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Very disturbing that mere allegation by any random person can bring down a COO of a major payment processor and cause future hiring troubles to a company that's
by tinok 14y ago
Very disturbing that mere allegation by any random person can bring down a COO of a major payment processor and cause future hiring troubles to a company that's going up against giants such as Visa. Do I smell a conspiracy?
- rmc 14y agoOr a crime has happened. It's not uncommon for the accused to step down, or step away, while an issue is being investigated.
- tinok 14y agoThat's my point exactly. In theory, even an unpaid intern has the power to bring down top-level executives by simply walking into a police precinct. For a competitor, it's a better and far quicker strategy than competing on product features.
- danilocampos 14y agoThat's not remotely what happened here, according to Rabois.
- rmc 14y agoThe biggest problem with sexual harassment is not that police over over zealous with prosecuting, but that they don't prosecute enough. just look at the stats for the amount of rapes which don't go to court.
- king_jester 14y agoThis isn't even remotely true, most sexual assault cases result in no arrest or prosecution. Even in significant cases where a person of power commits sexual assault, they are likely to win their case -- the Diallo case comes to mind: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_v._Strauss-Kahn http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_v._Strauss-Kahn
- Alex3917 14y agoFor what it's worth, sexual harassment is not a crime.
- bdcravens 14y agoSexual harassment tends to be civil. In most cases where some sort of sexual-related crime has occurred, there pretty much a guarantee that harassment occurred as well (think physical contact or labor-related crime such as extortion) though harassment can occur without a crime (unwanted verbal advances or comments leading to hostile work environment)
- protomyth 14y agoYep, it is. It is generally charged as criminal stalking, attempted assault or assault, and criminal sexual conduct.
- obstacle1 14y agoNot to be pedantic, but in those cases criminal stalking, (attempted) assault, and criminal sexual conduct are the crimes, not sexual harassment.
- protomyth 14y agogo read the descriptions of each of those in your state's criminal code and see the phrase "sexual harassment" used multiple times.
- Alex3917 14y agoUnder the normal US definition, the only things that are workplace sexual harassment are quid pro quo and hostile work environment. IANAL, but I believe that while sexual assault can be used as evidence of a hostile work environment, I don't think that sexual assault is itself a criminal form of sexual harassment.
- GiraffeNecktie 14y ago
- kaonashi 14y agoIt's not a random person, it's an unnamed person. Without any details, I'm curious why the possibility the the claims might be correct are not even considered.
- doomlaser 14y agoHow would you know that it is a "mere allegation"?
- rmc 14y agothere is a persist, false, and negative meme that all sexual harassment is a fraud by feminists, and that men are now being systematicly oppressed by feminazi misanderists. just look into the "men's rights" orgs.
- danso 14y agoFWIW, the accuser is male: > Several months after our relationship began, I recommended that he interview at Square. He went through the interview process and was ultimately hired. I had no impact on his potential success at the company. At no point did he ever report directly to me, and I have seen his work product less than a handful of times. http://keithrabois.tumblr.com/post/41463189288/a-note-from-keith http://keithrabois.tumblr.com/post/41463189288/a-note-from-k...
- reinhardt 14y agoAs opposed to the much more persist, false, and negative meme that all buyer's remorse is sexual harassment, and that all men are potential rapists under the right circumstances. Just look into the "gender equality" orgs.
- rmc 14y agoI don't think there's any feminist group that thinks all men are potential rapists. that's just spreading the falsehood that feminists hate men.
- FireBeyond 14y agoAndrea Dworkin and her supporters come close: "In [Intercourse], she argues that all heterosexual sex in our patriarchal society is coercive and degrading to women, and sexual penetration may by its very nature doom women to inferiority and submission, and "may be immune to reform."" Though Dworkin denied it, many, including female, critics, viewed it as such: "Such descriptions are often cited by Dworkin's critics, interpreting the book as claiming "all" heterosexual intercourse is rape, or more generally that the anatomical mechanics of sexual intercourse make it intrinsically harmful to women's equality. For instance, Cathy Young says that statements such as, "Intercourse is the pure, sterile, formal expression of men's contempt for women," are reasonably summarized as "All sex is rape.""
- danilocampos 14y agoLet me see if I've got this straight. Your preferred explanation of this event is that a baseless accusation of sexual harassment was orchestrated by the big payment processors as a means of torpedoing Square's already breathless pace? And that, despite the baselessness of that claim, a major architect of Square decided to hop off the train? That despite a huge investment of time, energy and ego, the mere whisper of an accusation was sufficient to send him running? If I may posit a more likely scenario: Square hires human beings. And human beings, thanks to a technology stack built atop a basal ganglia, like to fuck almost at the exclusion of all other things. And, due to imperfections of this stack, sometimes higher order objectives are subjugated by that enthusiasm for fucking. And that as a result, maybe someone just didn't keep their willy in their pants, they knew it, and decided to step aside before their complicated mess got slopped on the company they helped build? I dunno – I feel like I like the "humans are imperfect" explanation a bit better. edit: Via a comment above by ry0ohki, this appears to be exactly what happened. http://keithrabois.tumblr.com/post/41463189288/a-note-from-keith http://keithrabois.tumblr.com/post/41463189288/a-note-from-k...
- phillmv 14y agoSigh. Yes, because a conspiracy is more likely than one of the guy's at the helm of a company notorious for its poor working environment[0] actually turning out to, allegedly, being a douchebag. [0] http://www.businessinsider.com/the-truth-about-those-brutal-descriptions-of-working-conditions-at-square-2012-5 http://www.businessinsider.com/the-truth-about-those-brutal-...
- protomyth 14y agoThis is why Billy Graham had a policy to avoid being alone with any woman other than his wife. Hard to do in a modern office, but a good rule for high power folks who might be a good lawsuit target. Works equally well for other partner combinations. Although I doubt this case was some conspiracy.
- homosaur 14y agoThis wasn't even a lady, so that policy wouldn't have helped.
- protomyth 14y agoSee danilocampos's thread
- danilocampos 14y agoWelp, good luck doing this if you're a man into men and you work in tech.
- protomyth 14y agoIts the same principal. A high powered person has an assistant they can trust to witness their interactions with people of the sex they would be interested in. Requires money, but then again, targets generally have cash.
- danielweber 14y agoAlmost every organization that deals with kids has a policy of "no single adult alone with a single child," for everyone's protection.
- Cherian_Abraham 14y agoSquare is not going up against Visa. Visa is an investor and is quite involved in Square's formulation and execution of its mobile POS strategy.
- Cherian_Abraham 14y agoSquare is not going up against Visa. Visa is an investor and is quite involved in Square's formulation and execution of its mobile POS strategy.
- bdcravens 14y agoIn other words: if you start a company that innovates and competes against the big boys, you should have criminal and civil immunity, because any accusations against you are conspiracies. Also, how are they going up against Visa? They don't issue their own cards, but rather, are competing against the likes of PayPal, Bank of America, and Authorize.net.
- wmf 14y agoIt is speculated that eventually Square will cut out credit cards, creating their own network (perhaps using ACH instead) to reduce their costs. This would be a threat to Visa.