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My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

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Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#671

Post by DoreenMichele »

dragonwriter wrote: post #664
koonsolo wrote: post #661

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder when is something is legally considered rape. Like what you read in the article, when there was a lot of manipulation, but not really a "no", and a bad feeling during an afterwards.

> I wonder when is something is legally considered rape. Its kind of weird that this hairsplitting curiosity about consent always comes up exclusively in the context of rape and not other crimes with the same “without consent” rule, like battery (particularly since rape is, ina sense, just battery where the “harmful or offensive touching” element involves specific configurations of genital contact.) But its actually…

TBF, I think a lot of people don't actually know what battery is. Internet definition:

the crime or tort of unconsented physical contact with another person, even where the contact is not violent but merely menacing or offensive.

Most people hear of that only in the form of assault and battery. I always have to look it up because my mind wants to say "That phrase repeats itself. Surely, battery means being battered."

As for when is it legally rape? That depends a lot on the jurisdiction. Different places have different laws and there is lots of debate about the merits of some of those laws.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#672

Post by sepin4 »

btilly wrote: post #124
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?…

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…

Not all criminal investigations are solved or competently followed. However this doesn't mean you should take justice in your own hands, which is what mob justice is. This is plain disrespect for official authority and the principal of "innocent until proven otherwise". Even murderers with clear and shut cases are afforded legal council and ways to defend themselves.

Also, this could have been resolved if this was reported in timely manner, not years after. She is a victim, however her followup actions are neither correct nor proper.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#673

Post by Accacin »

grammarnazzzi wrote: post #595
quickthrowman wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Implicit in your post is the idea “Power is equal in every relationship” which is obviously false. This is clear cut victim blaming.

I'm not blaming her. I'm ignorant of any facts. I'm just saying she doesn't seem to have her head screwed on quite as tight as Accacin suggests. Accacin suggests that sharing a plausible story is proof of wrongdoing. I don't think so. I'm ignorant. Accacin is ignorant. Everybody on this thread is ignorant of the facts. I'm saying that Jon Pretty shouldn't have his livelihood and career destroyed by ignorant people an…

I'm not a jury, I do not require any proof. I'm not asking for the guy in question to be arrested or anything else. The story has come out, now it's a matter for the relevant authorities.

I'm merely saying that I believe what she's saying, and as I've not got the power to arrest, it's perfectly okay for me not to require more proof than a general feeling of her honesty.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#674

Post by dragonwriter »

eloff wrote: post #285
dmit wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you gave consent because you were drunk, that's not really rape, it could be poor judgment. No, it's lack of judgement. Total inability to judge, in fact. > The perpetrator might reasonably think you're sober enough to make your own decisions. Especially if they are also inebriated. It doesn't matter what the perpetrator thinks. And especially ? Is the perpetrator less guilty of rape depending on his blood alcoh…

> It doesn't matter what the perpetrator thinks. I think it may be the only thing that can decide the difference between a crime here or not. If the other person gives consent, then how you judge their ability to make their own decisions here is the difference between having intent to rape or not having intent. Intent matters in a lot of crimes, I don't think it matters in rape cases - I could be wrong. > Is the perp…

> Intent matters in a lot of crimes, I don't think it matters in rape cases

As in other forms of battery, intent matters in rape, but it is thr defendant’s intent to commit the requisite form of physical interaction, not the defendant’s intent with regard to the absence of consent by the alleged victim.

> > > Is the perpetrator less guilty of rape depending on his blood alcohol level?

Interestingly, legally, the answer (in the US) is yes if the intoxication makes him incapable of being cognizant of the nature of the act, because it makes him incapable of thr requisite mental state. But there is a huge caveat: in general, voluntary intoxication has been specifically adopted into law as not defeating the mental state requirement for a crime (or, equivalently, as satisfying it for any mental state up to and including specific intent).

> So the victim has no responsibility if blood alcohol level is too high for good judgment, but the perpetrator is responsible no matter their blood alcohol level and judgment? That seems self-contradictory.

Well, no, its not self-contradictory. If your voluntary intoxication causes harm to yourself, you suffer the consequences as much as if you had chosen the outcome (and that’s true whether or not someone else is punished for their role).

If your voluntary intoxication causes unlicensed harm to someone else, society has decided that you suffer the consequences as much as if you had chosen the action, as well. No inconsistency.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#675

Post by thatswrong0 »

thatswrong0 wrote: post #411
willeh wrote: post #198

This may be a tone-deaf sidetrack but also perhaps an important piece of advice for some. There should be an impenetrable barrier between ones love life and ones professional life. While there are certainly people who have met their significant other in a professional setting, there are much better ways of doing that, especially nowadays. By striving to keep this separation water tight we can avoid both unwanted adva…

or maybe just don't rape people idk

To expound on this because apparently it needs to be done:

> if everyone followed the above basic principle we would not have to deal with disturbing stories such as this one

This guy would still be a predator and a rapist, and he would still be doing similar things to people. Wishing that people were robots and were able to completely separate themselves emotionally from people they meet in situations in which they share a common interest is an exercise in futility. It's simply not how people work.

This sidetrack is basically victim blaming with extra steps.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#676

Post by Accacin »

grammarnazzzi wrote: post #502
Accacin wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously? How often does this happen? Unless you are a terrible person, I doubt anyone would try to ruin someone's life like this. This lady seems to have her head screwed on. Her post doesn't seem to me like she's trying to cause a witch hunt and it seems like she's sharing her story in a logical and sensible manner. I'll gladly read the post from another woman defending John Pretty, but I doubt that's going to be…

> This lady seems to have her head screwed on. I don't agree. She did not set her boundaries. She did not effectively communicate boundaries. She did not enforce boundaries. When she doesn't get the outcome she wants, she turns to blame rather than introspection.

The default boundary should be "I do not want to have sex with you".

It's even more important when one person is in a position of power and when there's an inherent element of trust (teacher, mentor, etc.) because it's going to be much more complicated for a person to set appropriate boundaries and feel like they can say no to them.

This is someone they looked up to and respected!

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#677

Post by DanBC »

epicureanideal wrote: post #220
Ankintol wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there is a court and criminal justice system for a reason Having supported a few friends trying to push these kinds of complaints through the courts, I think the precise reason this kind of naming and shaming has become so common place is the criminal justice system isn't working well. Even for fairly straightforward sexual assault case in a liberal jurisdiction with witnesses I've watched a friend struggle with me…

Can you please provide proof that our justice system is failing victims? Do you just mean that the conviction rate is anything less than 100% for accusations? Also, can you clarify what you mean by "verbally insulting and degrading them"? It's possible you just mean the lawyer is accusing them of lying... which is what you do when you think a person is lying. The accused does have a presumption of innocence, and the…

> Can you please provide proof that our justice system is failing victims? Do you just mean that the conviction rate is anything less than 100% for accusations?

Nobody is asking for near 100% conviction rates.

In the UK there are about 150,000 rapes per year. Police record about 60,000 crimes. CPS prosecutes fewer than 5,000 cases. Courts convict fewer than 2,000 people.

Rape is a very serious crime. A less than 2% conviction rate is failing the victims.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#678

Post by koonsolo »

dragonwriter wrote: post #664
koonsolo wrote: post #661

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder when is something is legally considered rape. Like what you read in the article, when there was a lot of manipulation, but not really a "no", and a bad feeling during an afterwards.

> I wonder when is something is legally considered rape. Its kind of weird that this hairsplitting curiosity about consent always comes up exclusively in the context of rape and not other crimes with the same “without consent” rule, like battery (particularly since rape is, ina sense, just battery where the “harmful or offensive touching” element involves specific configurations of genital contact.) But its actually…

So basically when a boy makes to first move to kiss a girl, it's already against the law?

edit: Why am I downvoted? This is a real question. Sorry for my european ignorance.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#679

Post by scala__alacs »

I'd like to give a Scala community "insider perspective" on Jon Pretty.

Something always felt off about him.

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. He wanted to be perceived as someone influential, but simply didn't have the technical level for it, nor put the effort in.

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.

Re: My experience with sexual harassment in the Scala community

#680

Post by baobabKoodaa »

Pfhreak wrote: post #476
baobabKoodaa wrote: post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It definitely sounds like he abused his position and did a horrible thing, but the thing he did is not rape (assuming OP story is 100% accurate description of events). If 2 people are intoxicated and have sex, do they both rape each other? If one person holds more power than the other, while both are intoxicated, is it just a one-way rape? Or is it still a two-way rape, where one person just "rapes a bit more" and th…

> she is not referring to the events as "rape", so maybe you shouldn't either. Can you point to where I used that word?

> Can you point to where I used that word?

Sure! I'm particularly referring to this exchange upstream. First, mirekrusin says:

> Rape is doing it, not insisting, I think.

...And then you respond to this comment in a way that indicates that rape occurred:

> Sex was had while she did not consent, she mentions in the fifth paragraph.

Here is a direct link to your comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26961759

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