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Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

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81–90 of 135 posts

Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#81
post #74
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Accusations of sexual harassment are commonplace at many work places. False accusations are disturbingly common. Don't ask me if you don't believe me -- it's obvious already that you don't anyway. Rather, go make friends with someone who works in HR at a large company that employs lots of men and women. For this experiment, best not to try to befriend someone at your workplace. They may be hesitant to speak freely, s…

If you are intentionally treating men and women differently in a way that "probably hindered the careers of some of the women who were my direct and indirect reports" then it's not only un-American but it's also illegal discrimination. You should be ashamed of yourself.

I treated the men exactly the same way. It's not illegal discrimination to manage people without having 1:1s with them. It's not illegal discrimination to manage people in such a way as to eliminate any suggestion that you might have sexually harassed them. And it is not illegal discrimination if managing that way has a side effect of possibly not providing every opportunity to develop an individual.

That is what I was hoping to discuss: how some of the side effects of MeToo might actually be detrimental to actual working women, and what strategies might be used to change that outcome.

Instead, that comment only opened the door for a bunch of posturing and virtue signaling so that the wider audience knows without a doubt that those who reply are nothing at all like this sexist commenter.

I've explained further what I meant in another comment in this thread and it would be very tiresome to repeat it.

It is worth repeating, however, that your default response is to attempt to shame me, like other commenters here. Why can none of you provide a substantive response to my original comment? Do you really think all women are virtuous all the time, and all men are weak slaves to their sexual impulses so it must be true if they're accused?

Nowhere have I defended anyone who sexually harasses employees. (We haven't even touched the possibility that men can be victims of sexual harassment, but I don't have any faith that would be productive in this forum.)

No, I merely shared a strategy that was successful and legal, but I have been treated as if I were hitting on the women who worked for me and using them for my personal pleasure. I'm embarrassed for you, but I need to point out that that is the exact opposite of what I have done at work for the past thirty years. I have almost certainly furthered the careers of more women than all my detractors in this thread combined. Yet I stand accused, and that is enough to convict.

So which is it? Are all managers legally obligated to do everything in their power to ensure that women receive not just the same exact management that the men on the team receive, but also additional coaching that could be interpreted by certain unthinking people as sexual harassment if a woman makes an accusation? Because men have all the power and deserve to be brought down a peg or two, evidence and due process be damned? And besides no woman would ever ever ever make a false accusations, because they're not even able to do so if they wanted to, which they never would because they're all pure as the driven snow and anyway none of them would ever do such a thing, why are you blaming the victim anyway, you probably harass them all day and all of the night, you sexist pig?

Or could it be that I'm not the only one who has devised a strategy to avoid being torpedoed by a sexual harassment claim, but in the only one foolish enough to talk about it? Ah well, better to sweep any discussion like that under the rug, everyone else is at least as virtuous as the other loud public proclaimers of the correct philosophy. Move along, nothing to see here, sure hope China catches up to us in this category of virtuous living, hope this guys company fails, he's obviously a creep, I would never do anything like that nor do I know anyone who would, can't believe this guy discriminates, hope he gets sued and dies penniless, glad I'm not him.

You should be ashamed of yourselves for lacking the ability to reason without resorting to emotional name-calling and useless shaming tactics.

Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are you making this about laws? This is about people that are employed voluntarily needing to follow certain rules of conduct for their continued employment. This is not about some constitutional right to fuck your subordinates.

Legal consenting adults do have a constitutional right to engage in consensual relationships, regardless of laws and moral codes otherwise. And history amply shows they will do so regardless. Case in point - Clinton/Lewinski. That was a textbook case of sexual harassment according to Federal regulations, except that Lewinski maintains to this day that the only abuse she suffered was from the media.

Your case in point is not in fact on point. Lewinsky described what happened to her as a "gross abuse of power", just a few months back. Moreover, what happened to Lewinsky served to corroborate the stories of several other women, most of whom have stories about WJC far darker than hers.

Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#83
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What we're living in is the vindication of Andrea Dworkin's views about the sexual revolution: https://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/03/how-the-se... . Women are renegotiating the rules in a way that isn't so one-sidedly beneficial to men. Part of that is putting constraints on when and where sexual propositioning is appropriate (and it's not appropriate in the workplace).

Outlawing normal human behavior has never worked in the past, and it's unlikely to start working now. Office hookups are going to keep happening. Regulations against soldiers fraternizing with the locals all failed. Laws against interracial relationships never worked. Laws against homosexual relationships didn't stop it. Prostitution continues unabated. Adultery is so commonplace it is hardly worth mentioning.

Beating someone you don’t like to death with a jawbone is normal human behavior, but fortunately we’ve gotten better at deterring and controlling it with laws. If your standard for the value of a law is total 100% then yes, they fail. Rape, murder, and arson haven’t gone away, but I somehow doubt you’re arguing for laws against them to be repealed.

I hope.

Laws aren’t perfect, but they do tend to improve matters when society at large has decided that a behavior is harmful to others. Sometimes laws get it wrong, and then come under pressure to be repealed or changed. Laws against drug use for example, or laws against homosexuality not only tended to fail, but failed to target people for sound reasons.

There’s more nuance here than just “laws regulating ‘natural’ human behavior don’t work.”

Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#84
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He wasn’t sexually assaulting people he just dated someone at work. You can date people at work, but you cannot date people in your reporting chain. That means that if you're the CEO, you cannot date people at work. Tough shit, there's 7 billion other people in the world.

That's not inherently sexual assault. Does it have the opportunity to go wrong? Sure, if your relationship becomes linked with career advancement, and especially if it's coerced. But as long as that's not present I don't see any assault going on here.

It's not inherently sexual assault. I never said it was. It is, however inherently a huge conflict of interest, and, depending on the circumstances, is likely to be sexual harassment.

Even if the two people in the relationship are fine with it, and there is no abuse of the manager-subordinate power dynamics, and all the other problems associated with this...

It can create the perception that the reason Sally is getting a good performance review, is because she is sleeping with the boss. This is absolutely toxic to a workplace, and irresponsible of the CEO.

Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#85
post #81
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are intentionally treating men and women differently in a way that "probably hindered the careers of some of the women who were my direct and indirect reports" then it's not only un-American but it's also illegal discrimination. You should be ashamed of yourself.

I treated the men exactly the same way. It's not illegal discrimination to manage people without having 1:1s with them. It's not illegal discrimination to manage people in such a way as to eliminate any suggestion that you might have sexually harassed them. And it is not illegal discrimination if managing that way has a side effect of possibly not providing every opportunity to develop an individual. That is what I w…

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Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#86
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I treated the men on my teams exactly the same way. There was no discrimination. They were all treated equally. It's a little weird that you think you have all the information you need to pass judgment on my career from a few short comments on an internet forum. It's even weirder that you haven't made any substantive comment or query on how that policy played out in real life, but rather resorted instantly to shrill…

> I treated the men on my teams exactly the same way. There was no discrimination. They were all treated equally. Did you also refuse to meet with men privately?

Yes I did. Everyone got the same treatment. Anything "private," such as disciplinary action that needed to be delivered, was always done with a witness, whether the employee was a man or a woman. Everything else was done in groups or in the open. It's not that hard, but suddenly I'm Mike Pence for suggesting it's a sound strategy to avoid the appearance of impropriety.

Edit: No, I don't socialize with the people at work. I have friends for that.

Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#87
post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Legal consenting adults do have a constitutional right to engage in consensual relationships, regardless of laws and moral codes otherwise. And history amply shows they will do so regardless. Case in point - Clinton/Lewinski. That was a textbook case of sexual harassment according to Federal regulations, except that Lewinski maintains to this day that the only abuse she suffered was from the media.

Your case in point is not in fact on point. Lewinsky described what happened to her as a "gross abuse of power", just a few months back. Moreover, what happened to Lewinsky served to corroborate the stories of several other women, most of whom have stories about WJC far darker than hers.

Monica describes it as "consensual" and a "consequence of my own poor choices."

http://time.com/5130921/monica-lewinsky-now/

Monica's story doesn't "corroborate" anybody else's story about affairs with Clinton. She's not a witness to any of those others.

Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Legal consenting adults do have a constitutional right to engage in consensual relationships, regardless of laws and moral codes otherwise. And history amply shows they will do so regardless. Case in point - Clinton/Lewinski. That was a textbook case of sexual harassment according to Federal regulations, except that Lewinski maintains to this day that the only abuse she suffered was from the media.

That's nice, but completely irrelevant.

Oh, it's completely relevant to the claim that there cannot be consensual affairs between people at different power levels, and it doesn't get much more different than literally the most powerful man in the world and an intern.

Re: Sex Scandal Toppled a Silicon Valley Chief. Investors Say, So What?

#89
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I treated the men on my teams exactly the same way. There was no discrimination. They were all treated equally. Did you also refuse to meet with men privately?

Yes I did. Everyone got the same treatment. Anything "private," such as disciplinary action that needed to be delivered, was always done with a witness, whether the employee was a man or a woman. Everything else was done in groups or in the open. It's not that hard, but suddenly I'm Mike Pence for suggesting it's a sound strategy to avoid the appearance of impropriety. Edit: No, I don't socialize with the people at w…

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