
Julie Ann Horvath names harassers - gortok
https://twitter.com/nrrrdcore/status/459375982013468672
======
crashandburn4
This seems to have turned somewhat juvenile at this point, I'm starting to
lose more respect for people the more mud they've started slinging. (This
doesn't just apply to Julie Horvath, Theresa seemed somewhat bitter in some of
her posts but this article [0] does seem to come across as somewhat churlish

[0] [http://valleywag.gawker.com/ims-and-email-support-
allegation...](http://valleywag.gawker.com/ims-and-email-support-allegations-
about-the-toxic-cultu-1567175545)

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dpritchett
For what it's worth there are a ton of details in a blog post that keeps being
killed in HN's new thread queue. Probably autokilled by hostname.
[https://twitter.com/nrrrdcore/status/459405044920500225](https://twitter.com/nrrrdcore/status/459405044920500225)

~~~
petercooper
Yeah, Valleywag is on the list of autodead domains. Which is a shame, because
they occasionally cover important stories.

~~~
crashandburn4
What does that mean the list of autodead domains, can it be posted in
comments? can we look at this list?

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jaredsohn
Here's a list from a few years ago:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=499044](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=499044)

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noir_lord
This is a PR train wreck and so far every single thing I've seen about it has
been "he said/she said".

These screen-shots (unless I'm missing something) don't show much of anything.

~~~
untog
One thing they do show is the HR rep not willing to be present in a meeting.
That at least is evidence that their HR department should have been
functioning better than it was. Not necessarily evidence of anything else,
though.

~~~
noir_lord
It's not even evidence of that, all you can conclude from that screenshot is
that HR is out of the office for much of the next week and is suggesting
someone else agreeable.

Everything else is pretty much speculation (but then this entire thing has
been like that).

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trustfundbaby
so so messy ... not sure that it really accomplishes that much either, except
to make Ms Horvath seem really undesirable as an employee. I just feel like
this could have been handled more maturely.

~~~
gregd
I'm curious to know specifically what makes you think she's undesirable as an
employee?

~~~
unfunco
I'll be honest and say I am now beginning to think the same as @trustfundbaby.
The situation has turned almost farcical, and without knowing the absolute
truth (which we don't) I think it would be a difficult decision to hire
Horvath, knowing her persistence.

Nobody can legally admit to it, but behind closed doors I'm sure there would
be a lot of managers who would disregard her Resumé knowing what might happen
when someone fumbles, or appears to fumble, regardless of who is telling the
truth.

Edit: I'll pose it as a question

You are the CEO of a company, and you come across Horvath's C.V. for a
position, you are aware of what is happening between Horvath and GitHub. Do
you hire her, knowing that an overheard (and likely innappropriate) comment
could be all it takes for her to resign and start a PR campaign against your
company's culture?

~~~
krainboltgreene
Yes, even explicitly because of that. I expect to be held accountable for any
actions I take, even the seriously horrible ones.

~~~
cpncrunch
What about something seriously horrible like watching someone hula hoop?

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cpncrunch
I thought my comment was obvious, but it looks like I got a downvote so I
guess I need to explain it _sigh_.

The point I was making is that there doesn't seem to be any real evidence of
any wrongdoing at Github. All the allegations seem to disappear once we hear
more details:

\- The hula-hooping seems pretty innocuous. Some people start hula-hooping in
the office, so other people start watching. It would be a pretty unusual thing
to hula-hoop in the office, so it seems natural to watch it. There should be
no reason to think the hula-hooping would cause male excitement (and if there
was reason to think that, it probably shouldn't have been done). It sounds
like nobody else had a problem with it.

\- The rug incident seems like a non-event. Why should 'meritocracy' be
divisive? The only problem it seemed to cause was preventing Horvath being
accepted into a "feminist hackerspace".

\- The 'harassment' against JAH from Heather and Tom now seems to disappear
given the facts from JAH herself in valleywag. It seems that JAH was accused
of starting the rumour against Tom's wife, and that is why JAH was called into
the HR office. JAH says that she was harassed because she was accused of
starting the rumour, and Heather sat silently. It would seem very appropriate
to talk to a worker accused of starting a vicious rumour, and get all the
facts. Did JAH actually start this rumour, or was it a lie? That is a bit
unclear at the moment.

\- The IMs in the valleywag article just seem like a vicious rant from JAH
against Tom and his wife. So Tom's wife set up an office at Github. Perhaps
not the most sensible idea given that she wasn't an employee, but certainly
not harassment.

\- Regarding the allegation against Ted Nyman: she now says he reverted her
edits because she wouldn't date him (previously it was "fuck"). So all we know
is that Nyman asked her out on a date, she refused, and he reverted some
edits. Were those two things linked? To be honest I have my doubts, based on
JAH's other "false positives".

Overall it looks like JAH is the bully and harasser here. It's also ironic
that she has achieved the exact opposite of what she wanted to achieve
(advancing the position of women in the industry). Perhaps the lesson -
unfortunately - is that it isn't a good idea to hire a feminist.

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gregd
What I don't understand is why, (presumably the only HR person at GitHub)
wouldn't be at a meeting as requested? Isn't this a rather important function
of an HR position? Why would she suggest someone else be there? Didn't she
have the authority to say, "under no circumstances will a meeting take place
between employee x and employee y without my presence"?

~~~
abracar
From the leaked convo, HR person wasn't sure to be in town and suggested
Preston-Werner was the one who could decide to postpone the meeting or not.

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rogerthis
Stop giving me orders. I feel harassed.

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integraton
I've been subjected to worse in the past, and I'm a male. I've seen other men
subjected to worse. I know multiple people who left the tech industry
altogether after suffering actual psychological abuse.

Regardless of everything else, her continued absurd attempts to link this to
gender are disgusting, obviously ridiculous, and thoroughly demonstrate that
she's not honestly interested in speaking for people who have suffered abuse
by employers.

~~~
shadesandcolour
Stating that the same thing happens to males isn't actually justification for
taking an issue with what she is saying. It shouldn't be about gender at all.

However, I agree with you in thinking that the attempts to tie this to gender
issues are way off base. When I first read the reports on the issues (which
are not the whole truth, I understand), none of them read like gender issues.
They read like issues between employees male or female, that didn't work well
together. Would we have had the same reaction if Tom's wife had interfered in
a male employees relationship? We should. Would we have had the same reaction
if a female employee was reverting changes from a male? We should.

From what I've seen, it looks like this became a gender issue because JAH is a
female, not because there were specific gender harassment issues.

~~~
integraton
It's about gender because she is directly claiming it's about gender and has
done so from the beginning. As valleywag quoted her saying today:

 _" Would this happen to a man in the same situation? No."_

She is _wrong, wrong, wrong._ Things happen all the time to men in the tech
industry that are worse than what she claims happened to her. Even famously
so:

[http://www.businessinsider.com/ex-color-employee-files-
lawsu...](http://www.businessinsider.com/ex-color-employee-files-
lawsuit-2012-11)

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bhw
She just made herself completely unemployable, and she'll get sued for
millions unless she can prove her allegations (and maybe even then).

She's very smart.

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nashequilibrium
Why are you not brave enough to use your normal HN account, why hide?

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burntroots
You mean besides for the tidal wave of downvotes?

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burntroots
Thank you, anonymous downvoting coward, for proving my point.

