4 ms·

no, he's suggesting that creating a "blacklist" of accused will inevitably end up with innocent names on the list.

smt88 9y ago
These situations aren't good analogs for several reasons. 1. If someone's "crime" is just having communist ideals, then it's not a crime at all. It's actually protected by the Constitution, although that doesn't apply to an employment situation of course. Harassing someone is often a crime. 2. Hollywood's blacklist prevented people from accessing their primary source of income. The consequences were extreme. The people who might be affected by this blacklist are not people who will starve or die because they aren't getting enough deals. 3. Accusing someone of communism doesn't have the blowback for the accuser that's equivalent to accusing someone of harassment. It's embarrassing, risky, and shameful for someone to publicly talk about sexual harassment. There's a need for a mechanism to hold VCs accountable for bad behavior. There wasn't such a need for the Hollywood Blacklist. YC's proposal isn't a perfect mechanism, and it's definitely possible the wrong people will be held accountable. But nothing could be a perfect system in he-said-she-said scenarios. If YC is erring on the side of accidentally punishing VCs rather than allowing women to be harmed, I'd rather see the VCs punished, as they're the ones with vastly disproportionate power.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- KekDemaga 9y ago
  What mechanism prevents me fabricating stories about my competitors or people I just don't like in order to get them blacklisted as happened during McCarthyism? That seems the be the problem they were unable to solve back then.
  - anigbrowl 9y ago
    That's trivially easy to safeguard against. One could, for example, keep recordings of one's business conversations.
    - KekDemaga 9y ago
      I claim you called me a "stupid do do head", prove you did not. More on why this is very hard: http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance John of England on the subject: "No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing in any other way, nor will we proceed with force against him, or send others to do so, except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land."
      - s73ver 9y ago
        Ok. You've now reported that to me, the Keeper of the List. Prove your claim. Prove that you're credible. Seriously, it's not as easy as, "Someone made a complaint. Ban the subject for life." There will be people who will be evaluating the credibility of the claims.
        mst 9y ago
        Right, this is YC we're talking about, not the Drupal Association.
      - anigbrowl 9y ago
        Your trolling game is less than impressive. Try coming up with something responsive.
  - geofft 9y ago
    The fact that this database is being run by actual people involved in the industry who have a sense of how to assign credibility to a story based on knowing the people involved, and not by a computer that is blindly appending to a list when you make an API call. There's also the convenient fact that when you ask people about incidents of harassment, they tend to go "I'm sorry she felt uncomfortable" instead of "I never did it." The responses of creeps Chris Sacca, Justin Caldbeck, Pavel Curda, Dave McClure, and Marc Canter to the recent accusations against them are excellent examples of this. So, you can just ask them.

These situations aren't good analogs for several reasons. 1. If someone's "crime" is just having communist ideals, then it's not a crime at all. It's actually protected by the Constitution, although that doesn't apply to an employment situation of course. Harassing someone is often a crime. 2. Hollywood's blacklist prevented people from accessing their primary source of income. The consequences were extreme. The people who might be affected by this blacklist are not people who will starve or die because they aren't getting enough deals. 3. Accusing someone of communism doesn't have the blowback for the accuser that's equivalent to accusing someone of harassment. It's embarrassing, risky, and shameful for someone to publicly talk about sexual harassment. There's a need for a mechanism to hold VCs accountable for bad behavior. There wasn't such a need for the Hollywood Blacklist. YC's proposal isn't a perfect mechanism, and it's definitely possible the wrong people will be held accountable. But nothing could be a perfect system in he-said-she-said scenarios. If YC is erring on the side of accidentally punishing VCs rather than allowing women to be harmed, I'd rather see the VCs punished, as they're the ones with vastly disproportionate power.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
KekDemaga 9y ago
What mechanism prevents me fabricating stories about my competitors or people I just don't like in order to get them blacklisted as happened during McCarthyism? That seems the be the problem they were unable to solve back then.
- anigbrowl 9y ago
  That's trivially easy to safeguard against. One could, for example, keep recordings of one's business conversations.
  - KekDemaga 9y ago
    I claim you called me a "stupid do do head", prove you did not. More on why this is very hard: http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance John of England on the subject: "No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing in any other way, nor will we proceed with force against him, or send others to do so, except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land."
    - s73ver 9y ago
      Ok. You've now reported that to me, the Keeper of the List. Prove your claim. Prove that you're credible. Seriously, it's not as easy as, "Someone made a complaint. Ban the subject for life." There will be people who will be evaluating the credibility of the claims.
      - mst 9y ago
        Right, this is YC we're talking about, not the Drupal Association.
    - anigbrowl 9y ago
      Your trolling game is less than impressive. Try coming up with something responsive.
- geofft 9y ago
  The fact that this database is being run by actual people involved in the industry who have a sense of how to assign credibility to a story based on knowing the people involved, and not by a computer that is blindly appending to a list when you make an API call. There's also the convenient fact that when you ask people about incidents of harassment, they tend to go "I'm sorry she felt uncomfortable" instead of "I never did it." The responses of creeps Chris Sacca, Justin Caldbeck, Pavel Curda, Dave McClure, and Marc Canter to the recent accusations against them are excellent examples of this. So, you can just ask them.