
Uber Taps Eric Holder to Investigate Discrimination Claims - rmason
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-02-21/uber-taps-eric-holder-to-look-into-gender-discrimination-claims?utm_content=markets&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&cmpid%3D=socialflow-twitter-markets
======
thathoo
I wish we take from this not that uber has a toxic culture (it may well have
that) - but rather see if there are lessons here to help improve their own
company cultures. The cost of a good culture is constant vigilance and such
blogposts raise important questions. We should introspect and ask - does this
happen at my company? What can I do to change this?

------
Canada
I'm reticent about sharing thoughts on sexual harassment in the workplace,
given the emotionally charged nature of the issue. I've seen men get away with
completely inappropriate behavior toward women at work, and I've also seen
women make absolutely false claims against male coworkers and get rewarded
with unearned benefits. I see how hard it can be for a neutral third party to
judge the difference when all there is to go on is he-said-she-said.

In this case however, the accuser claims to have verifiable evidence that her
direct supervisor propositioned her for sex and then punished her for
declining. And not only did Uber not remove him for it, it covered for him. If
her accusation is true, and it probably is if Uber isn't denying it at this
point, then Uber is causing incredible self-inflicted damage by allowing some
employees bully over 1/7 of its technical/product workforce with impunity.
Uber has taken over 8 billion dollars from investors. To those investors, how
much has Uber represented that 1/7 of its workforce is worth?

Yeah, not surprising they're getting some famous names to help explain this.

------
Asparagirl
They are shocked, shocked to find gambling going on in this casino.

~~~
Analemma_
"We investigated ourselves and found ourselves not guilty"

------
tdeck
Users of the tech employee chat app Blind won't be surprised to see this is
happening at Uber, it seems like that forum is full of nothing but complaints
about their toxic work environment. I remember in particular seeing this
thread and being horrified:

[http://m.imgur.com/22JWxGQ](http://m.imgur.com/22JWxGQ)

------
getpost
Asking Holder and Huffington to get involved is grandiose. I imagine isn't
difficult to avoid being grandiose when you have a multi-billion dollar
valuation. The thing is, what's needed is a culture change, and these people
aren't going to change the culture. It'll just be another distraction.

------
snowwrestler
Uber is treating this like it's a situation that they just stumbled upon,
rather than the way that their own company, which they painstakingly created
from scratch, works.

The goal of this sort of investigation is to try to reset the clock--to try to
get people to say "well let's see what the investigation finds," like the
situation is a complete mystery, like it's a dead guy in a locked cabin with
nothing but a puddle of water. "What a mystery we have stumbled upon! Let us
investigate."

The reality is, this should never have happened in the first place, and it was
100% in Uber's control to prevent it.

The very best you can possibly say right now is that executive management at
Uber placed zero emphasis on preventing harassment. If they had, their HR team
would not have acted so stupidly.

~~~
urahara
It is actually seems that Ubber executive management and CEO not only place 0
emphasis on preventing harassment, but also supports and promotes harassment.

------
yeukhon
I'm going to say I believe in Ms. Flower's statement. It can't just be some
make up story if so many people echo on the culture at Uber (it would be big
conspiracy to organize).

I'd look forward a criminal case opened on this, but it's up to Ms. Flowers. I
am very aggressive person, I don't let people get away easily if they offend
me like this.

Anyway, when the investigation is concluded, and when the investigation result
matches the victim's statement, I expect no less from the CEO but a public
meeting with reporters, bow to the TV audience like how one does in Japan. I
expect no less. Leader who is "misled" and "misinformed" by his or her workers
should feel scared. Think about the whole national adviser talking to Russia
scandal.

Uber recruiter, you can take my name off your recruitment list.

------
ithought
What happened to being normal, getting to know people and then once having
some sort of familiarity, maybe mildly flirting with them? IF they
reciprocate, then go from there -- if not, forget about it?

Of course, if you're in a position of power over someone, you shouldn't do
this or at least be aware of the consequences. But this culture of texting
girls that are co-workers direct sexual or relationship stuff without even
knowing them is just crazy. It's never appropriate.

------
aorloff
They certainly appear to be taking their _own liability_ in the matter very
seriously.

------
adamnemecek
What's Uber trying to message with this? Why Holder? Isn't he the guy behind
the "fast and furious" debacle
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal)?

~~~
markbnj
Could be nothing more than having the description "former U.S. attorney
general" next to a finding that Uber did nothing wrong. That would pretty much
close the case for the average news skimmer.

------
KevinEldon
The real test is how Uber specifically addresses Susan Fowler's comments. If
they recognize issues, create programs, wave hands, weep openly, hire someone
to yell "shame", etc. then it's all about correcting how they are perceived.
It's understandable.

If they pay Susan something larger than an annual salary and request that
other female employees who suffered similar mistreatment come forward for
similar compensation then they're serious about resolving the issue
permanently and addressing their mistakes (I'm imagining Uber running ads like
a personal injury lawyer 'are you a woman, have you worked at Uber corporate,
were you sexually harassed and mistreated, please call Uber for $150k or more
in compensation for the wrongs you were forced to endure).

No company actively prosecutes themselves. No lawyer seeks outcomes that
aren't aligned with their client's best possible outcomes. Eric Holder,
despite his name recognition and alignment w/ President Obama, is not there to
help women who work at or have worked at Uber. He's there to help Uber look
better.

~~~
ComodoHacker
>If they pay Susan something larger than an annual salary and request that
other female employees who suffered similar mistreatment come forward for
similar compensation then they're serious about resolving the issue
permanently and addressing their mistakes

How paying off victims has anything to do with _resolving the issue
permanently_?

------
dpweb
Just read the blog post and it's a really terrible story. Just awful.

Assuming it's true.. You can take the Nixon position - didn't know what
subordinates were doing - and probably didn't - but this goes to _culture_ and
that means - the very top management levels. Like it or not, the very top
management is responsible for culture. Could be no one in the world more
horrified reading about this, than the CEO. I would be.

However, I wouldn't be too harsh on bringing in people somewhat friendly to
the company (doesn't mean they can't be impartial or follow the leads where
ever they lead) - there is an interest in protecting (call it, saving) the
company from people who did know about it and perpetrated it.

------
Ensorceled
Or, you know, we could wait to see if Eric Holder and Ariana Huffington
actually do nothing about this before we assume they're merely paid shills for
Uber.

------
Asparagirl
I'm curious whether Holder's "investigation" will also look at Uber's
historical attitude and pattern of behavior towards _women_ as a whole, not
just their female employees.

For example, there's Uber's refusal to background-check their drivers using a
system that includes fingerprints, which is something that most traditional
taxi companies are required to do. The SF District Attorney has publicly
called a background check without fingerprints "worthless."

Journalist Sarah Lacy of PandoDaily linked Uber's fingerprinting refusal to
the number of cases of women kidnapped and/or raped by their Uber drivers, and
how Uber seemed to think that this was either not happening or wasn't their
fault. Lacy claimed in one article that that Uber PR would even smear the
passengers as having been drunk and dressed inappropriately. In one case, a
woman was choked by her Uber driver and police were called to the scene, but
CEO Kalanick claimed in an interview in "GQ" that it didn't happen. (We're
talking about _hundreds_ of incidents of assault; a partial list is here:
[http://www.whosdrivingyou.org/rideshare-
incidents](http://www.whosdrivingyou.org/rideshare-incidents) )

Lacy also pointed out Uber's collaboration with escort services in Lyon,
France -- which objectified _Uber 's female drivers_ as lingerie-clad escorts,
and offered passengers free 20-minute rides with them...

And there was BuzzFeed News reporter Johana Bhuiyan, who had her trip
information accessed on two occasions without her consent...

And then there was the report from the National Bureau of Economic Research
(NBER), which is non-partisan and non-profit, that found in a two-year study
covering 1500 rides and published last October that female Uber passengers
were taken on longer and therefore more expensive rides than male Uber
passengers...

~~~
eh78ssxv2f
I have seen that list of incidents that you shared
([http://www.whosdrivingyou.org/rideshare-
incidents](http://www.whosdrivingyou.org/rideshare-incidents)). That list
includes regular driving accidents too which could happen to anybody.

After seeing that website, I think the first few questions I had were: (i)
During a given time period, how many rideshare trips were taken? (ii) How many
rideshare riders were affected (killed, assaulted etc.)? (iii) During that
same period, how many taxi trips were taken? (iv) How many taxi riders were
affected?

That website only answers (ii), and not the rest of the three questions which
makes the presented data meaningless (and also misleading, IMO).

~~~
Asparagirl
How about data like "how many Uber drivers had glaring criminal records (sex
offenders, murderers, etc.) _and_ were still hired by Uber, because Uber
doesn't do decent background checks with fingerprints, whereas those drivers
would not have been hired by traditional taxi companies, and therefore this
policy recklessly put female Uber passengers at risk?"

Because _just in Los Angeles alone_ , that number is at least twenty-five
identified drivers, according to a lawsuit that Uber settled last year:
[https://ww2.kqed.org/news/2016/04/07/uber-settles-lawsuit-
wi...](https://ww2.kqed.org/news/2016/04/07/uber-settles-lawsuit-with-s-f-and-
l-a-district-attorneys/)

~~~
dllthomas
If Uber is hiring drivers with criminal records, and nonetheless has fewer
incidents per number of rides than traditional taxis, _GREAT_! People who have
committed crimes and served their time need a way to make a living, and
obviously the risk to passengers is not substantial as we accept more from
taxis.

On the other hand, if ... and has substantially more incidents than
traditional taxis, this is an important criticism! But you're not actually
making the comparison that matters (and neither has any media that I've seen),
so we don't know.

------
hueving
Keep in mind this isn't an independent investigation from the perspective of
Uber. Holder has ties to Uber and it's only independent in the sense that he
was not involved with the parties in question.

In order to get a truly independent investigation, there will likely have to
be a lawsuit, because companies very rarely want actual independent
investigations.

------
JCzynski
On one hand, he has reputation to risk. On the other, he has reputation to
burn.

------
pasbesoin
All this does is further reduce my opinion of Holder.

------
intrasight
Hiring Eric Holder to me means that they aren't going to handle this
"internally". So this could be very interesting. But likely this is Eric
Holder as big PR bandaid, and that's all we're likely to see unfortunately.

------
mankash666
Why doesn't she sue Uber. By law, emails under litigation are required to be
retained, so the evidence must exist.

~~~
InclinedPlane
To what end? It's unlikely she'd get enough money from the lawsuit to justify
the expense and difficulty. And it would consume her life for perhaps a year
or several years. On a pure cost/benefit analysis it makes no sense.

If she couldn't find other work in the tech field it might make sense, but if
you're pulling down a silicon valley average 6 figure salary at another job
you just move on.

------
yuhong
Personally, I don't dislike sexual harassment laws as much as employment anti-
discrimination laws, but I do question whether they are really needed.

------
234dd57d2c8dba
Isn't this the "fast and the furious scandal" guy? Yuck. Another strike
against Uber for me...

------
nickpsecurity
If they hired me, I'd be talking to all the _ground workers_ personally about
company culture in general, any abusive behavior at all, any sexism on top of
that, and effects on business achieving its goals. I'd probably visit or
survey them a few times to re-question based on extra information I got over
time. I'd anonymize the source material in final report to executives and
investors. I'd highlight any damage to business objectives that I found along
with changes that amount to new top-down agenda plus house cleaning at middle
& lower management levels. If no response, I'd give the report and anonymized
data to the media instead.

Scheming politicians talking to scheming executives and management rarely
results in good things. Hopefully this does but I'm not optimistic.

~~~
alexandercrohde
Well I'm not defending Uber, nor the status quo of doing a political facade of
investigation to cover your ass but I think you're making it out to be a
little too simple.

Uber has over 6,000 employees, so let's say you send a survey to all of them
that's confidential asking about harassing behavior. Let's say you get a
number like 6% [360] feel they've been harassed. Let's say you talk to the 6%,
but half of those seem ambiguous (i.e. nothing in writing, this individual has
complaints about a number of people and past jobs, individual's account seems
inconsistent). Perhaps other employees don't even fill out your survey because
they don't trust it's anonymous, or that when investigating their claims HR
will be able to know who the "troublemakers" are.

Nonetheless you take the 3% that seem solid and to find common threads (the
same person being complained about, HR people failing to record/raise
complaints, etc) but without everything in writing it's so hard to prove who
raised a concern about what last year. Maybe many of those people already have
left (voluntarily or not).

I think if we want to solve these types of problems truly, we need to think
about developing auditable _systems_ (e.g. HR gives you a signed and written
copy of every complaint, which their supervisor sees, and that lying on such a
complaint be a legal offense on both the individual and corporate level).

~~~
nickpsecurity
I'm describing a method already implemented by many large companies and one-
man shops that do "efficiency engineering" by basically listening to ground
workers. One of my employers got better survey results than you're describing
despite being over 10x bigger than Uber.

Getting the info out of workers hasn't been the hard part in industry. It's
getting management to act on it that's hard. Things have to get bad enough,
esp in media, that executives are forced to respond and handle policy change
top down. Uber is halfway in that position.

------
photonwins
I am not aware of how the system works, but shouldn't authorities voluntarily
(don't know the legal term) investigate this case even though there is no
official complaint? There is victim's statement out in the open right?

~~~
freyr
I'm not a lawyer, but sexual harassment is usually a civil offense, not a
criminal offense.

------
nullnilvoid
One thing to remember that those so-called "independent" investigators are
almost never independent. They are hired by the company, provided with biased
information, and will definitely serve the company's benefits in the end. This
is more like for show. Look, we have hired the former U.S. Attorney General to
do the investigation. We are taking it very seriously. That said, let's wait
and see the result.

~~~
Asparagirl
Yup. In the case of GitHub several years ago, the "independent" investigation
never even talked to the woman who made the accusations! That's common.

~~~
spangry
Not quite as common as you think. For instance, Github:

 _" Rhoma identified the employees she wanted to talk to based on an initial
list we provided, the evidence she gathered, employees who asked to speak with
her, people Julie asked her to speak with, and anyone else she determined was
relevant, including Julie herself."_

Sounds like she spoke to 'Julie' (i.e. the woman who made the accusations). As
for independence:

 _" When the allegations against GitHub were raised publicly we took them
seriously and within days launched an investigation into what happened. We
hired Rhoma Young, an independent, third-party investigator that GitHub had
never worked with before. Rhoma has a long history of conducting fair and
impartial investigations, with 30+ years of HR experience. She has worked with
every type of organization, from Fortune 50 companies to local governments,
and frequently testifies as an expert witness for both plaintiffs and
defendants in depositions, arbitrations, and in litigation involving
discrimination, harassment, retaliation, disability, and mitigation of
damages.

Most importantly, Rhoma does not have a history of siding with companies or
otherwise being a partisan, industry spokesperson. Half of her litigation
witness work is on the side of employees, half for companies. Her job is to
investigate situations and figure out what actually happened, even when the
people who hired her don’t want to hear it."_

The full report is available here if you want to read it:
[https://github.com/blog/1826-follow-up-to-the-
investigation-...](https://github.com/blog/1826-follow-up-to-the-
investigation-results)

~~~
chimeracoder
> Sounds like she spoke to 'Julie' (i.e. the woman who made the accusations)

Horvath herself says that she never received an email from Rhoma, and (iirc)
Rhoma says that she only reached out a few days before the end of the
investigation.

Melissa Severini (who made similar claims against the same founder _two years
earlier_ ) also said that she never heard from Rhoma, which is a glaring
omission if you're an investigator looking to identify a potential pattern of
behavior.

------
lsiebert
Frankly, seems like Uber and any large workspace should have regular company
wide training on appropriate workplace behavior, before it's an issue for
anyone. You get the culture you create.

~~~
wpietri
Training isn't entirely useless, but it's a pretty small part of preventing
problems like this. It's not like her manager didn't know that hitting on his
employees was wrong. He didn't do it out of ignorance. He did it because he
could get away with it.

~~~
walshemj
The point of the training is to stop the employee saying I didn't know it was
wrong

~~~
wpietri
Did somebody say that here?

And don't most companies cover this stuff during orientation and in the staff
manual?

Even if they don't, so what if employees claim ignorance? There are a whole
host of firing offenses that professionals are expected to know without being
told. "Nobody told me I couldn't punch my boss," is not a reasonable excuse.

------
flootch
Q: What are the ethical implications of an engineer taking on employment with
Uber given what we know as factual regarding Uber's behavior and given the
high demand for software engineers in today's economy?

Q: If you do not have family, and are reasonably healthy, what are the ethical
implications of retaining a position at Uber and not resigning?

~~~
matt4077
A: If the engineer has any reasonable alternatives (which they should have, as
you're pointing out) it's somewhat indefensible on moral terms. Maybe,
possibly, you could count this news as indication that the process is working
as expected and defer judgement for a while.

More importantly, though: it's completely stupid to join Uber now. It's pretty
clear that the work environment has always been the sort of thing that kills
any humanity people may have had. With this investigation, the backstabbing
will only get worse. You'll get there (without any knowledge of the internal
structure) and have to navigate a maze while it's on fire.

Somewhere above, I'm also making the case of an upcoming Uber->Under
transformation. They were burning cash as if Elon Musk was trying to escape
from the Federal Mint. Now, their revenue is taking a hit and investors won't
touch them with a 10-foot pole in an open relationship.

Apart from engineers, their management may at the verge of collapse: If your
vesting is nowhere in sight (and I believe Uber's vesting is tied to exit
scenarios, so good luck with that), it's time to cut your losses before
Holder's successor starts the actual investigation. If there's anything
suspicious with their finances (which people have long been speculating about,
considering they stopped publishing them), you don't want to be an innocent
guy/gal in a guilty org.

~~~
lovealmond
I joined Uber as an engineer last year. Professionally this is the best thing
to happen to me. I work with great engineers, i learnt a lot from them. There
are people from diverse backgrounds, people for top CS universities to people
without any formal CS education but who are 2-3x better than most engineers i
have seen. That said, it is not the place for everyone, things move really
really fast. Lots of engineers are from Google & FB. Some tooling is
inadequate but that is normal for any young company

I like TK, he is honest & anti-burecracy (which is very important for
engineers). We have weekly town hall & he answers all sort of questions from
employees with honesty that i haven't seen in my previous companies. I feel
Uber is going through growing pains since they grew too fast. They have
hired/hiring managers from bigger companies who will help them transitioning
into a mature company.

------
freyr
So they chose an Uber lobbyist, an Uber director, and the head of the
department under investigation to lead their "independent investigation"? This
company really has some audacity.

~~~
imron
He's a high performer. And if he makes a mistake, I'm sure it'll only be his
first offense.

~~~
AckSyn
High performer meaning he lost hundreds of thousands of assault rifles in the
"Fast and Furious" scam that sent small arms into Mexico. Which were
immediately lost and use against US Citizens abroad and in our own country.

That Holder?

~~~
freyr
> _That Holder?_

Right, the Holder who cut his teeth representing banks, became U.S. attorney
general and refused to prosecute banks, and then went back to work
representing banks. The Holder who has advocated on Uber's behalf in the past,
and whose firm, Covington & Burling, has counseled Uber. I'm sure he's a real
bastion of impartiality.

------
simonsarris
So... not very independent.

Holder has advocated for Uber in the past, we know he has a relationship with
upper management already, which suggests it may not be a very impartial
investigation.

He's been in an advisory position to Uber since at least mid 2016. From July:

> _In one of the widest national efforts that Eric Holder Jr. has undertaken
> for a client since rejoining Covington & Burling last year, the former U.S.
> attorney general has written to lawmakers in three states on behalf of Uber
> Technologies Inc., urging them not to mandate fingerprinting for driver
> background checks._ [1]

> _Holder 's firm advises the company on safety matters and Uber asked him to
> write the letter, according to company spokesman Craig Ewer._ [2]

I hate to be negative and rude but I don't think this is going to generate the
best outcome. What if Holder is just their go-to big name to get... political
problems solved, and they just consider this to be just another _pesky
political problem?_

The article mentions Holder's firm, and they mention that the firm did an
investigation into Airbnb, but they don't mention the previous relationship of
that firm to Uber. This seems like relevant info for such a story and makes me
wonder if the omission is intentional.

[1] [http://www.law.com/sites/almstaff/2016/06/16/eric-holder-
adv...](http://www.law.com/sites/almstaff/2016/06/16/eric-holder-advocating-
for-uber-questions-regulatory-mandates/?slreturn=20170120215653)

[2]
[http://bigstory.ap.org/article/01685274cc944196af9016ad0a875...](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/01685274cc944196af9016ad0a875b72/eric-
holder-weighs-uber-against-fingerprint-checks)

~~~
flootch
Eric couldn't find a single bankster guilty of anything in the 2008 meltdown,
and he wasn't able to find anything wrong with Fast & Furious, so I have to
disagree with you, his appointment will certainly provide the best outcome for
Uber.

~~~
CalChris
One was found guilty, but point taken.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/04/magazine/only-one-top-
ban...](https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/04/magazine/only-one-top-banker-jail-
financial-crisis.html)

None were found guilty in Britain as well. Nor did Congress enact any
meaningful reform. Hell, Arizona has re-elected John McCain and he was a bag
man for Charles Keating.

Seems like no one, Justice, Congress or the American people want to hold
people accountable.

~~~
bboreham
> None were found guilty in Britain as well.

Interested to know why you exclude Jay Merchant, Alex Pabon, Peter Johnson et
al from your count.

~~~
CalChris
Thanks. The article I read was from before those convictions. And given the
relative sizes of our countries, y'all did a much better job of holding people
accountable. We clearly didn't.

After Enron, many people (not enough) went to prison. Arthur Anderson was shut
down with huge job losses. White collar jobs. Politicians and the Justice
Department have no stomach for that.

Maybe they have a point. In the 30s, a lot of good banks went down as a
contagion spread. In 2008, it was already bad and no one but no one wanted
that. Lehman was more of a hit job favor for Goldman Sachs, but also a visible
sacrifice. But no one wanted the 30s again.

------
isubkhankulov
I'm not trying to defend Uber here but there are two sides of every story and
I'm sure we'll find out more in the coming weeks and months one way or
another.

I could see how many people could jump to conclusions about Uber after reading
the original blog post. However, by headcount- it is a medium to large company
at this point while at the same time has an uncertain future and still taking
big bets. I could see how that could cause chaos in some or all areas of the
company.

Maybe- the blog post provide one point of view into Silicon Valley
culture/gender dynamics. Maybe- this culture often exists within engineering
departments of elite companies (vs the business/marketing/sales side).

There are a lot of moving parts in the original post: HR department acting
unprofessionally, manufactured performance reviews and awkward IM's.

I've encountered situations where new employees just didn't fit in well with
their coworkers, for a variety of reasons. They typically don't last long as
employees. Usually a year or less.

~~~
muglug
> I'm not trying to defend Uber here

Well, insofar as you present an alternative reality wherein Uber didn't do
anything exceptional (by the standards of their peers), you're defending Uber.

And then "I've encountered situations where new employees just didn't fit in
well with their coworkers".

If the engineer's claims are true, what happened to her and to others has
nothing whatsoever to do with culture fit.

~~~
khazhou
Right now all you know is that blog post. There's no denying that there _may_
be another side, which can only be known after they investigate. That's the
basic principle of our legal system... why wouldn't it apply here, despite
this still being handled privately within the company?

~~~
muglug
> Right now all you know is that blog post

It wasn't posted anonymously. It's a blog post from a well-regarded female
engineer with a lot to lose (her career, and possible financial penalties) if
her claims turn out to be made up. The basic atmosphere she describes has been
corroborated by other former Uber engineers. And a number of prominent female
engineers at other companies have reported near-identical experiences in their
own careers.

If I was a betting man, I'd put a lot of money on her claims being born out by
any even-handed investigation (though, as other people here have commented,
Uber's investigation is unlikely to be particularly neutral).

Additionally, nobody on HN is under any obligation to assume that anyone is
innocent until proven guilty — that's up to the (criminal) courts.

~~~
khazhou
Of course, you can make any assumption and come to any conclusion you'd like.

But you still don't know.

~~~
muglug
No, and I never claimed I did.

But I suppose I do question the motivations of those who care deeply about
presenting the "other side" when there are allegations of sexist practices in
the workplace. In this particular scenario, the other side is a company with
incredibly deep pockets and priority access to world leaders. They've dealt
with far worse (e.g. threatening to stalk journalists), and they'll be fine.

In fact, an exec who threatened to "expose" a personal detail about a
journalist who had written negatively about Uber is still employed there.
Fancy that.

~~~
khazhou
To be clear, you're questioning _my_ motivations (perhaps implying I condone
sexual harassment)? Or you're questioning the original commenter?

~~~
muglug
Talking about the original commenter's "other side".

------
ultrahate
Yall, I'm down with Uber. I know there's a lot of mudslinging lately, but I am
so damn excited about the future. A world where we can do pub transit + big
data, freight + big data, air freight + big data, food delivery + big data et
al.

Bad shit happens sometimes. There's a lot of shitty assholes in the world, but
crucifying a worthy cause and successful business because a couple of morons
work there just seems counter productive.

As other comments have noted, this smells like the github situation a while
back, and I'm no fan AT ALL of github, but even I concede that they are making
a real difference for open source. I think uber is making that difference for
moving people/things.

I want to see some justice, I want to know exactly how it went down and how it
was able to get to that point ie a dependency resolution as far as who shirked
policy and who didn't, AND THEN I want business as usual. Shit happens, fix
it, move on.

~~~
dandelany
First off, how _cool_ and _futuristic_ you judge a company's tech to be should
have _absolutely zero bearing_ on how an investigation like this is treated,
and the fact that you even bring it up makes it hard to take the rest of your
post seriously.

Secondly, Fowler did exactly the right things in response to these incidents,
over and over: she kept evidence, and she talked to the people in the company
who were ostensibly supposed to help her deal with them. For a year straight.
The fact that things continued to steadily get worse for her throughout this
process shows pretty clearly that this is not a couple of morons. This is an
institutional problem at Uber that must be dealt with at an institutional
level.

~~~
ultrahate
Fowler has submitted exactly zero proof that any of this even actually
happened.

~~~
dandelany
Obviously. She's presented her personal story in the form of a blog post -
we're all well aware of that. And it seems you're perfectly willing to accept
that story up to the point that it matches _your_ preferred narrative (ie.
"bad shit happened, couple of morons"), but anything more and it's "where's
the proof?!"

Why not just call her a liar and show your real true colors?

~~~
Rapzid
It's not good to conflate healthy skepticism with the belief that one is an
outright liar. We know so much about the fallibility of memory and how bias
affects recounts of events these days.

~~~
wpietri
Are you seriously claiming that ultrahate is just demonstrating healthy
skepticism?

~~~
Rapzid
I made no such claims, however dandelany was strongly suggesting the contrary.

> show your true colors

Is very close to a personal attack. This doesn't need to turn into the CCN or
Fox news comment section...

~~~
wpietri
If somebody with "hate" in their name responds to credible accusations of
sexual malfeasance with false interjections of "but there's no proof", then
we're already approaching Fox-News-comments levels of quality.

If you aren't claiming that ultrahate is displaying healthy skepticism, then
what do you think he's doing? And why is that valuable enough that you took
time to defend it?

------
jbapple
Eric Holder said that it met the constitutional bar of "due process" for a
Anwar al-Awlaki, a US citizen living abroad, to be assassinated by the
executive branch as long as they talked about it a bit beforehand. I am
doubtful that his investigation will result in meaningful change at Uber.

~~~
rayiner
It's not so clear cut as you make it out to be. In the phrase "due process,"
the word "due" literally means "what is warranted." I.e. "Due process" has
always been understood as the idea that people are entitled to the amount of
process warranted under the circumstances. It's about fact-specific inquiries,
not bright-line rules.

How much process is "warranted" when a U.S. Citizen wages war against the U.S.
abroad and actively tries to evade any attempts at accountability through
other means? Is military action against a U.S. citizen abroad never warranted?
Maybe, but maybe not. I wouldn't have made the same call as Holder, but that's
just me opinion, not an inexorable legal conclusion.

~~~
imron
Procedural Due Process [0]:

"Procedural due process is a legal doctrine in the United States that requires
government officials to follow fair procedures before depriving a person of
life, liberty, or property. When the government seeks to deprive a person of
one of those interests, procedural due process minimally requires for the
government to afford the person notice, an opportunity to be heard, and a
decision made by a neutral decisionmaker. Procedural due process is required
by the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the
United States Constitution."

They deprived him of his life and did not afford him notice, the opportunity
to be heard, or a decision made by a neutral decisionmaker.

That's why people are skeptical when Holder said his death met the
requirements for due process.

0:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedural_due_process](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedural_due_process)

~~~
eh78ssxv2f
> They deprived him of his life and did not afford him notice, the opportunity
> to be heard, or a decision made by a neutral decisionmaker.

How do we know that? Genuine question. May be they sent him a court notice to
his last known address (in US or in foreign countries) asking him to appear in
the court. What makes you believe that this did not happen? Are you implying
that Anwar never knew that US law agencies were looking for him?

~~~
rhizome
The Federal death penalty is only used for crimes involving death, and they
don't use the post office for capital trial information, scheduling, and/or
notifications.

~~~
rayiner
The death penalty is a punishment in response to ordinary criminal acts. Even
countries that have abolished the death penalty reserve the right to kill
people in war.

There is a fundamental difference between policing and military action.
Applying civilian legal standards to military situations is a bad idea because
it inevitably results in watering down ordinary criminal protections to
accommodate the needs of military situations.

~~~
rhizome
You don't have to condescend to me. On what principle(s) was al-Awlaki subject
to anything other than ordinary criminal due process?

~~~
rayiner
How was I being condescending? I was simply explaining the important
difference between the criminal justice system, which exists to maintain
internal order and the security of individuals, and the military, which exists
to protect the nation from foreign threats.

Al Awalki was in a foreign country--where U.S. criminal laws presumptively do
not apply--organizing armed action by foreigners against the United States.
It's an archetypal act of war, rather than a crime.

~~~
rhizome
Are you really saying that whenever a US citizen is out of the country, the US
government is de jure entitled to kill them?

~~~
rayiner
Your question is disingenuous because it ignores the factual context. Due
process is _inherently_ concerned with the particular factual circumstances.
It has never meant that you get a full trial in every circumstance. So no, the
U.S. government is not entitled to kill a U.S. citizen once he leaves U.S.
soil as a categorical rule. But it can do so if it provides process
commensurate with the circumstances. Which brings us back to the question:
What process is "due" to someone who commits something that is not a crime,
but rather is an archetypal act of war, from foreign soil?

~~~
rhizome
What was the "archetypal" act of war, and in what way(s) was it more serious
than actually taking up arms against the US?

But even so, why ask me? You're a lawyer, you know how to provide
extraordinary evidence to support extraordinary claims relevant to what is by
no means a settled question.

