“Ben Delo’s involvement with EA just quietly stopped being talked about without any kind of public reflection on what could be done better moving forwards.”
“Failing to share information because you suspect it will make me less supportive or more critical of your views, decisions, or actions smells of overconfidence and makes you difficult to trust, and this has regularly happened to me in my engagement with EA.”
Yes, exactly. Thank you! EA Berkeley had to remove their leader just two years ago, for reasons that none of the membership there is willing to even mention—which makes it sound particularly bad, which means that ‘the fact that EA is keeping that bad stuff hidden’ is even worse.
Similarly, EA Berkeley members were targeted by a higher-up for blacklisting, and mentioned such in emails to me, only to go silent on the matter until I brought-up the blacklisting as an issue on their slack. At that point, they mentioned that “we’ve been in private talks with the Blacklister, asking them to stop their behavior”—nothing public until absolutely necessary.
The EA houses in Berkeley, who are a magnet for EA Berkeley campus members to move-into (most residents are post-grads who were EA Berkeley prior to graduation and moving into the EA house), had repeatedly splurged unnecessarily, and when I pointed this out, the near-universal response on the EA Berkeley slack was ‘well, that’s them, not us. We’re not responsible for anyone else in our org if they’re committing petty fraud.’ The slack poster Charles He even suggested that I be banned from their slack, for ‘disrupting’ things by bringing-up their bad behavior!
Further: when I have posted new ideas on this forum, I was repeatedly strawmanned by EA members until other members eventually pointed-out that I was being strawmanned, and those who did so never admitted and apologized; they just downvoted every comment I made, as a team. EA protects the trolls who downvote-mafia and misrepresent, while looking for reasons to exclude ‘non-aligned views’.
Here are the less contentious parts, I hope?
“Ben Delo’s involvement with EA just quietly stopped being talked about without any kind of public reflection on what could be done better moving forwards.”
“Failing to share information because you suspect it will make me less supportive or more critical of your views, decisions, or actions smells of overconfidence and makes you difficult to trust, and this has regularly happened to me in my engagement with EA.”
Yes, exactly. Thank you! EA Berkeley had to remove their leader just two years ago, for reasons that none of the membership there is willing to even mention—which makes it sound particularly bad, which means that ‘the fact that EA is keeping that bad stuff hidden’ is even worse.
Similarly, EA Berkeley members were targeted by a higher-up for blacklisting, and mentioned such in emails to me, only to go silent on the matter until I brought-up the blacklisting as an issue on their slack. At that point, they mentioned that “we’ve been in private talks with the Blacklister, asking them to stop their behavior”—nothing public until absolutely necessary.
The EA houses in Berkeley, who are a magnet for EA Berkeley campus members to move-into (most residents are post-grads who were EA Berkeley prior to graduation and moving into the EA house), had repeatedly splurged unnecessarily, and when I pointed this out, the near-universal response on the EA Berkeley slack was ‘well, that’s them, not us. We’re not responsible for anyone else in our org if they’re committing petty fraud.’ The slack poster Charles He even suggested that I be banned from their slack, for ‘disrupting’ things by bringing-up their bad behavior!
EA definitely has a brand they’re protecting, and other posters seem to be bumping into other icky spots under the surface, too! (https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/eoLwR3y2gcZ8wgECc/hubris-and-coldness-within-ea-my-experience) & “Power dynamics: What procedures exist for protecting parties in asymmetric power relationships? Are there adequate opportunities for anonymous complaints or concerns to be raised? How are high-status individuals held accountable in the event of wrongdoing?” from (https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/sEpWkCvvJfoEbhnsd/the-ftx-crisis-highlights-a-deeper-cultural-problem-within)
Further: when I have posted new ideas on this forum, I was repeatedly strawmanned by EA members until other members eventually pointed-out that I was being strawmanned, and those who did so never admitted and apologized; they just downvoted every comment I made, as a team. EA protects the trolls who downvote-mafia and misrepresent, while looking for reasons to exclude ‘non-aligned views’.
Strongly upvoted because I don’t think this post deserves the downvotes.