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The other uncharitable interpretation is: "What did you expect when you get drunk men and women together at a bar?" But focusing on the GP's general point, I fe
by Jach 14y ago
The other uncharitable interpretation is: "What did you expect when you get drunk men and women together at a bar?" But focusing on the GP's general point, I feel like this was more of a failure of the bar (shouldn't they be on the lookout for these things?) than the conference. Also, if you're being harassed at a bar, why don't you immediately tell the bar owner/tender/bouncer or police instead of waiting a full day before telling the conference organizer? (You can do the latter too, but the former was left out of the given narrative which makes me think it wasn't done.) [Edited for clarity.]
- neilk 14y agoThe OP doesn't specify, but her alleged harasser is well known in the community already. So I would assume he's not just a regular conference attendee; he's probably got some technical reputation, and may be a featured speaker. That's usually what makes these things extra extra difficult. As for whether the bar is really part of the conference, I agree it's a bit of a grey zone. But in every such gathering, the unofficial parts are where most of the important stuff happens. If you have a conference where the women feel unwelcome doing that stuff, you don't really have a woman-friendly conference.
- wpietri 14y agoPerhaps you can tell us about the times you've been sexually harassed and immediately reported it? Having never been harassed like that, I don't know quite what I'd do. But I can think of any number of times I've taken a little while to go from "what the fuck just happened?" to feeling confident enough in my analysis to raise a ruckus.