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I have at least some sympathy with the point you're trying to make here. I think you are essentially saying that we've all gone a bit soft, and that the modern

I have at least some sympathy with the point you're trying to make here. I think you are essentially saying that we've all gone a bit soft, and that the modern workplace is full of a bunch of crybabies that can't solve any problem on their own without escalating it to HR. And this problem becomes particularly egregious when that escalation turns into a dark mark on that person's "permanent record", as it tends to do in modern society when we're talking about allegations of sexual harassment. Can't we all just be grown-ups and deal with our problems with ease and panache, rather than being sanctimonious little tattletales? I get this argument, but I would posit to you that perhaps the modern take on sexual harassment IS society growing up. Consider changing your mindset - imagine that a new hire is just bad at working with people. They don't consider other people's ideas, or they're just generally rude - whatever it is. Just generally hard to work with. Now try to think about somebody who makes inappropriate propositions to women in the workplace: this is just another brand of the same problem. If you can't get along with some of your fellow female coworkers because they don't feel comfortable with you, then you're not a good team player. In other words, instead of thinking about society as having gone soft, think about it like we go hard. We demand excellent people-skills in the workplace. If you can't take the heat, and other people feel annoyed, offended, and yes harassed working with you, then you're going to have trouble keeping work. Tough titties. Working at Uber requires excellent technical skills - why not social skills too? Anyway, I would put it to you that if you don't find this compelling, you might be giving too much primacy to the sensibilities of poorly socialized men. If you find yourself asking "why should these poor saps have to suffer just because they can't talk to girls?" then that's a sign you have a blindspot. Food for thought.

graphememes 9y ago
> They don't consider other people's ideas, or they're just generally rude - whatever it is. Just generally hard to work with. Now try to think about somebody who makes inappropriate propositions to women in the workplace: this is just another brand of the same problem. If you can't get along with some of your fellow female coworkers because they don't feel comfortable with you, then you're not a good team player. I disagree with the idea that we should bully, and ostracize people from society for making mistakes or simply not being able to interact socially with others as well as we all want. That doesn't fix anything it only makes things worse. We should be focusing on teaching, and embracing that people make mistakes and working on fixing those issues, if someone refuses to acknowledge that when it is seriously risking the safety of those around them, that is when it becomes a problem that should be handled with grace. I am heavily against this group ostracizing, demeaning, and bullying tactic. It is getting disgusting, you can see it constantly on twitter, and it is starting to float onto hacker news.
- sebastos 9y ago
  But to play devil's advocate, replace "for simply not being able to interact socially with others" with "for simply not being able to adhere to a schedule" or "for simply not being able to keep up personal hygiene" or "for simply not being able to understand their boss's tasking". There are a million social standards to which we hold the average employee, and they all add up to an effective coworker. In a world with men and women in the same workspace, being able to interact comfortably with the opposite sex is not just a life skill. It's part of your job description. So I'm not offended by companies that demand high "performance" in this regard. With all that said, I 100% agree that the increasing frequency of "trial by twitter mob" is an unacceptable development. If somebody got fired for poor job performance, you wouldn't raise a twitter storm shaming that company for having made a poor hiring decision, nor would you plaster that person's mugshot everywhere to warn others of making the same mistake. You would just say "sorry, it's not working out" and send them on their way. So in that regard I think we are actually in complete agreement - making a mistake shouldn't make you a pariah. But I'm fine if it makes you fired.

graphememes 9y ago

> They don't consider other people's ideas, or they're just generally rude - whatever it is. Just generally hard to work with. Now try to think about somebody who makes inappropriate propositions to women in the workplace: this is just another brand of the same problem. If you can't get along with some of your fellow female coworkers because they don't feel comfortable with you, then you're not a good team player. I disagree with the idea that we should bully, and ostracize people from society for making mistakes or simply not being able to interact socially with others as well as we all want. That doesn't fix anything it only makes things worse. We should be focusing on teaching, and embracing that people make mistakes and working on fixing those issues, if someone refuses to acknowledge that when it is seriously risking the safety of those around them, that is when it becomes a problem that should be handled with grace. I am heavily against this group ostracizing, demeaning, and bullying tactic. It is getting disgusting, you can see it constantly on twitter, and it is starting to float onto hacker news.

sebastos 9y ago
But to play devil's advocate, replace "for simply not being able to interact socially with others" with "for simply not being able to adhere to a schedule" or "for simply not being able to keep up personal hygiene" or "for simply not being able to understand their boss's tasking". There are a million social standards to which we hold the average employee, and they all add up to an effective coworker. In a world with men and women in the same workspace, being able to interact comfortably with the opposite sex is not just a life skill. It's part of your job description. So I'm not offended by companies that demand high "performance" in this regard. With all that said, I 100% agree that the increasing frequency of "trial by twitter mob" is an unacceptable development. If somebody got fired for poor job performance, you wouldn't raise a twitter storm shaming that company for having made a poor hiring decision, nor would you plaster that person's mugshot everywhere to warn others of making the same mistake. You would just say "sorry, it's not working out" and send them on their way. So in that regard I think we are actually in complete agreement - making a mistake shouldn't make you a pariah. But I'm fine if it makes you fired.