Re:Why didn't you back me up?
by pron on Sunday March 08, 2015 @12:01AM
(#9164612)
I don't think you even remotely understand the problem. The problem isn't the place human sexuality plays in conversation, but the fact that women in Silicon Valley work in male-dominated environments that have been getting increasingly hostile towards women over the last two decades, and people working in such environments quickly sublimate the power structure. It's not that talking about sex makes the atmosphere hostile, but the other way around: women (and men) don't feel comfortable where they don't feel safe. If all employees felt safe, secure, and respected, they -- including women -- will be happy to talk about many subjects, including sex.
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No, I get it. My issue is that they get conflated in the media and in discussion. Combating sexism and harassment is good, no two ways about it -it is a problem? Yes, I know of women who have to turn down repeated requests for dates, from the same people over and over and over. Myself I remember some guy asking me out repeatedly --knowing very well I'm not into guys. But, it's a shame that there is no nuance and any semblance of sexuality is automatically seen as treading the very thin ice of harassment.
People aren't sure any more if a compliment is going to be interpreted as harassment. Harassment meanwhile goes unabated, and as you conclude, may be getting worse.
But the harassment, in this case, is only a symptom of the sexism that is making its way into the very core of SV workplaces. Everything gets amplified when the perpetrator enjoys more power and the support of the boy club. This case is just one more demonstration that the problem is not the limits of propriety, but a very unfair distribution of power.
If someone hurts you, whether or not you will experience the offense as a dangerous threat depends very much on whether the offender makes the offense knowing they enjoy the protection of power, which allows them to harm people who don't.
It can't be a symptom of sexism, else I could not ever be accused of harassing a man. Yet, could be capable of harassing a man, or a man harass me. Or one woman another. And power amplifies it, or squelches it (one rarely sees a superior get sexually harassed, but it's not because a potential harasser does not exist). Harassment is to me, more a disorder, at least that's how I have experienced it.