by reaching out to your local lodge. The person who responds can help you with the process. Beyond masons, there are the elks, the moose, and in parts of the West Clampers. Each have their lodges, their rituals, and focus. I started the mason path, but life got busy. I’m a Moose member and a Clamper. In all cases, the focus is community. In most cases, and this is what I apprecia…

I wish there was a HN virtual lodge or something more intimate than this. Sometimes I feel like only you guys will understand the things im expressing and tbh I would love to illuminati some (adjective) and change/guide the world in more real ways than simply through corporation and finance.

And aren't modern day hackers the very descendants of the original Freemasons? You know, the ones that actually had to build (and rebuild) Rome.

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#593

Post by learc83 »

extra88 wrote: post #447
inertiatic wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>insist that one be their a current manager That's inviting imposters. Most regular people applying for a job wouldn't provide their current boss as a reference, but the people who would provide fake references? No problem! You can talk to my current boss, or even my boss in 5 years time, whatever you want!

Having a friend pretend to be your boss for a reference would be risky. I could look up the contact information you provide to see if it matches the manager's name, I could call a general number at the business to be connected to them. Is the friend supposed to answer the phone pretending to be someone else for an unknown period of time? There are many ways in which they could screw up their performance. This is real…

> I could look up the contact information you provide to see if it matches the manager's name, I could call a general number at the business to be connected to them.

I've never done this when checking references, and I've never known anyone who does it regularly. It seems that there is a disconnect here between your sector and private industry. Your hiring practices seem a bit off to people coming from private industry, so you're seeing people here trying to come up with ways around it.

>If a candidate attempted that, I would definitely look into what options there are for consequences beyond not getting the job.

If you mean legally, no one is going to prosecute this even if their technically could be criminal penalties.

You could sue the person to recover damages, but you don't really have any damages beyond a bit of wasted time. The person they are impersonating could sue the person for defamation, but they'd have a hard time proving damage as well.

You could also try calling up their current employer, but then you're opening yourself up to defamation claims that would have a very clear damage component. Truth is a defense in defamation cases, but you're going to need to prove it and it's not going to be pleasant.

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#594

Post by nkrisc »

magduf wrote: post #582
root_axis wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well said. These types of people are driven by an extreme arrogance that manifests itself as the justification for any bad behavior. Ultimately they believe they are always right, so if they have to lie in order to get you fired, that's fine, because clearly your crazy ideas are a threat to everyone's livelihood, and it would just be better for everyone if you were gone from the office, they just don't know it yet, b…

The companies they're applying to are engaged in behavior that is just as bad, so these "catfishers" are just creatively adapting to the unfavorable situation that employers have collectively created.

You're right. Still wouldn't hire them.

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#595

Post by learc83 »

nocman wrote: post #367
learc83 wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Asking people who weren't listed as references can cause all kinds of trouble. In this case the candidate said they left on good terms, but given the author's willingness to go beyond what is "considered kosher" says to me that they likely do this all the time. Even if you're not asking people at a candidate's current employer, if you start poking around asking all of your contacts about someone and it gets back to t…

"In America it is incredibly easy to fire someone--stop being so paranoid." ^ uh, that is very often not the case. Well I guess it is if you are willing to live with any legal consequences that are the fallout of firing someone. I have a close relative that did a lot of hiring and a decent amount of firing (for legitimate reasons -- they were the type to give people a lot of chances, and genuinely wanted to help peop…

>would try to pursue legal action against the employer (even though they had no case whatsoever)

People can pursue legal action for anything they want. They can pursue legal action for not hiring them in the first place.

This isn't something unique to firing someone, it is a normal cost of business.

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#596

Post by wl »

M_Bakhtiari wrote: post #350
Kenji wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Question: What is freemasonry about and why did you join it? I read up on them quite a bit but I just didn't find any good examples of actual goals and activities they are pursuing. Do Masons have a hacker mentality?

It’s important to note that most responses here will come from Americans, who aren’t exactly known for their Masonic ideological purity. I probably wouldn’t care about an American candidate, but I would never consider hiring someone who turns out to be a European Freemason any more than I would hire a neo-nazi.

It is ignorant and defamatory to imply European Freemasonry is in any way comparable to neo-Nazism. Indeed, the Nazis suppressed Freemasonry because it opposed Nazism. It is obvious that the majority of the parent commenter's supposed knowledge about Freemasonry ultimately comes from a long line of anti-Masons who lie about the fraternity because of ideological disagreement with the craft or because the craft makes a convenient scapegoat. The latter is especially prominent in Turkey, which may be relevant here given a post about Turkish orthography in the parent poster's history. If there were any specific allegations to rebut, I'd gladly do so. However, vague allegations are impossible to counter.

This does not belong on Hacker News. Flagged.

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#597

Post by erichurkman »

eigenvector wrote: post #199
deviationblue wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similarly, rule #4: Google candidate. What happens if candidate doesn't have Google presence? Or if there are other people with the same name as the candidate who have weird websites or videos posted somewhere. Give me a break, let's not get paranoid about hiring. You can always let someone go.

There's a guy with my name, roughly the same age as me, from the same hometown who's a recently paroled pedophile. All the top results when you search my name are about him. So yeah, I'm not enthusiastic about Googling every candidate.

I took my partner's last name when we got married so I no longer shared a name with murderers, drug dealers, a corrupt politician. Now I share a name with a farmer, two people in the Netherlands, and a hobbyist jeweler. Much better.

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#598

Post by lovich »

nocman wrote: post #587
lovich wrote: post #565

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this scenario you were asked one question, but answered another when saying "thank you for making it", because you didn't want to deal with the social fallout of actually telling the truth to the original question. I don't see how that's not mental gymnastics to say it's not lieing, which seems like a big divide in this thread

It's actually very simple, and not at all mental gymnastics. It's not a lie because I didn't say something that was not true. Again you are saying that me not answering a question is equivalent to me lying, and you are simply wrong about that. They are not the same thing.

Talking to people is not computer code. In this admittedly contrived situation, they are looking for you to say it's good. You give an answer _to a different question_. Either people realize and you've violated the social expectation or they don't realize and you've misdirected them. Avoiding the question in a way that's misleading people has the same result as a lie even if not technically the same thing

If you refused to answer the question in this statement that's not lieing. If you said "no, it wasn't good" that wouldn't be lieing.

The entire camp of people in this thread with your viewpoint are acting like a stereotypical genie where as long as everything you say is technically accurate you have done nothing wrong even when you are will full disregarding the extra layers of meaning that are part of human to human conversation

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#599

Post by learc83 »

eeZah7Ux wrote: post #463
learc83 wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You ever politely laugh at something you really didn't find all that funny? Human social interactions are built on small deceptions. Some amount of dishonesty is required if you want to avoid being an awkward social pariah. If you are incapable of any social dishonesty whatsoever, you will quickly be labeled an inappropriate, self righteous asshole. Of course there is a limit to those social norms. Dishonesty that ex…

> Some amount of dishonesty is required if you want to avoid being an awkward social pariah. Not at all. When people ask "did you like the food?" they want to receive honest feedback, including a perfectly acceptable "actually not that much", at least where I live. You can teach people that you will refuse to manipulate them and lie to them - and that this is a way to respect their dignity. It's also unpolite to ask…

> at least where I live

That is completely cultural. Many culture have different expectations.

>People can find your (polite) honesty refreshing and warm.

In many cultures, including large parts of the US, politeness is often valued more than honesty--polite lies in such cases are a required a social convention. In any culture there will be consequences to ignoring social convention. Perhaps you are willing to accept those consequences. Some people have the social capital to flaunt convention, and some people choose to live with the stigma, but there is a stigma.

For example, if you were to answer "actually not that much" at my grandmother's house, you'd at a very minimum get a sideways glance from most people at the table.

Re: I Got Catfished by a Candidate

#600

Post by learc83 »

bookofjoe wrote: post #453
learc83 wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Actually that's not true. It is possible to be completely sincere, yet tactful I completely and utterly disagree with this. There are too many social interactions centered around a shared expectation of dishonesty. If your partner's grandmother asks you how the food was, if you answer with anything less than "great", regardless of how tactfully you do so, there will be negative social consequences. Even in the rare…

>Actually that's not true. It is possible to be completely sincere, yet tactful Concur. I was asked for a reference on a graduating anesthesiology resident who was terrible in terms of his attitude, yet competent enough to practice safely; my reference letter, in its entirety: "He worked here."

Is this satire? This isn't tactful at all. It comes across as a completely passive aggressive.

Communication is more than just the literal meaning of the words you write. Most people reading this are going to interpret is a "Do not hire this guy under any circumstances, he is terrible"

I think complete honesty--"Terrible attitude, but competent"--would have actually been more tactful than what you wrote.

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