Update on Julie Horvath's Departure • Hacker News Board

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#191

Post by sp332 » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:35 AM UTC

tw268 wrote: post #96

comrh wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, rage against feminism... the radical notion that women are people.

Feminism is a cultural Marxist ideology which tries to explain the world through the lens of class conflict - an overclass (male) which is oppressive and therefore evil and an underclass (female) which is oppressed and therefore good. This is why it is not considered oppression when men die young or go to prison more often than women and it is not a problem when men are underrepresented in higher ed - men can't be op…

The word "feminism" describes a lot more that just that one ideology. There are lots of feminist movements and "agendas" and the only thing they have in common is advocating equality for women. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminism

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#192

Post by hueving » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:36 AM UTC

rodgerd wrote: post #60

It's good to see a straight-up apology, not a mealy-mouthed "I'm sorry if our engineer's sexual harrassment offended you" type response. Of course, it would have been better if Julie had felt like she could have taken this up while she still worked there and got something done at the time.

Re-read it. He was careful not to actually apologize for anything in particular. It's worth noting that they have not admitted to any 'sexism' or whatever other accusations are floating around.

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#193

Post by sp332 » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:36 AM UTC

duked wrote: post #88

I wasn't aware of the whole story. Here is the link to better understand the context: http://techcrunch.com/2014/03/15/julie-ann-horvath-describes...

And the discussion, which is still on the front page https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7408055

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#194

Post by benatkin » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:38 AM UTC

minimaxir wrote: post #2

This is the best possible response GitHub could have done given the circumstances.

One thing he could have done better is to praise her contributions as a developer specifically or not call anything out specifically. One of her main complaints is having her pull requests reverted and Chris Wanstrath's post does nothing to support her in this matter.

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#195

Post by reeses » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:39 AM UTC

skywhopper wrote: post #4

It's good to see this statement out of Github. The general tone and specifically the mention of the founder's wife in this post gives a huge amount of credence to Julie's claims. I hope Github follows through on this with as much sincerity and determination as this post implies.

Agreed. Keep this handy for when you have an event such as this. If no attorneys were involved in drafting this, I would be surprised.

It admits no guilt, declares that individuals are the possible cause and that action is being taken to prevent their continued damage, notifies the community that a new HR head started very recently, and attempts to be as graceful as possible in acknowledging the points made by the victim.

If you get a chance, watch 'Wing Chun', an informative documentary on the same topic, and note the effectiveness of 'cotton belly'.

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#196

Post by hueving » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:39 AM UTC

wcummings wrote: post #128

If what she said is half true, the engineer in question should absolutely be fired. I would fire him.

It's a good thing you aren't a manager. Which half is it that's good enough for termination? Reverting a commit, or what?

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#197

Post by btilly » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:39 AM UTC

One of her claims was that she was told that the founder's wife had ALREADY been told not to enter the building.

Unless we see confirmation that it has actually happened, I'm not going to believe it. Statements are easy. That's just damage control. We need to see the actual action.

I predict that the founder in question stays away for a month or so, and then is exonerated and let back in.

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#198

Post by sp332 » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:40 AM UTC

Sindrome wrote: post #178

Female developers are not special.

Exactly! She should never have been singled out by the wife, and that coworker shouldn't have had so much free reign to delete her code out of spite.

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#199

Post by hueving » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:41 AM UTC

duncan_bayne wrote: post #3

Awesome response from GitHub. Professional response, apologises and thanks the complainant rather than being defensive ... I think their new HR hire in January is already paying dividends ;)

They didn't actually apologize for anything in specific. This is very carefully crafted and is being very defensive by not admitting to anything. The only real meat is clarifying that the wife had no hiring/firing power.

Re: Update on Julie Horvath's Departure

#200

Post by greenyoda » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 4:42 AM UTC

ephemeralgomi wrote: post #148

greenyoda wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I would like to personally apologize to Julie" certainly sounds like an admission that the company wronged her. And don't lawyers frequently tell their clients not to apologize (even if they feel they ought to), since that may be construed as an admission of wrongdoing in a subsequent legal proceeding?

If anything, "I would like to personally apologize to Julie" would mean that defunkt personally wronged her, not the company. Maybe he's just sorry because she's obviously hurt and things didn't work out for the best?

If a CEO writes on his company's web site, it's usually understood to mean that he is speaking on behalf of the company.

In any case, the company did wrong her by allowing an environment to exist in which these kinds of behaviors were tolerated. The actions that the CEO took today should have been taken a long time ago.