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Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

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Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#71

Post by igloofoo »

egwynn wrote: post #55
downandout wrote: post #11

This may get downvotes, but the speed with which careers are being destroyed based on mere allegations of sexual misconduct these days is frightening. While the allegations in this case may or may not be true, it is actually possible for a woman to make a false allegation of sexual misconduct. There are myriad reasons that someone would make make such a false allegation against a powerful VC. Yet in today’s environme…

I’m not convinced that "career death due to fraudulent sexual misconduct allegations” is a ramptant problem in tech. Based on nearly 100% of women I’ve ever known in tech, the vast majority of sexual misconduct either goes unreported or gets reported and ignored. Maybe you have some better data about this, though. If so, do share. And besides, I have a hard time imagining that a large VC firm would fire one of its fo…

OP just highlights the speed at which careers are getting destroyed on accusations alone (guilty b4 proven innocent), and pragmatically suggests that it is possible for a malicious user to exploit this vulnerability.

Also Steve wasn't fired from DFJ (not RFJ), he left to sue

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#72

Post by astura »

1337biz wrote: post #31
on_and_off wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is concerning. I am not even sure what the attitude should be. By default I would say that when there are serious allegations we should wait until a trial has been conducted. But there are also cases emerging of dozen of people finally speaking out about an individual, where some kind of opportunistic fabrication seems very unlikely. How should we balance the 2 ?

I don't see how why this topic has become all of the sudden a crime where journalists are the judges and not a court of law. It saddens me that society has become so blood hungry again that there are almost seasonal public lynchigs going on. It hurts also the crime itself. In a few weeks nobody is going to care about it anymore as the next whitch is going to be hunted through the village.

Oh, give me a break, the decision to fire someone is not decided by a court of law and never was in the history of the universe. These stories broken by journalists in the last couple months are have investigations that are 10x more thorough than any HR department would ever conduct.

Conducting an investigation and reporting on factual information is not "lynching." Suggesting it is is a gross assult on freedom itself.

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#73

Post by Danihan »

kelukelugames wrote: post #66
Danihan wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, and the answer isn't apparent to me at all. I believe HR departments handle this sort of thing very well in the vast majority of cases.

What do you mean "believe?" At Uber, HR covered up bad behavior. At my last company the HR rep quit due to discrimination.

>At Uber, HR covered up bad behavior.

If that's true, which it may well be in that case, I'd say that Uber is an exception to the rule and the HR department was simply run in a (frankly) idiotic and irrational manner.

HR departments are intended to protect the company from liability. Generally speaking, they do that by taking standardized actions regarding harassment claims because otherwise they open the company up to lawsuits and negative PR. (see Uber)

Most company HR departments take harassment VERY seriously for this reason, especially if the harassment was written in black and white, such as Susan Fowler claims her harassment was.

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#74

Post by Frondo »

shifter wrote: post #62
astura wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why you think it makes you a jerk, most of what you said I'd simply include simply under "being professional."

A lot of feminists think this denies networking opportunities for women.

When men openly discuss not meeting with women because of a fear of being falsely accused (which itself is exceedingly rare) of inappropriate behavior or molestation, what are women supposed to conclude?

That they aren't being denied networking opportunities or opportunities to build working relationships?

What is a positive take-away for women from powerful or monied men saying, in public, "I am afraid of meeting with women, so I no longer will"?

For the record, I'm a dude and when I hear men say this, I think much less of them--for being cowardly and shutting women out of industry for their cowardice.

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#75

Post by Dylan16807 »

tetrep wrote: post #63
ghostbrainalpha wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know this might not be a popular opinion. But I've basically instituted a modified version of this rule for myself. Billy Graham and Mike Pence are definitely not a fountain a good ideas, but that doesn't mean this rule is that bad, despite the nonsense place it comes from. Whenever I need to have after work dinner/social communication with a female associate after 5:00pm, I just go out of my way to invite another…

Do you extend the same principles to homosexual men? Are homosexual women exempted? I find it easier to not have to consider the sexual preferences of my coworkers when I'm interacting with them. Edit: I should add, if someone is going to attack my character, they're going to do it regardless of what I do. I'm not going to go out of my way to prevent that. Similar to using encryption everywhere you can: it makes the…

> Do you extend the same principles to homosexual men? Are homosexual women exempted?

The worry is about him appearing plausibly improper, so their sexuality doesn't matter.

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#76

Post by egwynn »

ghostbrainalpha wrote: post #42
hkmurakami wrote: post #27

Following these very visible and high profile falls from grace, in politics, media and entertainment, and high tech, there must be some legitimate concerns that in the near future the Billy Graham rule [1] (or lately called the Graham-Pence rule) will find more followers than before. Many men in power will instinctually and subconsciously cut out women from their professional lives more than before, to the detriment…

I know this might not be a popular opinion. But I've basically instituted a modified version of this rule for myself. Billy Graham and Mike Pence are definitely not a fountain a good ideas, but that doesn't mean this rule is that bad, despite the nonsense place it comes from. Whenever I need to have after work dinner/social communication with a female associate after 5:00pm, I just go out of my way to invite another…

I dunno if I’d say that makes you a jerk, but it strikes me as maybe a little overcautious. As with any security/safety issue, I think it comes down to the threat model you’re using. What’s the attack vector you’re protecting against? How likely is it that any attempt on that vector will succeed? What’s the damage if it succeeds? Speaking for myself, it never seems like I need to go too far out of my normal mode in order to keep the whole threat model in check.

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#77

Post by astura »

kelukelugames wrote: post #70
astura wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why you think it makes you a jerk, most of what you said I'd simply include simply under "being professional."

I don't understand why people hug their co workers. That sounds weird. But some of the things on the list are ridiculous. I'm socially awkward and I still don't have problems having a closed door conversation with a member of the opposite sex. Are you just going to pass on interviewing women because that puts the two of you in a room?

Yeah, that's the only thing on the list that I thought was weird, that's why I said "most." The closed door meetings in all these sexual misconduct stories were really, really egregious and would be easily avoided.

Everything else is just being professional.

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#78

Post by aero142 »

hkmurakami wrote: post #27

Following these very visible and high profile falls from grace, in politics, media and entertainment, and high tech, there must be some legitimate concerns that in the near future the Billy Graham rule [1] (or lately called the Graham-Pence rule) will find more followers than before. Many men in power will instinctually and subconsciously cut out women from their professional lives more than before, to the detriment…

I understand the fear of men being accused of harassment and losing their career over a he said, she said. However, the stories coming out recently look nothing like a he said she said. I'm not aware of any the recent allegations being based on two professionals meeting alone for a professional discussion and the woman accusing the man of harassment. There seems to be a lot of invitations back to hotel rooms, or numerous, numerous women claiming groping and outright sexual assault. The facts on the accusations here are not public, as far as I'm aware, so I can't speak to this allegation specifically. But to imply that men need to not have normal business interactions with women to protect from this doesn't seem to match up with the facts here and sounds like FUD that does a disservice to women who deal with real harassment.

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#79

Post by nothrabannosir »

gozur88 wrote: post #69
shifter wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of feminists think this denies networking opportunities for women.

The feminists created the environment in which it becomes the smart thing to do.

No, the people committing sexual assault did.

Re: Steve Jurvetson is out at his own VC firm after allegations of sexual harassment

#80

Post by downandout »

egwynn wrote: post #55
downandout wrote: post #11

This may get downvotes, but the speed with which careers are being destroyed based on mere allegations of sexual misconduct these days is frightening. While the allegations in this case may or may not be true, it is actually possible for a woman to make a false allegation of sexual misconduct. There are myriad reasons that someone would make make such a false allegation against a powerful VC. Yet in today’s environme…

I’m not convinced that "career death due to fraudulent sexual misconduct allegations” is a ramptant problem in tech. Based on nearly 100% of women I’ve ever known in tech, the vast majority of sexual misconduct either goes unreported or gets reported and ignored. Maybe you have some better data about this, though. If so, do share. And besides, I have a hard time imagining that a large VC firm would fire one of its fo…

If there were proof - emails, texts, etc - it would have been leaked to recode and other publications to avoid perceptions like mine. Public disclosures of these kinds of actions are meticulously calculated. Mr. Jurveston clearly disputes the allegations, to the point where he is promising litigation. The lack of evidence publicly presented likely means that it is a flimsy accusation - likely a “he said/she said” kind of thing. The sad thing is that in a post-Weinstein world, “she said” seems to be all that matters.
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