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This entire article is a smorgasbord of cringe: >During the recruiting process, Mr. McClure, a founder of 500 Startups and an investor, sent her a Facebook mes

by rl3 9y ago

This entire article is a smorgasbord of cringe: >During the recruiting process, Mr. McClure, a founder of 500 Startups and an investor, sent her a Facebook message that read in part, “I was getting confused figuring out whether to hire you or hit on you.” One would think having the phrases "hire you" and "hit on you" in the same sentence when communicating with someone undergoing recruitment at your company would be reason enough to take pause for a moment, and maybe ponder why PR suicide seems like a good idea. >Mr. Canter, in an interview, said that Ms. Dent “came on strong to me, asking for help” and that she had used her sexuality publicly. He said he disliked her ideas so he behaved the way he did to make her go away. ??? >Lindsay Meyer, an entrepreneur in San Francisco, said Mr. Caldbeck put $25,000 of his own money into her fitness start-up in 2015. That gave Mr. Caldbeck reason to constantly text her; in those messages, reviewed by The Times, he asked if she was attracted to him and why she would rather be with her boyfriend than him. At times, he groped and kissed her, she said. That one's just downright pathological creepy in the extreme.

dba7dba 9y ago
To me, this article explains it all. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/13/1-in-5-ceos-are-psychopaths-australian-study-finds/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/13/1-in-5-ceos-are-p... Many 'successful' people who make it to ceo are more likely to be a psychopath according to the article. And I would describe these actions of the men who are more likely to be psychopath, not normal.
- dkarl 9y ago
  As a culture we are obsessed with psychopaths, but in reality there is nothing out of the ordinary about people who enjoy sadistically wielding power over others. You find them in every schoolyard. The difference between a psychopath and a bully is that bullies act in a way that increases their power and standing, so they are affected by (and can be constrained by) social and cultural norms, especially among adults. Our obsession with psychopaths (and the power fantasy it reflects) reinforces bullies' intuition that people secretly admire and envy their bad behavior.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
api 9y ago
I am white and male and the misogyny I've observed in tech has annoyed me. If it annoys me it must be intolerable to women. I believe every word of it and I could tell a few stories of things I've seen. I've seen a lot of other kinds of assholery too. Tech has an underbelly just like any other major industry. FWIW I've heard Hollywood and Wall St. are worse.
- rokhayakebe 9y ago
  Tell one.
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    I'll tell you one. A bank I worked at in the mid 80's had one woman working on a floor in a fairly separate building away from the main building. That one woman had to endure pretty much constant harassment from two guys who were technically her superior and their boss didn't lift a finger to stop it. I made a good bit of noise about it to HR and then she begged me to stop because she was afraid they'd let her go. The two guys that did this (Koert Borst and Jos Haarsma, I sincerely hope they read this, assuming they are still alive) were crossing so many lines in their behavior I lost count. Fortunately I only worked in that department (systems administration) for about a year before landing a job at the computer center which was far away from the main offices. Assholes would be too friendly a term to describe those two, it was downright sadistic how they enjoyed harassing her until she cried.
    - kelukelugames 9y ago
      I want to play! One of the West Point/Sloan MBAs, Chip, showed his dick to a recruiter. One of my lawyer friends had a hiring manager show his dick to her. I've been in tech for a decade and haven't met anyone who has been exposed to a dick in person.
  - michaelchisari 9y ago
    This is a small thing, but I have multiple friends who routinely had Linkedin requests that resulted in date requests. Having to constantly reset professional relationships back to where they should be is something I, as a guy, have never had to deal with. This is the low tier stuff, and it's still, in my mind, totally unacceptable. There's bigger stuff I'm not comfortable talking about in an open forum. A couple of the people I have in mind have given up on the tech scene and moved on elsewhere.
dkarl 9y ago
I think cringe is the wrong word. We cringe when we watch The Office and see people make social mistakes without meaning to. These are not unwitting social mistakes. This is people being assholes because they know they can get away with it. Furthermore, not having met any of these people but speculating based on my experience, I would guess that their motivations go beyond just looking for sex and knowing that one time in twenty it will work. I think they also enjoy the nineteen out of twenty who are repulsed and insulted but don't -- correction, hopefully, didn't -- think they could afford to call them on their bullshit. Very few people are genuinely indifferent to putting someone through an experience like that, but it's very common for people to enjoy it. Those are the people we call bullies, whether their acts are criminal or not. I'm sure the people described in the article took care to stay on the right side of the law, but reading this I can't help hoping that they made mistakes.
- ronilan 9y ago
  > This is people being assholes because they know they can get away with it. Nope. These people are being assholes because they ARE assholes. Never attribute to rational decision making what can be attributed to rotten character.
  - theseatoms 9y ago
    I mean... rotten characters can make rational decisions, to achieve their rotten ends.
  - voidlogic 9y ago
    >Nope. These people are being assholes because they ARE assholes. To be fair, even an asshole may show some restraint when they have a clear understanding of consequences. Thinking their money buys them immunity from consequence is an enabler as they don't believe they have the slightest need for this kind of rational self-interest. You are both right, an asshole is an asshole as you suggest, but even so, assholes are worse when they think they won't face consequences as the poster your replied to implied.
    - 9y ago
kartD 9y ago
Heads are already rolling https://500.co/making-changes-at-500/ https://500.co/making-changes-at-500/ https://medium.com/@sacca/i-have-more-work-to-do-c775c5d56ca1 https://medium.com/@sacca/i-have-more-work-to-do-c775c5d56ca...
- taytus 9y ago
  He turned off comments on his super creepy post.
  - rconti 9y ago
    While I admit I cringed at a few little things, on balance I didn't find it creepy, and I think that assessment just adds to the feeling among many that it's easier to dodge the issue than to try to get involved.
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    He could have left out a couple of the self congratulatory bits about how he's making a real difference, that's up to others. But other than that that post could have been a lot worse.
  - pharrlax 9y ago
    He touched someone's face once like eight years ago "in a way that made her feel uncomfortable". A stupid, asshole, casually sexist move? Yup. Worthy of being raked over the coals despite bending over backwards to make amends in the years since? Uhhh... no, not really. Don't get me wrong. The other stories are really, really bad. Insanely evil, even. But the idea that Sacca's extremely minor dick move almost a decade ago deserves to be lumped in with the monstrous stories of serial stalking and sexual battery is pretty ludicrous. Makes me think the writer just wanted to shoehorn in a TV star to inflate the piece's reach.
    - acjohnson55 9y ago
      He, himself, admits that this sort of behavior was a pattern. I don't think he has been or will be raked over the coals, because he seems to exhibit genuine remorse. I respect him, but my sympathy isn't with him. I'm sure it's deeply uncomfortable to be under this level of scrutiny and lumped in with people who have been caught doing things that seem skeezier. But you know what's worse? Not being a billionaire and trying to make a living in a world where people you need are more interested in having sex with you than your business value, or at the very least, are more than willing to tie one to the other.
mikeash 9y ago
That last part seems to go beyond creepy and into criminal sexual assault territory.
- rdiddly 9y ago
  Yeah there definitely needs to be no touching ever, aside from handshakes.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - morgante 9y ago
    With any people, ever?
    - rdiddly 9y ago
      At work. What work-related purpose is being served by being all touchy-feely with people?
  - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    But I'm mano-sexual and find hand touching to be sexually inappropriate in the workplace. [Not true for me.]
- Broken_Hippo 9y ago
  Mhm. Yet, I'm not sure I'd trust the cops to do anything about it. Heck, it is hard enough with actual harrassment: Groping is even more difficult. We have a hard enough time doing decent things when folks are raped. If the person is lucky enough to work in a large place, there is som
mintplant 9y ago
Huh. Who would've thought that allowing wealthy frat bro types* to run amok, wield power over others, and construct cults of personality would engender a culture of sexism and abuse? (* I'm not, of course, attempting to excuse any who may not fit this profile.)
- stcredzero 9y ago
  Huh. Who would've thought that allowing wealthy frat bro types to run amok, wield power over others, and construct cults of personality would engender a culture of sexism and abuse?* Power is a dangerous thing. This is why we must also be careful of the power in evidence-free accusations and abrogation of "innocent until guilty." Not saying that is necessarily happening here. However, such urging to "listen and believe" comes up when these topics are discussed. Women are no less corruptible by unchecked power than men.
  - abalone 9y ago
    > we must also be careful of the power in evidence-free accusations and abrogation of "innocent until guilty." Not saying that is necessarily happening here. But you are strongly implying it. In a case where many of the men admitted their guilt, nonetheless. Your comment is just "men's rights" activist talking points.
    - photik 9y ago
      That's fairly dismissive. He was asserting an unbiased approach at accusation. How is that a "men's rights" activist talking point? Are you suggesting that bias should exists against Y chromosomes?
      - abalone 9y ago
        > Are you suggesting that bias should exists against Y chromosomes? No. The men admitted guilt in this case and the women did supply evidence. This makes his assertion a politically motivated non sequitur.
ingenuous2 9y ago
What if the choice were "no investment or attention" versus "creepy attention and small investment"? Entrepreneurs are so willing to sacrifice, and this should not be the situation, but what if it is? How many of us males would accept these types of advances in order to get our idea funded? To think that we can remove power from sex is misguided. There were times during my startup that I would have wished for the attention, even as a straight male, if only because it was better than the nothingness that my idea lived in otherwise.
- rorykoehler 9y ago
  Grass is always greener on the other side...
- ethanwillis 9y ago
  I personally wouldn't want unwanted sexual advances to get money for a startup.
  - Smaug123 9y ago
    Though of course this is explicitly a personal preference.
ajeet_dhaliwal 9y ago
A new one to put in the pros column for bootstrapping your startup - not having to get harassed by creepy investors!
DonHopkins 9y ago
I've known Marc Canter for a long time, but I don't know anything about Ms. Dent or her interactions with Marc. However, he has so many other highly effective behavioral techniques for making people go away, that it sounds pretty fishy that he would just happen to deploy that particular technique in that particular situation for that particular person. If he dislikes your ideas, he'll usually simply tell you directly and loudly, not hit on you to make you go away. So I have a hard time buying his explanation. But I would not describe him as a rich powerful VC holding money and power over the women he harasses. If what she says is true (which I don't know and he denies), he may be a sexist pig contributing to the toxic environment for women (which is wrong and should be called out and condemned), but he's certainly not in the same category as Dave McClure and Justin Caldbeck.
- auserperson 9y ago
  Even if the explanation were true it would still count as sexual harassment though.
  - DonHopkins 9y ago
    Absolutely! He's just not in such a disproportionate position of power over the women he harasses as Dave McClure and Justin Caldbeck are. He has his white male privilege, magisterial facade, and all that, but not millions of dollars and an old boys investors network behind him. But that definitely doesn't excuse his behavior. And his explanation is bizarre.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
pbreit 9y ago
On the McClure anecdote, you write "undergoing recruitment" which sounds formal but is almost certainly not.
mirimir 9y ago
Even if Ms. Dent was trying to manipulate him sexually, Mr. McClure totally missed the point. If they had met in a public place, with no professional context, he might reasonably have twitted her about flirting with him. But in a professional context, he would have been better served by just making sure she didn't get hired. Because you don't want to hire people who sexually manipulate their colleagues.
Geekette 9y ago
One has to marvel at the thought process that made Marc Canter offer that ludicrous excuse to defend his sexual harassment of Wendy Dent. Also amazing that he prioritizes disputing being her adviser, rather than the harassment allegations online [1][2][3]. The article has prompted more people to outline incidents with him: "Horrified but not surprised by Marc Canter's justification of his sexual harassment. He propositioned me for a threesome many times"[4]. Didn't matter how many times I said no or how awkward it was [5]. [1] https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/880934108246847488 https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/88093410824684748... [2] https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/880931688326471680 https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/88093168832647168... [3] https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/880923230390829056 https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/88092323039082905... [4] https://twitter.com/zephoria/status/880967155365367808 https://twitter.com/zephoria/status/880967155365367808 [5] https://twitter.com/zephoria/status/880967375692148737 https://twitter.com/zephoria/status/880967375692148737
nickthemagicman 9y ago
Wish someone would invest 25k into my startup.
x1798DE 9y ago
> One would think having the phrases "hire you" and "hit on you" in the same sentence when communicating with someone undergoing recruitment at your company would be reason enough to take pause for a moment I don't know the exact situation here, but to be fair, if you were mostly flirting with someone and it was not a hiring situation, this would not be an unflattering thing to say - "hey, I like you and I think you are smart and capable". If in his mind they met as social acquaintances and in hers they met as business acquaintances, it's easy to see how it would seem reasonable to him and horrifying to her.
- adrienne 9y ago
  It was a job interview.
  - eropple 9y ago
    'adrienne, it looks like you've been hellbanned. I've vouched this post and your other post, but figured you should know so you're not just yelling into the void. When I've run across you I've consistently thought your positions were reasonable and from a group consistently both marginalized and ignored on HN, so I'm very surprised you're hellbanned.
    - adrienne 9y ago
      'eropple: I know i'm hellbanned. It's because i'm too mean, according to 'dang. Sometimes i shout into the void anyway, figuring people will have showdead on, that's all.

by rl3 9y ago

dba7dba 9y ago

To me, this article explains it all. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/13/1-in-5-ceos-are-psychopaths-australian-study-finds/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/13/1-in-5-ceos-are-p... Many 'successful' people who make it to ceo are more likely to be a psychopath according to the article. And I would describe these actions of the men who are more likely to be psychopath, not normal.

dkarl 9y ago
As a culture we are obsessed with psychopaths, but in reality there is nothing out of the ordinary about people who enjoy sadistically wielding power over others. You find them in every schoolyard. The difference between a psychopath and a bully is that bullies act in a way that increases their power and standing, so they are affected by (and can be constrained by) social and cultural norms, especially among adults. Our obsession with psychopaths (and the power fantasy it reflects) reinforces bullies' intuition that people secretly admire and envy their bad behavior.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

api 9y ago

I am white and male and the misogyny I've observed in tech has annoyed me. If it annoys me it must be intolerable to women. I believe every word of it and I could tell a few stories of things I've seen. I've seen a lot of other kinds of assholery too. Tech has an underbelly just like any other major industry. FWIW I've heard Hollywood and Wall St. are worse.

rokhayakebe 9y ago
Tell one.
- jacquesm 9y ago
  I'll tell you one. A bank I worked at in the mid 80's had one woman working on a floor in a fairly separate building away from the main building. That one woman had to endure pretty much constant harassment from two guys who were technically her superior and their boss didn't lift a finger to stop it. I made a good bit of noise about it to HR and then she begged me to stop because she was afraid they'd let her go. The two guys that did this (Koert Borst and Jos Haarsma, I sincerely hope they read this, assuming they are still alive) were crossing so many lines in their behavior I lost count. Fortunately I only worked in that department (systems administration) for about a year before landing a job at the computer center which was far away from the main offices. Assholes would be too friendly a term to describe those two, it was downright sadistic how they enjoyed harassing her until she cried.
  - kelukelugames 9y ago
    I want to play! One of the West Point/Sloan MBAs, Chip, showed his dick to a recruiter. One of my lawyer friends had a hiring manager show his dick to her. I've been in tech for a decade and haven't met anyone who has been exposed to a dick in person.
- michaelchisari 9y ago
  This is a small thing, but I have multiple friends who routinely had Linkedin requests that resulted in date requests. Having to constantly reset professional relationships back to where they should be is something I, as a guy, have never had to deal with. This is the low tier stuff, and it's still, in my mind, totally unacceptable. There's bigger stuff I'm not comfortable talking about in an open forum. A couple of the people I have in mind have given up on the tech scene and moved on elsewhere.

dkarl 9y ago

I think cringe is the wrong word. We cringe when we watch The Office and see people make social mistakes without meaning to. These are not unwitting social mistakes. This is people being assholes because they know they can get away with it. Furthermore, not having met any of these people but speculating based on my experience, I would guess that their motivations go beyond just looking for sex and knowing that one time in twenty it will work. I think they also enjoy the nineteen out of twenty who are repulsed and insulted but don't -- correction, hopefully, didn't -- think they could afford to call them on their bullshit. Very few people are genuinely indifferent to putting someone through an experience like that, but it's very common for people to enjoy it. Those are the people we call bullies, whether their acts are criminal or not. I'm sure the people described in the article took care to stay on the right side of the law, but reading this I can't help hoping that they made mistakes.

ronilan 9y ago
> This is people being assholes because they know they can get away with it. Nope. These people are being assholes because they ARE assholes. Never attribute to rational decision making what can be attributed to rotten character.
- theseatoms 9y ago
  I mean... rotten characters can make rational decisions, to achieve their rotten ends.
- voidlogic 9y ago
  >Nope. These people are being assholes because they ARE assholes. To be fair, even an asshole may show some restraint when they have a clear understanding of consequences. Thinking their money buys them immunity from consequence is an enabler as they don't believe they have the slightest need for this kind of rational self-interest. You are both right, an asshole is an asshole as you suggest, but even so, assholes are worse when they think they won't face consequences as the poster your replied to implied.
  - 9y ago

kartD 9y ago

Heads are already rolling https://500.co/making-changes-at-500/ https://500.co/making-changes-at-500/ https://medium.com/@sacca/i-have-more-work-to-do-c775c5d56ca1 https://medium.com/@sacca/i-have-more-work-to-do-c775c5d56ca...

taytus 9y ago
He turned off comments on his super creepy post.
- rconti 9y ago
  While I admit I cringed at a few little things, on balance I didn't find it creepy, and I think that assessment just adds to the feeling among many that it's easier to dodge the issue than to try to get involved.
- jacquesm 9y ago
  He could have left out a couple of the self congratulatory bits about how he's making a real difference, that's up to others. But other than that that post could have been a lot worse.
- pharrlax 9y ago
  He touched someone's face once like eight years ago "in a way that made her feel uncomfortable". A stupid, asshole, casually sexist move? Yup. Worthy of being raked over the coals despite bending over backwards to make amends in the years since? Uhhh... no, not really. Don't get me wrong. The other stories are really, really bad. Insanely evil, even. But the idea that Sacca's extremely minor dick move almost a decade ago deserves to be lumped in with the monstrous stories of serial stalking and sexual battery is pretty ludicrous. Makes me think the writer just wanted to shoehorn in a TV star to inflate the piece's reach.
  - acjohnson55 9y ago
    He, himself, admits that this sort of behavior was a pattern. I don't think he has been or will be raked over the coals, because he seems to exhibit genuine remorse. I respect him, but my sympathy isn't with him. I'm sure it's deeply uncomfortable to be under this level of scrutiny and lumped in with people who have been caught doing things that seem skeezier. But you know what's worse? Not being a billionaire and trying to make a living in a world where people you need are more interested in having sex with you than your business value, or at the very least, are more than willing to tie one to the other.

mikeash 9y ago

That last part seems to go beyond creepy and into criminal sexual assault territory.

rdiddly 9y ago
Yeah there definitely needs to be no touching ever, aside from handshakes.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- morgante 9y ago
  With any people, ever?
  - rdiddly 9y ago
    At work. What work-related purpose is being served by being all touchy-feely with people?
- pbhjpbhj 9y ago
  But I'm mano-sexual and find hand touching to be sexually inappropriate in the workplace. [Not true for me.]
Broken_Hippo 9y ago
Mhm. Yet, I'm not sure I'd trust the cops to do anything about it. Heck, it is hard enough with actual harrassment: Groping is even more difficult. We have a hard enough time doing decent things when folks are raped. If the person is lucky enough to work in a large place, there is som

mintplant 9y ago

Huh. Who would've thought that allowing wealthy frat bro types* to run amok, wield power over others, and construct cults of personality would engender a culture of sexism and abuse? (* I'm not, of course, attempting to excuse any who may not fit this profile.)

stcredzero 9y ago
Huh. Who would've thought that allowing wealthy frat bro types to run amok, wield power over others, and construct cults of personality would engender a culture of sexism and abuse?* Power is a dangerous thing. This is why we must also be careful of the power in evidence-free accusations and abrogation of "innocent until guilty." Not saying that is necessarily happening here. However, such urging to "listen and believe" comes up when these topics are discussed. Women are no less corruptible by unchecked power than men.
- abalone 9y ago
  > we must also be careful of the power in evidence-free accusations and abrogation of "innocent until guilty." Not saying that is necessarily happening here. But you are strongly implying it. In a case where many of the men admitted their guilt, nonetheless. Your comment is just "men's rights" activist talking points.
  - photik 9y ago
    That's fairly dismissive. He was asserting an unbiased approach at accusation. How is that a "men's rights" activist talking point? Are you suggesting that bias should exists against Y chromosomes?
    - abalone 9y ago
      > Are you suggesting that bias should exists against Y chromosomes? No. The men admitted guilt in this case and the women did supply evidence. This makes his assertion a politically motivated non sequitur.

ingenuous2 9y ago

What if the choice were "no investment or attention" versus "creepy attention and small investment"? Entrepreneurs are so willing to sacrifice, and this should not be the situation, but what if it is? How many of us males would accept these types of advances in order to get our idea funded? To think that we can remove power from sex is misguided. There were times during my startup that I would have wished for the attention, even as a straight male, if only because it was better than the nothingness that my idea lived in otherwise.

rorykoehler 9y ago
Grass is always greener on the other side...
ethanwillis 9y ago
I personally wouldn't want unwanted sexual advances to get money for a startup.
- Smaug123 9y ago
  Though of course this is explicitly a personal preference.

ajeet_dhaliwal 9y ago

A new one to put in the pros column for bootstrapping your startup - not having to get harassed by creepy investors!

DonHopkins 9y ago

I've known Marc Canter for a long time, but I don't know anything about Ms. Dent or her interactions with Marc. However, he has so many other highly effective behavioral techniques for making people go away, that it sounds pretty fishy that he would just happen to deploy that particular technique in that particular situation for that particular person. If he dislikes your ideas, he'll usually simply tell you directly and loudly, not hit on you to make you go away. So I have a hard time buying his explanation. But I would not describe him as a rich powerful VC holding money and power over the women he harasses. If what she says is true (which I don't know and he denies), he may be a sexist pig contributing to the toxic environment for women (which is wrong and should be called out and condemned), but he's certainly not in the same category as Dave McClure and Justin Caldbeck.

auserperson 9y ago
Even if the explanation were true it would still count as sexual harassment though.
- DonHopkins 9y ago
  Absolutely! He's just not in such a disproportionate position of power over the women he harasses as Dave McClure and Justin Caldbeck are. He has his white male privilege, magisterial facade, and all that, but not millions of dollars and an old boys investors network behind him. But that definitely doesn't excuse his behavior. And his explanation is bizarre.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

pbreit 9y ago

On the McClure anecdote, you write "undergoing recruitment" which sounds formal but is almost certainly not.

mirimir 9y ago

Even if Ms. Dent was trying to manipulate him sexually, Mr. McClure totally missed the point. If they had met in a public place, with no professional context, he might reasonably have twitted her about flirting with him. But in a professional context, he would have been better served by just making sure she didn't get hired. Because you don't want to hire people who sexually manipulate their colleagues.

Geekette 9y ago

One has to marvel at the thought process that made Marc Canter offer that ludicrous excuse to defend his sexual harassment of Wendy Dent. Also amazing that he prioritizes disputing being her adviser, rather than the harassment allegations online [1][2][3]. The article has prompted more people to outline incidents with him: "Horrified but not surprised by Marc Canter's justification of his sexual harassment. He propositioned me for a threesome many times"[4]. Didn't matter how many times I said no or how awkward it was [5]. [1] https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/880934108246847488 https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/88093410824684748... [2] https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/880931688326471680 https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/88093168832647168... [3] https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/880923230390829056 https://twitter.com/marccanter4real/status/88092323039082905... [4] https://twitter.com/zephoria/status/880967155365367808 https://twitter.com/zephoria/status/880967155365367808 [5] https://twitter.com/zephoria/status/880967375692148737 https://twitter.com/zephoria/status/880967375692148737

nickthemagicman 9y ago

Wish someone would invest 25k into my startup.

x1798DE 9y ago

> One would think having the phrases "hire you" and "hit on you" in the same sentence when communicating with someone undergoing recruitment at your company would be reason enough to take pause for a moment I don't know the exact situation here, but to be fair, if you were mostly flirting with someone and it was not a hiring situation, this would not be an unflattering thing to say - "hey, I like you and I think you are smart and capable". If in his mind they met as social acquaintances and in hers they met as business acquaintances, it's easy to see how it would seem reasonable to him and horrifying to her.

adrienne 9y ago
It was a job interview.
- eropple 9y ago
  'adrienne, it looks like you've been hellbanned. I've vouched this post and your other post, but figured you should know so you're not just yelling into the void. When I've run across you I've consistently thought your positions were reasonable and from a group consistently both marginalized and ignored on HN, so I'm very surprised you're hellbanned.
  - adrienne 9y ago
    'eropple: I know i'm hellbanned. It's because i'm too mean, according to 'dang. Sometimes i shout into the void anyway, figuring people will have showdead on, that's all.