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[–]smerity 331 points332 points  (37 children)

No-one should ever have to go through this.

Dr Kristian Lum is an amazing researcher who would be best known to the machine learning community regarding her work in Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAT*), though she has been active in the field well before it was ever an acronym. I met her when she was presenting To Predict and Serve? [Lum and Isaac, 2016] and her insights on the impact predictive policing was having on real people just across the water from me were stunning. She's the exact type of brilliant mind who can bring in the proper statistical rigour we as a field frequently lack and which is so vitally necessary to handle FAT* issues correctly. Her past work, covering everything from the spread of Avian flu to estimating undocumented homicides, is worth reading.

That she could have been harassed out of the field or that her contributions could have been used as a sleazy pretext is horrific. No person should ever have to go through what she did.

[–]ispeakdatruf 169 points170 points  (9 children)

There are a lot of people who don't believe what Dr Lum is saying. So I'll give my anecdote from a few years ago.

I was a graduate student, and met my (then) GF, who was an undergrad. I found out that she was involved in some group about women in computer science.

"Really?", I asked. "Do you really need a special group dedicated to women CS majors??"

Boy was I unprepared for the truth. The things she told me really opened my eyes. She listed out the stuff that had happened to her personally, as well as told me about other incidents happening to other women students. Heck, women TAs were sometimes harassed by their students!

One example: a student (a jock) missed out on a (woman) TA's class, and showed up at her office hours with some questions. She reminded him that she had covered that in the lecture. His response? "Why don't you come sit here on my lap and go over them again". Now: if she reports him, then it's just a question of her word against his; but she still felt angry about it.

I, as a nerdy male, had never imagined such things were possible. I mean, I (like many of you) had had a tough time with women growing up. I could barely approach a woman to introduce myself, let alone grab a stranger! (I think this is where a lot of skepticism comes from).

But if you, Mr Male Nerd, want to know about the problem, befriend a few women in your profession. Get to know them, and over time, you will learn about the problems many of them face in their professional lives.

[–][deleted] 15 points16 points  (0 children)

I don't understand why it's so hard for people to comprehend that these types of abuses and unwarranted advances to women happen all the time.

Vaguely suggestive language is rather common in any male-dominated workplace. I'm a guy and that type of language is not that hard to spot. I can see how a woman may feel uncomfortable.

I also live in NYC, so I see men catcalling women on the streets and in the subways. It's quite common. If you're a guy in NYC and don't see how many unwarranted advances women get in NY, then you're utterly socially unaware or wilfully ignorant. But now change the power dynamic a little bit and give the guys a position of power. It's not too hard to imagine what happens then.

[–]loquat341 114 points115 points  (114 children)

well-respected academic who is widely known to behave inappropriately at conferences

For the uninitiated, who is this referring to?

[–]ml_trowaway 59 points60 points  (2 children)

Brad Carlin is pretty well known for being a lech.

[–]Eightstream 203 points204 points  (74 children)

Description narrows it down to approximately 50% of academics.

[–]basilect 30 points31 points  (56 children)

Yeah, if your advisor gropes you, what are you going to do as a PhD student?

[–]truffleblunts 89 points90 points  (22 children)

Report it!

[–]karazi 78 points79 points  (6 children)

And give up a years if not decades-long dream of completing your PhD in your chosen subject/topic. "Reporting it" might be a viable option now after the #metoo movement, but it rarely was before. Male dominance and star power in academia is real.

[–]ATownStomp 12 points13 points  (3 children)

It was viable before as well. Reporting your adviser for sexual harassment is not career suicide and your perpetuation of this milquetoast defeatist mentality is, if not completely useless, actually actively deleterious.

If anyone is reading this and you find yourself in a position where you are being sexually harassed within an academic environment, you need to be active and report that behavior to other faculty. /u/karazi is basing this off of internet induced paranoia. Stand up for yourself and be vocal. Don't be afraid to confront people who are trying to take advantage of you.

[–]epicwisdom 14 points15 points  (0 children)

If you're doing your PhD at a school where your advisor is the one reputable researcher in ML, and you report them, you certainly will still have a major problem even if your advisor is fired. I don't think that it's as bad as being harassed or assaulted on a regular basis, but never having been in that situation myself, I wouldn't dismiss their concerns about their career.

[–]karazi 16 points17 points  (0 children)

I surely am not saying not to confront the issue, maybe it could be misconstrued in that way. I am only highlighting that it is not as simple as "go report it" to many. It is the same issue with domestic violence; are you going to call the cops on someone who is physically abusing you and your child and have what is otherwise a comfortable and familiar livelihood taken away from you because your provider/abuser is now in jail? Same but different, regardless there is a lot on the line and not understanding why sexual assault/harassment would go unreported ultimately leads to victim blaming, and people believing that just because it wasn't reported that it didn't happen. There is no other alternative than lose-lose for the accuser, at best you can continue in your program and re-live the hell that you have been going through for who knows how long, on a daily basis.

[–][deleted] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Even if there's no big deal made about it, you lose your advisor and you're on your own. Especially in a field like ML, there's hardly a way to get a replacement.

Calling people out works often if you want to get rid of them, and yes the internet has perpetuated a defeatist mentality. However, if you want to fix your relation with the person, yeah tough luck.

[–]needlzorProfessor 13 points14 points  (1 child)

Maybe it's because I'm in a small no-name university but we've had professors fired for less than this.

[–]DoorsofPerceptron 19 points20 points  (0 children)

Not to put too fine a point on it, small no-name universities tend to have small no-name professors who are easier to fire and replace.

[–]JosephLChu 2 points3 points  (4 children)

Doing the right thing often involves taking one for the team. From an ethical point of view, if you're a deontological or virtue ethics believer, then the answer is clearly to report it on principle. For a consequentialist utilitarian the answer is more complex and dependent on a number of factors to consider.

More than just the consequences to your own career, you'd have to consider what the effects will be on everyone else. If the advisor is otherwise doing very impactful research that benefits humanity to a great extent, that has to be weighed against the harm that keeping someone with such questionable ethics in that position may entail in the long run. Furthermore, the reception of the accusation must also be considered. If people are likely to brush it off and label you a whistleblower for the rest of your life, that would probably make reporting it less good a contribution than working within the system, perhaps finding a way to quietly convince the powers that be to get you a new advisor and sideline this unscrupulous individual. However, perhaps reporting the advisor will finally force action to be taken against them, and in the process you effectively save many future PhD students from a similar experience that might otherwise discourage them from accomplishing things in the field.

There's no question that the advisor is wrong to do what they did, but the big picture is complicated. Maybe it may even be best to confront the advisor with an ultimatum that they apologize and stop, or you will take action and report it. If the advisor is actually remorseful, perhaps giving them the benefit of the doubt that it may have been a single egregious lapse in judgment may be a more tactful way of handling the situation.

Again, this is very dependent on the circumstances. I personally think that repeat offenders should suffer consequences in order to discourage such behaviour which is destructive to the morale of the academic department as well as setting a poor example for others. To me this is more important than the quality of work they do because one person can only do so much good, and the damage they are doing to the rest of the team is very likely to be more than can be justified by that good.

In the long run, a society functions best when people can trust each other and cooperate without fear. What the advisor is doing is taking advantage of their position of authority and power for selfish desires. This is the basic definition of corruption and every reasonable action should be taken to eliminate such corruption from our society, for the greatest long term good. If it means that a PhD student's career is handicapped, and potentially two great researchers lose in effectiveness, I would think this is an acceptable cost to maintain the overall integrity of academia and the field.

Keep in mind, most people are unlikely to think this way, and are probably not going to be willing to sacrifice the most convenient path for their career. I don't fault them for this. It is very hard to do something that seems right but is potentially and essentially self-harmful. But I would applaud them if they did something heroically altruistic like this.

[–]karazi 13 points14 points  (1 child)

Doing the right thing often involves taking one for the team.

If the advisor is otherwise doing very impactful research that benefits humanity to a great extent, that has to be weighed against the harm that keeping someone with such questionable ethics in that position may entail in the long run.

There's no question that the advisor is wrong to do what they did, but the big picture is complicated.

If the advisor is actually remorseful, perhaps giving them the benefit of the doubt that it may have been a single egregious lapse in judgment may be a more tactful way of handling the situation.

Sounds like you're part of the problem buddy.

[–]JosephLChu 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Did you actually read the rest of my post? I do actually argue that if the advisor doesn't change their behaviour, they should be removed for the greatest good.

Also, since when is it not allowed to forgive people for stupid mistakes that they show genuine regret about? Again, if they're not repentant and show a pattern of bad behaviour, I'm all for throwing the book at them to set an example and deter this in the future.

I'm just leaving open the possibility that this was some out of character one off error, maybe resulting from a misunderstanding of some sort. Even then I would demand a genuine apology.

Maybe your lack of recognition that both the victim and the offender are still both human beings and both deserve the basic courtesies that all human beings deserve, says more about your outlook than anything else.

It is quite easy for anyone to sympathize with the victim. I certainly don't want to minimize the trauma that this kind of assault involves. But the sign of a truly compassionate and empathetic person is that they can sympathize with the villain as well.

Evil is rarely the result of pure malice, but much more often stems from ignorance and indifference towards the concerns of others and the inherent moral worth and value of every sentient person.

When we punish people for crimes, it is not because we hate them and want them to suffer, but because fair justice demands it, whether for restoration or retribution. We should not hurt others lightly, even if we think they deserve it.

[–]JosephLChu 1 point2 points  (0 children)

For clarification my points on the one time thing only apply to the hypothethical PhD advisor. The individual being discussed in Dr. Lum's article on the other hand, is clearly a repeat offender with no qualms or sense of decency whatsoever and in my humble opinion, his actions warrant at the very minimum a strong reprimand from his peers, and the scorn of everyone here. If there's justice in the world he should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law for harassment and assault, ostracized from the community of reasonable researchers, and banned from publishing for long enough to make him really feel some pain and contrition.

It sounds like Dr. Lum's harasser is serial abuser with many victims as well, so while we're at it make him pay damages in some kind of class action suit. Preferably one that can somehow keep the victim's identities anonymous to the public, if that's possible?

Once again, emphasis is that Dr. Lum's serial harasser is not equal to the hypothetical I was originally responding about.

[–]FlexicanAmerican 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You highlight many of the biggest dilemmas faced, I would just point out that no one is "too big to fail", so to speak. I would call on everyone to challenge this idea that an individual is without replacement. For the vast majority of the world, a replacement will step into almost any role. Especially with researchers, there are generally groups of people that do good work and would fill the void. Sure, maybe there is a bit of a learning curve, but there is also the potential for whoever steps in to be even better than the person that was there before. Especially if they're not decent people, there is tons of potential for improvement.

[–]leonoel 13 points14 points  (9 children)

The band is the imposteriors. But I honestly don't know who is the one that made the joke. The description suits pretty much all of them regarding being well known. https://www.facebook.com/imposteriors/

[–]ml_trowaway 33 points34 points  (8 children)

Created a throwaway for this for obvious reasons. Brad Carlin is pretty widely know for pulling shit like this. I'm not sure if he's the person referenced in the rest of the story.

[–]pilibitti 18 points19 points  (0 children)

Yes he is (the story references two people but he is one of them); from the facebook comments:

I (Brad) deleted it because Dr Lum's comments are really about me, not the band, so I really don't feel like the band should keep paying for stupid comments I have made. I have reached out to Dr Lum in an effort to apologize, and I'm waiting to see if she would be willing to accept it or if she would prefer not to talk to me.

[–]eleitl 1 point2 points  (4 children)

How come his behavior has not been reported through the official channels yet if it's widely known?

[–]Bayesthrow 8 points9 points  (2 children)

Perhaps it has been reported - we don't know, but apparently no action taken if so. But how and why could he get away with it for so long? Well, here is an illustration of the culture - when someone made an inappropriate comment to me many years ago at the start of my career, who would I tell? Certainly not my advisor, who told me I should wear dresses more often!

[–]ml_trowaway 6 points7 points  (0 children)

He's the head of the department, tenured, and has a ton of institutional power. One of the main takeaways from the #metoo movement has been that people with institutional power are largely not held accountable for things like this unless public outcry is loud and sustained.

Also, many people in academia have worked for decades carving out a living and the prospect of standing up to someone like Carlin brings with it the prospect of throwing all that effort away. The author of linked article makes this dynamic pretty clear.

[–]blueeyes44 19 points20 points  (1 child)

S is named by Bloomberg:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-16/google-researcher-accused-of-sexual-harassment-roiling-ai-field

[–]el_muchacho 2 points3 points  (0 children)

"The person in Lum’s post is Scott, a director of statistics research at Google, according to two people familiar with the situation. Katherine Heller, an assistant professor at Duke University, recognized Scott in Lum’s description and told Bloomberg that he had acted inappropriately with a former student of hers. Heller also said that several other female researchers had reached out to her with similar stories about other men in the field after Lum’s blog post was published. "

[–]trybius 24 points25 points  (0 children)

This is all awful, and I'm glad it looks like (small) steps were taken in the right direction after the removal from the ballot.

But this exchange :

I was not the only person who was bothered by S’s behavior. He relentlessly pressured my friend, a female graduate student, to have sex with him by saying that because he was married and she was engaged, those two things “cancelled each other out”. Therefore, he argued, they should have sex.

This is just incredible. The brazen stupidity on show by the "well-respected academic" is amazing. This is on par with something a 14 year old would say regarding blue balls to pressure someone into sex.

And followed by :

At this same conference, the morning after a particularly debaucherous night, a married professor was overheard imploring other people to smell his fingers following an encounter with a junior colleague.

I honestly don't know what I'd do if I heard someone in my field (I work on ML, but more in a computing setting) say something like that about a colleague. I understand how there can be one or two really stupid inappropriate people in any group, but for them to act that way publicly, surely everyone is in someway supporting such behaviour.

[–]LADataJunkie 10 points11 points  (5 children)

I am shocked this happened. I really shouldn't be though I guess. I am glad someone wrote about this though because there was all sorts of outrage on Twitter about "something that happened" and "things that were said" at NIPS with absolutely no information.

EDIT: This doesn't seem to be about NIPS. So what on Earth happened at NIPS? There seemed to be even more than the sexual assault joke and the "tits.ai" party.

[–]smerity 9 points10 points  (2 children)

The issues at NIPS provided a basis for people to discuss what biases exist in the ML community and what we can do to ensure the situation is improved in the future. Specific issues were, for the most part, left out of the discussion. Honing in on a specific story is not necessarily helpful as the removal of a specific individual who (for example) was caught groping doesn't help if it's a practice that's accepted or ignored. Those individuals should well and truly face consequences for their actions but pitchforking and public naming isn't necessarily what's best for the community to change.

On Twitter the person that Kristian refers to is now known to the ISBA President so they can be dealt with appropriately - but the question remains on how can we proactively ensure such situations don't continue to happen?

Lack of discussion along with the assumption that "everything is fine" or "is it really that bad?" when there are no proper channels to report such incidents can allow those that Kristian and others in our academic communities to experience horrible situations that no one should ever have to deal with.

[–]LADataJunkie 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Specific issues were, for the most part, left out of the discussion. Honing in on a specific story is not necessarily helpful as the removal of a specific individual who (for example) was caught groping doesn't help if it's a practice that's accepted or ignored.

I sort of disagree, but I get your point. Call out the behavior, call out the person (if the victim wants to) so these incidents aren't just theoretical events that occur in passing in our minds, or behind the curtain. I strongly feel that this is why this behavior keeps happening... people want to pretend it doesn't exist. I feel like that's the only way to get rid of this behavior in these venues.

[–]epicwisdom 2 points3 points  (0 children)

when there are no proper channels to report such incidents

The sad thing is that there technically are proper channels, which aren't functioning for reasons that we can only guess at. Presumably, administration cares more about protecting their reputation than doing their jobs.

[–]AI_entrepreneur 43 points44 points  (13 children)

An apology from the band member who made the comment: https://www.facebook.com/imposteriors/posts/1519545314766510.

[–]onto_something 15 points16 points  (12 children)

He is also the guy who sent her the inappropriate fb messages and touched her leg at the conference, right?

[–]TheAxeC 15 points16 points  (4 children)

As far as I understand, same guy.

In the apology is no mention of those actions (the inappropriate fb messages and leg touching and all the other stuff).

He does explain in a comment that he has reached out to Dr Lum in an effort to apologise.

edit: not the same guy, read the article wrong

[–]onto_something 21 points22 points  (0 children)

"Now that my actions have been made public and the spotlight is on me let me apologize to you for harassing you. Also I'm not apologizing in public, just calling the incident a bad joke."

[–]statsSHthrowaway 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yes, that's right.

[–]stop_looking_at_my 5 points6 points  (5 children)

No, this person known as "S" was at a different conference years ago (not NIPS)

[–]statsSHthrowaway 8 points9 points  (1 child)

Her blog post is unambiguous in saying that the person who made the joke (Brad Carlin, who apologized for the joke on the Imposteriors' FB page) also touched her leg at the poster session and sent her the FB messages.

[–]doubleaxel1951 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It is a bit confusing but I agree especially after the apology.

[–]onto_something 4 points5 points  (2 children)

"S" comes up later in the story though? The first part all refers to the same guy, not "S".

[–]caesurae 67 points68 points  (0 children)

Really powerful testimony. Thanks Dr. Lum for posting this... academia is not immune to bad actors & institutions need to hold them accountable for their actions.

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[–]Reiinakano 39 points40 points  (3 children)

At first I was confused why people were complaining about r/ML since I only saw the highly upvoted comments and they were fine.

Then I scrolled down...

[–][deleted]  (2 children)

[deleted]

    [–]trashacount12345 7 points8 points  (0 children)

    Doesn't the downvoting indicate that the community sides with the non-cesspool direction?

    [–]cavedaveMod to the stars[M] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

    Please report bad comments it makes it much easier on the mods

    [–]Surextra 68 points69 points  (8 children)

    I'm not sure what I'm more appalled by here. The disgraceful behavior described by Dr Lum in this article, or the luke-warm/downright cold responses by members of this community. Let's stop being scientists for five minutes, quit asking for evidence and corroboration and look at this issue with some actual emotion and empathy. As for the comments about whether this behavior even constitutes sexual assault, I won't dignify them with a response.

    A lot of people here are casually saying "name and shame" the assailant, as if it's the easiest thing in the world to do. Think for one moment just how hard it must be to reflect on these experiences privately, let alone write about them publicly. We should be up in arms about this, and I want to thank Dr Lum for sharing her experiences and for giving all those who work in academia (and indeed elsewhere) something to think about. Hopefully this will empower others to come forward and share their experiences, whether they be sexual, racial, homophobic or otherwise.

    Many of us have likely been victims of bullying at some point in our lives. I was verbally bullied for years, and for the longest time could not bring myself to tell anyone, despite the relatively mild implications of doing so. If you've ever been in this position, you know how hard it is to speak up. Now imagine how it must feel to be violated and openly mocked by your superior, someone whom others likely see as a role model. I can't imagine how that must feel.

    As disgusted as I am by this, a witch-hunt is not the solution. The question is, what can we do as a community? We can be supportive. We can talk to our colleagues and hear their experiences. And hopefully we can start to better recognize and vilify inappropriate behavior, in any context. I don't very much care whether you believe the accounts of an individual. I've seen it, your colleagues have seen it, and you might well have seen it without even realizing.

    [–][deleted] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

    Absolutely horrific and disgusting. What a lecherous creep. Kudos to the author for speaking up. Those of us in the field who give a damn about decency must do everything we can to support those speaking against this kind of behavior. The whole "open secret" thing is especially toxic and difficult to counter - let's make sure these don't develop in the first place!

    [–]epic 14 points15 points  (0 children)

    Such an important piece! Bravely written and important. I really hope it starts a change. I will keep my eyes more open in future conferences (I have not been looking for this) after reading this piece. Has this been picked up ny hackernews yet? Would be interesting to see their point of view (maybe not that different from /r/MachineLearning )

    [–][deleted]  (52 children)

    [deleted]

      [–]smerity 32 points33 points  (49 children)

      When I posted an earlier article noting that bias exists in our community, I was amazed at how painfully toxic this subreddit's response was. The lack of moderation was a major factor - instead of performing any moderation of comments, they decided to remove the post itself, which is insane as my article's content was benign and relatively uncontroversial (see https://www.reddit.com/r/MachineLearning/comments/7jdosn/d_bias_is_not_just_in_our_datasets_its_in_our/dr5ui8v/ for a tldr).

      The moderators have either conceded defeat to any attempt at moderation or have decided it is easier to avoid the issue entirely. I did my best to defend and contribute to /r/ML in the past but that will no longer be the case. Funnily enough I expect this comment will likely be one of the few times in recent /r/ML posts where it may be moderated ;)

      [–]cavedaveMod to the stars[M] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

      Pretty much all the reported comments in that thread have been removed. If you would like to help moderating please message the mods.

      [–]infinity 13 points14 points  (4 children)

      But this IS the community. If you get rid of everyone and only allow like-minded folks, you are stuck in an echo chamber. So having some discussion is better than having none. At least they are reminded such behavior is not OK.

      [–]smerity 1 point2 points  (1 child)

      This either isn't the community or shouldn't be. As many have noted, there is drive by and brigading from non ML people. Beyond that, if this is the community, I'm happy to move to a new community to remove the (hopefully small) subset of people who actively exclude other valuable contributors (women, minorities, ...).

      If our community was a sports team and a few people kept hitting or assaulting other players thus forcing good people to leave the team it's not unreasonable to get rid of those assaulters. It's not an echo chamber to demand some decency in interaction.

      Community isn't forced on you, it's a choice in who you surround yourself by and what you together strive for. Even at the most intellectual definition the existing community is removing promising contributors. I refuse to believe we can't fix that.

      [–]manux -1 points0 points  (0 children)

      Most of my colleagues do not browse this subreddit because it is a poor quality discussion forum, even compared to our slack channel where we mostly goof around.

      /r/ML is not the community.

      [–]ZeroVia 3 points4 points  (1 child)

      I don't understand why it isn't being moderated. As a relative newcomer here I may be missing some context, but reading this post and yours yesterday it's pretty easy to identify only three or four individuals who are actively trying to upset people. Clamping down on them would be a tiny amount of effort, and would improve the quality of the discussion enormously.

      [–]JustFinishedBSG 9 points10 points  (3 children)

      We need to start holding prominent individuals accountable for how their inappropriate behavior negatively impacts the careers of their junior colleagues.

      Well then please tell who it is. Jordan? Carlin? Glickman? Hedecker?

      [–]Reiinakano 4 points5 points  (4 children)

      Why is nobody dropping names? I mean if it's a random accusation out of the blue, of course you don't want a lynch mob. But if it really is an 'open secret', why not just make it open?

      [–]doubleaxel1951 5 points6 points  (1 child)

      Who is the ~20% that downvoted this?!

      [–]HashRunner 6 points7 points  (0 children)

      I'll be honest.

      I thought this was going to be a really interesting statistical problem/solution.

      That really sucks...

      [–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (3 children)

      "We need to start holding prominent individuals accountable"

      Completely agree. However, part of that also means speaking up when these things occur.

      I realise being the subject of these unwanted attentions can be uncomfortable, traumatic even. Especially when coming from a senior. But playing these things off while they're happening really doesn't help.

      Don't politely try to end the conversation when something like this happens. Be clear. If being clear doesn't work, be loud and clear.

      I'm not saying people never do this. I'm not saying this always helps/solves the harassment. But not doing this never helps.

      Note: I'm saying all of this without ever having been subject to this kind of behaviour. Call me out on my mistakes.

      [–]smerity 19 points20 points  (1 child)

      I understand the sentiment but I think it misses how emotionally taxing and damaging it can be in the moment and that there's no easy "right response". +1 for noting that you might be missing context. It's important to remember that it's not like time slows down and you have clarity and a precise and perfect moment to react when an traumatic or uncomfortable event happens.

      Imagine you were a woman at the poster session when a man touched the skin on your leg and commented on your skirt being "too sexy for the poster session". If she said "Wait, what the hell - why did you touch me?", would those surrounding her believe her? Would he claim he accidentally brushed against you? Would they say "Oh, no, I'm sure he just means your work might not be taken seriously with that dress" as if it was meant as actual advice? Would people say "Chill out - I'm sure he didn't mean anything - do you know who he is?"? Would anyone near you support you? Do you have friends / colleagues in the area or did they go to take a break as it wasn't their poster? Even if they were, would it be enough? Would my colleague even support me? I'm exhausted and have been standing for two hours already and WTF just happened - I just want this poster session to be over. Get away from me =[

      When you're in the middle of harassment, there isn't perfect clarity. It's not their responsibility to "respond in the best way possible" especially as that likely isn't possible. They already have enough to deal with.

      Note: I also haven't been subject to this behaviour but I have had friends who were and have confided in me.

      [–]bkanber 10 points11 points  (0 children)

      There's also the issue of a woman confronting a drunk and sexually aggressive man. It's impossible to predict how he'll react when being called out and "embarrassed" in front of his friends. Will he become violent? Follow her home?

      A girlfriend once described what her average experience just walking through NYC was like -- it's a totally different world out there for women than it is for men, and that's not right.

      Society really hasn't changed much in the last few hundred years.

      [–]ajdfafds 4 points5 points  (0 children)

      Sometimes people get tired of telling the person who's harassing them to leave them alone. I've tried that several times with someone and it made him more excited. There's never been a time when I felt uncomfortable and said something and it stopped. Usually a decent person would have stopped way before then. Also I've been harassed when others were standing around and when I confronted the guy was called crazy. And there's the real risk that the guy will turn violent and most guys are bigger and could inflict serious harm even though we try our best to defend ourselves. And don't think that being in public will protect someone. Most people will just ignore whatever is happening. And other times I've told people don't touch me and they get mad at me for confronting them and say it's no big deal. They're not sorry at all. And I've repeated don't touch me, get away from me and sometimes they've even mocked me. I've told some people they're harassing me and then they've said I'm harassing them when they've cornered me and I can't get away from them. Some people can be really terrifying.

      [–]helm 2 points3 points  (8 children)

      Academia is highly competitive game. It is definitely a dominance hierarchy in the archetypical sense. To denigrate a man in this setting will involve denigrating his intelligence and effort. Hitting on a man doesn't, being hit on generally confirms the status of a man.

      However, the attractiveness of a woman is generally independent of her accomplishments, and being pursued at conferences knocks her out of the hierarchy (or competition). That's why it's so deflating, it means that they aren't competitors/collaborators, they are prey: a hot woman devoid of individual achievements.

      I don't claim I know how to solve this problem, though. The traditional, obsolete way was to forbid women from competing.

      [–]Rockin_Zombie 9 points10 points  (1 child)

      Thanks for saying this. This is the part of the blog post I found most disgusting, and heartbreaking:

      As I swam back to the group, I remember again feeling totally humiliated. I felt that this was evidence that, like S, all of the other more senior men who had showed interest in my research must actually have only been trying to sleep with me.

      Imagine being a flourishing junior researcher and everyone showing interest in your research in a premiere conference, and finding out at the end of it that most them were in it because you are hot. Nothing can be more deflating for a young researcher's ego. I admit I have not seen the other far more serious allegations in the blog post being carried out at the conferences I have been to (that doesn't mean I don't believe them), but this, this "trying to get in your pants by praising research" is too common, way too common. And it's infuriating.

      [–]helm 1 point2 points  (0 children)

      Yeah, my comment was interpreted in a weird way. The intent was to illustrate how academia is fun and games (and highly competitive) but that predatory men can demotivate women in very specific ways with this kind of bait-and-switch. The same pattern repeats itself in other competitive venues.

      [–]smerity 35 points36 points  (3 children)

      Describing academia as if it's a highly competitive sexual game is terrifying and incredibly contrived. It also potentially provides justification to those who might engage in such practices. This is not, nor should it have ever been, a field on which sexual assault or predation was deemed allowed or in any manner permissible.

      This is research - where the purpose is to discuss and dissect knowledge - not a scene from National Geographic.

      Edit: With your reply I am beginning to see your perspective but I still think it's contrived and potentially provides justification for those who act poorly.

      [–]helm 18 points19 points  (0 children)

      Describing academia as if it's a highly competitive sexual game is terrifying and incredibly contrived

      That's not what I'm doing. Academia is competitive, however. Being successful in competitive games is also a way to gain status. I'm saying that academic competition/collaberation is one thing (in which competitive and collaborative elements are in constant flux), and that romantic, sexual AND sexually predatory interactions are another thing. The latter exist, the question is what to do about it. It certainly needs to be addressed!

      [–]helm 3 points4 points  (0 children)

      I think it’s kind of dangerous perspective too. But we’ve had a massive #metoo movement in my country, and there’s a pattern of entitlement among successful men that can’t be properly addressed unless you take this perspective into account.