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A lot of the press I saw about this case focussed on allegations of sexism. However reading the release, the gender of the injured party seems to be independen

A lot of the press I saw about this case focussed on allegations of sexism. However reading the release, the gender of the injured party seems to be independent and unrelated to the injustices which relate instead to the apparently inappropriate behaviour of TPW's spouse and her unsanctioned involvement in the company. Sexism is a highly incendiary issue in this community. How did a case which apparently was not about sexism come to be so closely related to it? Is the report from Github incorrect or was sexism used to market this to the watching population?

SnakeDoc 12y ago
I could be wrong, but I believe originally the ex-employee claimed the un-equalism's were due to the fact she was female. As we know now, that's a load of bs... but the media is still running with it.
- hashbanged 12y ago
  We don't know that now. We just know that no one was willing to admit to a company hired investigator (as impartial as defunkt claims they are, would you feel comfortable voicing allegations of sexism about your superiors to someone who you KNEW was going to report to your superior? Now imagine if you were a woman, where talking about sexism is often enough to get you labeled as a troublemaker, or just a nasty word). I shouldn't expect better from HN, but it's amazing how much stock people put in the words of corporations trying to cover their asses, even if they are start ups. Everyone stops applying critical thinking when you criticize start ups because of the ridiculous start up boosterism mentality we've adopted.
  - danielweber 12y ago
    Having read the parent and grandparent comment, I regret upvoting this thread.
    - SnakeDoc 12y ago
      regret all you want. this is NOT a gender issue. It's a classic disgruntled employee issue. it happens all the time, just with less media attention.
      - achompas 12y ago
        How is it not a gender issue when the "disgruntled" employee claims she was harassed because of her gender?
        malandrew 12y ago
        Because both an employee and employer can make whatever claims their want and claims from both sides should be viewed as suspect absent evidence and witnesses. This becomes a gender issue when other people support that claim. Until evidence or a credible witness corroborate the claims, it's a disagreement between an employee and employer. We have zero evidence to support anything more than that at this point. To claim otherwise respects neither science nor due process.
        achompas 12y ago
        My point is that the allegations are gender-based in nature, which makes this a gender issue by definition. This did not become a gender issue when "other people support[ed] that claim." This became a gender issue the moment Julie claimed she was harassed because she was a woman. Whether her claims are invalidated or not doesn't change the gender-based nature of her claims--it would simply mean that her claims (which are still gender-based!) are not supported by the evidence.
      - glesica 12y ago
        Is it also a part of that "classic" scenario for one of the founders of the company to be forced out based on the results of an investigation that found "confrontational conduct, disregard of workplace complaints, insensitivity to the impact of his spouse's presence in the workplace, and failure to enforce an agreement that his spouse should not work in the office."? Does that always happen when some random disgruntled employee talks shit about a company on Twitter?
  - zasz 12y ago
    Yeah, and there aren't a lot of women at GitHub. It would be quite easy to figure out who was making a particular complaint.
  - IanDrake 12y ago
    >We don't know that now. We just know that no one was willing to admit to a company hired investigator You assume here that someone is holding back, but we don't know that either.
    - hashbanged 12y ago
      I think it's fair to assume that in most work places people hold back criticism from their employers, no? Why this need to assume anything anyone says is as equally likely to be true as anything anyone else says?
  - rhizome 12y ago
    And indeed the content of the interviews made it to the bosses via the report: Rhoma’s report includes personal stories, private thoughts, documents, and all kinds of details that were shared for the purpose of the investigation, not for public consumption. We are trying to be transparent, but I hope you understand that there are privacy concerns preventing us from sharing the report in full.
  - hrjet 12y ago
    Adding to that, it is also possible that Github board of directors were willing to make a scapegoat of a founder (guilty or not), rather than risk the whole company's reputation by acknowledging inequalities in the workplace. Shouldn't these sort of investigations be done by a legal agency? Not that legal agencies are always unbiased, but an investigator appointed by a corporation seems obviously suspect.
  - yawboakye 12y ago
    Women at GitHub reported feeling supported, mentored, and protected at work, and felt they are treated equitably and are provided opportunities. This is an interesting revelation. (Actually it's not a revelation. It clears a doubt on our minds after Julie's incident.) Also, I have always wondered why none of GitHub's female workers have supported her or spoken to Github's allegedly rotten, sexist working environment so far.
    - hashbanged 12y ago
      Another possibility you should consider is that people don't like to rain on other people's parades. They also saw what happened to Julie and probably would not have been treated very well at work if word got out that they were speaking critically about the company?
      - yawboakye 12y ago
        > Another possibility you should consider is that people don't like to rain on other people's parades The media attention this incidence garnered says otherwise. From thousands of tweets, to HN comments, to blogposts, etc. We sunk our beaks into the carcass. > They also saw what happened to Julie and probably would not have been treated very well at work if word got out that they were speaking critically about the company You imply GitHub's female employees read prepared scripts to the investigator about their working conditions.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
integraton 12y ago
The source of the gender and sexism angle is that Julie Anne Horvath has stated in tweets and comments to the press that her gender was a central factor in this issue. As Valleywag quoted her saying: "Would this happen to a man in the same situation? No."
- mtrimpe 12y ago
  It is of course possible that the investigation might not have been able to identify a, possibly subtle, dysfunction at the core of a company's culture with a few days of work... Regardless; by definition all Julie-Ann can comment on is her own experience and it's very much possible for her to have experienced gender-based harassment, even multiple times, yet it not being systemic to GitHub.
  - gfodor 12y ago
    So you are saying sexism is unfalsifiable
    - deleted 12y ago
      [deleted]
    - smsm42 12y ago
      I think it is impossible to prove or disprove a theory based on one data point. Much less on one data point that there are conflicting accounts about and some claims made about it was found to be without substance. Of course, "I was mistreated at X" sounds much less powerful than "there's a gender discrimination at X", but one example of the former does not prove the latter, and refuting this example also does not prove the latter does not exist.
      - gfodor 12y ago
        burden of proof lies with the accuser imho. particularly after an investigation has failed to show otherwise. there seems to be a palpable thirst by some for the smoking gun that tech is overrun with mysogynistic brogrammers. it was out in full force here. it's depressing to see my field play into the hand of gossip mags like valleywag. i have no problem with flushing out bad actors like the people who were found to act unprofessionally. they are the minority though. to take their behavior and try to paint a whole industry is sad and usually being done by people whose identities and personal brands are defined by this issue.
tvon 12y ago
> However reading the release, the gender of the injured party seems to be independent and unrelated to the injustices which relate instead to the apparently inappropriate behaviour of TPW's spouse and her unsanctioned involvement in the company. Reading GitHub's statements on the investigation, it seems the independent investigator they hired found no evidence that sexism at GitHub. The investigator did find issues with TPW's general professional behavior which is why he resigned. > Sexism is a highly incendiary issue in this community. How did a case which apparently was not about sexism come to be so closely related to it? I think you answered your own question there. > Is the report from Github incorrect or was sexism used to market this to the watching population? That is what we call a false dichotomy. I do not see how you have narrowed it down to those two choices, and it honestly seems like a veiled accusation.
- petenixey 12y ago
  I was just thinking the same thing as I re-read my comment. It is a false dichotomy and it was badly phrased. The reason I asked it though is that if this is being used as a tool then it takes away from the real problem. I have no doubt that there are a lot of women in technology have experienced and do experience sexism and that is a very bad and sad thing However, the amplitude and focus of how this story played out (in places as far as the British Sunday papers) and focussed on institutional sexism seems to be very different to the facts portrayed in the report. Such harassment and psychological pressure is of course terrifically difficult to document and I do know that there could be several different backgrounds that fit the report but there is still quite a distance between the two. So the reason that I asked the question is that if this is the case then it's a massive disservice to those who are feeling the effects of genuine sexism and weakens their voice. I suspect that that was the net effect of what happened in the Sendgrid case and I think that is a very sad thing.
  - mtrimpe 12y ago
    > I was just thinking the same thing as I re-read my comment. It is a false dichotomy and it was badly phrased. Thank you for that. It's somehow very much appreciated. As for the sexism accusations; Many, many women feel they're being discriminated at work ( and they're usually right.) Only a tiny, tiny percentage chooses to speak out about it though because of the very high costs associated with it. My guess is that in this case Julie-Ann just happened to be one of those silent women and when things escalated with Tom it was just a case of 'now that my reputation will be ruined anyhow I might just as well get everything off my chest.' If you read her original post she also doesn't make that much of a big deal about the sexism stuff; it's just 'one amongst many' of the abuses she listed. Also keep in mind that, assuming she's acting in good faith, it's very likely that the reverted commit was indeed very small and dubious but was accompanied, verbally or non-verbally, by something that very clearly and unambiguously communicated the real reason; but of course without leaving a paper trail.
Guvante 12y ago
> How did a case which apparently was not about sexism come to be so closely related to it? Because she explicitly called out that the source of the problem was gender discrimination. Whether she was mistaken or whether the investigation failed to find the problem no one knows for sure, but it is not surprising that this case was closing related to sexism when the victim claimed that was the cause.
cmelbye 12y ago
Would the founder's wife have acted inappropriately toward the employee had the employee been male? It's probably not possible to know the answer to that for sure, but that's where the possibility lies. The intention of GitHub's investigation was to determine if there was systemic sexism within the company.

SnakeDoc 12y ago

I could be wrong, but I believe originally the ex-employee claimed the un-equalism's were due to the fact she was female. As we know now, that's a load of bs... but the media is still running with it.

hashbanged 12y ago
We don't know that now. We just know that no one was willing to admit to a company hired investigator (as impartial as defunkt claims they are, would you feel comfortable voicing allegations of sexism about your superiors to someone who you KNEW was going to report to your superior? Now imagine if you were a woman, where talking about sexism is often enough to get you labeled as a troublemaker, or just a nasty word). I shouldn't expect better from HN, but it's amazing how much stock people put in the words of corporations trying to cover their asses, even if they are start ups. Everyone stops applying critical thinking when you criticize start ups because of the ridiculous start up boosterism mentality we've adopted.
- danielweber 12y ago
  Having read the parent and grandparent comment, I regret upvoting this thread.
  - SnakeDoc 12y ago
    regret all you want. this is NOT a gender issue. It's a classic disgruntled employee issue. it happens all the time, just with less media attention.
    - achompas 12y ago
      How is it not a gender issue when the "disgruntled" employee claims she was harassed because of her gender?
      - malandrew 12y ago
        Because both an employee and employer can make whatever claims their want and claims from both sides should be viewed as suspect absent evidence and witnesses. This becomes a gender issue when other people support that claim. Until evidence or a credible witness corroborate the claims, it's a disagreement between an employee and employer. We have zero evidence to support anything more than that at this point. To claim otherwise respects neither science nor due process.
        achompas 12y ago
        My point is that the allegations are gender-based in nature, which makes this a gender issue by definition. This did not become a gender issue when "other people support[ed] that claim." This became a gender issue the moment Julie claimed she was harassed because she was a woman. Whether her claims are invalidated or not doesn't change the gender-based nature of her claims--it would simply mean that her claims (which are still gender-based!) are not supported by the evidence.
    - glesica 12y ago
      Is it also a part of that "classic" scenario for one of the founders of the company to be forced out based on the results of an investigation that found "confrontational conduct, disregard of workplace complaints, insensitivity to the impact of his spouse's presence in the workplace, and failure to enforce an agreement that his spouse should not work in the office."? Does that always happen when some random disgruntled employee talks shit about a company on Twitter?
- zasz 12y ago
  Yeah, and there aren't a lot of women at GitHub. It would be quite easy to figure out who was making a particular complaint.
- IanDrake 12y ago
  >We don't know that now. We just know that no one was willing to admit to a company hired investigator You assume here that someone is holding back, but we don't know that either.
  - hashbanged 12y ago
    I think it's fair to assume that in most work places people hold back criticism from their employers, no? Why this need to assume anything anyone says is as equally likely to be true as anything anyone else says?
- rhizome 12y ago
  And indeed the content of the interviews made it to the bosses via the report: Rhoma’s report includes personal stories, private thoughts, documents, and all kinds of details that were shared for the purpose of the investigation, not for public consumption. We are trying to be transparent, but I hope you understand that there are privacy concerns preventing us from sharing the report in full.
- hrjet 12y ago
  Adding to that, it is also possible that Github board of directors were willing to make a scapegoat of a founder (guilty or not), rather than risk the whole company's reputation by acknowledging inequalities in the workplace. Shouldn't these sort of investigations be done by a legal agency? Not that legal agencies are always unbiased, but an investigator appointed by a corporation seems obviously suspect.
- yawboakye 12y ago
  Women at GitHub reported feeling supported, mentored, and protected at work, and felt they are treated equitably and are provided opportunities. This is an interesting revelation. (Actually it's not a revelation. It clears a doubt on our minds after Julie's incident.) Also, I have always wondered why none of GitHub's female workers have supported her or spoken to Github's allegedly rotten, sexist working environment so far.
  - hashbanged 12y ago
    Another possibility you should consider is that people don't like to rain on other people's parades. They also saw what happened to Julie and probably would not have been treated very well at work if word got out that they were speaking critically about the company?
    - yawboakye 12y ago
      > Another possibility you should consider is that people don't like to rain on other people's parades The media attention this incidence garnered says otherwise. From thousands of tweets, to HN comments, to blogposts, etc. We sunk our beaks into the carcass. > They also saw what happened to Julie and probably would not have been treated very well at work if word got out that they were speaking critically about the company You imply GitHub's female employees read prepared scripts to the investigator about their working conditions.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

integraton 12y ago

The source of the gender and sexism angle is that Julie Anne Horvath has stated in tweets and comments to the press that her gender was a central factor in this issue. As Valleywag quoted her saying: "Would this happen to a man in the same situation? No."

mtrimpe 12y ago
It is of course possible that the investigation might not have been able to identify a, possibly subtle, dysfunction at the core of a company's culture with a few days of work... Regardless; by definition all Julie-Ann can comment on is her own experience and it's very much possible for her to have experienced gender-based harassment, even multiple times, yet it not being systemic to GitHub.
- gfodor 12y ago
  So you are saying sexism is unfalsifiable
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - smsm42 12y ago
    I think it is impossible to prove or disprove a theory based on one data point. Much less on one data point that there are conflicting accounts about and some claims made about it was found to be without substance. Of course, "I was mistreated at X" sounds much less powerful than "there's a gender discrimination at X", but one example of the former does not prove the latter, and refuting this example also does not prove the latter does not exist.
    - gfodor 12y ago
      burden of proof lies with the accuser imho. particularly after an investigation has failed to show otherwise. there seems to be a palpable thirst by some for the smoking gun that tech is overrun with mysogynistic brogrammers. it was out in full force here. it's depressing to see my field play into the hand of gossip mags like valleywag. i have no problem with flushing out bad actors like the people who were found to act unprofessionally. they are the minority though. to take their behavior and try to paint a whole industry is sad and usually being done by people whose identities and personal brands are defined by this issue.

tvon 12y ago

> However reading the release, the gender of the injured party seems to be independent and unrelated to the injustices which relate instead to the apparently inappropriate behaviour of TPW's spouse and her unsanctioned involvement in the company. Reading GitHub's statements on the investigation, it seems the independent investigator they hired found no evidence that sexism at GitHub. The investigator did find issues with TPW's general professional behavior which is why he resigned. > Sexism is a highly incendiary issue in this community. How did a case which apparently was not about sexism come to be so closely related to it? I think you answered your own question there. > Is the report from Github incorrect or was sexism used to market this to the watching population? That is what we call a false dichotomy. I do not see how you have narrowed it down to those two choices, and it honestly seems like a veiled accusation.

petenixey 12y ago
I was just thinking the same thing as I re-read my comment. It is a false dichotomy and it was badly phrased. The reason I asked it though is that if this is being used as a tool then it takes away from the real problem. I have no doubt that there are a lot of women in technology have experienced and do experience sexism and that is a very bad and sad thing However, the amplitude and focus of how this story played out (in places as far as the British Sunday papers) and focussed on institutional sexism seems to be very different to the facts portrayed in the report. Such harassment and psychological pressure is of course terrifically difficult to document and I do know that there could be several different backgrounds that fit the report but there is still quite a distance between the two. So the reason that I asked the question is that if this is the case then it's a massive disservice to those who are feeling the effects of genuine sexism and weakens their voice. I suspect that that was the net effect of what happened in the Sendgrid case and I think that is a very sad thing.
- mtrimpe 12y ago
  > I was just thinking the same thing as I re-read my comment. It is a false dichotomy and it was badly phrased. Thank you for that. It's somehow very much appreciated. As for the sexism accusations; Many, many women feel they're being discriminated at work ( and they're usually right.) Only a tiny, tiny percentage chooses to speak out about it though because of the very high costs associated with it. My guess is that in this case Julie-Ann just happened to be one of those silent women and when things escalated with Tom it was just a case of 'now that my reputation will be ruined anyhow I might just as well get everything off my chest.' If you read her original post she also doesn't make that much of a big deal about the sexism stuff; it's just 'one amongst many' of the abuses she listed. Also keep in mind that, assuming she's acting in good faith, it's very likely that the reverted commit was indeed very small and dubious but was accompanied, verbally or non-verbally, by something that very clearly and unambiguously communicated the real reason; but of course without leaving a paper trail.

Guvante 12y ago

> How did a case which apparently was not about sexism come to be so closely related to it? Because she explicitly called out that the source of the problem was gender discrimination. Whether she was mistaken or whether the investigation failed to find the problem no one knows for sure, but it is not surprising that this case was closing related to sexism when the victim claimed that was the cause.

cmelbye 12y ago

Would the founder's wife have acted inappropriately toward the employee had the employee been male? It's probably not possible to know the answer to that for sure, but that's where the possibility lies. The intention of GitHub's investigation was to determine if there was systemic sexism within the company.