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Comment by yummyfajitas | Hacker News Reader

A similar event did happen in a semi-business setting last year. I met a woman at a bar, discussed work and personal travel, and decided to meet up another time. I thought it was a sale, she thought it was a date. She did touch me in a manner far better suited to a date, at which point I figured out that we talked past each other. Should I name and shame her?

If you've actually got some set of abstract principles you are willing to use across the board, I'd love to hear them. But I don't think that's where most of the commenters here are coming from.

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If you feel like that person was exploiting a power dynamic to coerce you into accepting her advance, and that the world would be a better place if you "named and shamed" (note your misdirection here, since the person we're discussing didn't "name and shame" anyone), then yes.

I know the OP didn't name and shame, I'm referring to the comments here asking for them to do so - this comment thread is about whether or not that should be done.

I don't know what "power dynamic" means, but feel free to provide a clear definition for it. If you've actually got some set of abstract principles you are willing to use across the board, I'd love to hear them.

From my vantage point, I don't see much of a problem here. Offering investment is a beneficial act. So is offering romantic or sexual options. It's hard to see why offering both together suddenly becomes a bad thing - worst case the recipient can decline and is exactly as well off as before.

I'm not sure where to start with this. Is it the idea that you find the act of a stranger putting their hand on a bodily location that would trip the statutes in several US states governing sexual assault "an offer of romantic or sexual options"? The idea that such an "offer" of "options", were we to stipulate that there was any optionality involved, would have been benign? Your statement that the "worst case" is the recipient declines and is "exactly" as well off as before?

But then I reread your second graph, where you cordially invite me to litigate the meaning of the term "power dynamic", and I realize you're just going to draw me into a fake debate where you play the nerd trump card of discrediting a straw man notion of social science instead of engaging the actual issue. And it's not like I'd lose that argument, just that it would be an enervating experience for both of us.

By your logic (which I don't agree with), it would have been okay ONLY IF the side boob were written into terms of the contract, stipulating that there must be tit for tat. And then we can assume that there would also be an article double d: "$50,000 will be left on the dresser."

You're fishing for events in your life that are superficially similar to the events in the article -- drinks at a bar, some kind of unwanted touching, etc -- but are substantively quite different.

And you're trying to draw parallels with extremely vague language. Someone kissed you. Who? A child? Grandma? A bus driver? Your boss? Why? Where? Someone touched you "in a manner far better suited to a date." What does that even mean? Did she hug you? Caress your cheek? Slap your ass?

You'll have to use your own best judgment as to whether it's appropriate to name and shame.

It's hard to see how they are substantively different without actually stating some moral principle and then observing that the two situations live on opposite sides of it.

As I said, I'm pretty sure most folks here are following knee-jerk emotional reactions, and the events I'm relating don't trigger the same emotional reactions.

If it was an honest misunderstanding, those things can happen. There is some room for leeway. But even on a date, you don't immediately grab the other in the crotch or by the breast. There are generally some stages you go through to check for consent, starting with simply touching/holding a hand or arm.

And in the case discussed in the article, it was very explicitly not a date, and yet the guy went straight for the boob while making a business proposition. There's no way that's not way out of line.

Well, no. That's just a case of bad communication that I hope you both were able to transcend. And that sounds like it could have been a fun date. Smart, non-asshole men and women are fun to date.

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