I looked through all the mentions of his behavior in the post. I think only one of them is plausibly misleading. I say
I see clear reasons to think that Kat, Emerson and Drew intimidated these people into accepting some of the actions or dynamics that hurt them
I only have reports of intimidating actions from Emerson and Kat, not Drew. I don’t have any reason to think he reduced the level of intimidation, but I don’t want to convey that I know of positive acts of intimidation that he took, beyond broadly participating in the dynamics set up by Emerson and Kat and being supportive of his brother. I’ve edited that bit and included it in an addendum collecting all edits.
Speaking from my perspective, not from anyone else’s (e.g. Alice’s, Chloe’s, yours) I don’t see Drew as exonerated from the dynamics at Nonlinear, even while I think that Emerson and Kat are each substantially more responsible for them.
I think the best thing to be said in his favor is that Alice felt he was the only one of the three of them to really hear her concerns (e.g. financially) and sometimes advocate for her needs.
That’s a red line in my book, and I will not personally work with Nonlinear in the future because of it, and I recommend their exclusion from any professional communities that wish to keep up the standard of people not being silenced about extremely negative work experiences.
Let’s suppose that Nonlinear have crossed red lines, and that additional information from them won’t change this. (In reality I think that this is up in the air for the next week or so; I won’t allow my limited imagination to diminish the hope.)
Do you not believe in the possibility of rehabilitation in this case?
I haven’t read up on what norms here work well in other high-trust communities. But at least in criminal vs. society settings I would want to be a strong proponent of rehabilitation. It seems pretty plausible to me that, after thinking more about best norms in high-trust communities, I could come to think that “create horrendous work environment” and “create credible fear of severe retaliation” were things that could change (and be monitored) upon rehabilitation, and that it would be good for this to happen after X period of time.
I don’t mean to imply that I couldn’t see evidence that persuaded me that this concern had been mediated sufficiently. But silencing and intimidating into being quiet is a problem that self-reinforces — when it’s happening, it stops you from learning about it, and about anything else bad that’s happening. So I think it’s important to take a much more hardline stance against it than with other norm-violations even if the two norm-violations caused a similar amount of damage.
The people involved may deserve some sort of rehabilitation—the company should not. And then also, there’s a question of whether this process would allow them to run EA organizations and not just take part in them.
Edit: I used the word ‘company’, but I mean any organisation. I don’t know the status of NL.
Because there’s barely anything relevant that is common to both. We don’t have any moral obligation to companies, nor does it make the world better in my view to “rehabilitate” companies. A person has to continue existing in society even after committing a crime. A company doesn’t have to continue existing.
I think the question of what to do with wrongdoers is a complex and difficult one. I will say that I think rehabilitation of criminals is important because there’s really no alternative for them—they’re outcasts from society as a whole, so we reintegrate them or they have no life at all. By contrast, we would not be entirely destroying someone’s life by expelling them from EA funding and networking circles—if you feel like being expelled from EA would destroy your life, it’s already time to start building an independent support network IMO.
Appreciate the comment Joel :)
(And of course, if you later come to have a critical/negative opinion of parts of my post, you’re v welcome to share those too!)
Yes, I think that the post does not do enough to make it clear that the central allegations are not about Drew Spartz. Happy to expand.
That sounds quite plausible. Will do a re-read of my post (and my notes) to check what I say, and think about what edit/additions are worth making.
(Will come back for that tomorrow. I’m signing off for today and taking the evening to rest.)
Thank you Ben—please check comment mentions of Drew, too!
I looked through all the mentions of his behavior in the post. I think only one of them is plausibly misleading. I say
I only have reports of intimidating actions from Emerson and Kat, not Drew. I don’t have any reason to think he reduced the level of intimidation, but I don’t want to convey that I know of positive acts of intimidation that he took, beyond broadly participating in the dynamics set up by Emerson and Kat and being supportive of his brother. I’ve edited that bit and included it in an addendum collecting all edits.
Speaking from my perspective, not from anyone else’s (e.g. Alice’s, Chloe’s, yours) I don’t see Drew as exonerated from the dynamics at Nonlinear, even while I think that Emerson and Kat are each substantially more responsible for them.
I think the best thing to be said in his favor is that Alice felt he was the only one of the three of them to really hear her concerns (e.g. financially) and sometimes advocate for her needs.
Here’s another thing.
Let’s suppose that Nonlinear have crossed red lines, and that additional information from them won’t change this. (In reality I think that this is up in the air for the next week or so; I won’t allow my limited imagination to diminish the hope.)
Do you not believe in the possibility of rehabilitation in this case?
I haven’t read up on what norms here work well in other high-trust communities. But at least in criminal vs. society settings I would want to be a strong proponent of rehabilitation. It seems pretty plausible to me that, after thinking more about best norms in high-trust communities, I could come to think that “create horrendous work environment” and “create credible fear of severe retaliation” were things that could change (and be monitored) upon rehabilitation, and that it would be good for this to happen after X period of time.
I don’t mean to imply that I couldn’t see evidence that persuaded me that this concern had been mediated sufficiently. But silencing and intimidating into being quiet is a problem that self-reinforces — when it’s happening, it stops you from learning about it, and about anything else bad that’s happening. So I think it’s important to take a much more hardline stance against it than with other norm-violations even if the two norm-violations caused a similar amount of damage.
The people involved may deserve some sort of rehabilitation—the company should not. And then also, there’s a question of whether this process would allow them to run EA organizations and not just take part in them.
Edit: I used the word ‘company’, but I mean any organisation. I don’t know the status of NL.
Why do you distinguish between person and company in this respect?
Because there’s barely anything relevant that is common to both. We don’t have any moral obligation to companies, nor does it make the world better in my view to “rehabilitate” companies. A person has to continue existing in society even after committing a crime. A company doesn’t have to continue existing.
I think the question of what to do with wrongdoers is a complex and difficult one. I will say that I think rehabilitation of criminals is important because there’s really no alternative for them—they’re outcasts from society as a whole, so we reintegrate them or they have no life at all. By contrast, we would not be entirely destroying someone’s life by expelling them from EA funding and networking circles—if you feel like being expelled from EA would destroy your life, it’s already time to start building an independent support network IMO.