8 ms·

Nah, I disagree. It's time for housecleaning in this industry. If it is true that he jumped before he was pushed at Google, then they must have had some seriou

by pacaro 10y ago

Nah, I disagree. It's time for housecleaning in this industry. If it is true that he jumped before he was pushed at Google, then they must have had some serious evidence against him. Should Hans Reiser be given a second chance because he's good at file systems? Turn it around, if an engineer does amazing work all their career, and behaves within societal norms, do they at some point accumulate enough credit to allow them a "get out of jail free" pass?

mc32 10y ago
Not sure I'd give Singhal a pass --depending on evidence provided, that said, I'd probably give someone who develops a cure for even one of the cancers a pass. It's probably not the PC thing to say, but if someone could have such a positive on their side of the scale, I think I could give them a pass. Your example has some false equivalence, Hans is a convicted murderer, Singhal is an accused sexual harasser. Those are not equivalent. In a purely procedural society such a hypothetical person does not get a pass --in a more relative society he gats a pass. Kind of how we look the other way regarding historical figures of importance and their flaws when what they achieved transcends those flaws.
- pacaro 10y ago
  The false equivalence was deliberate! This is one of those subtle things that can be problematic, we don't have a good moral calculus on where to draw the line. Slippery slope or reductio, your choice. Large companies often run a simple financial thought experiment: "How much liability does this expose us to (a.k.a. how much to make this go away -- hence the popularity of confidentiality clauses in settlements)" vs. "What is this person worth to us" If we accept that he left Google before they forced him out, then (cynically) Google must have decided that the liability was greater than his value. But when we consider this from the perspective of someone who has been abused at their place of employment, they may be facing a career change, PTSD, you name it. Both of the women that have written about their experiences at Uber describe stark psychological responses to their experiences - these can/will have lifelong impact. Does a track record of technological innovation excuse even one instance of that?
  - mc32 10y ago
    Obviously I can't speak for the affected people, and different people will react differently to a similar event, that said, if it happened to me, I do think I could excuse it, but not forgive it. That is, I'd be willing to "take one for the team". But then again, having been robbed at gunpoint in highschool, while kind of scary hasn't scarred me measurably. As another example, I knew women who complained about sexual harassers to me, but as I encouraged them to seek out HR and report, they said the harassment, in their estimation, didn't warrant getting their supervisor in trouble, that they could handle it. Different people have different tolerances and different ways to address unfavorable circumstance.
    - alpha_squared 10y ago
      > I'd be willing to "take one for the team" > But then again, having been robbed at gunpoint in highschool, while kind of scary hasn't scarred me measurably. A mildly dismissive viewpoint followed by an irrelevant appeal to emotion followed by an anecdote. This feels a little unfair to those who've actually gone through sexual harassment (which is a spectrum and ranges in severity). Surely, there's something to be said of the psychological damage that results from sexual harassment as well.
    - thinkt4nk 10y ago
      > I'd be willing to "take one for the team" How does sexual harassment further the aims of the team?
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - rimantas 10y ago
    Ok, so I should probably get fired for saying "Hi" for the female coworker not on my team: because how do you know where to draw the line?
    - davidgerard 10y ago
      If that's a serious question, then it would indicate you literally have bad enough social judgement that you probably shouldn't. Almost nobody would consider that a serious question, so if you do then the onus is on you personally.
LoSboccacc 10y ago
that's a funny comparison because reiserfs never got past toy filesistem since from inception to the bitter end was plagued by corruption and data losses.
linuxkerneldev 10y ago
> Should Hans Reiser be given a second chance because he's good at file systems? I'm not sure I'm able to follow your analogy. Hans murdered his Russian mail-order bride who was getting a divorce from him. There's a pretty big difference from a convicted murderer to an alleged sexual harasser. If someone came to me and told me that they'd been convicted of murder, I could not in good conscience hire them and expose my team members to that risk. There would be no further discussion. If someone came to me and told me that they'd been accused of sexual harassment and had left that job, I'd inquire and try to understand the details. There is much more gray area. If someone had physically assaulted another person, I'd immediately say no-hire. If someone had made untoward sexual remarks and was unapologetic for it, no-hire. If someone had said they misread someone else's body language and made a pass was apologetic for it, then negative, but not an immediate no-hire.
- steven777400 10y ago
  This seems disturbingly severe. Someone misread body language, was corrected, and immediately apologized; you say that's a negative? Also, what happens to more serious crimes when a person is released from prison? I've had several ex-cons on my team from time to time. My view is, if they've been released from prison then they've done their time and we (as a society) owe them a chance to show that they can rehabilitate. What's the alternative? Once you've committed a crime, even a serious crime, you should be unemployable and starve on the street? It's a serious question.
  - linuxkerneldev 10y ago
    > you say that's a negative? Yes, I perceive that as negative compared to someone who did not exhibit that mistake. I'm not saying that's a no-hire or an extreme negative. I'm trying to communicate that is an indicator of a possible issue, that means it needs to be looked at further to see if there's a pattern of misreading body language. > Once you've committed a crime, even a serious crime, you should be unemployable and starve on the street? It's a serious question. I understand and respect the question you've asked. I want to make sure we separate genuinely serious crimes like murder/rape from crimes that are perceived as serious but in my subjective opinion are harmless like drug use. If someone had been convicted of using or even selling cannabis, I would not perceive that as a negative. If someone had been convicted of murder, I would perceive that as unemployable in my team. The reason being is that I could not consider exposing my team to that risk. I can see that even here, there's some gray areas. For example, if the murder was in self-defense or an act of revenge, and there had been a long period of healthy behavior, then perhaps this could be mitigating factors. I would not want anyone to be unemployable or to starve. There are jobs that are less team oriented that might be suitable, or where the risk can be more tightly controlled.

by pacaro 10y ago

mc32 10y ago

Not sure I'd give Singhal a pass --depending on evidence provided, that said, I'd probably give someone who develops a cure for even one of the cancers a pass. It's probably not the PC thing to say, but if someone could have such a positive on their side of the scale, I think I could give them a pass. Your example has some false equivalence, Hans is a convicted murderer, Singhal is an accused sexual harasser. Those are not equivalent. In a purely procedural society such a hypothetical person does not get a pass --in a more relative society he gats a pass. Kind of how we look the other way regarding historical figures of importance and their flaws when what they achieved transcends those flaws.

pacaro 10y ago
The false equivalence was deliberate! This is one of those subtle things that can be problematic, we don't have a good moral calculus on where to draw the line. Slippery slope or reductio, your choice. Large companies often run a simple financial thought experiment: "How much liability does this expose us to (a.k.a. how much to make this go away -- hence the popularity of confidentiality clauses in settlements)" vs. "What is this person worth to us" If we accept that he left Google before they forced him out, then (cynically) Google must have decided that the liability was greater than his value. But when we consider this from the perspective of someone who has been abused at their place of employment, they may be facing a career change, PTSD, you name it. Both of the women that have written about their experiences at Uber describe stark psychological responses to their experiences - these can/will have lifelong impact. Does a track record of technological innovation excuse even one instance of that?
- mc32 10y ago
  Obviously I can't speak for the affected people, and different people will react differently to a similar event, that said, if it happened to me, I do think I could excuse it, but not forgive it. That is, I'd be willing to "take one for the team". But then again, having been robbed at gunpoint in highschool, while kind of scary hasn't scarred me measurably. As another example, I knew women who complained about sexual harassers to me, but as I encouraged them to seek out HR and report, they said the harassment, in their estimation, didn't warrant getting their supervisor in trouble, that they could handle it. Different people have different tolerances and different ways to address unfavorable circumstance.
  - alpha_squared 10y ago
    > I'd be willing to "take one for the team" > But then again, having been robbed at gunpoint in highschool, while kind of scary hasn't scarred me measurably. A mildly dismissive viewpoint followed by an irrelevant appeal to emotion followed by an anecdote. This feels a little unfair to those who've actually gone through sexual harassment (which is a spectrum and ranges in severity). Surely, there's something to be said of the psychological damage that results from sexual harassment as well.
  - thinkt4nk 10y ago
    > I'd be willing to "take one for the team" How does sexual harassment further the aims of the team?
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- rimantas 10y ago
  Ok, so I should probably get fired for saying "Hi" for the female coworker not on my team: because how do you know where to draw the line?
  - davidgerard 10y ago
    If that's a serious question, then it would indicate you literally have bad enough social judgement that you probably shouldn't. Almost nobody would consider that a serious question, so if you do then the onus is on you personally.

LoSboccacc 10y ago

that's a funny comparison because reiserfs never got past toy filesistem since from inception to the bitter end was plagued by corruption and data losses.

linuxkerneldev 10y ago

> Should Hans Reiser be given a second chance because he's good at file systems? I'm not sure I'm able to follow your analogy. Hans murdered his Russian mail-order bride who was getting a divorce from him. There's a pretty big difference from a convicted murderer to an alleged sexual harasser. If someone came to me and told me that they'd been convicted of murder, I could not in good conscience hire them and expose my team members to that risk. There would be no further discussion. If someone came to me and told me that they'd been accused of sexual harassment and had left that job, I'd inquire and try to understand the details. There is much more gray area. If someone had physically assaulted another person, I'd immediately say no-hire. If someone had made untoward sexual remarks and was unapologetic for it, no-hire. If someone had said they misread someone else's body language and made a pass was apologetic for it, then negative, but not an immediate no-hire.

steven777400 10y ago
This seems disturbingly severe. Someone misread body language, was corrected, and immediately apologized; you say that's a negative? Also, what happens to more serious crimes when a person is released from prison? I've had several ex-cons on my team from time to time. My view is, if they've been released from prison then they've done their time and we (as a society) owe them a chance to show that they can rehabilitate. What's the alternative? Once you've committed a crime, even a serious crime, you should be unemployable and starve on the street? It's a serious question.
- linuxkerneldev 10y ago
  > you say that's a negative? Yes, I perceive that as negative compared to someone who did not exhibit that mistake. I'm not saying that's a no-hire or an extreme negative. I'm trying to communicate that is an indicator of a possible issue, that means it needs to be looked at further to see if there's a pattern of misreading body language. > Once you've committed a crime, even a serious crime, you should be unemployable and starve on the street? It's a serious question. I understand and respect the question you've asked. I want to make sure we separate genuinely serious crimes like murder/rape from crimes that are perceived as serious but in my subjective opinion are harmless like drug use. If someone had been convicted of using or even selling cannabis, I would not perceive that as a negative. If someone had been convicted of murder, I would perceive that as unemployable in my team. The reason being is that I could not consider exposing my team to that risk. I can see that even here, there's some gray areas. For example, if the murder was in self-defense or an act of revenge, and there had been a long period of healthy behavior, then perhaps this could be mitigating factors. I would not want anyone to be unemployable or to starve. There are jobs that are less team oriented that might be suitable, or where the risk can be more tightly controlled.