The Woman in the Facebook Frat House

You're really going all-in on this double standard thing, aren't you?

1. Credibility You're take as fact that the accusations are already false, and hence "grossly unprofessional". Which holds pretty much no water, since that this person is making a claim not just about her own knowledge (re: the aggression/harassment in question) but ALSO about what actually was also common knowledge at the time. Let's not leave out, either, that books of length probably don't lend themselves well to 100% fabricated accusations - least of all those which implicate small groups of people and mention them by name. So much for anonymity and character assassination, huh?

On the other hand, the recounted instance the author gives us is being falsely accused of being difficult to work with after a manager refuses to move past aggression.

2. Stated Accusation vs. Perception

"she seemed proud of the fact that the engineers were demoted or reassigned without even having a chance to defend themselves"

You're living in the world of 'seems', rather than the world of facts. Of course, facts can be fabricated, and we can prove that they are in fact false. No one is denying that.

That said, things stated _as facts_ (behavior specified, conversations recalled, timelines constructed, etc -- basically the stuff that makes up this piece and others like it) are going to be better than your world of made up accusations (the stuff that separates conspiracies like the one you're touting here from an actual story). Think _Loose Change_ vs. _All The President's Men_.

But as to the merits of what you've said, I don't know why she 'seemed proud' to you. Joining you - again, temporarily - in your world of impression, you'll find that she had _seemed_ pretty dejected and not the least bit upset that she had to go through her superiors to get anything done about it. The word might be something more like 'relieved'.

3. ASSUMPTIONS

You straight-up assert that these people didn't have the chance to defend themselves, and that's how they were fired. The truth, by your way of thinking, was something that was not let out because they did not have the chance to say it.

And, yet, you insist that others are ranting and, as you put it, 'pointing and screaming'. So let's work out the assumptions you're making, and who's doing any 'pointing'.

I'm not sure that those accused had the chance to defend themselves, that's something you have to admit from the account. But it's definitely not something you can - as you have here - straight-up assume. If that were the case, and these people were 100% innocent as you seem to believe, you can be sure they would have a book deal of their own; although I'm less sure if you wouldn't find some kind of duplicity or targeting then, either.

As well, the facts as given point against you: it's not a conspiracy against engineers. The person who was doing straight-up sexual harassment by her account was a senior supervisor/management or somesuch. It's not, as you put it, the two engineers that this evil woman and her billionaire female ally targeted.

Finally, let's not forget that the account also specifies that Cheryl Sandberg made a point of talking to all the females in the office to make sure things were right. Or could be made right, as was the case here. If you think that any of this points to a world in which the, say, 5% of women in the office lord over the politics and seek to find you and accuse you falsely so that you can be fired, well, no amount of bullshit-detection applied to your posts can save you.

Obviously you need to adjust for the difference in salaries. If they still aren't equal, that is not a very well run company. I realize it is naive to epect every salary to be exactly fair, but if the engineers are contributing signifficantly more per salary dollar, they are getting screwed.

My god, you're right! There is a witch-hunt for men going on by the women invading our industry. Its high time for us to stand up to it.

This is possibly the weakest article ever.

This problem seems pretty circular to me. Girls don't want to join companies like this because it's a boys club, but it stays a boys club because girls don't want to join. I do feel bad for women who wind up in situation like this, and I personally have no problem with girls writing code or managing projects or being involved with the tech world if they want to.

About the things that "suburban boys from Harvard would find cool" so that's why they were there, um, duh. They were suburban boys from Harvard who didn't really have a lot of women around the office. Obviously they're going to put things like that on the walls. Speaking from experience, the only thing dumber than a guy is a guy who is still in college. These aren't mature individuals yet, and while that's unfortunate, they have to be treated differently sometimes.

Here's my problem with the bearskin thing. We have to remember who picked it up and put it on. Everyone was drunk, everyone was having fun. She picked it up and put it on her head and was being funny. I challenge you to find one drunk person, guy or girl, who would tell someone to stop doing something that is funny. The picture sounds like an issue of most pictures that wind up on Facebook after a party. They were taken at an inopportune moment and you wish that no one would have taken it.

Long story short, some guys are dicks, and they have to work somewhere. When they get out of line, the issue should be dealt with like it was. Its unfortunate that the tech world still seems like a boys club, but it's a difficult problem to fix when the people working in the industry don't always see themselves for what they really are.