Former Unity Technology VP files lawsuit alleging CEO sexually harassed her

Former Unity Technology VP files lawsuit alleging CEO sexually harassed her(techcrunch.com)

60 points by mikkelewis 6 years ago | 24 comments

echelon 6 years ago |

From what I can tell from the article, these are allegations. I don't see any mention of emails or text messages (I skimmed a bit, but not enough to miss something like that). Maybe records exist and can be used to prove harassment, but what's the point of publicizing this until the case has been decided?

The media loves to publish this stuff because it gets everyone riled up. But until anything is proven in court, it doesn't mean anything. What if nothing actually happened? Reputations can be ruined.

I'd love to have feedback from divergent perspectives or opinions. My current feeling is that we should keep these cases sealed until there is a verdict, but perhaps that's oppressive?

I wish we were all above this kind of behavior.

jakelazaroff 6 years ago | |

A courtroom verdict doesn't "prove" anything. All it means is that a set of lawyers and witnesses were able to convince the people on the jury to believe beyond a reasonable doubt (or not) that the events that were alleged actually happened.

Trials are the best way our society has figured out to come to the correct conclusion, but don't make the mistake of thinking the verdict always accurately reflects the events as they occurred. There are many, many cases with unjust outcomes.

ksec 6 years ago | | |

>What if nothing actually happened? Reputations can be ruined.

Reputation will be ruined.

Let assume the just outcome, and those allegation were false. AND the reputation were ruined. Now do you go on and sue them back?

paulryanrogers 6 years ago | | |

The court of public opinion may be unavoidable, but how do we know when we've crossed over from informing the public of real and present danger to personal vendetta?

Pfhreak 6 years ago | |

> But until anything is proven in court, it doesn't mean anything.

I don't know that court is the bar for 'meaning something'. For example, if a victim has evidence but for various reasons cannot succeed in a court case (statute of limitations, for example) are you really saying their allegations don't mean anything?

paulddraper 6 years ago | | |

Yes, but you often don't have all the facts until it goes to court.

Person A reveals plain-as-day romantically suggestive emails, blows the lid off the story, gets media attention.

Only until sometime later does Person B provide the emails proving it was a two way thing.

paulryanrogers 6 years ago | | |

This reminds me of the OJ Simpson murder trials, one criminal and one civil. But two different outcomes.

Harvey Weinstein is facing both a judicial and public trial of sorts. Yet in that case there appear to be more public accusers, and some with nothing to gain and much to lose. (Which I think makes their statements more convincing, if more difficult to produce an independent jury for any judicial trial.)

EDIT: typo

jmull 6 years ago | |

Well, secret trials have a long history of working very poorly in terms of just outcomes.

Anyway, allegations can be made independent of a formal court proceeding.E.g. how would you shut people up from talking about things that have happened to them? Who would victims be allowed to tell and how would it be prevented from coming out, if its newsworthy? Or maybe you shut down the press so it's OK to talk about what happened to you but not publish it? It's pretty tricky.

Obviously, a system where you have to prove your allegations before you can make the allegation is not a system at all, so I think there inherently has to be a time of ambiguity between when an allegation is made and when it's resolved.

> ...what's the point of publicizing this until the case has been decided?

One very important reason is that it encourages other victims to come forward. E.g. in the Larry Nasser/Michigan State case, this guy molested hundreds of girls. At various points someone would speak up.. to an MSU coach or a parent, or up the line to USAG and the allegation was killed or ignored. Finally there was one girl who just wouldn't shut up and got something moving forward. As it progressed, more of the girls (many actually women by that point) were encouraged and were able to come forward again. It made a big difference to finally putting a stop to what the guy was doing.

In this case many of the allegations are of things that are pretty unambiguous and took place in front of third parties, so there should be a chance to get at the truth of enough of them to determine the general truth of the overall case, I think.

It's interesting the company is backing him 100%. Essentially betting the reputation of the company on this. (I think it's a private company, so maybe it's just the CEO backing himself? I don't know how much power various investors or founders have so I don't know how much they are backing him. Either way, the company will be seriously damaged if the allegations are found to be substantially true).

new_realist 6 years ago |

So the CEO was in a relationship with the head of HR, while the alleged victim herself had a brief relationship with (by all appearances) a subordinate in her own reporting chain. So many "not good ideas" happening in this company.

s33n 6 years ago |

It's honestly shocking to me how people can continue to behave like this, especially in the aftermath of #metoo. I suspect there's just something about being in a position of ultimate privilege that conditions you to think you're invincible until you're not.

hn_throwaway_99 6 years ago | |

Well, right now we are only privy to one side of the story. Indeed, the article goes over the story of how the accuser in this case alleged that she herself was the victim of false sexual harassment allegations, so seems like it's best to reserve judgement until both sides come out.

bsder 6 years ago | |

The primary point of clawing your way to a CEO slot is power.

Once you are in that position:

1) You are going to exercize that power that you finally have.

2) You lose most negative feedback mechanisms as everybody now wants to gain your favor.

Consequently, you continue do things until you do the one that is a bridge too far and get burned.

Consultant32452 6 years ago | | |

Those are some pretty strong allegations to make so broadly.

Creationer 6 years ago | |

And yet in other threads here on HN, we're decrying the breakdown of the family, epidemics of loneliness, and low rates of relationships and marriage for young people.

Given that the workplace is now the only place to interact with the opposite sex (for many people), I think it would be healthier to acknowledge it as a relationship foundry, and figure out how to use it to forge healthy adult relationships, whilst avoiding adultery and abuse.

ralfn 6 years ago | | |

It's called Tinder. It's better for everyone to just date outside of the office. And if you can't succeed there any success within the office is a hint that maybe power dyanmics and subtle coercion is at play.

thatoneuser 6 years ago |

Allegations should not be news. Misandry at its finest, considering she herself claims to be the victim of false allegations.

jmull 6 years ago | |

> ...considering she herself claims to be the victim of false allegations.

That only makes sense if you assume her allegations are false.

neya 6 years ago | | |

Well, then the only other way is to assume the allegations are true, which also has severe consequences to the accused if it were actually false. Which is why, it's best we leave this to investigators to come up with substantial evidence to back up the allegations (or not).