> Ummmn, you appear to have missed the bit where this "unwanted sexual overture" was put in context i.e. "one or more inappropriate incidents by angels or VCs"

I think you're missing the point here. How did the survey define which unwanted sexual overtures are inappropriate? You write that this was put in the context of harassment, but how this context was presented to the respondents has a big impact on what their responses really mean. At face value, it seems like the study considers all romantic advances to be inappropriate. This seems like an overly simplistic definition, as per my example here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18225474

Asking for further context is entirely warranted. Studies like these can often be made (intentionally or unintentionally) to seem alarmist due to poorly defining categories of harassment. For instance, I was counted as a victim of sexual assault in one of my university's surveys because I answered yes to the question "have you received unwanted sexual advances in the last year?". Yes I had, but all of them were from people who ceased their advances after being denied and generally acted with respect. While there's always some element of discomfort in being put on the spot like that, I would absolutely not consider any of these instances harassment in any way shape or form. Asking someone out on a date or inviting them over for intimate contact, and ceasing all advances after being denied was considered an act of sexual harassment by this survey. I'm not kidding, if someone asked a person out respectfully, they got told no, and both parties walked away with no further contact this was considered sexual harassment. This also disturbed me because it not-so-subtly implied that I had harassed literally every person I had asked out on a date and was denied, even though I've never continued pursuing someone after being told no.

It was explicit from the results that responding "yes" to this question was considered sexual assault. After the results were published they provided the breakdowns of responses. They included "yes" responses of this question as part of the student population that had been subject to sexual assault. I had talked to other students about it, and while many told me that they interpreted the question along the lines of "have you ever received unwanted advances after being told to stop" that emphasis was not part of the original question. If someone truthfully answered the question that was asked, they would have to answer "yes" even if they declined a respectful invitation to go out.

OK, my commment was a bit rude and flip (esp. for HN). But I'm finding your approach wearying, which may or may not be your intention (maybe you're not sea-lioning, but you're doing a good impression).

First of all, a survey about unwanted sexual advances in a professional setting is set against a background that's completely different than a campus survey; only if the campus survey was talking about "unwanted sexual advances from teachers or someone with a power imbalance e.g. TAs, coaches, etc." would the analogy be interesting. Was it?

Obviously the YC survey could be better worded and/or explained (perhaps the summary is less precise than it should be). However, it's pretty weird that your takeaway is to try to parse out these numbers, with no actual knowledge of anything involved, to try to make them seem smaller.

Second of all, you are going out of your way elsewhere in the thread to conjure up corner cases and thought bubbles where a VC/angel might have asked someone on a date ("an unwanted sexual advance" - maybe) without it being a conflict of interest. It's a maybe, but that's a real reach to imagine - first, it would imply that these people met up again after a clean 'sorry, we're not interested in your business'. It's not logically impossible, but it seems more likely that the "first order" effect was "a group of entitled VC/angel dudes acted like assholes as per usual".

Or if they had accepted the invitation, but would have preferred not to. It wasn't "have you ever turned down an unwanted sexual advance?"

Here's a novel idea. Most founders work long hours. Their work is their life (for the most part). I wasn't aware you had to take a vow of celibacy to start a company...

Also 'inappropriate incidents' is completely undefined.

Are you suggesting founders are required to treat professional events as places of business as well as the sole venue for finding a potential partner/lover because they'll have no chance otherwise? That's silly.

Working long hours doesn't immediately excuse you from adhering to social contexts, especially when there are obvious power structures present which evidently is rampantly abusive across industries.

'Innappropriate incidents' is entirely subjective and can't be defined beyond a personal context. If one party believes the manner in which someone else operates in a context is inappropriate, that's enough of a definition, especially in the context of such a survey.

> 'Innappropriate incidents' is entirely subjective and can't be defined beyond a personal context.

That's unacceptable. If there are no firm, objective rules then anyone can be guilty of anything and "inappropriateness" loses all meaning.

I could consider the fact that you don't pray before eating something inappropriate in a work dinner context.

The post in question refers to harassment of female founders by VCs. Thus, your wibbling on about how founders work long hours is a non sequitur at two different levels (both the fact that you're attempting to excuse the wrong population and that you're attempting to excuse people for doing the ethically wrong thing 'because busy').

The "inappropriate incidents" bit is not "completely undefined" - it refers to the things in the list that follows. I think for a survey the response was surely detailed enough?

i'm not entirely unsympathetic to this argument, but i don't think it only applies to busy executives. there's a certain cruelty in expecting people to spend so much of their lives in a setting where it is prohibited (or at least very taboo) to look for love. especially so for engineer types who may not have the skills or energy to maintain a social life outside of work. unfortunately, i don't think our society is healthy enough to do this in a safe way.

That seems like a problem with the culture that women shouldn't have to bear the consequences of.

Interestingly, when my company proposed banning all workplace relationships (as opposed to only those between team members and superiors in the reporting chain) the biggest pushback was from women.

That's likely because banning consensual relationships is a incredibly poor attempt at fighting sexual harassment.

Allowing workplace romances inherently entails romantic advances between coworkers (some, or all of which constitute harassment depending on your views on the acceptability of asking out coworkers). If women are put off by these advances (as stated in the original comment to which I replied) one would expect that women would be more interested in halting this. But interestingly, women at my company seem to value the chance at making relationships with coworkers more than stopping advances from coworkers.