For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare • Hacker News Board

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#201

Post by belorn » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:48 PM UTC

scott_s wrote: post #162

goodcanadian wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I said she hadn't experienced sexual harassment. You are correct that the bullying constituted harassment. I was not trying to say that it doesn't exist; I was just trying to offer my thoughts on the article. The title says, "For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare." I have worked in Astronomy my entire career, but I have not seen it at all (perhaps, because I am male). My wife works in a di…

My point is that the harassment your wife has experienced may in fact be sexual harassment. Sexual harassment is not limited to harassment of a sexual nature. If the harassment was because she is a woman, that falls under sexual harassment as well: https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/sexual_harassment.cfm

Interesting. Looking at the kind of things people say in online games, almost every negative comment falls under sexual harassment. Homophobic comments, "you suck", comments about genitalia, neck beards, a comment about the sexual nature for which the person was born from...

About the only type of harassment that do not qualify under sexual harassment is those that insult intelligence, ability to perform a task, and racism.

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#202

Post by woodman » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:49 PM UTC

wfo wrote: post #186

woodman wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...people who commit crimes... While sexual harassment is terrible, it isn't a crime. There are a lot of terrible things that aren't crimes. A push to criminalize it would have the opposite effect of what the proponents desire: the definition would be severely narrowed and companies would likely have a lot less exposure to litigation.

Actually, fortunately you are incorrect here. While certain kinds of sexual harassment are not criminal, groping is certainly a crime. I'm pretty sure threatening to destroy someone's career to force sex is a crime. If you succeed, it's rape which is quite a serious crime. Even if you just file a report, it's important to establish a pattern of abuse for when the person inevitably crosses the line and goes to court.…

Describing an assault as sexual harassment is ridiculous. That is like describing a murder as impolite driving... that resulted in the flattening of a person who you happened to want dead.

We are talking about different things here, and conflating them isn't going to help anybody.

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#203

Post by powertower » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:49 PM UTC

I am curious of why is it everyone here is so eager for this to be true?

Several people so far have posted that they have never seen such a thing in the field, and a number of people (outside those fields) responded that they must be blind.

The last 9 out of 10 of these types of stories ended up being exaggerated to such an extent that it became clear that they were all fabricated to get views and to drive agenda.

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#204

Post by stcredzero » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:49 PM UTC

tome wrote: post #181

stcredzero wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually ended up asking her what was going on, specifically, "Am I bad at taking hints?" At that point, I should think a simple yes would have done fine. Making someone feel like a rapist for believing what is said or failing to correctly second guess is just weird and oppressive in itself.

> Making someone feel like a rapist for believing what is said or failing to correctly second guess is just weird and oppressive in itself. It is unfortunate and I sympathise with your hurt feelings, but I think this is just something you should take on the chin.

Double standards and requiring second guessing based on gender is as harmful now as it was in the 50's.

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#205

Post by JoeAltmaier » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:49 PM UTC

kitd wrote: post #192

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting point. And why isn't it? Why is the 'real world' run according to some narrow set of safe-and-happy rules that insecure people make up? Just being 'devil's advocate' here. Sales people know, you get what you negotiate, not what you deserve. Anything else is a fantasy. Extend that to every facet of the working world, and you have the 'school playground' all over again.

One would hope that when you have left the school playground and entered the "real world", you have developed enough sense of empathy and social skills to understand the long-term benefit of treating people with respect, ie how you would want to be treated yourself. We do spend much time and effort drilling this into infants after all. Those who don't, ie who find it ok to use/abuse others (or can't stop themselves)…

...and that, I would say, is the real world. We have to deal with it. Short of rounding up and executing all the sociopaths that never learned empathy.

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#206

Post by pavel_lishin » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:50 PM UTC

kefka wrote: post #184

pavel_lishin wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it possible that you do know them, but don't know who they are? After all, if you're a guy, you'll never be the target of harassment - and if they do most of their harassing one-on-one, you may ever witness it, either.

I'm a guy and have been subject to sexual harassment. Now, I'm also bisexual, and I get that people want to be forward. It's called a mating signal for a reason, and that area is fraught with misunderstandings on both sides. Well, I went in to a bar with my wife and a guy friend (of both of us). He's gay. We tried a relationship with him prior, but distance/timing meant it wouldnt. So, we were up visiting and going t…

Is it possible that that's typical and accepted behavior at that bar? If it's a gay bar, frequently attended by bears, with literal pornography playing on the walls, I would expect the social interaction there to be different from my neighborhood bar - which is a friendly place where my wife and I bring our kid on Saturday and Sunday afternoons.

It sounds to me like your friend was being an asshole by a) not informing you of what sort of place you were going to, and b) by strongly signaling to the other folks there that you did know what type of place it was, and were a willing participant.

I'm not saying you weren't harassed, by the way, and I'm sorry you were being treated shittily. But it might be like getting splashed in the first three rows of a Sea World show - if you don't know it's coming, it's shitty, but some people go specifically for that experience.

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#207

Post by sp332 » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:51 PM UTC

ainiriand wrote: post #179

sp332 wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think brudgers's advice is excellent, and I would encourage you again to take it. I hope this doesn't sound too pushy, it's just a suggestion.

It is an excellent advice. Made by someone who writes for a living. However, the comment system is not made to make us all agree about everything. My concern is about the restriction you put in a unconscious way to your opinions when there is dissent. Is this a kind of censorship? A very sofisticate one?

I don't see the point in expressing your opinions on this forum if you don't care whether anyone agrees with you. If you're not interested in connecting with the readers and influencing them, why not just keep it to yourself? What are you accomplishing by posting here?

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#208

Post by scott_s » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:52 PM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #199

scott_s wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would not call it a "weird disconnect". It's just very awkward to give a flat-out "No" when asked out, even when the two people are not coworkers. When it comes to asking someone out, there are three answers: Yes; Yes in principle, but I'm not available then, how about next Tuesday?; all other answers are No. She was probably frustrated that you weren't picking up on this, and probably did feel uncomfortable that s…

If sounding like "yes in principle" is the goal of your speech, then how can one reasonably expect to feel violated when that speech is taken as "yes in principle?" I like "no means no" as a principle. I wish everyone stood up boldly for the right to say "no." Do this by boldly saying no. The right to say yes but really mean no is something else entirely, and is corrosive to the right to say no.

The answer is only "yes in principle" if they counter-offer with a specific date. Otherwise it's no. These are standard social-norms, not specific to work. Asking someone out is stressful, but being asked out is also stressful. I think it's unreasonable to assume that people who are being asked out should automatically have to assume the awkward social burden of providing unequivocal rejections. Once you learn these social-norms, it's not hard to navigate with them.

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#209

Post by eropple » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:55 PM UTC

matt_wulfeck wrote: post #114

ceejayoz wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And yet working in he unrelated field of IT I haven't seen it. The article notes various reasons for this. It gets covered up, abusers are generally cautious about where/when they do it, some people don't perceive it as abuse, etc. Take Bill Cosby as an example. Decades of consistent reports of behavior (to the point where 30 Rock was making pointed jokes about it years ago), dozens of victims, legal settlements, a…

> Bill Cosby as an example. Rich and wealthy people can cover up a lot. See Michael Jackson. It doesn't mean that child abuse is rampant among musicians. I also work in IT and I share the GP question. If it's as rampant as some articles and people make it out to be then the harassers are getting very good at covering it up.

They might be good at covering it up. Or you're not actively looking, and so it's not in your sphere of awareness. Or the coworkers to whom it's happening don't trust you enough to discuss the problem with you, and so it's not in your sphere of awareness.

I'm a pretty average straight white dude, but I have seen this happen, right in front of me, at multiple jobs, and absolutely nothing happened except when I spoke up and started something over it. The targets didn't say anything, because the power imbalance (real or perceived; I tend to think the latter, but then, I'm not the one being attacked and made to feel powerless in the first place) was too great.

Re: For Female Astronomers, Sexual Harassment Is a Constant Nightmare

#210

Post by fweespee_ch » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 3:55 PM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #191

fweespee_ch wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So what? In itself, this shouldn't be a significant factor. 1) He is clearly hiring based on a fetish he has. 2) They were hired to replace male, white, african-american, or hispanic members of his department over a period of ~2 years. The area is almost entirely a white and/or hispanic population so there is no way this is coincidence. 3) The odds of a guy rolling the same 20 sided die 12 times and always coming u…

1) He is clearly hiring based on a fetish he has. That's a pretty strong, even in terms of your analysis. Would you have thought he had a fetish if all of his hires were black men?

> That's a pretty strong, even in terms of your analysis.

You do understand the probability of the strongest hire in 12 separate rolls of the die being female and asian is absurdly small right?

We are talking thousandths of a percentage point here. The odds of that being a "natural" distribution is absurd.

Similarly, I know from one of them that he has engaged in the sort of sexual harassment behavior I'd expect from a guy who hired on a fetish.

> Would you have thought he had a fetish if all of his hires were black men?

If one of them mentioned sexual harassment and he was living in an area where they were a single digit percentage of the population? Yes.