The Dolphins Make Me Cry.com - Forums

Here is one of the rare situations where my virulent leftism is overridden by another factor (in this case, my nerd-centric bro mindset):

http://techcrunch.com/2014/03/15/julie-ann-horvath-describes-sexism-and-intimidation-behind-her-github-exit/

Julie Ann Horvath, one of the senior software engineers at GitHub (a programming network for Open Source software) has resigned amid claims of a sexist internal culture.  In a nutshell, she alleges that she was repeatedly intimidated and harassed by the founder's wife (who is not an employee), which then escalated to an HR meeting with the founder; the founder accused Horvath of being a liar and told Horvath that it was bad judgment to date a co-worker (Horvath was in a relationship with another GitHub employee).  According to Horvath, she cried during the meeting, and was left "crying and shaking uncontrollably."  The founder also had a conversion with Horvath's significant other and asked him to resign (he did not).

During this time, another employee asked himself over to “talk,” and then professed his love, and “hesitated” when he was asked to leave. Horvath was in a committed relationship at the time, something this other employee was well aware of, according to Horvath.  After this rejection, on several occasions said employee removed Horvath's code from various projects with no comments or explanation (in open source development, this is a Bad Thing).

Horvath also alleges that after this and other HR meetings, when HR had made it clear that the founder's wife (again, not an employee!) was not to to be on the same floor as Horvath, the wife still repeatedly sat near and around Horvath, and directly confronted her.

The final straw for Horvath came when she saw men gawking at women who were hula-hooping at the office. She called the episode “a really ugly and inappropriate scene.” Her words:

"Two women, one of whom I work with and adore, and a friend of hers were hula hooping to some music. I didn’t have a problem with this. What I did have a problem with is the line of men sitting on one bench facing the hoopers and gawking at them. It looked like something out of a strip club. When I brought this up to male coworkers, they didn’t see a problem with it. But for me it felt unsafe and to be honest, really embarrassing. That was the moment I decided to finally leave GitHub."

After Horvath had arranged an exit with HR, someone posted a disparaging message to a social networking site about her departure; that post is what led Horvath to “speak up.” Instead of seeking attention, Horvath says she wants someone to be finally held accountable.

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My thoughts:

- The founder's wife has no business being at the company or telling people what to do; it is not a family business and she is not an employee
- Reverting someone else's code without explanation or commentary (especially after you have been exposed with ulterior motives) is Not OK
- You should not ask someone to resign over a personal relationship unless that has been clearly prohibited before-the-fact

But:
- Crying during an HR meeting doesn't make you right (and Horvath is the one that repeatedly mentioned the crying)
- Dating people at work means you lose the right to complain about normal dating drama (including: being propositioned by people you aren't interested in) at work
- If you are hulahooping (or dancing, or doing pushups, or other physical recreational activity) at work during business hours, then you shouldn't be complaining about co-workers looking at you

While I agree with Horvath on the broad strokes, some of her complaints strike me as wanting to have her cake and eat it too.  Furthermore, I simply cannot endorse I was crying as a indicator for anything of value; such an evaluation inherently favors those with the least emotional stability.  To be clear, I'm not bashing her for getting upset and crying  (you can't necessarily always control your emotions); I'm bashing her for pointing that out as support for her position.

I've been following this case. The sexism in tech is overwhelming and part of the reason I either want out or to work on my own terms. It's REALLY bad. I imagine it's even worse in SF.

With that said, my number one rule is don't sleep with or date  coworkers. Been there. Done that and it always gets messy.

I do agree that sexism is VERY prevalent in the tech field... it may be one of the most sexist fields out there.  Among tech/gaming/comic/sci-fi communities (anything with a large population of nerds), there's a very strong undercurrent of "girls think they're too good for us?  well they can go to hell" mentality.  This is also why you see the "fake geek girl" accusations; guys who have a lifetime of indoctrination that girls don't approve of your interests are immediately suspicious of a girl that does, and think she's just doing it for the attention (and believe me, there is a lot of attention).

That all being said, if (attractive) women in the office are hulahooping, then guys in the office will be looking at them, and I cannot imagine any field in which this would not be so.  And in general, I just have no tolerance for people who date co-workers and then complain about another co-worker asking them out.  That reeks to me of the "What's the difference between harassment and charm?  Whether or not he's attractive" trope.

especially if they do crack

the difference between harassment and not harassment isn't asking someone out .. it's the deleting of their code  in retaliation

Or trying to pressure them into going out with you after they've told you no several times

I don't see any complaints about the asking out. I see the complaint about code being deleted after the rejection. Other than this, I pretty much agree with all your positions.

Spider - Do you work for a tech company?  I'm asking because you seem to know a lot about the inner workings of tech companies first hand.

I work in a tech company (although some people would smugly claim otherwise) and we don't see this type of behavior.  Granted the employee ratio is probably 85% male, but the females that do work here are treated no differently as far as I can see.

As for the hula hooping incident, the girls doing the hooping weren't the ones objecting.  No one hula hoops privately, they were doing it for the attention.  A third party observer was the objector.  To be frank, its none of her damn business.  Nothing inappropriate was going on...

I am currently re-writing my company's manual for HR and I studied a bit on how other companies handle these kind of issues about harassment.

The short answer is that it's extremely broad and basically anything that someone feels is harassing is harassing.  So much of it has to do with how the person perceives the interactions.  It's all about good judgment, reporting to supervisors, and letting them handle it as quickly as possible.

As I saw it, Horvath made a specific point to complain that the co-worker asked her out even though she already has a boyfriend (that works with them).  Maybe I read too much into that and she was just setting up facts.

I've worked in IT for most of my adult life, for companies across the spectrum (software, insurance, pharma, medical, wine industry, gov't, etc.).  I'm not necessarily talking about tech companies as I am the tech field (e.g. the IT department within a hospital).

Aren't you in electrical engineering?  When I say tech, I primarily think about software/IT, though I could see how consumer electronics might also be considered tech.  (note: this is not me smugly claiming otherwise)

Not to go off topic, but with the advent of the smart phone, I would say that mobile phone companies should definitely be considered tech companies.

i would say brian works at a tech company for sure.

and i work at a company that provides Saas

Boy did I learn my lesson.

I would never consider it sexual harassment for a coworker to ask me out (unless that's strictly forbidden. As is the case in many companies.). It goes over the line when they repeatedly ask you out or are then hostile after saying no. ie - deleting your code

The hula hooping thing is just stupid across the board.

I did state my position on this, but yeah, repeatedly deleting someone else's code with no explanation or comment would be an HR-worthy offense by itself.  Doing so after you've have your romantic advances rejected is what I would call grounds for instant termination.

^^ Only if you can prove motivation, as opposed to sheer ignorance.  He's going to plead the "i didn't know" card, or whatever.  He deserves a stern reprimand, perhaps probation.  A second infraction would likely lead to termination.

As I said, repeatedly deleting someone else's code without comment or explanation is a big deal in and of itself.  That alone should earn him a trip to HR, regardless of who he's doing it to.

Now, if it turns out that he's just been deleting her code and not others' as well?  Goodbye, enjoy your exciting new employment opportunities.

Repeatedly accidentally deleting someone else's code that you don't like, is sufficient evidence of motivation.  You don't have to take his word on it, you can judge from conduct ones motivation.  Once can be an accident, multiple times is strong evidence that is was deliberate.

Besides, even if you accept the accidental theory, repeatedly accidentally destroying a company asset thru sheer ignorance is gross incompetence and a valid reason for dismissal. (However, if the state believes the fired employee that it was incompetence instead of deliberate they would be eligible for unemployment insurance.)       

REPEATEDLY doing it is a failure of management.  It should be corrected after instance #1.  If not, then I agree.  However, if it happens 37 times before anyone says anything to the guy, that's a failure of supervision.

You can't just fire him without prior reprimand, I feel.  Not legally, but in fairness.

If he's deleting the code without comment or explanation on an open-source project (<--- this part is important), he already knows he's doing something wrong.  Very, very wrong.  There are two possibilities:

1) He's an insufferable asshole who thinks he can just revert changes on his own without documentation, in which case HR should immediately proceed to corrective action
2) (if he's only reverting her changes) He is clearly and unambiguously using his position to settle personal grudges, in which case he should immediately be fired

You absolutely DO NOT modify code on an open-source project without documentation.  You just don't do it.  Open source programming cannot work if you do.

edit: To go into more detail, the company in question (GitHub) provides code management and review.  For someone that works at a code management/review company to revert code without documentation would be like someone at McAfee "accidentally" opening an unknown e-mail attachment and infecting someone else's PC with a virus; either it was intentionally malicious, or that person is so grossly incompetent that he should be fired anyway.

Agreed on this. He knows exactly what he's doing.

Also, kind of off topic, but I just sat through an online Q&A with Anita Hill. She was awesome!