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A note from Keith

keithrabois.tumblr.com

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Re: A note from Keith

#91

Post by jacalata »

johndevor wrote: post #87
danilocampos wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's so much implicit wrongness in your statement my mind doesn't know where to lock on to respond. Sorry. edit: I figured it out. You seem to desire a world where Square is exalted to some sort of sovereign status, answerable to no law beyond their own policies and procedures. Which is a horrifying state of affairs. If something happened here that is against the law, I am heartened that a legal framework exists t…

I guess I just don't see who, other than the couple in question, was harmed here. Is the author being intentionally vague about what really happened? Was Square harmed? Was a third party harmed? You seem to desire a world where Square is exalted to some sort of sovereign status, answerable to no law beyond their own policies and procedures. Which is a horrifying state of affairs. Why would it be a horrifying state of…

Imagine a company with the official policy that feeding your kids is not important. Can employees off that company now starve their children without fear of legal consequence? How about beating up fellow employees - oh too bad, you should have worked somewhere with a policy against assault?

Re: A note from Keith

#92

Post by danilocampos »

johndevor wrote: post #87
danilocampos wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's so much implicit wrongness in your statement my mind doesn't know where to lock on to respond. Sorry. edit: I figured it out. You seem to desire a world where Square is exalted to some sort of sovereign status, answerable to no law beyond their own policies and procedures. Which is a horrifying state of affairs. If something happened here that is against the law, I am heartened that a legal framework exists t…

I guess I just don't see who, other than the couple in question, was harmed here. Is the author being intentionally vague about what really happened? Was Square harmed? Was a third party harmed? You seem to desire a world where Square is exalted to some sort of sovereign status, answerable to no law beyond their own policies and procedures. Which is a horrifying state of affairs. Why would it be a horrifying state of…

> Why would it be a horrifying state of affairs? I'm not saying you're wrong, I just don't understand!

Well.

It would mean that corporations would exist outside of laws to govern their behavior. And we've already figured out that's a bad idea.

Society, generally, wants it to be illegal to force people to fuck you to keep a job, in an extreme example.

Generally, it wants it to be legal to blow the whistle on illegal activity.

Generally, it wants it to be illegal to prioritize profits over the safety of workers.

Being successful and making lots of money shouldn't relieve your company of accountability under the law.

> Was Square harmed?

Square's reputation would have been harmed by a protracted and public legal battle.

> I guess I just don't see who, other than the couple in question, was harmed here.

There's not a couple here. There's an accuser, who claims that Rabois sexually harassed him and that Square covered for it.

Where it gets complicated for Rabois, I suspect, comes with this line:

"exchanged intimate, personal information, as people in similar relationships often do."

This suggests to me that the accuser has sufficient proof that Rabois can't deny a sexual relationship continuing after the hire. Given the asymmetry of power between these two sexual partners, consent starts to get very muddy to sort out.

So he had to leave, given the very real legal issues this opened for the company.

Re: A note from Keith

#93

Post by danilocampos »

tlogan wrote: post #89
danilocampos wrote: post #16

What an impossible position. On the one hand – work has become such a big part of our lives. If we make it impossible for romance and work to co-exist, that reduces a lot of surface area for finding long-term romantic partners. On the other – at a certain level of authority and prominence, you just shouldn't have sex with someone you're working with. There's too much that can go wrong. This is the nightmare scenario…

I'm not sure if this impossible position is given: he fucked up. He was C-level executive, his partner got hired, but he did not tell a word to HR (or company) about their relationship. Now, you have impossible position. If the company and HR knew about their relationship then his position might not be so impossible.

Relationships are nebulous, unpredictable things.

Sometimes it feels like even talking about a relationship to other people can effect the state of that relationship. It's easy in hindsight to say, hey, you shouldn't have done it this way. But maybe at certain points it looked like it was about to dissolve itself, but didn't... who knows. I can see a few reasons why I wouldn't want to say anything, especially if this person wasn't a direct report.

(This is taking the story at face value – who knows the truth and if there was a more nefarious reason behind the withholding of that information.)

It's a spectrum. Consider two extremes:

Smart and clean: Don't form relationships at the office, period.

Dumb and messy: As CEO, have sex with the office manager of your small startup.

This sounds like something very much in the gray area in between.

Re: A note from Keith

#94

Post by csense »

johndevor wrote: post #87
danilocampos wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's so much implicit wrongness in your statement my mind doesn't know where to lock on to respond. Sorry. edit: I figured it out. You seem to desire a world where Square is exalted to some sort of sovereign status, answerable to no law beyond their own policies and procedures. Which is a horrifying state of affairs. If something happened here that is against the law, I am heartened that a legal framework exists t…

I guess I just don't see who, other than the couple in question, was harmed here. Is the author being intentionally vague about what really happened? Was Square harmed? Was a third party harmed? You seem to desire a world where Square is exalted to some sort of sovereign status, answerable to no law beyond their own policies and procedures. Which is a horrifying state of affairs. Why would it be a horrifying state of…

So managers should be allowed to require their employees to have sex with them as a condition of their continued employment?

I'm not saying that's what happened here; rather, the laws against this sort of arrangement are what the alleged "victim" is invoking to bring a case against Mr. Rabois.

Re: A note from Keith

#95

Post by FireBeyond »

falcolas wrote: post #12
abraininavat wrote: post #9

To those of you who immediately believe the tumblr and therefore condemn the accuser as a liar: On what basis do you make your judgment? Do you: 1. Know Keith or the accuser personally, and therefore have the capacity to make an educated guess as to the veracity of the claims? 2. Believe that rich people, well known people, or people with blogs don't have the capacity to do what Keith is accused of doing? 3. Believe…

There's a human being on both sides of the story here. And being falsely accused of sexual harassment is a painful event. I can't side with either party right now (due to the lack of facts), but I certainly feel more for Keith than I do the other, anonymous party.

Why, because they haven't taken to a blog to talk of the emotional turmoil they are suffering through (allegedly) as the result of these actions?

If empathy is a car fueled by how vocal you are in expressing yourself, well... that's not so good.

Re: A note from Keith

#96

Post by [deleted] »

danilocampos wrote: post #93
tlogan wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if this impossible position is given: he fucked up. He was C-level executive, his partner got hired, but he did not tell a word to HR (or company) about their relationship. Now, you have impossible position. If the company and HR knew about their relationship then his position might not be so impossible.

Relationships are nebulous, unpredictable things. Sometimes it feels like even talking about a relationship to other people can effect the state of that relationship. It's easy in hindsight to say, hey, you shouldn't have done it this way. But maybe at certain points it looked like it was about to dissolve itself, but didn't... who knows. I can see a few reasons why I wouldn't want to say anything, especially if this…

[deleted]

Re: A note from Keith

#97

Post by cadlin »

slapshot wrote: post #66
samstave wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WTF?! I knew Thiel was gay - and until today had no idea Rabois was as well. The story you linked to is the first time I've seen this and to see that they were some ultra conservative bible toting rebels is... Bizarre. Are they Tech's equivalent of the anti-gay senators caught in rest-stop bathrooms? How weird this got quickly

> to see that they were some ultra conservative bible toting rebels is... Bizarre. Or Mother Jones is trying to set up a strawman of them as being homophoboic bigots without realizing that they were actually protesting [1] the then-controversial Stanford speech code, which prohibited much more speech than the government could prohibit. Lawsuits [2] were underway against the speech code and it was a bit of a topic of…

I looked through your links and don't see anything about Keith Rabois being gay. That he was might be common knowledge, but it's not intimated on those sites.

Re: A note from Keith

#98

Post by danilocampos »

[deleted] wrote: post #96
danilocampos wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relationships are nebulous, unpredictable things. Sometimes it feels like even talking about a relationship to other people can effect the state of that relationship. It's easy in hindsight to say, hey, you shouldn't have done it this way. But maybe at certain points it looked like it was about to dissolve itself, but didn't... who knows. I can see a few reasons why I wouldn't want to say anything, especially if this…

[deleted]

> I'm not talking about relationship. I'm talking about informing affected parties about it.

Yeah, it's really feeling like you skipped the part where I explain why the nebulous nature of the relationship might have affected the disclosure.

Re: A note from Keith

#99

Post by spuz »

run4yourlives wrote: post #58

Several months after our relationship began, I recommended that he interview at Square. I don't know Keith, anyone at his company, this story or have any opinion on who did or didn't do what to whom. I will just say this: The quote above, regardless of who says it when, is perhaps the worst business decision a person could ever make. Full Stop. Please, don't do this. Especially if you are the boss.

I don't understand. Maybe we have different professional cultures. Why is having an undisclosed relationship with another employee the worst possible business decision? (Certainly in my culture I can think of much worse decisions one person could make).

Re: A note from Keith

#100

Post by Macsenour »

danso wrote: post #74
Macsenour wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That struck me as odd too. When I saw someone I had a single date with was interviewing at the company I worked for, as she left the building I went to HR and told them so that there would be no surprise later. And that was just a single date, not an ongoing relationship.

Yeah, Keith mentions this fact in an understated way...but it really is a huge part of this drama. From the reading of the news articles, you could argue that even if the sexual harassment charges were dropped, Square would be justified in pushing Keith out for not disclosing this personal conflict-of-interest.

I agree, odd that he wouldn't let them know.
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