Here's the thing: If you had ever taken even a few minutes to sit down with women who work in our industry and asked them if anything like this has ever happened to them you would learn it is extremely common. You would also learn that women rarely get the benefit of the doubt in these situations and are often punished or eventually forced out of the company. Women don't talk about it because jerks immediately start screaming "WHERES THE EVIDENCE?!?!?!?!". As far as anyone can tell she has no interest in pursuing a legal case; in that sense this is just like the NFL national anthem controversy. No matter how blandly and inoffensively someone behaves there will be assholes at the ready to condemn them for speaking out about anything in any form whatsoever. Susan kept her head down, tried to do good work, then left for another job. She has made the absolutely minimum of an issue out of this as it is possible to make.

Try this thought experiment: assume the original story was written by a man and was identical except for the sexual harassment part. The same tales of toxic work culture. The same stories about managers protecting fiefdoms, undermining each other, and withholding information. The same story about being denied a transfer so this person could serve as a "feather in the cap" of the manager denying the transfer. Would you still be out here claiming it is the end of civil society that everyone isn't demanding evidence before rushing to judgement?

Hint: we've had these kinds of stories show up before with male authors and the answer is no, people aren't so demanding. Only people who experience sexual harassment are held to this double-standard.

Nothing about what Susan posted seems far-fetched or out of the ordinary. HR exists to protect the company from you, not to help you or ensure justice is served. Telling people this is someone's first offense is likely to diffuse the situation and ensure no one files any pesky complaints with commissions nor hires a lawyer. Playing games with performance reviews is par for the course. Anyone who complains is viewed as a troublemaker. This happens on a daily basis in most companies in the USA.

Of course I don't believe you (or the rest of your compatriots) posting here are acting in good faith. If she shared screenshots and emails you'd just claim they were faked. How exactly she is supposed to gather evidence (when CA is a two-party state, so recording the conversations secretly would be illegal) is never explained.

You seem very reasonable.

Please try your own thought experiment: would requests for evidence in your scenario get silenced by assumptions and accusations of bad faith and sexism?

These are some of the same tools used by dictators, despots, and criminals to chill rational discourse.

Your thought experiment is lacking a critical component: the hearsay accusation of a criminal act. You've unwittingly created a straw man argument.

This is a risk when you don't engage with the world in a rational evidence-driven format. You mislead even yourself.

Try this thought experiment: Assume I'm a very supportive professional married to a woman who works in technology, intimately familiar with the pressures and difficulties that come with that. You can explore my comment history if you like.

Seriously re-read what you've written and consider it from my perspective. What does it say about you, your prejudices, values, beliefs, and open mind? What is the impact if everyone behaves the same way?

Can you see why I'm concerned that ycombinator contributors behave this way?

Or: view it from the perspective of a misogynist that you seek to shame and silence. Few of them will be converted through bullying. You're trying to stop terrorism by bombing Iraq. Attacking the wrong people for the wrong reasons while sacrificing your values quickly destroys your reputation, highlights your hypocrisy, and creates new opponents.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that your behavior here doesn't match how you see yourself or how you want to be. That you have a love of democracy, freedom, and the pillars that support them. We desperately need people like that, and we have no shortage of ignorant bigots.

> Here's the thing: If you had ever taken even a few minutes to sit down with women who work in our industry and asked them if anything like this has ever happened to them you would learn it is extremely common.

This type of argument is extremely dangerous. Not only isn't it true for many (I've done this), it's conflating claims with evidence.

If one is being honest, it's clear that the vast majority of news outlets that routinely cover activities in the tech industry are ideologically left-leaning and progressive towards ideas like those in feminism. It's regularly claimed that sexism in the tech industry is a major issue as fact, including in the linked article:

> Ms. Fowler’s account is another sign of Silicon Valley’s struggle with women’s issues and diversity in a male-dominated engineering environment.

This is a factual claim, and no evidence is ever given for claims like these from left-leaning media.

Now, given that we have an established media that leans this way, and has a long history of sensationalizing the hell out of anything that they find validates their position, why is it then that stories like these are so infrequent? Why must we suspend disbelief and not require evidence a few times a year when these stories get published and talked about? And further, why then must we conclude that because we get a few sensationalized cases per year that this is a pervasive issue which many women face, as you claim?

Given the context that these same outlets routinely print other stories that overhype exaggerated or outright false claims in this same vein (earnings mismatch, college "rape" statistics, etc), why is this suddenly the issue where second guessing what's printed is not okay? Surely merely believing what anyone tells you uncritically is dangerous.

I'll gladly wait until actual evidence is presented, or a group that is actually informed by the facts of the case (and not overly sensationalized clickbait articles) makes a decision regarding the merits. That's for the judge and any jury to decide, and the rest of us can opine when actual evidence is provided. A blog post truly is insufficient.

Dude, this isn't a court case. It's one woman sharing a story about how sexism in a male-dominated environment affected her career. Anyone can opine on it, especially people who have experienced similar issues firsthand and want to discuss the root cause of it and how to stop it(Is it a few bad apples? Is it endemic to tech/SV culture? Is it a problem equally in all fields dominated by a single sex?). If you don't think there's a pattern there worth discussing, that's your call, but it seems clear that a huge number of us do, and a blog post is plenty sufficient for discussing that.

I'm glad your women friends tell you things are all good and rosey, but the rest of us are going to keep talking about this sort of behavior until it stops happening.

Also, scare quotes around "rape" statistics? Ewww.