My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community • Hacker News Board

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#301

Post by scala__alacs » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:22 PM UTC

na85 wrote: post #15

jdmoreira wrote: post #4

I have no clue on who this guy is nor do I have any sort of interest in Scala but this is terrible. If this is even remotely true I hope he suffers enormous consequences including being persecuted. How are people still getting away with this kind of abuse? How?

>How are people still getting away with this kind of abuse? How? It's quite simple, really. You know that phenomenon you see here on HN with big names like Steve Jobs or RMS, or Elon Musk? The phenomenon where people give them a pass for being disgusting, abusive assholes because "he's a genius/luminary/visionary" or because "his contributions to $thing are so great"? It's the same phenomenon with people like Jon Pre…

Being quite involved in the Scala community myself, I can tell you that the impact of his technical contributions is basically zero.

None of the projects he developed along the years has had any momentum (save for one, called "magnolia", which has a modest userbase).

He was giving more talks than anyone else in the community, solely based on vague ideas he couldn't even make happen. He was always bluffing somehow, presenting himself as some kind of grand architect pursuing grand ideas, while his effective impact was close to zero.

I think he was tolerated just because he's been around since basically the language was created, and thus was friend with many people, and could tell stories about the early days of Scala.

With him (hopefully) going away, this will have no impact at all on the development of Scala or related projects, apart from saving slots at upcoming Scala conferences.

So it's definitely not the same phenomenon as RMS or Elon.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#302

Post by faitswulff » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:22 PM UTC

_f1dq wrote: post #280

There is a lot about the sexual events in this post that, to me, highlights something I feel is important which is: we parents need to get better had having conversations with our children around sex. This girl was feeling uncomfortable and crying but at the same time "didn't think those behaviors were problematic". I can't help but wonder if her parents never sat her down and discussed situations like this and, I ge…

+1 but especially our boys. Girls and women already learn so much about how to avoid being harmed by men. It’s time for our boys to learn how to become kind men - and for those of us who are men to model that for them.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#303

Post by cogman10 » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:23 PM UTC

Fern_Blossom wrote: post #175

btilly wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I only kind of agree. In this case a Chinese woman living in the USA apparently got raped in Germany 3 years ago. To involve law enforcement she would have to travel to a country where she doesn't speak the language, to make an accusation for which she has no evidence but her word, against a man who lives in another city. What, exactly, do you imagine that the police are likely to do with her report? I hate the court…

>To involve law enforcement she would have to travel to a country where she doesn't speak the language, to make an accusation for which she has no evidence but her word, against a man who lives in another city. That's what an embassy is for... they help deal with these situation. >And there is also a chance that we can hit a critical mass where law enforcement somewhere may take an interest after all. Don't complain…

> That's what an embassy is for... they help deal with these situation.

Have you ever worked with an embassy? I have, it's no picnic even in the best of circumstances (lost passport). It takes time to setup such an appointment and you are expecting a young college student to have the wherewithal to navigate that all while being on a budget and having their current lodging with the aggressor.

You are expecting an abused person to do everything right in a foreign county while currently staying with their abuser.

Don't blame a sexual abuse victim for not doing everything right and by the books.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#304

Post by monocasa » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:23 PM UTC

epicureanideal wrote: post #256

swyx wrote: post #20

similar stories are emerging: - https://killnicole.github.io/statement/ (edit i see she has added it to the article itself) - https://twitter.com/brianclapper/status/1387115214064193537?... - https://twitter.com/adelbertchang/status/1387090351626723329... there seems to be some coordination here, as this came out pretty much at the same time. https://typelevel.org/blog/2021/04/27/community-safety.html Yifan also link…

Sometimes character assassination is coordinated. I personally only slightly increase the probability of something being true when multiple accusers come forward. I still want to see proof. What if a bunch of your ex-girlfriends or ex-boyfriends got together and decided to ruin your life with accusations?

I for one, while having a mountain of ex-girlfriends/boyfriends, haven't left them vindicate enough to do something like coordinate a character assassination against me.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#305

Post by PaulDavisThe1st » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:23 PM UTC

JPKab wrote: post #27

Jon Pretty sounds like a complete creep and yes, based on this account, a predator. That being said, there is a court and criminal justice system for a reason. While I empathize with the author, and utterly despise the archetype of high-status men who use their status within programming communities as a tool to target women, I find the nature of these kinds of posts to be counterproductive. Therapeutic to the author?…

>That being said, there is a court and criminal justice system for a reason.

If you come to my home and act in a way that my family and other guests find offensive, we're not going to invite you back. We're also not going to try to prosecute you.

There is a huge set of behaviors that are not criminal nor civil offenses, but still things that if experienced would likely lead people to want to avoid you, not hire you, not work with you etc.

The author did not claim that Mr. Pretty broke any laws. She doesn't call for any legal consequences. There's no basis for suggesting that the story needs to be judged by a legal system.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#306

Post by Pfhreak » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:24 PM UTC

cbmuser wrote: post #255

_qwfv wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US, lynching has extremely strong implications of racist violence. It's not strictly the definition of the word, but most folks in the states will understand a lynching to imply race related murders.

> In the US, lynching has extremely strong implications of racist violence. Please don’t assume everyone is a US citizen.

I'm not. In fact, I'm the opposite. That's literally why I wrote that comment. It was for the benefit of people who were not US citizens who may not understand that a US reader will likely interpret the phrase that way.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#307

Post by dimgl » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:24 PM UTC

mirekrusin wrote: post #14

dheera wrote: post #2

Related: Open letter of support for community members targeted by Jon Pretty https://github.com/scala-open-letter/scala-open-letter.githu...

I don't know anything about it, but this starts to look a bit like public lynching.

Make no mistake. This is a public lynching.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#308

Post by eloff » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:24 PM UTC

Pfhreak wrote: post #127

eloff wrote: post #36

> I don’t remember how much I drank. I don’t remember him drinking. But I remember feeling uncomfortable when he made advances on me. I felt being taken advantage of that he had unprotected sex with me when I was intoxicated. Nothing felt right. I remember panicking and crying. I don't want to victim blame here because this guy sounds like a grade A creep and predator. But does a person not have some responsibility h…

> I don't want to victim blame here ... but does the victim bear some responsibility? The answer to your question is no. The victim bears no responsibility. The abuser took advantage of someone, who bears no fault for the result. There's no "well, both parties were in the wrong here". The abuser should not have abused the other party, no matter how vulnerable the other party made themselves. You specifically said you…

And what if they were consenting - I'm not saying that's the case here, I don't know obviously, I'm asking in general, just like my comment is a musing about the vagaries of when is consent not consent.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#309

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:25 PM UTC

nerdponx wrote: post #16

merb wrote: post #9

first, a small rant: tbf. I dislike the title. the real title is sexual harassment from Jon Pretty a leader of certain Scala Community standups. because the current title actually sounds like it's the whole commnity, but the blog is about a specific guy. --- second I really do not understand, how other people can be so horrible. he basically abused her in a moment where she was really really desperate and I think suc…

> In June, Heather noticed that I was upset at a dinner after ScalaDays. I shared with her about what happened. She warned me to stay away from Jon Pretty. And she wasn’t the only person who told me that. Even though my experience in Berlin was awful, it was difficult for me to accept that someone, who seemed like a good friend, mentor, and ally, could be so selfish, manipulative, and cruel. It sounds like people kne…

[deleted]

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#310

Post by joe5150 » Tue, Apr 27, 2021, 10:25 PM UTC

epicureanideal wrote: post #256

swyx wrote: post #20

similar stories are emerging: - https://killnicole.github.io/statement/ (edit i see she has added it to the article itself) - https://twitter.com/brianclapper/status/1387115214064193537?... - https://twitter.com/adelbertchang/status/1387090351626723329... there seems to be some coordination here, as this came out pretty much at the same time. https://typelevel.org/blog/2021/04/27/community-safety.html Yifan also link…

Sometimes character assassination is coordinated. I personally only slightly increase the probability of something being true when multiple accusers come forward. I still want to see proof. What if a bunch of your ex-girlfriends or ex-boyfriends got together and decided to ruin your life with accusations?

why would they be motivated to do that?