I disagree with the black and white view of morality that the article espouses. If people do something wrong, they should be punished, but banning them from community entirely seems a little medieval to me.
People are human, and sometimes they are complicated, and can do good and bad at the same time.
If someone repeatedly raped and made inappropriate sexual comments about your family members banning them from family events would be considered about the mildest thing you could do.
This guy should be in prison for rape. But even disregarding the actual illegal things this guy has done, his other behavior alone disqualifies him from interacting with others in the community, esp. as a community leader.
On the other hand, it's up to the particular community (or employer) to weight the situation. I don't think doing something illegal should mean that every community should shun you, and it seems to me that's what the article calls for.
It's a warning to other communities that unless he changes his ways, which probably involves undergoing therapy, there is a high likelihood that he will be a threat to women elsewhere. Communities can and will do what they want, but his history should be known so that people don't advertently put more women at risk of his predatory behaviour.
I certainly agree with that. I don't however agree that it invalidates the possibly good work that he has done in other areas. (As I explain below, that's what the article seems to claim.)
If multiple female friends come up to me and tell me that they are comfortable around a person because they said some lewd things or grabbed their butt, I'm not going to respond by saying "oh well why don't you just go to the police and get them arrested". I'm just going to ban the guy from the event.
This is not a court of law. If I am running a private event, I can ban people for whatever reason I feel like. And "this person has made multiple people very uncomfortable because of the things he said or has done" seems like a pretty damn good reason to me.
She's calling out his employer for not firing him when he was known to sexually harass employees. It's black and white because it's clear as day. Don't keep rapists on your staff, you're making your workplace unsafe for other employees.
Certain willful and vile behavior does merit banning from a community. Why should other people have to endure sexual harassment and be fearful when they go to events because of this guy?
Tolerating his behavior sends the message that it is okay to behave that way in that community and that if you want to be a part of the community you'll simply have to endure his toxicity.
> I disagree with the black and white view of morality that the article espouses.
What on earth are you talking about?
> If people do something wrong, they should be punished, but banning them from community entirely seems a little medieval to me.
He should be in jail, there's nothing medieval about separating a rapist from the community.
Anyone who introduces people to you by lying and saying you give good head in a business context is absolutely someone who needs to be completely ostracized, this is an abusive person with some serious disorder who should have been fired the first time that happened. That is not ever OK.
So, let's say that you loan someone $2000, and they promise to pay you back, but they don't.
Now, let's say that person comes to me and asks for $2000. I know you loaned them money, so I ask you, and you say 'Well, he didn't pay me back, and I don't think he's a good risk.'"
Given that, I can react in two ways.
A) "Huh. Good to know. Thanks for the heads-up."
B) "You never took him to court, and he was never found guilty. Stop accusing him."
It appears that you're requiring the evidentiary standards of a court of law that can imprison someone, when the actual punishment here is removal from a specific social and professional sphere.
Two different standards of evidence for two different spheres of influence.
There's more than enough evidence for him to have been fired "in that article alone"; of course a rape charge would have to be prosecuted, my saying he should be in jail doesn't mean "without due process". Firing someone however requires no due process, several women complaining about harassment is more than enough.
The bar for firing is much lower than the bar for imprisonment, you obviously can't see that, but it's true none the less. That article contains first hand testimony of multiple incidence of abuse and names numerous witnesses so it's all easily verifiable; if that's not enough evidence for you to fire someone, you need to reevaluate your standards. If you wouldn't fire him for those complaints, you're complicit in his abusive behavior.
That would be true if you were replying to the original post, but you weren't, I clarified the jobs thing and then you replied to it so no, it isn't a moved goal post or a straw man, so go on and try another line of reason or move along.
How is this getting down-voted? Dude seems 100% toxic, keeping him around is only going to poison the community further.
Is there something the HN community identifies with in this man?
Extrajudicial mob justice is killing someone who you think is a murderer.
Firing someone because of their behavior does not require a court of law (though they can challenge it in court). Banning someone from a community function does not require a trial, nor should it.
If you act like an asshole, don't be surprised if people don't want to be around you. That part of the situation is not a matter for the courts. The rape, however, is a matter for the courts.
Firing someone for inappropriate abusive behavior is not remotely mob justice. Mob justice would be dragging him into a back alley and cutting his balls off. Do you see the difference? I'm guessing you don't since you're repeating your "mob justice" comment several times over.
Specifically, this:
"When harassment, sexual or otherwise, requires a cost-benefit analysis, you have failed."
And this: "When someone harasses, humiliates, discounts, abuses, threatens, stalks, takes action to harm someone, no — they do not do good work."
> He should be in jail, there's nothing medieval about separating a rapist from the community.
Assuming he is a rapist (he hasn't been convinced), then yes, he should be in jail. But even then, he shouldn't be entirely prevented to participate in coding on Tor or political activity or whatever he was doing.
> Anyone who introduces people to you by lying and saying you give good head in a business context is absolutely someone who needs to be completely ostracized
I disagree. I don't think a person like that should be completely ostracized. Yes, he should get a different job, something that perhaps requires less social skills.
Let me ask you, in practice, what are you going to do with all those ostracized people? If you're American, I am not surprised with your views - that's the way how you got the largest prison population on the planet. But I don't think it's a way to run a civilized society, I am sorry.
A case of Hans Reiser came to my mind. I don't think he should be ostracized and prevented to commit any new code in his life (assuming he wants to), and he is a murderer. Or that we should reject ReiserFS or its concepts in jest. I am sure there are many other examples from history.
>But even then, he shouldn't be entirely prevented to participate in coding on Tor or political activity or whatever he was doing.
You think that if this guy literally raped people he should not be excluded from the community he exploited and damaged? What the fuck, dude?
If the stories coming out about this guy are true, then he is dangerous. He should be excluded from the community, not as some sort of vigilante punishment, but to keep others in the community safe. If you know someone has a pattern of hurting others and you choose to keep enabling them, then it's your fault, too.
Hans Reiser is an interesting comparison because he didn't murder his coworkers. It's one thing to say "everybody deserves a second chance". It's an entirely different thing to say that everyone deserves a second chance with the very same people they victimized. Do you think Reiser's in-laws are morally obligated to invite him to their holidays once he's served his time?
> You think that if this guy literally raped people he should not be excluded from the community he exploited and damaged?
Duh, no, and I already explained my position in other comments. Perhaps I should have written "society" instead of "community" in the original comment, that would have been clearer. Any community should be free to shun him, or not to do it. And community which doesn't shouldn't be called out for not doing it.
Your question is a little loaded, because you assume that the community feels it was damaged. But maybe it doesn't.
> Duh, no, and I already explained my position in other comments. Perhaps I should have written "society" instead of "community" in the original comment, that would have been clearer.
I don't think anyone here has actually proposed that Appelbaum be excluded from society as a whole. It is, however, perfectly legitimate to tell people/communities/society, "Hey, be wary of this guy. He has a history of abuse."
> Any community should be free to shun him, or not to do it. And community which doesn't shouldn't be called out for not doing it.
It's absolutely reasonable to call out a community for not doing the right thing. If a community is enabling members to do terrible things, they should be called out. If a community is enabling abusers, or sheltering thieves, or otherwise hiding unethical or criminal behavior, it's perfectly correct to say, "Hey, you're an accomplice to the crimes you're enabling." To say that no one should call out the Tor community for enabling Appelbaum is to say that no one should have called out the Catholic Church for hiding child molestation.
> Your question is a little loaded, because you assume that the community feels it was damaged. But maybe it doesn't.
Clearly at least part of the community feels that Appelbaum has done damage.
> I don't think anyone here has actually proposed that Appelbaum be excluded from society as a whole.
Well, that's how I read the original article (it's an appeal to all tech people to shun him) and some of the comments.
> If a community is enabling abusers, or sheltering thieves, or otherwise hiding unethical or criminal behavior
But we don't know if he was criminal. It's a matter of justice to decide that.
In any case, I meant my original quote assuming that the person gets actually punished if they are found guilty. If they have been punished for their deeds, why should any community be necessarily required to add to that punishment?
> To say that no one should call out the Tor community for enabling Appelbaum is to say that no one should have called out the Catholic Church for hiding child molestation.
It's not the same. Tor community is not preventing criminal investigation. It's perfectly OK to call out community for interfering with justice (since they are part of the society). But it's not OK to call out some community because it doesn't do extra punishment to people who we consider morally bad. (Also, the Catholic Church case has another dimension which is hypocrisy.)
You're reading selectively. I also mentioned abusers and unethical behavior. You overlooked that because it doesn't fit into your "justice system" narrative.
> But it's not OK to call out some community because it doesn't do extra punishment to people who we consider morally bad.
Yes, it absolutely is. The problem here is you're worried about punishment when you should be worried about the community. Shunning someone is partly about punishment but it's also largely about protecting the community. It is perfectly right to say "hey, you have predators in your midst and it's hurting some of your community members while you look the other way." The Catholic church issue is extremely relevant because it is the same scenario at a higher level of severity. Predators preying on the weak should be called out, and if the community doesn't do it, they should fully expect those outside the community to do so.
Your concerns here are especially nonsensical, though, because it's actually community members calling this guy out.
I am worried about the community. But I consider abusers to be part of it, whether you like it or not. I believe that shunning them out completely is worse than trying to rehabilitate them (which means some punishment plus some forgiveness).
I see this as a variation of a NIMBY problem. If you consider community as a sort medieval thing, which needs to be protected from outsiders at all cost anyway, it's a perfectly valid strategy to deal with abusers by shunning them out.
But modern world is not like that. The abusers have to live somewhere in the society, and if they are not allowed to interact with others, you will get a bigger problem. And arguably, USA applies this strategy the most from all developed world, and it is a cause of considerable problems.
And I am saying again, what I specifically disagreed with was the call to other groups to shun him.
I don't think that continuing to include serial abusers is in any way rehabilitating. It's just enabling.
I'd be interested in hearing how allowing someone with a consistent pattern of sexual harassment continue to participate in the community will result in anything other than more of the same.
To be clear, shunning this guy from the community isn't likely to result in him being a homeless criminal. He has marketable skills and clearly people have in the past ignored his behavior because it was beneficial to business. He can undoubtedly find a job. What he might not find after this is a position of power and influence, which is a good thing. (Of course assuming the accusations are largely true.)
> He has marketable skills and clearly people have in the past ignored his behavior because it was beneficial to business. He can undoubtedly find a job.
But isn't this what the OP argues against? That nobody should consider him having good skills because he is a harasser?
And regarding him having "position of power". I actually wish no one had a position of power, ever. I would even argue that the whole concept exists to facilitate sexual selection, and that's the reason why many people (of both sexes) will want it to exist.
Sure. I'd agree that the OP is arguing that basically no one should employ this guy. I don't quite agree with that, but I also don't think that it's a real concern because someone will employ this guy whether it's a good idea or not.
Regarding power, I don't agree with your assessment. Positions of power exist to provide social structure. Yes, positions of power are relevant to mating, but humans would have power structures even if we started reproducing asexually. If you put a dozen people in a room and ask them to accomplish something, leaders will emerge, because the alternative is disorganized, undirected, and wasted energy.
> ask them to accomplish something, leaders will emerge, because the alternative is disorganized, undirected, and wasted energy
There are studies that indicate that the "natural leaders" will be predominantly men, because of intervention from both sexes (both sexes see by default dominant women as worse than dominant men). And I don't think alternative is necessarily wasted energy, for example democracy is a pretty good alternative. It's hard to say what would happen if we were asexual, but maybe we would all readily agree on having democracy.
No, that's too simplistic definition. You're talking about representative democracy, but that's just one of the about 4 possible options how to implement democracy, which is at the core about everybody having same power in decision-making.
We know he's an abusive person due to the multiple incidence described in the article which included specifics that can be verified. That's enough to get him shunned regardless of any criminal behavior.
> But it's not OK to call out some community because it doesn't do extra punishment to people who we consider morally bad.
You're confused, what he's doing is not merely morally bad, it's directly abusive to people, i.e. it's actually bad regardless of any loose morality, there are victims. He's victimizing people with sexually abusive behavior in public, this isn't a simple matter of "morals" being different.
> Specifically, this: "When harassment, sexual or otherwise, requires a cost-benefit analysis, you have failed."
JA was not essential for Tor's continued survival as a project and a movement. They chose the convenience of a good developer at the cost of his victims. Are you going to personally tell the victims that their sacrifice was worth it, because Tor is better than ever?
> Are you going to personally tell the victims that their sacrifice was worth it, because Tor is better than ever?
Probably not, I don't know any of them personally.
> They chose the convenience of a good developer at the cost of his victims.
That's one interpretation. But maybe the community around Tor decided that these accusations are independent problem, which should be dealt with by the police and justice system. I am not part of that community, so I cannot tell them how to deal with it; they should have freedom to decide for themselves. Yes, maybe they will make some other members unhappy in the process.
Suppose the illegal act in question is a little different. It gets revealed that famous person in OSS project cheated on taxes. Should there be a call trying to ban him from working on OSS? Should everybody denounce his work? Or should he just get his punishment and continue with whatever he was doing?
> they should have freedom to decide for themselves. Yes, maybe they will make some other members unhappy in the process.
They can and do have the freedom to decide for themselves. Right now they seem to be deciding that this guy should be excluded because it's better for the community.
Some people struggle to understand when it's okay to exclude others, presumably because they were excluded at some point and found it hurtful. Sometimes, though, the person you are trying to include is hurtful, and the rest of the community suffers as a result. By excluding a hurtful person, you include others who are driven away by the hurtful person. You might think that you're giving the "choice" to everyone by keeping the hurtful person in the community, but you aren't. The people driven away by the dangerous, hurtful, or just plain abrasive people don't have the choice to participate in a healthy community. So long as the community chooses to include hurtful people, they choose to exclude the people victimized by those hurtful people.
I have friends who were really into tabletop gaming (e.g. Warhammer 40k). They used to go to the gaming store to play with other people in the gaming community. They stopped going because a number of the players there were assholes. They were abrasive, and made creepy remarks toward women, and generally made it unpleasant to be there. New people would show up to play a few times, have a bad interaction, and stop coming. Other people also stopped going because of this, which meant the assholes were an even bigger piece of the community. Eventually my friends stopped going entirely because the community wasn't fun to engage with anymore. Including the assholes drove away too many of the good community members. Including the assholes hurt everyone else.
> It gets revealed that famous person in OSS project cheated on taxes. Should there be a call trying to ban him from working on OSS?
This is entirely different, because in the case of Appelbaum, the community is (allegedly) being victimized. If he'd cheated on his taxes, no one would likely be calling for him to be excluded from the community. If he were repeatedly stealing from his co-workers wallets? Yeah, there would probably be a call to exclude him because he's toxic.
Well, we completely disagree; if you voluntarily employed such a person, I'd consider you complicit in his behavior and just as reprehensible as him. That's not black and white thinking, that's moral reasoning. If fact views like yours are the problem here, you're basic point is "but he does good work".
Yes, we disagree. The problem with this, in my view, very extreme black-and-white moral thinking, is that if everybody would strictly follow it we would very quickly run out of people who are not reprehensible. I simply think there needs to be a balance, and somebody who is not actively punishing others (even if he actually thinks they are immoral) is not on the same level of reprehensible as them. That's why human morality has also a component of forgiveness.
It's not extreme, it's normal and healthy to exclude abusive people from groups. Your position, keeping them, is the extreme one and it's abusive to those whom he abuses. You're concerned about a slippery slope that doesn't exist, your position is based on fear of a possible bad future rather than the reality of an abusive person actively hurting people in the present. If you support someone by continuing to employ them, when they are known to act this way, you are complicit in their abuse.
Forgiveness applies after someone is accountable for and have changed their behavior; it has no relevance here.
People are human, and sometimes they are complicated, and can do good and bad at the same time.