15 ms·
No, of that I'm innocent
- pg_is_a_butt 9y agowhy would a series of soldiers all attack the same city? because at some point, they needed money and direction and were told what to do by someone else. you're all idiots.
- allisonburtch 9y agolol this is bad
- salqadri 9y agoThis issue isn't just plaguing the tech industry. This is an issue affecting the entire Western society, from Tech and Entertainment industries to even religious institutions. Its time at last for society to realign itself. But lets keep in mind that while such matters should be brought to public attention, lets also let the jury be the ones to deliver the verdicts.
- Mz 9y agoNone of the women who came forward were ever in a position where I could make or break their careers. Sexual Harassment requires that I have such power. This is not true and it does not look good for him to say it: The legal and social understanding of sexual harassment, however, varies by culture. In the context of US employment, the harasser can be the victim's supervisor, a supervisor in another area, a co-worker, or someone who is not an employee of the employer, such as a client or customer, and harassers or victims can be of any gender. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_harassment https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_harassment But, I do generally agree that two wrongs don't make a right. I am pretty appalled to hear that he had an online text-based affair with a woman who outed him to his wife for apparently vindictive reasons. I don't know how we move this discussion forward into constructive territory. I see this at least partly through the lens of massive social changes disrupting the rules and neither side having a good play book. I challenge commenters here to find something constructive to say and avoid just wallowing in the mud here.
- dsp1234 9y agoIt's incredibly difficult to talk about this specific post in a constructive way without wallowing in the mud. The content makes child-like arguments[0] and contradictory statements[1] to the point where it feels like an unstable foundation to have a conversation. It's like trying to have a debate where neither side agrees with the foundational logic of the other sides arguments. [0] - "None of the women who came forward were ever in a position where I could make or break their careers. Sexual Harassment requires that I have such power" [1] - "Perhaps because they felt peer pressure to join the #MeToo bandwagon, perhaps because they felt slighted for other reasons. I won’t speculate on their motives."
- Mz 9y agoTrue. That's why I issued a challenge. I realize it is a difficult thing I am asking of people.
- TarpitCarnivore 9y ago> I am pretty appalled to hear that he had an online text-based affair with a woman who outed him to his wife for apparently vindictive reasons. So because of a relationship it absolves him of all his accusations? Should we just throw out the multiple stories accusing him of this just because of said relationship? Guy straight up gaslighted these women so excuse me if I have zero sympathy for him.
- QAPereo 9y agoI am sorry that so many women feel wronged by me... This whole thing opens with the classic of all scumbag apologies, “I’m sorry for how you feel.” I’m not sure that this is much of a jumping off point for good discussion, as much as it is just another one biting the dust in the messiest way possible. Where does a constructive conversation begin here? With someone covering their ass in a blog post against their lawyers advice? With a bunch of people on HN opining about something that has been an open fact of life for many people, especially women, for longer than any of us of been alive? The solutions aren’t that difficult, they just take time and consistent desire and willingness by legislature and business leaders to follow through. So far that desire has been largely absent, and with recent revelations it’s not hard to see why.
- minimaxir 9y agoThis is not a dupe of his previous apology (which has been deleted). This is something else entirely that will be talked about years later. To give you an idea of what it’s about, it starts with “I have rejected my lawyer’s advice to not make a statement”
- jonknee 9y ago> This is something else entirely that will be talked about years later. I don't think he's nearly famous enough for anything he says to be talked about years later. He'll most likely be forgotten, there are plenty of other pitchmen in the Valley to take his role.
- DonHopkins 9y agoHopefully some pitchwomen too.
- zimpenfish 9y ago> I don't think he's nearly famous enough for anything he says to be talked about years later. I would put money on this being used in future education as an example of why you should listen to your lawyers when they say "don't make a statement". Because it is a classic.
- sharksauce 9y agoI have rejected my lawyer’s advice to not make a statement Oh this always works out well.
- emodendroket 9y agoIt feels like it would have been smart to have at least asked his lawyer to review his statement.
- astura 9y agoIf he wanted to give a statement he should have hired a PR firm to help him write it.
- throwaway345678 9y agoSo, honest question: Are men allowed to approach women in a sexualized context ever again? If so, when?
- dang 9y agoWe detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15552931 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15552931, which I'm not sure what it has to do with.
- Mz 9y agoSince it was originally addressed to me and you claim it is an honest question: Mostly not in work settings or work related settings, and much more carefully than in the past when dating norms hinged on the assumption that men were providers and women were destined to become homemakers. You have to consider how this impacts both your career and hers, not just yours alone. To give an example that I hope elucidates something: A senior programmer at the company I worked for asked for a date under circumstances that did not constitute bad behavior insofar as being against company rules, nor would be a problem for his career. But it basically slammed doors shut in my face and made it less likely I could get a job in the department he worked in. He was an otherwise attractive man that I might have happily got involved with, but his monstrous disregard for how this impacted my career prospects was a deal breaker for me. I hope sex becomes a less touchy topic over time, but I don't imagine it will ever stop being an issue.
- asdfasfhretwt 9y ago-
- Mz 9y agoHe was high up in a department I wanted a job in. I was not in the IT department, but I have a Certificate in GIS. He knew that and never wondered if I might be an asset to the IT department, nor if I might want to move to an IT position, which would have paid better than what I was doing. I really don't like your second question for a long list of reasons. I don't really see that being a constructive dialogue.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- hartator 9y ago> in a spirit of healing It's kind of interesting that his focus is still to "heal" himself. So self centered in this fake apology.
- DiabloD3 9y agoI think this can be best described as "sinking the boat just to kill the captain." In the interest of being the devil's advocate: if he is telling the truth, this looks very bad for several of the women that accused him of sexual harassment, and tried to inflate his cheating on his wife into something much worse. I mean, this sounds a lot like how some women accuse guys of rape just to cause harm to them, instead of a rape actually having occurred. Such actions are harmful to women, harmful to society as a whole, and actively work against the ideals of feminism and make it harder for feminists to have a meaningful dialog with both men and women alike. If his version of events is even remotely true, merely saying "two wrongs don't make a right" isn't even scratching the surface, and indicates a very large problem in the tech industry community. I have no clue if they are true, or how true they are, but I believe that because he disregarded his lawyer's advice and made a statement, there is at least a little bit of truth here.
- CJefferson 9y agoLots of people commit crimes and deny them. To me, the idea that an apparently disconnected set of women would all come forward with similar stories set off serious alarm bells. Why would a series of women all accuse the same man? Of course, we can still wait for this to make it's way through court, but I feel your defensiveness is too strong in the other direction, going straight to accusing all the women of being liars.
- minimaxir 9y ago> I have no clue if they are true, or how true they are, but I believe that because he disregarded his lawyer's advice and made a statement, there is at least a little bit of truth here. Quinn Norton’s account of her interactions with Scoble has been corroborated by multiple witnesses and it drastically disagrees with Scoble’s account: https://twitter.com/willoremus/status/923257035742781440 https://twitter.com/willoremus/status/923257035742781440 Layers advise clients to remain silent even if they are 100% innocent because talking almost always makes things worse.
- arkades 9y agoThat is a link to a screen grab of a Norton quote alongside a screen grab of a Scoble quote. It doesn’t seem to include any corroboration by anyone. Wrong link?
- TarpitCarnivore 9y ago> I don’t have employees, I don’t cut checks for investment. None of the women who came forward were ever in a position where I could make or break their careers. Sexual Harassment requires that I have such power. This is an incredibly disgusting and miss-guided view of sexual harassment.
- blattimwind 9y agoThis paragraph clearly relates the allegations against him to those against Weinstein et al, who used their power of "making or breaking careers" to coerce women. If you do not possess such a power, as he argues, you cannot possibly commit this kind of sexual harassment.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- TarpitCarnivore 9y agoAnd that some how makes his statement better? Sexual harassment is sexual harassment.
- Anderkent 9y agoEh. I think everyone agrees power imbalance is a crucial part of capital letters Sexual Harassment. We know people can be assholes to each other at any point, but we pay particular attention to people in positions of power over others. Setting aside power imbalances of physical nature (i.e. alone in an elevator), I think he's mostly accurate? Unwelcome advances in a situation where there is little possibility of harm to the woman should she reject you are just unwelcome advances. Maybe creepy, maybe rude, maybe disgusting. But they're not abuse, and they're not sexual harassment. I think that's clearly the goalpost he's comparing his behaviour to.
- DanBC 9y ago> I think everyone agrees power imbalance is a crucial part of capital letters Sexual Harassment. No. here's the EU definition: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CONSLEG:1976L0207:20021005:EN:PDF http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CONSLE... > harassment: where an unwanted conduct related to the sex of a person occurs with the purpose or effect of violating the dignity of a person, and of creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment, > sexual harassment: where any form of unwanted verbal, non-verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature occurs, with the purpose or effect of violating the dignity of a person, in particular when creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment. Here's the English law: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/contents https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/contents https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/section/26 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/section/26 > 1)A person (A) harasses another (B) if— > (a)A engages in unwanted conduct related to a relevant protected characteristic, and > (b)the conduct has the purpose or effect of— > (i)violating B's dignity, or > (ii)creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for B. > (2)A also harasses B if— > (a)A engages in unwanted conduct of a sexual nature, and > (b)the conduct has the purpose or effect referred to in subsection (1)(b) There's nothing in there about power imbalance.
- hartator 9y ago> Every act of infidelity, every time I have watched an adult video online, How watching porn equates to cheat on your wife? Very weird moral compass.
- csydas 9y agoI believe you're misreading that part of the post, as it goes on to list these as actions which wrong women in general. The writer is equating his viewing of porn to wronging women. It's kind of a strange mea culpa, to be honest, as even in the most socially progressive of circles, pornography is a very divisive topic, with many finding it degrading and many finding it liberating. edit: added a comma after "circles"
- hartator 9y agoI don't think I've misread. I think his moral compass is broken and he doesn't know the difference between evil and harmless browsing.
- Anderkent 9y agoJust because you mention two things together doesn't mean you equate them.
- PerryCox 9y agoYeah I've never understood that kind of thinking.
- cisanti 9y agoHe's a man down right now and probably very emotional. Just a guess, but should have listened to his lawyer. Also, U.S seem to have strange views on what is sexual assault. I don't know who is quilt or who is lying, but reading some of them are things I would avoid women over the ocean all together.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- 9y ago
- Invictus0 9y agoWithout making any moral judgments here, the guy has a valid point in that it's important to make a distinction between cheating in a relationship and sexual harassment. The former is a non-illegal, personal matter, and the latter is a criminal matter. I think most people probably aren't interested in making this distinction and would prefer to indiscriminately shun either kind of person, but this the importance of this lies in the #MeToo thing becoming a witchhunt. Sexual harassment/assault/rape is different that many other crimes in that mere accusations, convictions be damned, can completely ruin an otherwise innocent person's life. I could definitely imagine the #MeToo tag being used to shame someone, because it has reached witchhunt proportions. See the recent claims about H.W. Bush. I claim to know nothing about what actually happened between this guy and these women, and all of the armchair judges here that are jumping to conclusions ought to realize that they, too, know nothing.
- TarpitCarnivore 9y agoedit: replied to wrong comment
- Invictus0 9y agoI don't know how you conclude from my comment, maybe you should reread it. I don't believe in social justice adjudicated by uninformed internet commenters, and caution against jumping to conclusions when you don't really know the facts. You're only reinforcing my point that sexual misconduct allegations are especially damaging, by misrepresenting my words and automatically assigning Scoble a guilty verdict.
- TarpitCarnivore 9y agoReplied to the wrong comment, sorry
- DanBC 9y agoLots of sexual harassment is not criminal. (It's still, obviously, no acceptable).
- oh_sigh 9y agoI have no knowledge of this issue specifically, but more generally, if you're even a somewhat public figure, I think the best course of action is to have a discreet 24/7 bodycam rolling to record all of your interactions. We're at a point where your career and social network can be torpedoed by anyone merely making a claim on social media. No police, no day in court, just allegations are enough.
- Anderkent 9y agoJust people finding out you have a bodycam is likely enough to get a harassment bandwagon going against you. It's creepy.
- oh_sigh 9y agoYou don't need to tell anyone.
- ceejayoz 9y agoIn twelve US states, not telling people is a crime. California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Washington require all parties being recorded to consent.
- googlryas 9y agoThat's for audio recordings I believe, and oh_sigh did say in another comment where legal in your jurisdiction
- Anderkent 9y agoYes, and then if you ever try to use those recordings it gets even creepier.
- oh_sigh 9y ago"I was afraid that people would make false claims against me, so I recorded my presence at some events. Check it out and you be the judge if accuser us telling the truth or not"
- astura 9y agoI'll preface this with, I don't know who this guy is and this is the first time I heard anything about this, I am unfamiliar with the allegations. I am just absolutely shocked by this >I don’t have employees, I don’t cut checks for investment. None of the women who came forward were ever in a position where I could make or break their careers. Sexual Harassment requires that I have such power. JFC, does anyone actually believe this? This is absolutely... Shocking. Disturbing... I have no words... Shouldn't he have consulted with the EEOC before making such a bold statement? https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/sexual_harassment.cfm https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/sexual_harassment.cfm >The harasser can be the victim's supervisor, a supervisor in another area, a co-worker, or someone who is not an employee of the employer, such as a client or customer. It just makes it seem like he has no idea what appropriate behavior is at all. Really takes away from his credibility. Makes me think he's a total creep but thinks it's other people who are the problem. Also, it stood out to me it seems odd that he used "sexual harassment" as a proper noun.
- emodendroket 9y agoYeah, I'm in pretty much the same place, with no idea who this guy is or what he's accused of, but I feel like this statement is having the opposite of the intended effect on me.
- dominotw 9y agoI think the implication is that victims would have gone to law enforcement if he has no power over them, i.e no consequences for going to law enforcement. I don't understand why they cant report harassment to law enforcement if its ' unlawful to harass a person '. Thats the only way to get justice in our society.
- UncleMeat 9y agoIn my experience, most women have done this a couple of times and found it both painful and useless. This leads to apathy. Yesterday my partner was harassed by a doctor. I asked if she wanted to file a complaint or report it to somebody. She simply looked disappointed and said that no it would be a pain and almost certainly accomplish nothing. Better to not see this doctor again and try to schedule appointments with female doctors when possible. This is because this sort of thing has happened to her dozens of times in her lifetime, reporting it has never worked, and she already has enough on her plate. She didn't want this to be the state of things, but was resigned to it. Yes, this person will likely continue to be an asshole. But after people try so many times to do the right thing and are rebuffed we cannot keep expecting them to do the same thing over and over. It becomes one more thing to feel guilty about in these sorts of scenarios.
- pg_is_a_butt 9y agoyou're a guilty piece of shit. you're all idiots.
- madmax108 9y agoOuch, this might very well have been drafted by a PR team. He even manages to pitch in his new company in there. Such non-apology apologies have sadly become the norm in the valley. All it takes is to understand that everyone's idea of what constitutes "harassment" is different, and to behave (or at least try) at a global minima. It's sad that he realizes that his moral compass is broken, yet seems to relish making the same "mistake" over and over again.
- emodendroket 9y agoIf it was drafted by a PR team it was not a good one.
- dsschnau 9y agodude sounds like an asshole
- athenot 9y ago> There are a great many things in Seitz’s conversations I would prefer never be public, not because I did wrong by Seitz, but because where I have said I don’t really care about privacy online, I don’t feel that exposing my sexual fantasies or desires online as a text based “sex tape” is something anyone needs to see. This part caught my eye as contradictory. Privacy doesn't matter unless it's <something I care about>? I think that's precisely why privacy matters, and everyone has a different list of things that matter to them.
- LambdaComplex 9y agoI interpreted that as meaning he generally doesn't care about his own privacy online, not privacy in general
- TazeTSchnitzel 9y agotl;dr: “[…] I have rejected my lawyer’s advice to not make a statement […] None of the women who came forward were ever in a position where I could make or break their careers. Sexual Harassment requires that I have such power. […] Each of the women who have come forward used grains of truth to sell false narrative. Perhaps because they felt peer pressure to join the #MeToo bandwagon, perhaps because they felt slighted for other reasons. I won’t [sic] speculate on their motives. […] And to some extent [I] did take advantage of [her]; […] ”
- klint 9y agoDoes anyone else find it bizarre that he writes "Quinn Norton, by her own account, physically accosted me[...] While it is admirable that Quinn wanted to defend the honor of another woman and the sanctity of marriage, perhaps she should have done so using the resources of the conference, or at a minimum in a manner that didn’t lead to her assaulting me," given that Norton's actual account is that he struck him because he put he grabbed her and put his arm around her? "Most telling however is that she makes it clear that her assault of me was premeditated." There's nothing about her account that suggests this.
- detaro 9y agoYes, that he totally glossed over that part really stood out. Doesn't even said he didn't grab her, just acts like that wasn't even a thing, and makes up claims about her account that just don't make sense. Not even about what happened, about what she wrote about it, which everyone can just go re-read and see that it's not true. How can he expect that to be taken seriously.
- justboxing 9y ago> given that Norton's actual account is that she struck him because he grabbed her and put his arm around her? Nope. According to Quinn, on her medium post, Scoble put one hand on her breast, then a reach around, ending in a butt grab. > And then, without any more warning, Scoble was on me. I felt one hand on my breast and his arm reaching around and grabbing my butt. Scoble is considerably bigger than I am, and I realized quickly I wasn’t going to be able to push him away. Meanwhile, the people around just watched, in what I can only imagine was stunned shock. I got a hand free and used a palm strike to the base of his chin to knock him back. It worked, he flew back and struggled to get his feet under him. I watched his feet carefully for that moment. He was unbalanced from the alcohol and I realized if he reached for me again I could pull him forward, bounce his face off my knee, then drive it into the ground. (I knew this move because it had been done to me, then the martial arts expert who did it picked me up and apologetically showed me how to do it.) Source: Robert Scoble and Me ( @quinnnorton on medium.com ) => https://medium.com/@quinnnorton/robert-scoble-and-me-9b14ee92fffb https://medium.com/@quinnnorton/robert-scoble-and-me-9b14ee9...
- blfr 9y agoWhy is it relevant to HN? Who is this? Were the original accusations posted here? It's also rather pointless to nitpick legal definitions of sexual harassment when the guy starts by mentioning he rejected his lawyer's advice.
- grzm 9y agoIt's Robert Scoble. From Wikipedia: > Robert Scoble … is an American blogger, technical evangelist, and author. Scoble is best known for his blog, Scobleizer, which came to prominence during his tenure as a technology evangelist at Microsoft. He later worked for Fast Company as a video blogger, and then Rackspace and the Rackspace-sponsored community site Building 43 promoting breakthrough technology and startups. He is a partner at Transformation Group and a noted evangelist in the immersive media industries. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Scoble https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Scoble There have been discussions related to this here recently. One is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15519902 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15519902 Other comments can be found using the search: https://hn.algolia.com/?query=scoble&sort=byDate&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?query=scoble&sort=byDate&prefix&page...
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- sky_rw 9y agoWith the massive amount of prostitution in Silicon Valley I am constantly shocked that people of prominence have such little self control that they seek extra-marital affairs in such obviously stupid places. The behavior he describes here sounds less like harassment and more like chronic self destruction and purposeful career suicide. Hell, writing this article at all is self flagellation. Baffling.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- itbeho 9y agoThis person needs to get immediate professional help on several levels (mental, legal, family counseling). He is a train wreck for his family.
- KVFinn 9y ago>I don’t have employees, I don’t cut checks for investment. None of the women who came forward were ever in a position where I could make or break their careers. Sexual Harassment requires that I have such power. Not a great sign to open your defense by arguing about definitions rather than factual claims.
- grzm 9y agoYou're right, it's not a great sign. Given the nature of the topic, while unfortunate, I think it's useful to have a set of definitions to be working from to ensure readers understand what he means when he uses certain words or phrases. One can disagree with the definitions and disagree that the rest of what he says follows from his definitions, but I understand where he's coming from in trying to make clear what he's saying. Above anything else, people do generally have a desire to be understood, and at the very least not be misunderstood. Please do not read this as justifying any particular behavior. I just think it's really important to at least try to understand each other even when we may vehemently disagree. We can't do that if don't know what each other means when using the language we do. Looking through the comments on this topic, I see at least some of the disagreement coming from people talking past each other or not using words in the same way.
- pwinnski 9y agoEverything about this reeks of nastiness. I'm sure it hurts to have your past wrongs put under a microscope publicly. I remember the days after my divorce, and the pain and shame were excruciating. The only thing that would have been worse would have been if I'd denied the obvious truths, minimized my own misbehaviors, and relied on self-righteousness to assuage pangs of guilt. Sadly, Scoble has not (yet?) come to that realization. I hope he stops talking long enough to realize his own pain, as excruciating as it is, isn't the story here. It's the pain he caused to others, and is continuing to cause with his self-righteousness. This isn't he-said/she-said. It's he-said/they-said, where many witness corroborate the other side of stories he tries to reframe. When even his own false reframing of stories makes him sound like a troubled terrible actor, that ought to have been a sign to him to not hit publish.
- zimpenfish 9y ago> I hope he stops talking long enough to realize his own pain, as excruciating as it is, isn't the story here. To be fair, if he had that amount of empathy and self-reflection, he wouldn't be in this situation.
- grzm 9y agoLet's be fair and hopeful that he may be able to come to such.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- jimmydddd 9y agoAs a non s-valley person, this whole issue seems very strange to me. Work and family/kids takes a lot of time. And tech people are always saying they work these grueling 100 hour work weeks. Not sure how these folks have the time to be out drinking and flirting so much. :-)
- chr4004 9y agoAnd of course he has to plug his new business at the end.
- stillsut 9y agoI wonder if he asked any women to watch him shower...while wearing Google glasses.
- sjs382 9y agoIt's incredibly telling when someone makes a defense and comes off significantly worse as a result. He should have listened to his lawyer, but I'm glad he didn't.
- DonHopkins 9y agoOn his Facebook page, Robert Scoble wrote: https://i.imgur.com/kH6DsGA.png https://i.imgur.com/kH6DsGA.png "Robert Scoble: Andrew Brackin I have NOT deleted ANY comments. They may have deleted them. I did not." That was a bald faced lie. He's deleted a whole hell of a lot of comments, along with his original non-apology-apology. https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/20/robert-scoble-has-allegedly-continued-to-sexually-harass-women-after-going-sober/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/20/robert-scoble-has-allegedl... "Update: Scoble has since deleted his original apology and now posted a lengthy rebuttal to the reporting done by TechCrunch and other publications on his personal site."
- benmmurphy 9y agoscobles refutation of quins allegation is a motte and bailey argument. quinn has accused him of grabbing her breast but instead of addressing this allegation he instead has redirected the argument to him making out with the other woman.