“But he does good work.”

https://medium.com/@violetblue/but-he-does-good-work-6710df9d9029#.axjt9r4e2

by jarcane • 10 years ago

415 266 10 years ago

medium.com

kendallpark• 10 years ago

This one of the most disturbing pieces I've read on this topic. Disgusting.

"When harassment, sexual or otherwise, requires a cost-benefit analysis, you have failed."

calibraxis• 10 years ago

Yep. Common as hell though. Not only do I know many who've explicitly told me about such attacks, but basic statistics indicates that many people we know have been attacked, regardless of them telling us. (Of course people often don't speak up when attacked, because the rest of us are generally complicit in maintaining that culture, for example shaming or silencing targets.)

ultramancool16• 10 years ago

Has anyone actually put their real name on something saying they were personally attacked by him yet?

Last I checked everything was just vague accusations, has this changed?

arenaninja• 10 years ago

"When harassment, sexual or otherwise, requires a cost-benefit analysis, you have failed."

I don't really agree with the quote. Harassment can be too loosely defined.

"It was a close call as to whether his benefits outweighed his liabilities."

I disagree with this one more strongly though. I mean from the author's writing, this guy was off-the-charts.

mordocai6• 10 years ago

Right, I believe the author's intent was that when you consider something the person is doing to be harassment and you still have a cost benefit analysis about whether to keep them, you have failed.

893helios• 10 years ago

It's a bloody mess really. http://theindicter.com/the-weaponising-of-social-part-1-the-...

pierrebai• 10 years ago

This link is really disturbing.

The poster seems to go out of her way to frame all accusation against Jake Appelbaum as a setup to discredit him. She even begins with an apology that claiming that wikileaks and Assange are worthy of excusing him. Bascially, 'but he does good work'...!

The text analysis reaslly outlines just how far people are going to try to drown and reject any allegation. Violet Blue's post contains dozens of precise allegations, with employer, locale, people and precise situations. Many of the incidents she describes can be verified, his getting fired and the emails. Yet, we're being served the same 'but he does good work.'

jamespo2• 10 years ago

that's a very long-winded way of also saying "but he does good work"

srtjstjsj7• 10 years ago

It's a long-winded way of saying that the anti-ioerror camp is led by a group that has logical inconsistencies and possible dishonesty throughout its accusations, is attacking the people it claims to be trying to get justice for, and is scortched-earth inviting harassment upon uninvolved people who happen to live in ioerror's building.

peterwwillis• 10 years ago

Most of the outlets are having a hard time wrapping their heads around how this could go on so long within arenas whose missions are to fight against injustice and power imbalances, and to champion whistleblowers.

So, again, this was basically personal power within an in-group. It can happen in literally any in-group, because it's a social dynamic, and social dynamics don't follow the ethos of an organization, they follow human heuristics.

The "stories" make for juicy reading, but the details of this case aren't special. Jake's is one of the most blatant, obvious, ongoing examples i've heard of, but similar situations happen in a variety of ways, usually far less obvious. Since the hacker scene is very much an exclusive in-group of outsiders, this kind of person is much more accepted there. But you'll still find these kinds of situations everywhere.

js814• 10 years ago

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.

gnaritas8• 10 years ago

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.

TheGirondin• 10 years ago

It depends on you worldview, if you find extrajudicial mob justice acceptable or if you believe in rule of law.

collyw3• 10 years ago

"He should be in jail, there's nothing medieval about separating a rapist from the community."

Has he been convicted of rape, or is an article on the internet good enough evidence for you? There is a good reason we have courts a justice system.

js814• 10 years ago

What on earth are you talking about?

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.

eutropia2• 10 years ago

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?

andrewvc2• 10 years ago

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.

js814• 10 years ago

I agree with that, assuming he is guilty.

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.

mfoy_2• 10 years ago

So you're literally saying "but he does good work"?

I hope you appreciate the irony.

frandroid2• 10 years ago

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.

GVIrish2• 10 years ago

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.

DanBC5• 10 years ago

It's really important that we understand why it's hard for people to stand up against abuse. It's very easy to say "I would", and maybe you would, but we see time and time again that it's hard for people to make that stand.

m_t• 10 years ago

I don't know why your comment seems downvoted.

I think it is a very valid question. How, as an employer, as a community, can we make sure negative or abusive behaviour is dealt with correctly?

stevetrewick• 10 years ago

I cannot believe this is getting down voted. What the hell HN? Would anyone care to explain their reasoning? What the OP said is not even remotely controversial.

gooseyard• 10 years ago

If a guy like this were to get a legitimate psychiatric diagnosis, what do you suppose it'd be? Not that I feel bad for the guy, mind you, rather I feel it'd be helpful to the community of people who have been affected by this kind of behavior to have an accurate name for it other than just saying the guy is a douchebag.

I knew a guy in college who had some aspects of this guy's behavior and was diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder (tragically, he fully embraced his condition), but I only have an armchair knowledge of psychiatry and I'd be interested to hear what somebody with experience has to say about it.

salmon30salmon• 10 years ago

It is generally considered inappropriate for a mental health practitioner to offer a diagnosis without formally seeing the patient in question, so I doubt that someone who has the knowledge to make an assessment would take the leap and breach protocol. It would surely be interesting though.

dpark9• 10 years ago

There's a whole spectrum of personality disorders, including narcissistic personality disorder, borderline personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder (aka sociopathy). Any of these and maybe others could be diagnosed. Or maybe none and this guy (based on the alleged behaviors) is just a terrible person with no diagnosable disorder.

musha68k2• 10 years ago

I can recommend Pieter Hintjens' "Psychopath Code" if you want to learn more on how human/social predators operate:

http://hintjens.com/blog:_psychopaths

Edit: I neither know the accused nor the writer of that piece, I just wanted to share that there's lots of layers to reality and that this book was eye-opening to me in that regard.

jrowley• 10 years ago

It's funny that we look for a diagnosis when something terrible happens. Why do we do it? I guess so we can work to help people that suffer from said diseases, but there are also plenty of people that do horrible things that don't fall into certain categories/diagnoses.

llamataboot2• 10 years ago

"Complex interplay between own personality and patriarchy/misogyny"

dloose• 10 years ago

I only have an armchair knowledge of psychiatry and I'd be interested to hear what somebody with experience has to say about it

Hopefully anybody with experience will know better than to diagnose someone over the Internet based largely on hearsay.

danso5• 10 years ago

I typed this response to a comment that called the OP "mostly bullshit" and that if someone does wrong, it is incumbent upon the victim to file charges or forever hold their peace. The comment was flagged so I couldn't submit what I typed, so I've pasted it here.

I agree that it's hard to find black and white in accusations...but I'd argue that even the judicial system leaves more than enough gray to argue over. And because of that, I don't believe that things are ever as simple "if something is wrong, file charges" -- just like it's never as easy as "if you love someone, put a ring on it."

I'll likely have the privilege of never having to file charges for rape, but once I had to file charges as a victim of armed robbery. Even though I had plenty of evidence, in hand and forthcoming (Android location tracing)...I had a hell of a time convincing a detective that I wasn't faking a robbery for insurance purposes, just because I wasn't clear exactly what block i was on when it happened. I can't even fucking imagine what it is like convincing the system that sexual assault (or even harassment) has happened, but I imagine the friction is enough to deter people from taking necessary action until it's too late. It seems that some of these victims are able to talk themselves out of thinking that a colleague truly did wrong, and when others step up, they realize their mistake in being quiet.

mordocai6• 10 years ago

Not to mention that this guy would apparently blackmail and/or destroy you if you tried to spread the word (no mention of filing charges that I saw, but I imagine a similar story).

dantillberg2• 10 years ago

Edit: Oops, I misread the parent, and I agree that yes, seeking legal help in a case like this is much harder than with robbery, which is hard enough.

-----

Robbery doesn't really make for a good comparison here:

- Did you fear for your own physical safety (e.g. that the thief or their friends/etc might retaliate) in reporting the crime to the police?

- Did you known the thief? Did you have friends in common, or did you work together? Will you possibly see social retaliation from the thief's allies for reporting their behavior?

- Does everyone involved, including the thief and the police, agree on what defines acceptable/legal behavior, or are you going to be argue with the police and others that just because you wore a sexy dress didn't mean that you "wanted" someone to steal your phone?

incongruity2• 10 years ago

It actually does make a good case, IMHO.

The robbery experience is comparably simple for the victim and yet even for that, filing a report and being believed was difficult. Therefore, it makes it completely believable that filing a complaint for something like sexual assault would be undeniably hard for many people, in many cases.

DanBC5• 10 years ago

That's the point -- someone had a difficult experience reporting a robbery, even though the definitions are much clearer and the evidence was much clearer. That person can imagine how much harder it is to report sexual violence.

kej• 10 years ago

I think that's his point. Dealing with the robbery was bad enough, how much worse must it be when dealing with sexual harassment and assault?

danso5• 10 years ago

Yes, I agree, robbery doesn't make a good comparison with rape because I had every reason to make the accusation of robbery, and such allegations are made on standards of evidence that most people agree on. Even though I knew it was going to be a pain in the ass, it was something that I had to do because 1) hard to file a insurance claim without a police report 2) kind of hard to just let a gun-wielding robber run around. I've had stuff stolen from me and I didn't report it, but armed-robbery is a whole different thing. I did feel paranoid for a few days afterward...after all, he had complete access to my phone and may have gleaned personal information from it before I was able to remotely lock/wipe it.

That said, it was still comically annoying to convince the detective. I was asked if I had been drinking (yes). I was asked why did I walk home before going to the police station (because without a phone, I had to get on the Internet to look up the nearest police station). I was asked why I didn't call 911 on a pay phone (...because, it literally did not occur to me that pay phones still work...?). I was asked why I walked from Chelsea through a "lively" section of town (Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village), a place known for prostitution, when I could've taken a more direct route (because it's a nice night, and I literally get lost everytime I wander off the grid in the West Village).

To say that the detective didn't believe me is an understatement. He actually accused me of soliciting a prostitute, and that my "lost" items were a result of me getting in over my head with a savvy prostitute.

But I didn't feel terribly offended because I knew I had evidence that could place me at the time of the incident, and other hard facts, such as how the robber ended up using my Netflix account to watch "Prison Break" in the days following the robbery.

A rape victim has none of that assurance. Even if the rape kit comes through, unless the rape is stranger rape, the rape kit does not contain hard facts about consent or intent. All those questions that were asked of me are going to be asked of the victim...except with far more difficult insinuations. After I told my roommate of my interrogation by the cops, she proceeded to tell me of her friends' similar stories...such as how a (female) cop was insistent on asking the victim why she would ever invite her friend (the accused) up to her apartment for tea.

And then there's the difficulty of answering those questions after having recently suffering the physical and emotional trauma of being raped. I have no idea what that feels like; my attacker was a jerk but otherwise left me unharmed.

lusen4• 10 years ago

indeed. victims of rape and sexual harassment are often blamed for the aggressors behavior, as if clothing or inebriation or past interactions makes such violations ok.

look at what the police asked the victim in the recent stanford rape case! it's baffling. https://www.buzzfeed.com/katiejmbaker/heres-the-powerful-let...

women who wear feminine or even sexual clothing and make-up aren't "sluts who are asking for it". they're not asking for unprofessional flirtation or jokes, and they're certainly not asking for bullying, disrespect or aggression. i'm not talking about dress code nuance. i'm not talking about whether someone is making destructive decisions or simply different decisions. i'm specifically talking about how femininity is used as an excuse to diminish and over-reach, as an excuse for those with power to project their desires and discount the will of those without. how one person dresses or behaves doesn't justify someone else being an asshole. and yet that is exactly how we make women feel when men cross boundaries, whether it is a rude joke or a physical violence.

the only other time i can think of clothing mattering in a crime is when black people are murdered and somehow it is justified because hoodie :-O

more generally, notifying authorities about sexual harassment or rape is extremely difficult - culturally, not just logistically. because of rape culture and the normative masculinity of most people in power, eg management and police, victims face aggressive doubt. people who speak up often face serious retaliation (bullying, asked to move locations rather than asking the aggressor to move, seen as a problem, stigmatized, etc), which can be even worse - professionally and emotionally - than the incident itself.

Casually telling people to shut up and file a claim reveals deep ignorance. In the Bay Area for example, we've recently had issues with police texting each other homophobic slurs, being involved with an underage sex worker, asking "shaming" questions of a rape victim, and of course being acquitted for murdering unarmed black and brown people. These are just the news-reading ways in the last 12 months that might lead someone to have less trust in authority, to think that maybe those with power aren't on their side.

One's parents, one's friends, one's experiences in the world - they also tell some people that police are not on their side. Daughter, always find a populated, well lit place to pull over at night if a police car flags you to stop. Son, you are black, so when the police pull you over for no reason be calm, be the bigger man, white people are taught to fear you, to see you as an "angry violent black man", so be extra small, don't draw attention. Child, you were born here like your friends, but your parents don't have papers, if you come home from work one day and we are not here it is because they found us, don't draw attention.

Having "the law" on one's side is a privilege. If someone can expect to call the police and have their problems taken seriously, they have a privilege. They don't need to feel guilty -- all of us on HN have some kind of privilege, eg access to the internet and reading and writing -- but they do need to acknowledge that not everyone is the same as themselves. they're not a jerk for having access to the police. but they are ignorant for not thinking about the challenges and differences others face, and then telling people they're doing it wrong for not shutting up and choosing an "easy" solution. have some compassion. be supportive. that's what it means to acknowledge privilege.

maxerickson• 10 years ago

The questions at your link were asked during the trial, by the defense attorney.

Skimming, the first conversation with law enforcement is when a deputy informs her she had been assaulted.

(None of that is meant as push back about reporting being difficult, it's just that in that case law enforcement didn't do anything baffling, they rendered assistance to someone who needed it and prosecuted the obvious crime)

ScottBurson2• 10 years ago

I think this is a great post, but I have one small nit to pick:

being involved with an underage sex worker

I've seen others argue, and I agree: there's no such thing as an "underage sex worker" or "child prostitute" -- terms that have been used for some time in the mainstream press. The correct term is "child sex trafficking victim" or the like. The point is that minors cannot legally consent to sex, so legally they must be victims, not criminals.

I don't know about the specific incident you're referring to, but if by "involved with" you mean "participating in the victimization of", I hope there were very serious consequences.

guard-of-terra2• 10 years ago

But sitting and waiting for the problem to resolve is also very stupid and leads to learned helplessness.

How would rape problem ever get fixed if there are no cases and no time served?

It's a probiel when crime is blamed on "rape culture" rather on a concrete person. That's like accusing everybody but the perpetrator.

Making IT community resolve rape cases instead of specific authorities is counterproductive too. I doubt we're good at it.

srtjstjsj7• 10 years ago

It may be ineffective, but it's not "stupid". Most people aren't willing and able to sacrifice themselves to be unsung heroes for a larger cause.

Have you ever had a software system with a bug that only appeared in integration tests, or production environment? Every individual component satisfied its contract tolerably well, or misbehaves but in a way that isn't detectable locally, but the system as a whole has emergent misbehaviors. That's a real problem, not imagined.

See also: Tragedy of the Commons, where bad things happen even when no one individual is clearly solely responsible.

danso5• 10 years ago

That's a difficult question to apply to the situation at hand...it seems like a lot of the allegations that are coming out now are workplace-harassment issues and complaints about egregiously creepy/offensive behavior. Between now and the incidents behind these complaints, someone had reported an actual rape, and that may be something that goes to the courts.

Sure, the people who experienced Appelbaum's harassing behavior could've spoken up and possibly averted the alleged rape by having him kicked out on the basis of his unpleasant behavior alone.

However, it's not easy to get someone kicked out based on allegations of behavior, especially someone as high up as him. I mean, that story of bureaucracy and shit rolling downhill is as old as civilization. And it's not all upside to have an organization where people get kicked out via accusation and internal arbitration alone.

Let's assume that some of this abusive behavior warranted official action via the courts (criminal or civil). But those who critique Violet Blue and her allies overlook an obvious problem: if you report a crime to the cops, they now have the authority to get all in your emails and other organization business. Giving Violet Blue and her friends the benefit of the doubt that they are true believers in the Tor project...I find it exceptionally easy to sympathize with how they were able to rationalize not going public about Appelbaum earlier. It's bad enough to cause emotional rift within an organization, no matter how justified...but to risk destroying an organization that you believe is saving lives and protecting freedom...yeah, that's kind of a hard thing to risk taking to court, even for black-and-white crimes.

joyeuse6701• 10 years ago

It should be difficult to convince the system, it should not be easy. If it were people would 'hack it' to there benefit. See welfare.

True, a victim will face the emotional hurdle and trauma. The system is unfeeling.

People these days mostly avoid confrontation. Going to the police is confrontation by proxy, and when it takes convincing to get them to take action, a beaten down victim has quite a battle to face.

The world is unpleasant, it will always be so, it will always be full of suffering. We strive to do our best as a people to improve our lot in life, but that doesn't mean lowering your defenses. Always advocate peace, always prepare for war. Many rely on the system or 'it won't happen to me' mentality as to why they don't or won't protect themselves. You shouldn't have to train in self defense but you must. You shouldn't have to be aware of the situation, but you must. You shouldn't have to note the exit signs in an enclosed structure, but you must. You shouldn't have to cover your drink but you must. You shouldn't have to blend in so as to not draw attention from a threat, but you must. Our world is dangerous, we like to think it isn't, and it's so much easier to tell ourselves that we're a victim and deserve sympathy than to ask ourselves what we could have done to prevent this and defend ourselves. We want someone else to do it for us. A higher up, police, lawyers... do it yourself, defend yourself and your friends.

nikdaheratik• 10 years ago

What do you even mean when you say: "See welfare." Welfare is designed to temporarily give out free stuff, it's not easy, but it also is less annoying than the Police.

With the police, the entire process for reporting many of these issues revolves around convincing them to do their job. Or rather, convincing them that your problem is important enough, or else an easy enough case to make, that they should devote time to it rather than other crimes in the area.

And then you say "Going to the police is confrontation by proxy"? That sentence, at least in any civilized part of the world, is complete nonsense. The reason why we have police, ideally, is to reduce the number of confrontations by making the cost of both crime and of escalating violence swift and clear. The job of courts and the police is to prevent vigilantism, as well as to protect people. It does more to prevent additional violence both because most criminals (who aren't the best in society) know that you don't try and take on the police and because it keeps the people being hurt by crime from lashing out and escalating.

And then you go on this victim blaming "you must train on self defense" nonsense? If you live in a war zone, or a really rough neighborhood and you can't count on the police, you might have a point. But for most people crime happens rarely, and nearly all of the time there's no way to prepare for it unless that's all you do with your time. Maybe that's how you want to live, but for me and most other people, that's alot of mental and emotional energy to spend on something that isn't likely to happen.

bcduggan• 10 years ago

Ugh, I think I upvoted this by clicking on the icon to the left that looked like it would collapse it. For the record, I do not agree with or support this comment.

adwn2• 10 years ago

Most of the outlets are having a hard time wrapping their heads around how this could go on so long within arenas whose missions are to fight against injustice and power imbalances, and to champion whistleblowers.

I see no dichotomy whatsoever. In fact, I would even say that individuals and organizations that pursue a "higher calling" (in this case, freedom from governmental authority) are more willing to sacrifice some less-valued members for the higher good – as evidenced by statements like "But he does good work".

Besides, not everyone who belongs to an ideological organization is in it for the ideology; some are there for the power and influence they can achieve from rising through the ranks. Judging by the descriptions given in this article, Jacob Appelbaum appears quite power hungry and manipulative.

vkazanov• 10 years ago

I believe this is true for all organisations implying hierarchy, explicit (big enterprises) or implicit (as in hacker communities): some people join the ranks only to be able to enjoy domination at the top of the pyramid.

serg_chernata• 10 years ago

I am completely on her side and this dude seems sketchy.

However, Macrina's story mentioned in a different article[0] sounded very very strange to me. I simply don't understand how Macrina, a working professional adult, can follow that kind of logic. To me it simply sounds like she made a mistake and now regrets it.

[0] http://gizmodo.com/another-woman-has-accused-jacob-appelbaum...

dTal• 10 years ago

It sounds scarily real to be. Being manipulated is a thing, and this ticks all the boxes: she was tired/hungover, he wouldn't take no for an answer, he continued talking about mundane stuff to maintain an atmosphere of normality even while applying strong pressure, she only found the strength to resist after being dragged (literally!) outside of her comfort zone.

It rings very true and does not sound like the kind of story someone would make up for attention.

lusen4• 10 years ago

our cultural environment gives us a bias toward downplaying the problem of rape and sexual harassment. i've found this thought experiment helpful in exploring bias:

rape is torture. for some it is worse than murder.

sexual harassment is aggression. for some it is worse than being punched in the face.

how would you feel if someone at your work murdered or punched someone else?

how would you feel if there was a systemic cultural inequity such that 1 in 3 people could expect to be murdered or punched at some point in their life?

ps - the opposite of rape (bully) culture is nurturance (support) culture.

barkingdog• 10 years ago

This is a really lucid explanation of something that is often unnecessarily muddled. Well spoken. To continue going with your thought experiment, how would you feel like if certain kind of people were tortured based on how they were different from you, and it was hard for you to even conceive of what that must feel like for them?

I think a lot of well intentioned folks are in this category. I don't think it's helpful for those folks to be skewered (ala extreme social justice style) for their difficulties. But with that said, it's the sum of their difficulties and those of society at large that may create room for these kinds of situations. I mean, for a very long time, we as a society had ethical arguments for slavery. I don't think it's beyond reason to think that later generations will look at the way survivors of sexual assault are treated by society the way we look at how slaves were once treated with society: shame and wonder at how anyone could let that happen, and yet an uneasiness at realizing that in the context of the historical period, it makes total sense. Humanity is capable of some really unsettling things.

I don't know the details of this particular case, and I would hope (although even courts have difficulties with this) that justice is found in the courts. But I must say, the allegations make my stomach churn precisely because they don't seem unrealistic. I've heard stories and seen folks do things like this with the brazen presumption that no one would stop them. Sadly, they can be right to some extent. I've done what I can to put those situations to a stop (you can only really do it if executive leadership is on your side and also not rotten in the same way the toxic individual is), but the fact remains -- it's a problem, even if it's sometime subtle and hard to notice or do anything about.

hashberry• 10 years ago

What about "up-playing" rape? In an account of one of Jacob's assaults[0], the victim wrote: "he was rubbing my clit and rimming the edges of my vagina" and then below she wrote according to German law this is rape with a maximum of 10 years in prison. Was this torture and worse than murder?

[0] https://blog.patternsinthevoid.net/the-forest-for-the-trees....

fl0wenol• 10 years ago

No, it's just predatory, disgusting, and wrong.

Five years.

pyrale2• 10 years ago

For some it is. There's a reason suicide is much higher among victimes of rape.

HarryHirsch3• 10 years ago

Everyone who advocates for codes of conduct needs to have a hard look at the Appelbaum story and answer cogently how a code of conduct would have defended against Jacob Appelbaum. That's the great weakness, they do not work at all against anyone in an elevated social position.

zellyn3• 10 years ago

Most codes of conduct I've seen would have helped by:

- making it explicit up-front that the behavior described is considered unacceptable by the community, which would help victims know that they have the support of the community

- publicizing a way of reporting inappropriate behavior

- setting up some kind of group governance for acting on reports

All of those things seem incredibly helpful. And I'm sure I've missed some.

zellyn3• 10 years ago

Publicizing a way of reporting behavior would have ensured that there was a central, cumulative record of bad behavior, instead of anecdotal and diffuse understanding of the problem.

HarryHirsch3• 10 years ago

Storytime: Sometime ago had materials stolen by a student who felt the need to get back at me. The kid did have a lengthy record of erratic behaviour, and I did report the incident to police. It caused great displeasure within the department, because the parents were wealthy and possible donors.

I'm convinced that the student handbook prevents non-sexual harassment of staff, and it's equally true that police and HR are the go-to contacts for that type of incident.

The employee and student manuals are the applicable codes of conduct. It's true that the workplace owns the problem now, and that there can be a pattern established (and one for myself as well), but come again about the incredible helpfulness! The world isn't black and white, and groups value peace, but they also value money and presenting a united front. The often value the latter two more than the peace of a fellow at the bottom of the totem pole.

srtjstjsj7• 10 years ago

Are you claiming that if something fails to solve ALL problems, it is useless?

HarryHirsch3• 10 years ago

I'd argue socially appropiate behaviour is a tone-at-the-top problem. Random arseholes and yahoos are generally dealt with fairly quickly through the usual channels. I'd even say they are no problem because of that fact. But those at the top of the hierarchy get away with more for longer, and they set the standard for the rest of the organization and make the atmosphere, too. The challenge is how to get the top brass to live by their code-of-conduct. I have no suggestion for that problem, but in the struggle between corporate culture and code of conduct, the corporate culture always wins.

camperman6• 10 years ago

A blog is no substitute for due process. Appelbaum may be guilty of all of the things he's been accused of, he may be guilty of none of them. Let's see some formal charges, sworn witness statements and court proceedings before we decide. False accusations can and do happen all the time.

chaz723• 10 years ago

No. Jail needs to wait for formal charges, but the community can make its own decisions whether they will accept his behavior - and they may decide they care about things that are both vile and legal, they may use entirely different reasoning than the courts.

ultramancool16• 10 years ago

This is a great way to make sure you have an unjust community wherein no one has the opportunity to defend themselves and speaking ill of someone is enough to evict them.

ultramancool16• 10 years ago

Yeah, while I'm pretty much willing to believe this just due to the people involved, it is curious that no one has been willing to put their name on an actual rape accusation.

adwn2• 10 years ago

Maybe because that's a very personal matter? I imagine that most people that have been victims of rape do not want their name to be part of the public discussion.

kemayo3• 10 years ago

That's pretty standard for criminal rape cases, mind you.

There were laws in the US prohibiting revealing the identity of the victim in a rape case, but they got struck down as unconstitutional -- there's still a strong cultural norm in the media of not announcing it.

It's also a good idea. Being raped is bad enough; if the bar for consequences for your rapist becomes "I have to loudly announce my rape to the world", that's even worse.

This can be viewed as a web-of-trust situation. The raped person told the leaders of the Tor project, who believed them. You can now either wait for possible criminal charges that might be going on behind the scenes, or you can trust the Tor leaders.

vtlynch• 10 years ago

Suggesting that the volume of accusations and eyewitness accounts that have been made against Appelbaum may be "false accusations" is a shameful thing to do.

camperman6• 10 years ago

I wasn't but even if I was it isn't shameful at all - it's how justice works in Western societies. Someone is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Allegations are just that - allegations. If there are a wide variety of them independently from different people, then it's more likely that there is something to them but that still doesn't mean you can just rush to judgement. That way lies Duke Lacrosse, Mattress Girl and A Rape On Campus just off the top of my head.

gozur882• 10 years ago

It's rather more principled than "shameful". You need only look at what happened to Jian Ghomeshi to realize this kind of stuff can be coordinated by people with their own agenda.

Without an impartial investigation, we on the outside know nothing but what has been alleged.

pjc503• 10 years ago

False accusations can and do happen all the time

No, accusations are labelled as false all the time; genuinely baseless accusations are much rarer.

JoeAltmaier2• 10 years ago

Maybe you have to live longer to experience this. Have encountered false accusations more than once in my life (not about me, but I knew they were false). If I'm typical, then they happen all the time everywhere?

bjourne• 10 years ago

Completely untrue. Victims of bullying, both in workplaces and in schools, are very often subjected to incredibly vicious rumors that are 100% made up.

mafribe10• 10 years ago

   baseless accusations are much rarer.

And where is the credible evidence for this claim? NB citing Wikipedia or a newspaper is not credible evidence.

gozur882• 10 years ago

You have no idea how often "genuinely baseless" accusations happen. Nobody does. We know they happen, but we're only sure when the accuser is a really terrible liar, as in the Rolling Stone UVA article's "Jackie" or Mattress Girl, or the accused (the actual victims) were able to produce a video as in this case:

http://articles.latimes.com/2006/jul/25/local/me-false25

Nobody knows how many guys are rotting in jail because they ran across a vindictive (or just plain crazy) woman who can keep her story straight.

DanBC5• 10 years ago

False accusations can and do happen all the time.

Can I check how you're defining "false accusation"? There are several different definitions.

EDIT after downvote: The different definitions include "nothing happened and the alleged victim made it all up", but also "it happened, and the alleged attacker actually did it, but was found not guilty, and so in law they're innocent and thus the accusation is false".

Clarifying which definition is being used helps conversation.

llamataboot2• 10 years ago

Have you missed the part where many of the people that have been abused by Appelbaum are also radicals that both distrust the criminal justice system AND think that it has overall negative effects that don't serve anyone? There are ways of getting to accountability and rehabilitation and justice that don't have anything to do with filing charges in a court of law. Start with looking up "restorative justice" and "restorative justice rape" for example, to read about approaches that have worked. Isis even talked about being involved in some of these approaches in the past (and why they weren't currently working with Appelbaum)

camperman6• 10 years ago

Have you missed the part where many of the people that have been abused by Appelbaum are also radicals that both distrust the criminal justice system AND think that it has overall negative effects that don't serve anyone?

I don't really care. For all its faults, due process in the West is still a whole lot better than the alternatives.

There are ways of getting to accountability and rehabilitation and justice that don't have anything to do with filing charges in a court of law.

If these allegations are true, Appelbaum is clearly someone who needs to be locked away from society for decades in my opinion and no-one can arbitrarily claim that authority. The important word is 'if'.

Start with looking up "restorative justice" and "restorative justice rape" for example, to read about approaches that have worked.

Great. Let's find out if a rape happened first. Because it didn't happen at Duke Lacrosse, it didn't happen to Emma Sulkowicz, it didn't happen at the University of Virginia, it didn't happen to Nicola Osborne, Elizabeth Coast, Katherine Bennett, Cassandra Kennedy or Linsey Attridge.

epberry• 10 years ago

Wow this is messed up. This guy is clearly a predator and it's pretty shocking that he was able to operate in this way for so long. As much as women can be marginalized and harassed at tech companies I can easily see how the problem could be much worse with organizations like the Tor Project or Wikileaks that don't necessarily have professional management.

These are causes, not just jobs or consulting gigs. They are symbols for fighting injustice, and crusading for those at risk of exploitation. Their reputations are fraught and fragile. To attack a person in them is to attack the movement. They are also male-dominated organizations, in the male-dominated realm of hacking, where very few of the men are willing to accept that their hacker heroes, team bosses, and conference buddies might be doing really, really fucked up things to women.

Above was the passage that struck me the most and seems like the most contributing factor for Jake's inexplicably long tenure. When you are constantly under attack by the powers that be it might seem rational to brush aside accusations against one of your most prominent members and plow ahead. Obviously this was a disastrous decision, both for the women involved and the organization.

EDIT: a word.

auvrw• 10 years ago

yea, it's strangely counterintuitive: the politics of tor are non-mainstream, but in a potentially positive way. yet, that left the door open for seriously negative sociopolitical issues. is that the tl;dr of the parent post?

anyway, i don't care what "league" this guy is in. wouldn't want to be around behavior like that.

what about the reality where Hitler cured cancer, Morty? it's best not to think about it.

musha68k2• 10 years ago

I don't know if it is clear as I know neither of the persons involved (do you?).

What seems ever clearer to me though is that many of the organizations/movements we look up to employ and attract certain kinds of people amongst which you'd probably find quite a few psychopaths as well (maybe even more so with "causes").

Do we need to fight fire with fire?

If so, how can we keep our "beneficial" predators (?!) in check (?!?!) insofar as to steer them towards "just doing their job" by concentrating their pernicious powers on the psychopathic bodies (people, organizations, skynet..) we need to be fighting?

If not, let's all level-up and fend them off - people involved with "causes" especially - hierarchies and secrets are the breeding ground for psychopaths as per Hintjens "Power Pyramids vs. Living Systems":

http://content.psychopathcode.com/chapter2.html

http://hintjens.com/blog:_psychopaths

aomurphy• 10 years ago

Being part of a small dedicated group fighting for a cause absolutely leaves you open to this, even when the ideals you are fighting for are against that very goal. You can see it all the time in far left groups, there are often similar sorts of deals going on, like this: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/mar/09/socialist-wo...

Anecdotally, I've met/heard of lots of creepy guys (almost always guys) at these sort of highly motivated ideological groups. There's a strong in-group/out-group thing going on.

I assume far right groups can be similar, but I've never been involved in one. Also it's less interesting, since they generally don't jump up and down to be called feminist.

infodroid• 10 years ago

Why does it seem like people working in tech have such a hard time keeping their personal and professional lives separate?

I'm not just talking about incidents of poor conduct.

It's also the fact people are exchanging insults and serious accusations over blog posts.

It's not like the observers have the facts and evidence to make fair judgements on these matters.

The whole trial by social media is really embarrassing to the profession.

MollyR• 10 years ago

Probably because people have been encouraged to think of coworkers as friends or family. My personal suspicion is simply the rise of social media enables mob like behavior over due process and rule of law.

incongruity2• 10 years ago

And, I'd bet some of that encouragement happens because work-life balance is non-existent in many places and/or many people in tech simply don't have a deep social network outside of work because they tend to be younger/unmarried/relocated, etc.

pjc503• 10 years ago

Other industries do it in the old news media instead. And this isn't quite so much "industry" as "activism". If it were a professional setting, there would be an HR process to deal with it.

misiti3780• 10 years ago

i have been wondering this exact same thing too. this seems like it is isolated mostly to the tech community.

clavalle3• 10 years ago

Perhaps I am being stereotypically Texan here, but sometimes I wish there was space in our legal and ethical system to kick someone's ass for behavior that doesn't reach the level of provable criminality but that still calls for more than a sharp rebuke, public shaming, or ostracism. Our current status quo of 'violence is never the answer' seems to give assholes a bit too much wiggle room to make the rest of us suffer.

jessaustin7• 10 years ago

In many jurisdictions, that space does exist, because cops and prosecutors are comfortable "looking the other way" when it's clear there is a reason to do so. It is to Texas's credit that much of that state is such a jurisdiction, but in fact much of the fly-over country is.

Of course, a fake-ass "anarchist" like Applebaum might file a civil suit for a well-deserved ass-kicking, but that's still sunlight.

srtjstjsj7• 10 years ago

fake?

ElComradio• 10 years ago

This is one of the many reasons why Texas is filled to the brim with happy and well adjusted people.

GFK_of_xmaspast• 10 years ago

Among all the problems with this kind of folk justice is it tends to "criminalize" things like "breathing while black" or "looks gay".

srtjstjsj7• 10 years ago

We banned that for a reason.

_Who_ decides what calls for more than a sharp rebuke?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching

clavalle3• 10 years ago

Yeah, I get that. It can get really bad, really fast.

But, then again, I'm not saying we should kill anyone or even damage them permanently so I'm not sure it is fair to take the statement to that extreme.

smoyer3• 10 years ago

From an older guy (and happily married) guy to the male population in tech.

If you see behaviors like this and let it happen, you're complicit ... if you're in a position of authority (someone's boss) and you let it happen, you may also be criminally liable.

But it's far worse ... what I hope is a small minority of bad actors are defining the definition of male in our culture. Since there's an even smaller number men who are willing to speak out against them, and an ocean of those who don't want to be involved in the middle, only a mere whisper of voices are countering those who, to be honest, tend to be the loud-mouth, misbehaving misogynists. It's time for the gentlemen to step up their game.

If you're being harassed, sexually or otherwise, within my earshot, I will take action to stop it. I'm not offering hugs of consolation but rather to stand between you and the abuse. I will protect you (potentially a stranger) as I would a member of family or any of my close friends. Those of us with spouses, daughters (and sons) want safe places for them to work too!

I originally wrote "If you're a woman being harassed ..." but realize there are many cases where a bully is harassing someone who shares their gender. And in the corporate world, there are always predators taking credit for others work (according to recent studies, it's the psychopaths that rise to the top).

I've had a long career in technology, and in theory have enough of a reputation that I can afford to spend some political capital. I think the younger men who are "just starting out" have a bigger voice than they realize, but they need to band together. Let's take back the organizations that have degraded to this point ... when there's nowhere left for people like Applebaum to work, I still won't feel sorry for him.

What's it going to be boys? ... are you willing to step up your game? To behave like men? Or better yet, to become a real gentleman?

</PROCLAMATION>

MrZongle23• 10 years ago

"If you see behaviors like this and let it happen, you're complicit ... if you're in a position of authority (someone's boss) and you let it happen, you may also be criminally liable."

As another older guy, also happily married, I agree completely.

That said, as someone who hasn't observed behavior like this while in the industry and certainly doesn't practice it....God, I'm tired of being painted with a broad brush (in general, I'm not implying that smoyer did so) and told that I'm part of the problem.

The finger-waggling can get quite grating if you're just trying to do your best day-to-day without being a dick to anybody. I suspect there are quite a few guys in the same boat who don't have issues with anybody due to their gender, race, religion or sexual orientation but are dealing with "chastisement fatigue".

Edit: What, I'm the villain for agreeing with the parent post but complaining about being painted with a broad brush? What the hell is wrong with some of you?

harpastum2• 10 years ago

The thrust of the grandparent's point was that if you only stand up if people "have issues" with you, you're leaving a bunch of people behind who don't have the power to defend themselves.

If you really haven't observed it, you're either not dealing with a large number of people per day, or you're ignoring the issues around you. In my experience, this behavior is pervasive.

There are a million reasons why it's hard to stand up for yourself in the face of abuse, and one of the biggest is feeling isolated and alone in your problems. So, if you ignore the problem because you're "just doing your best day-to-day", you are part of the reason that the situation is not getting better.

smoyer3• 10 years ago

"what I hope is a small minority of bad actors are defining the definition of male in our culture"

It feels weird to be quoting myself but I definitely agree with you ... I'm (finally) making this a proclamation because I don't want to be painted with that broad brush either. And I think that there's a very quiet majority of males who feel this is wrong but are unwilling to call it out.

I'm a WASP male and find there are multiple ways I can be vilified. I'm NOT owning that. If the view of men is going to change, the majority of us need to be speaking out against the abuse. There have been a couple instances where I've overheard the broad brush strokes you've described and pointedly asked "are we all that bad" ... you'll see back-pedaling and sometimes an admission that it's (also) a generalization.

bllguo• 10 years ago

Firstly: "Please resist commenting about being downvoted. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading." Sometimes it just happens, there are people who simply disagree.

Secondly: this kind of "as long as I'm not doing anything wrong it's fine" attitude is precisely what the commenter was calling out as being not enough.

mafribe10• 10 years ago

   are you willing to step up your game?

I'm going to step up: what are you doing concretely to stop dead false accusations?

What are you doing to counter the blatant misandry in current harassment laws? To wit, you wrote "If you're a woman being harassed ..." this is a blatantly sexist question. What if you are a man being harassed by a woman?

dragonwriter4• 10 years ago

What are you doing to counter the blatant misandry in current harassment laws?

What misandry in current harassment laws? Please cite the specific laws containing misandry, and identify the specific source of the misandry in the law.

smoyer3• 10 years ago

I've admitted I'm old ... I grew up with my father teaching me I should "protect the weaker sex". Note that "Weaker sex" is NOT the same thing as "inferior sex" and my father, to this day, treats my mother as his partner.

Of course, I was also conditioned (thanks Disney) to want to be the knight in shining armor who comes to the aid of the damsel in distress.

So while I intellectually know it applies to everyone, I felt safe admitting that my original sentence contained some stereotypical ideas. And while we're at it, I know plenty of girls and women who could kick my butt - those ladies that fall into that category can feel free to be my knight in shining armor if they see me being harassed.

A funny story from my high-school days - our sociology class was assigned to perform an act that fell outside the social norms. I spent a few hours one day opening the doors for anyone who entered our local mall. One woman (who still went through the open door) asked me if my parents would be embarrassed that they'd raised such a male-chauvinist pig. I have no idea where it came from but my response was "They think they've raised a gentleman - if you'd held the door open for me, I only would have said 'Thank you'". Why is it that I often only think of the clever thing to say minutes or hours after the moment has passed?

lusen4• 10 years ago

how much of a problem are false accusations compared to not reporting sexual harassment or rape?

this is a really interesting point worth investigating. i don't have research on hand to link to (though it's fresh on my mind from reading Roxanne Gay's Bad Feminist), but my understanding is that sexual harassment and rape are grossly underreported. false positives is not a huge problem. false negatives are.

by talking about false accusations you are placing greater importance on the suffering of the fewer people who are falsely accused compared to the suffering of the greater people who are falsely silent.

that's fine to intentionally value this, but do consider how this parallels rape culture and the protection of aggressors over the safety of victims. (for offenders, like priests who abused children, become repeat offenders)

as for the fact that men are also harassed and raped, and that male-male and female-female harassment and rape also exist: these are big problems, too, and the silence of the victims is even more complicated, for it doesn't follow the usual victim norm. people want to be heard. they want their problems to be seen and resolved. thus i contend that being heard is the greater problem. not false accusations.

romanovcode• 10 years ago

What's it going to be boys? ... are you willing to step up your game? To behave like men? Or better yet, to become a real gentleman?

Chivalry is dead, and women killed it.

avocad4• 10 years ago

If your chivalry is killed that easily, it was not worth much to begin with.

RileyKyeden• 10 years ago

Chivalry is dead

What a relief.

and women killed it

Good on them. Let's send all gender roles into the past with other relics like dowries and stonings, where they belong.

tootie• 10 years ago

Protect in this case being to ensure the perpetrator is fired. Let him, management, HR and everyone on your team know that it's unacceptable and that person should be ostracized. Just like I won't watch Roman Polanski movies.

avocad4• 10 years ago

I agree with you, and before reading yours I wanted to write a less theatrical comment in the same line. I figure people like Appelbaum are making tech a hostile environment for women to work in, like a vicious circle.

The thing that drew my attention was the public comment he made about giving head. Because why would anyone want to work with a person who behaves like that? He probably knows how to pick an audience, but the real explanation came at the end of the article:

"People like Jake can be found in other places (...) Wherever power imbalances, hero worship, and secret-keepers intersect."

And those are places that independent people like to avoid. And that might be an explanation for why so many people never heard of stories like that in their surroundings.

Kalium2• 10 years ago

It's great in the abstract. Enlightened bystanders, intervening to halt abusive behavior. Exactly what everyone who's ever suffered abusive behavior dreams of! I know I have in the past. Yet in practice, trying to be that enlightened bystander means listening in on a lot of private conversations, a lot of privately judging people and their actions with context, and a lot of intruding in places where nobody involved has invited you.

I've been rebuked for trying to "step up my game" and getting it wrong enough times that I no longer trust the concept. I'm done second-guessing which particular people want/need help in particular moments and which don't. It's patronizing as hell. I'll help those who ask and I'll make it easy to ask, but I'm done making people's choices for them.

avocad4• 10 years ago

There were mentions of open, public humiliations with sexual suggestions. You don't have to accept that talk in a meeting that you attend even when it is completely consensual.

pwenzel• 10 years ago

CULT OF THE DEAD COW is known for a lot of things, but treating people horribly is not one of them. If communities are to thrive and remain relevant we have to do some housecleaning from time to time. As we have become aware of the anonymous accusations of sexual assault, as well as the stories told by individuals we know and trust, we’ve decided to remove Jake from the herd effective immediately.

http://w3.cultdeadcow.com/cms/2016/06/cult-of-the-dead-cow-s...

moon_of_moon2• 10 years ago

Applebaum's side of the story: http://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1soorlp

kemayo3• 10 years ago

The article links to that, and also to this "decoding" of it: https://medium.com/@frabyn/decoding-jake-appelbaum-9fa75d060...

moon_of_moon2• 10 years ago

Why decode it? Take it at face value:

"I want to be clear: the accusations of criminal sexual misconduct against me are entirely false."

"I’ve dedicated my life as a journalist, activist, and longtime member of the Tor Project to advocating for the transparency of public processes and to speaking out about the necessity of privacy, security, and anonymity. These are ideals that I will continue to uphold, despite the vicious campaign that is currently being waged against me."

This guy spent two years in foster care when he was a kid. That kind of adversity, in my opinion, rears character.

Bartweiss• 10 years ago

Can anyone fill me in on more details of the Snowden connection there?

The rest of this article is quite thorough, and this topic certainly deserves more public discussion of what went wrong and what should be done in the future. Obviously this episode should unsettle those who have concluded that the claims are true, and even those who are uncertain should take a look at how these issues circulated for so long without being brought to a head.

The Snowden comment, though, confused me. Appelbaum accepted an award on his behalf, but as far as I knew that's about the extend of it. CCC and Assange have been tied into the community for long enough to have heard these things, and I can understand the comment about how they should have vetted Appelbaum.

Snowden (to my knowledge) had no real connections in this community, and Appelbaum only stepped up to bask in his glow once he was in hiding and largely restricted from 'vetting' others. There might be questions about why no one else who knew the claims stepped in, but barring more evidence I have trouble with the claim that Snowden has something to answer for.

I don't want to push too hard on one off-hand comment in a much larger piece, but I've already seen this used as ammunition to discredit Snowden: "If his actions are so good, why did he have anything to do with Appelbaum?" It seems like a bad meme to spread without some explanation of why he should have known about as-yet-unpublicized accusations.

shasta4• 10 years ago

Is there really a big problem with acceptable/legal behavior not being agreed upon? Isn't the problem usually that the guy claims "it was consensual?" Similarly, when police consider what a woman was wearing, isn't usually in the context of figuring out who's story they believe? In other words, the police aren't thinking "well, she wore a sexy dress and followed him to his room and therefore deserved to get raped" but rather "well, she wore a sexy dress and followed him up to his room so maybe his claims that it was consensual are true." I get that you don't want police to blame the victim, but isn't it just as/more important that they correctly figure out who the victim is?

panic3• 10 years ago

What someone is wearing has nothing to do with consent.

shasta4• 10 years ago

Your claim is that P(consent | sexy clothes) = P(consent | not sexy clothes)? Seems counterintuitive. Do you have evidence to support this claim?

threatofrain3• 10 years ago

If the prosecution, in anticipation of defense strategy, believes that what a person is wearing, among a collection of facts, may be utilized by defense, then of course it's to prosecution advantage to have the police ask first on their terms, as opposed to letting the defense ask these questions on their terms. That way the police and prosecution can control the progression of fact discovery.

It's because prosecutors understand factors to legal victory that clothing, drug use, prior relationship with defendant, and other things like that are relevant.

Speaking descriptively, the job of the police is not to act as some neutral 3rd party of justice and investigate all claims of the truth in proportion to their merit. It is the secondary job of the police to set up cases for the prosecution without regard for defense interests. It is the primary job of all agencies ever to manage organizational credibility, robustness, and scope.

lusen4• 10 years ago

"well, she wore a sexy dress and followed him up to his room so maybe his claims that it was consensual are true."

how is that reasonable? maybe we should ask what she claims and what he wore.

but wait, what clothing indicates whether someone is a rapist? tshirts and tatty jeans? polo shirt? suit? of course clothing implies nothing.

why does her wearing "sexy" clothing -- to say nothing of "sexy" being all about the male perception and desires, as if her own clothing can't be worn for her own reasons -- imply anything about her desire for sex?

"isn't it just as/more important that they correctly figure out who the victim is?"

if you're only asking men their opinion, and believing whatever assumptions you want to make about women based on their clothing rather than their word, the system is already tilted towards men getting want they explicitly want, and women not being listened to.

i'm not saying believe rape victims without scrutiny. i'm saying have a little more compassion and support and actually listen to their words as much as you listen to the man's words, and care about their clothes as much as you care about the man's clothes.

threatofrain3• 10 years ago

When the police and justice system collects information about clothing, sexual history with defendant, alcohol and other drugs, they do so because these are legally relevant facts to establishing a narrative that's otherwise often too lacking in material basis.

The police and justice system wish to know these facts so they know the strength of some legal narrative and what counternarratives can be supported. Wearing sexy clothing fits a narrative of consensual sex. Sexual injuries fits a narrative of sexual assault. Drug use damages the credibility of any party. Prior relationship with defendant can fit narratives about the likelihood that someone might agree to sex.

These are facts that defense will ask, and it's best for the prosecution that the police ask first on their terms to control the progression of fact discovery, as opposed to letting the defense ask first on their terms.

Why not be interested in what the man was wearing? Maybe because the prosecution, in anticipation of defense strategy, thinks it won't matter. The job of the police is not to act as a neutral 3rd party to the justice system, proportionally investigating claims on the strength of their merits. The secondary job of the police is to set up cases for the prosecution, even if it's unfair to the defense. The primary job of the police, and any agency, is to establish its own credibility, robustness, and scope as an agency. Note that I am speaking descriptively, not prescriptively.

shasta4• 10 years ago

Of course it's not reasonable to conclude that he's telling the truth on the basis of her clothing. But my point is that it's also not reasonable to treat any mention of her clothing as off limits. It's just one piece of evidence.

If a woman is raped, and the guy claims it was consensual, do you think a woman should be able to point out that, "if I had any intention of sleeping with him I wouldn't have been wearing those underwear?" Or should that piece of evidence be excluded because clothing is never relevant?

throvwavvay3• 10 years ago

First, what do clothing say about intention? I would like to live in a world where clothing is all about keeping a balanced body temperature and nothing else.

The second question is of course, does it even matter what intention people had? Maybe it should not be the police job to determine which person is more believable, but rather just write down the statement of the accuser and the accused, and collect any evidence that a prosecutor might find valuable in their decision to either pick up the case or not.

The third question is then, if police would have a policy to investigate anything reported, will there be enough resources? How much added taxes would be needed to have a 100% impartial police whose only duty is to investigate and deliver reports to prosecutors who then do the judgement on whom to believe.

dang• 10 years ago

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11946338 and marked it off-topic.

fhood• 10 years ago

Sometimes the hardest part about dealing with people like this is that they seem to have multiple personalities. Thus a person that to me (white male) seems like a great guy, may not be that same person at all when they interact with others (women or minorities for instance). It can be really difficult to reconcile the person you know with the person that other people are interacting with, and when glimpses of this less pleasant personality show through in casual comments and the like, it is all too easy to write them off as jokes, because no one wants to believe that their friend is a bad person.

ScottBurson2• 10 years ago

Such a person wouldn't necessarily even be abusive to all women. They tend to choose the most vulnerable as their victims.

In this case we've seen a group of women publish a statement saying "Appelbaum never treated us like that" [0]. Well, it's nice that he wasn't a jerk to absolutely every woman he ever met, but that really doesn't prove anything at all. (At least the statement is fairly carefully worded so as not to dismiss the possibility that Appelbaum harmed others... but I still have to wonder if it was a good thing that they published it.)

[0] https://ourresponse.org/

_greim_• 10 years ago

Setting aside for the moment the facts of this particular case, I thought the article makes a good point in general.

When harassment, sexual or otherwise, requires a cost-benefit analysis, you have failed.

simula67• 10 years ago

Does the flags on the comments affect if the story itself get flagged ?

srtjstjsj7• 10 years ago

I turned to Jake and said, “I think you have me confused with a certain blonde blogger,”

Who is that referring to? Is the audience supposed to know, or was that in inside reference

jessaustin7• 10 years ago

It might not have referred to anyone. She was trying to derail his bullshit, not have an engaging conversation.

throvwavvay3• 10 years ago

What is the point of having a trial by media like this? If we want social change, could we first define the requirement for trial by media?

We got statements from the accusers. We got statement from the accused. We got statement from people who are not victims but claim to speak for them (ie prosecutors). We got people who are neither the accuser nor accused, but instead talks in favor/against a conviction (ie lawyers). We got a jury, ie all the comments here on HN and articles on media platforms. All that is missing from a real court is the unbiased judge who can specify the rules and finalize a judgement.

For those 100+ comments in here, particular those that make a direct or implied judgement, do you think we should replace the court system by articles like this? The current justice system has problems. It requires time, energy, and often capital from victims. Sometimes the guilt gets away. Sometimes the innocent get locked up. There is a lot of fear of not being believed. A lot of self-doubt. Privacy is lost for both the accuser/victim and accused/perpetrator. Social relationships can be destroyed, and risk of retaliation is high. Trial by media really sound as a tempting solution, and all we need to give up seems to be that of a impartial judge and the rules.

notes: Its fun to see the up and down votes in real time. 1->4->2->5->1->3. The Zero replies make for a interesting discussion.

33a• 10 years ago

Well. Now I'm disgusted and freaked out for the rest of the day.

srtjstjsj7• 10 years ago

How did the Kink thing stay quiet so long? There you have a corporate situation, with real lawsuit money on the table, and (I expect) sympathetic management.

mcguire4• 10 years ago

Well, there is a bright side to all this.

Social engineering is still the easiest, most successful approach to breaking any security infrastructure. Intelligence agencies have a long history of using sexual-antic-related blackmail as a lever against their opponents.

But if nobody cares, it becomes somewhat more difficult to apply the lever.

ihsw• 10 years ago

So why hasn't anyone smashed his face yet? Surely an insufferable sexual failure like Applebaum should've attracted that kind of attention.

Did every single person -- every victim, bystander, and authority figure -- deftly slink away or obediently succumb to his forcible coercion?

Maybe I'm just a violent individual with anger issues but I would've had no problem with physically correcting his behavior.

CGamesPlay• 10 years ago

All of the commentary here is hedging against this anonymous rape claim. What bothers me is that if we throw that argument out there is still clearly some huge injustice going on here. With this hook the commentators here are seeking to disarm the entire rest of the argument. The nail in the coffin for me was when the Tor leadership acknowledged the harassment evidence but allowed it to continue. That's inexcusable.

The actual criminal allegations should be settled in court.

adrusi• 10 years ago

This article presents evidence that Appelbaum was a creep, but theres a big gap between creep and rapist. Pseudonymous accusations don't make for very compelling evidence.

Regardless, my intuition is inclined to accept his guilt, not that I, or almost any of the internet commenters, are really qualified to pass that judgement.

But when these cases arise, I can't help but think how easy it would be to manufacture a rape scandal, especially against a charismatic man, especially if they're a creep. I would think that security-minded people would be the first to realize this, but alas. Every time there's a public reaction like this, with the accused being fired and publicly shamed before any rigorous investigation even begins, we show potential defamers that the strategy works. It's a hard problem, because we want to support victims, but we can't ignore the fact that the accused could be the greatest victim of all.

We have to postpone judgement in cases like these, until stronger evidence emerges, else we risk creating an environment where everyone has to live in fear of false scandals. We can't let that get in the way of reporting on the case, but at least we shouldn't give any credance to crap like the "skewering" article refuting Appelbaum's denial [1] (what statement of denial would have convinced the author?) and we shouldn't be respecting statements like in the Wired article [2]:

Shepard also says she’s spoken directly with one of Appelbaum’s alleged victims, who told Shepard in February of this year that Appelbaum had raped him or her. “Sadly… I think it’s the damn truth. He’s a charismatic, socially dominant manipulator,” Shepard writes to WIRED. “I absolutely believe the accusers.”

He's a charismatic, socially dominant manipulator, therefore he raped this woman? Does muscularity implicate someone in a mugging? The fact that you spoke with someone who spoke with an alleged victim and they were convinced, is meaningless, considering how many people are convinced of Appelbaum's guilt without knowing almost anything about the case.

[1] https://medium.com/@frabyn/decoding-jake-appelbaum-9fa75d060...

[2] https://www.wired.com/2016/06/tor-developer-jacob-appelbaum-...

masmullin2• 10 years ago

we risk creating an environment where everyone has to live in fear of false scandals.

I think this is an interesting concept and needs to be brought more to light.

NetTechM• 10 years ago

Well, if he did it, he deserves whatever the judge gives him.

Seems like there is a ton of twitter drama surrounding this, which I tend to avoid so I'll leave it at that.

mhewett• 10 years ago

Some possibly useful advice: if I'm at a conference and someone I sort of know says, "This one speaker is being an ass. He's pestering me about another speaker." I'm like, "yeah, yeah that's part of being an organizer".

But if that person says, "Can you help me? Bill Smith is harassing me." Now they've got my attention.

In this case I don't know what the exact dialog was, but if you want help be sure to ask for it and state clearly why. People will respond more proactively.

“But he does good work.”

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