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Clearly few in the comments are in favor of this, but it's curious why. My supposition is that sexual harassment is too grey. It's ill defined. It's hard to kn

Clearly few in the comments are in favor of this, but it's curious why. My supposition is that sexual harassment is too grey. It's ill defined. It's hard to know how to 100% avoid it when flirting with someone. If someone can define the exact point hitting on someone goes from acceptable flirting to unacceptable harassment, then we could all rest easy. But without that, it's incredibly worrying to accidentally do something that ruins your career. Is there a place for coworkers falling in love or making love in 2017? Maybe not. Maybe so. But I think it's sort of sad how much we are repressing human sexuality if not.

mrkurt 9y ago
This one is pretty cut and dried. When there's a power disparity between two people, flirting's not ok. You can be against investors and bosses making passes at the people who have to make them happy without wanting to ban workplace romances entirely. Big companies have been doing this for years.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
  - rosser 9y ago
    No. You're just not specifically subject to that test. If you're in their management chain, and you get involved with them, you've actually exposed them to significant risk.
    - randyrand 9y ago
      Ah dang, deleted my comment because I had a change of heart and didn't feel like going down this rabbit hole further. But for reference it was: > so as long as you're a lower level employee you're in the clear? Clearly the answer to this question is no. The flow chart of bad behavior is much larger than that.
- throwaway_30761 9y ago
  This one is pretty cut and dried. When there's a power disparity between two people, flirting's not ok. Well, there's flirting and then there's flirting. Real-life example, which I observed from the sidelines: . Mr. A is a new hire. Mrs. B is the senior non-management team member. Someone gets flowers sent to them. Mr. C decides it would be amusing if they ended up on Mrs. B's desk, with a note saying they're from Mr. A. An hour or two later when Mr. A realizes he's just being hazed and still has a job, he decides to take the joke and run with it. This leads to several years of the most absurd and blatant come-ons you can imagine. Several years later, Mrs. B is the official team lead and Mr. A is reporting to her. The blatant flirting and absurd come-ons are still exactly the same as they've always been. . The only concern about whether this is OK, is if some outsider were to see and take it seriously enough to cause trouble with HR.
rosser 9y ago
It's not that hard, dude — and I say that being nontrivially Aspie, and profoundly bad at these kinds of social cues. The point where it becomes "unacceptable" is subtle and situational, but not terribly ambiguous. A good generalization: presumably, you like this person. Why would you want that — or you — to be a thing that is unpleasant for them? That should be the place you're operating from: what's good (or, at the very least, not bad) for them, not what you want out of the situation. That said, here's a few tests you can use: If you have any kind of authority over the other person (or them over you), don't even start. If it's unwelcome, stop immediately. Apologize if it's warranted. Go out of your way not to make it worse. If you're in any kind of doubt about whether it's appropriate or welcome, it probably isn't. Err on the side of caution. If you still want to try, a good place to start is probably an honest, respectful, "Hey, so I think I've got some feelings here, but I don't want that to be a problem for you." If you do that and you're told it's not OK (whether explicitly, or implicitly, thorough the lack of an enthusiastic response) DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES CONTINUE, unless that response changes. "Unless that changes" doesn't mean polling for state changes. That's creepy. That's all I've got, offhand. This list isn't remotely exhaustive. It's survivorship bias, but I've never been sued for harassment, nor my employers because of me. And, like I said, I'm not good at this stuff. (This comment was edited bigly.)
- randyrand 9y ago
  Those are of course, good starters. My mom married her boss, my dad. So I'm not sure the authority part is cut and dry. But the rest seems like good albeit no-full proof pointers. If you want to flirt with a same-level employee, I don't think there is actually a guaranteed way to make a first move with zero liability. It seems we agree there is inherent risk in making any move, whether its just 1 time or not.
  - rosser 9y ago
    I know it's not the specific kind of "risk" you're referring to, but the notion of trying to engage with human intimacy in a way that avoids risk sounds like it would be pretty Pyrrhic — or, at best, hollow — if it were even possible.
cbtacy 9y ago
Why? HN Gender skew is kind of the obvious explanation.
- randyrand 9y ago
  That was the assumption I already made. I assume all commenters in this thread are male. But that still doesn't really answer the question.

mrkurt 9y ago

This one is pretty cut and dried. When there's a power disparity between two people, flirting's not ok. You can be against investors and bosses making passes at the people who have to make them happy without wanting to ban workplace romances entirely. Big companies have been doing this for years.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
- rosser 9y ago
  No. You're just not specifically subject to that test. If you're in their management chain, and you get involved with them, you've actually exposed them to significant risk.
  - randyrand 9y ago
    Ah dang, deleted my comment because I had a change of heart and didn't feel like going down this rabbit hole further. But for reference it was: > so as long as you're a lower level employee you're in the clear? Clearly the answer to this question is no. The flow chart of bad behavior is much larger than that.
throwaway_30761 9y ago
This one is pretty cut and dried. When there's a power disparity between two people, flirting's not ok. Well, there's flirting and then there's flirting. Real-life example, which I observed from the sidelines: . Mr. A is a new hire. Mrs. B is the senior non-management team member. Someone gets flowers sent to them. Mr. C decides it would be amusing if they ended up on Mrs. B's desk, with a note saying they're from Mr. A. An hour or two later when Mr. A realizes he's just being hazed and still has a job, he decides to take the joke and run with it. This leads to several years of the most absurd and blatant come-ons you can imagine. Several years later, Mrs. B is the official team lead and Mr. A is reporting to her. The blatant flirting and absurd come-ons are still exactly the same as they've always been. . The only concern about whether this is OK, is if some outsider were to see and take it seriously enough to cause trouble with HR.

rosser 9y ago

It's not that hard, dude — and I say that being nontrivially Aspie, and profoundly bad at these kinds of social cues. The point where it becomes "unacceptable" is subtle and situational, but not terribly ambiguous. A good generalization: presumably, you like this person. Why would you want that — or you — to be a thing that is unpleasant for them? That should be the place you're operating from: what's good (or, at the very least, not bad) for them, not what you want out of the situation. That said, here's a few tests you can use: If you have any kind of authority over the other person (or them over you), don't even start. If it's unwelcome, stop immediately. Apologize if it's warranted. Go out of your way not to make it worse. If you're in any kind of doubt about whether it's appropriate or welcome, it probably isn't. Err on the side of caution. If you still want to try, a good place to start is probably an honest, respectful, "Hey, so I think I've got some feelings here, but I don't want that to be a problem for you." If you do that and you're told it's not OK (whether explicitly, or implicitly, thorough the lack of an enthusiastic response) DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES CONTINUE, unless that response changes. "Unless that changes" doesn't mean polling for state changes. That's creepy. That's all I've got, offhand. This list isn't remotely exhaustive. It's survivorship bias, but I've never been sued for harassment, nor my employers because of me. And, like I said, I'm not good at this stuff. (This comment was edited bigly.)

randyrand 9y ago
Those are of course, good starters. My mom married her boss, my dad. So I'm not sure the authority part is cut and dry. But the rest seems like good albeit no-full proof pointers. If you want to flirt with a same-level employee, I don't think there is actually a guaranteed way to make a first move with zero liability. It seems we agree there is inherent risk in making any move, whether its just 1 time or not.
- rosser 9y ago
  I know it's not the specific kind of "risk" you're referring to, but the notion of trying to engage with human intimacy in a way that avoids risk sounds like it would be pretty Pyrrhic — or, at best, hollow — if it were even possible.

cbtacy 9y ago

Why? HN Gender skew is kind of the obvious explanation.

randyrand 9y ago
That was the assumption I already made. I assume all commenters in this thread are male. But that still doesn't really answer the question.