4 ms·

Kudos to her for standing up to it, but she should clearly never have to. This kind of thing just shouldn't be happening... I don't think I know anybody who do

by chipx86 11y ago

Kudos to her for standing up to it, but she should clearly never have to. This kind of thing just shouldn't be happening... I don't think I know anybody who does this to women. I really hope that's because I don't actually know anyone who does, and not that people I otherwise respect are secretly doing this. How would a person know, if it's anonymous? Well, maybe a few ways. The question is, are these all actually anonymous? Jessie's post lists messages on IRC and e-mails. I'd bet some people get harassed on Twitter, Reddit, or other widely-used platforms. Some of these people must be identifiable, surely? At the very least, some might be using the same username/e-mail address across many services, and might end up using one in relation to a job application. The last thing I'd want is a witch hunt, where innocent people end up on the wrong end of an Internet lynch mob. What I'm about to wonder out-loud might be a bad or ill-conceived idea, but here goes: Would it be reasonable/helpful/worthwhile to have some centralized place where these kinds of harassments can be forwarded and grouped? E-mails with headers, tweets with screenshots of the full context, IRC messages with Nickserv registration info, etc., so that repeat offenders would have a form of evidence (and I stress evidence) stacked against them? Some form of "witness" system, where other recipients (Twitter users, IRC users, etc.) can sign off that they saw this take place? Basically, create a sort of tech industry predator list. Not everyone on there would be readily identifiable, but maybe some would be. I certainly would check it before hiring anyone, look up GitHub usernames and such, and it might help give people who don't experience this a better sense of just how terrible and prevalent this all is. So, good idea, at least in part? Terrible idea with too much potential for further abuse? Somewhere in-between?

byuu 11y ago
Way too difficult and rife for abuse. First, we don't really have static IPs, not even static prefixes on IPv6. You could narrow someone down to their city by their host mask, but that can still be any of 5,000,000 people. And all they have to do is change their MAC address and renew their DHCP lease to have a new IP. Second, easy to submit faked screenshots to get someone flagged as a bad person. When you get (in)famous enough, trolls start using false flag operations against you. Best bet is probably a service where registration requires absolute proof of ID (Facebook's "I pinky promise I'm really $madeUpName" isn't enough.) But that still has issues with stolen logins, tricking the registration system, the harassment having your real identity known can cause, and it would keep away decent people who value their privacy. This is why we can't have nice things.
thedudemabry 11y ago
I'm going to avoid addressing the community-created offender registry idea, because like you I'm not sure how to even begin evaluating its potential harms. But I think that law enforcement will inevitably create something of the sort. Like John Oliver's harrassment video from a few weeks ago described, these are real crimes being committed and the state has an interest in solving them. The current weak link in prosecuting offenders is in training officers and prosecutors to recognize that a crime was committed and in providing them the tools to gather enough evidence for a conviction. And I hope we'll get there soon. Once there is a lower bar for and less social stigma attached to reporting these crimes and having those responsible judged in court, there will be a public record. So whether someone in our community makes a death threat in real life or via Twitter, they'll face the same social consequences as well as legal ones.
- chipx86 11y ago
  Yeah, there is a lot of potential for abuse. Mostly hoping that it would spur on some additional thinking in this area. John Oliver's segment was great. What I'm unsure of, though, is how much a cop can really do? The offenders are not necessarily going to be in the same general area. They may not be in the same country. This would need to be handled internationally, in some way, wouldn't it?
  - nmrm2 11y ago
    Law enforcement has done a pretty decent job at cooperating across jurisdictions in their war on poor people who use drugs. I'm willing to bet that, if they cared about the issue, they would find a way. I'm also willing to bet a huge portion of these people are domestic.
  - baudehlo 11y ago
    John Oliver's segment massively downplayed the fact that men also get harassed online, to the point that I lost a lot of respect for it. It effectively made online harassment a female only problem, which it most definitely is not. This is an issue without gender. A perfect example is reddit's Unidan, who has received multiple death threats.
aaronem 11y ago
Absent any binding reputation system with meaningful consequences, making such a registry public would be a pretty broad abuse risk; you'd need extremely heavy moderation, distributed over a large number of people, and even then you'd just be increasing the effort required to abuse the system, rather than eliminating the possibility. Given the potentially serious consequences of being blacklisted this way, I'd be very hesitant to make a registry like this public. On the other hand, I'm really not sure anything less would be worthwhile -- keeping such a registry, but having it be private, would I think be hardly better than nothing, in terms of actually bringing this kind of misbehavior under control. There's a tradeoff here that I'm not sure I'm qualified to evaluate. On the one hand, I don't really care for the idea of an industry blacklist in general, on whatever grounds. On the other hand, I'm not having to put up with death threats, rape threats, depraved sexual harassment, et cetera ad nauseam, simply in order to try to do my job to the best of my ability. Taken all in all, I find myself in favor of a public registry. After all, no one has to act on anything they find there, and having a solid base of information out there would give the industry at large an opportunity, heretofore lacking, to put up or shut up -- either demonstrate that this kind of malbehavior is beyond the tech industry's civilized pale, or demonstrate that the tech industry is the boys' club it's been accused of being and has no particular desire to see that change. I'm honestly not sure which is the more likely result, but I have to say I'd be interested to see the experiment made.
aikah 11y ago
> Basically, create a sort of tech industry predator list People with your blacklists, you never learn... > The last thing I'd want is a witch hunt, That's exactly what it is. If one get abused,one must report it, contact someone in the business involved and even file a complain at the nearest police station. But lynch mobs on the internet ,no. If a business doesn't do enough against harassment then expose it. But don't go after individuals and ruin their lives because "internet justice".
chipsy 11y ago
Practically speaking, this has happened among SJ activists using social media; see for example the "Block Bot", "call-out culture," et al. What has been observed is that the harassment doesn't "go away", so much as metamorphose into indirect forms. Now when abusers get attacked, they weaponize their own victimhood into a backlash, suddenly sending out dozens of messages that build up a sympathetic story. They bury their past by opening a new account, but openly declare themselves to be the same person, so as to bring along their entourage. They threaten suicide to raise the stakes(and in most such cases, they are actually unstable enough for this to be a serious concern). Abusers can be popular despite evidence against them, through a mix of propaganda, misinformation, and well-meaning onlookers who thoughtlessly share. There are many gambits that allow you to be an awful person with few penalties. For this reason, many of my friends who were or considered being involved in activist efforts have gotten burned and would prefer not to be visible at all. The rest of them indicate some of the personality traits that allow them to tolerate or thrive off of sustained abuse, despite its toxicity. I currently believe that the Internet is too dangerous to broadcast open thoughts on, but it has an alternate possibility of suggesting those thoughts without saying them. The wise will find the wise without anyone being the wiser.

by chipx86 11y ago

byuu 11y ago

Way too difficult and rife for abuse. First, we don't really have static IPs, not even static prefixes on IPv6. You could narrow someone down to their city by their host mask, but that can still be any of 5,000,000 people. And all they have to do is change their MAC address and renew their DHCP lease to have a new IP. Second, easy to submit faked screenshots to get someone flagged as a bad person. When you get (in)famous enough, trolls start using false flag operations against you. Best bet is probably a service where registration requires absolute proof of ID (Facebook's "I pinky promise I'm really $madeUpName" isn't enough.) But that still has issues with stolen logins, tricking the registration system, the harassment having your real identity known can cause, and it would keep away decent people who value their privacy. This is why we can't have nice things.

thedudemabry 11y ago

I'm going to avoid addressing the community-created offender registry idea, because like you I'm not sure how to even begin evaluating its potential harms. But I think that law enforcement will inevitably create something of the sort. Like John Oliver's harrassment video from a few weeks ago described, these are real crimes being committed and the state has an interest in solving them. The current weak link in prosecuting offenders is in training officers and prosecutors to recognize that a crime was committed and in providing them the tools to gather enough evidence for a conviction. And I hope we'll get there soon. Once there is a lower bar for and less social stigma attached to reporting these crimes and having those responsible judged in court, there will be a public record. So whether someone in our community makes a death threat in real life or via Twitter, they'll face the same social consequences as well as legal ones.

chipx86 11y ago
Yeah, there is a lot of potential for abuse. Mostly hoping that it would spur on some additional thinking in this area. John Oliver's segment was great. What I'm unsure of, though, is how much a cop can really do? The offenders are not necessarily going to be in the same general area. They may not be in the same country. This would need to be handled internationally, in some way, wouldn't it?
- nmrm2 11y ago
  Law enforcement has done a pretty decent job at cooperating across jurisdictions in their war on poor people who use drugs. I'm willing to bet that, if they cared about the issue, they would find a way. I'm also willing to bet a huge portion of these people are domestic.
- baudehlo 11y ago
  John Oliver's segment massively downplayed the fact that men also get harassed online, to the point that I lost a lot of respect for it. It effectively made online harassment a female only problem, which it most definitely is not. This is an issue without gender. A perfect example is reddit's Unidan, who has received multiple death threats.

aaronem 11y ago

Absent any binding reputation system with meaningful consequences, making such a registry public would be a pretty broad abuse risk; you'd need extremely heavy moderation, distributed over a large number of people, and even then you'd just be increasing the effort required to abuse the system, rather than eliminating the possibility. Given the potentially serious consequences of being blacklisted this way, I'd be very hesitant to make a registry like this public. On the other hand, I'm really not sure anything less would be worthwhile -- keeping such a registry, but having it be private, would I think be hardly better than nothing, in terms of actually bringing this kind of misbehavior under control. There's a tradeoff here that I'm not sure I'm qualified to evaluate. On the one hand, I don't really care for the idea of an industry blacklist in general, on whatever grounds. On the other hand, I'm not having to put up with death threats, rape threats, depraved sexual harassment, et cetera ad nauseam, simply in order to try to do my job to the best of my ability. Taken all in all, I find myself in favor of a public registry. After all, no one has to act on anything they find there, and having a solid base of information out there would give the industry at large an opportunity, heretofore lacking, to put up or shut up -- either demonstrate that this kind of malbehavior is beyond the tech industry's civilized pale, or demonstrate that the tech industry is the boys' club it's been accused of being and has no particular desire to see that change. I'm honestly not sure which is the more likely result, but I have to say I'd be interested to see the experiment made.

aikah 11y ago

> Basically, create a sort of tech industry predator list People with your blacklists, you never learn... > The last thing I'd want is a witch hunt, That's exactly what it is. If one get abused,one must report it, contact someone in the business involved and even file a complain at the nearest police station. But lynch mobs on the internet ,no. If a business doesn't do enough against harassment then expose it. But don't go after individuals and ruin their lives because "internet justice".

chipsy 11y ago

Practically speaking, this has happened among SJ activists using social media; see for example the "Block Bot", "call-out culture," et al. What has been observed is that the harassment doesn't "go away", so much as metamorphose into indirect forms. Now when abusers get attacked, they weaponize their own victimhood into a backlash, suddenly sending out dozens of messages that build up a sympathetic story. They bury their past by opening a new account, but openly declare themselves to be the same person, so as to bring along their entourage. They threaten suicide to raise the stakes(and in most such cases, they are actually unstable enough for this to be a serious concern). Abusers can be popular despite evidence against them, through a mix of propaganda, misinformation, and well-meaning onlookers who thoughtlessly share. There are many gambits that allow you to be an awful person with few penalties. For this reason, many of my friends who were or considered being involved in activist efforts have gotten burned and would prefer not to be visible at all. The rest of them indicate some of the personality traits that allow them to tolerate or thrive off of sustained abuse, despite its toxicity. I currently believe that the Internet is too dangerous to broadcast open thoughts on, but it has an alternate possibility of suggesting those thoughts without saying them. The wise will find the wise without anyone being the wiser.