Would someone from CEA be able to comment on this incident?
’A third described an unsettling experience with an influential figure in EA whose role included picking out promising students and funneling them towards highly coveted jobs. After that leader arranged for her to be flown to the U.K. for a job interview, she recalls being surprised to discover that she was expected to stay in his home, not a hotel. When she arrived, she says, “he told me he needed to masturbate before seeing me.”‘
Was this ‘influential figure in EA’ reported to Community Health, and if so, what were the consequences?
[Caveat: Assuming this is an influential EA, not a figure who has influence in EA but wouldn’t see themselves as part of the community.]
The woman did bring this concern to us. I don’t want to share details that would break her privacy, but I did my best to follow her wishes as far as how the matter was handled. My post on power dynamics was informed by that situation.
Looking back at the situation, I’m not sure about some aspects of how I handled it. We’re taking a renewed look at possible steps to take here.
Thanks. Is this person still active in the EA community? Does this person still have a role in “picking out promising students and funneling them towards highly coveted jobs”?
Just bumping this in case you’ve forgotten. At the moment there only seem to be two possibities: 1/ you forgot about this comment or 2/ the person does still have a role “picking out promising students” as Peter asked. I’m currently assuming it’s 2, and I imagine other people are too.
We are working actively on this, but it is going to take more time. As a general point (not trying to comment on this situation in particular), those are not the only two possibilities, and I think it’s really crucial to be able to hold on to that in contexts where there’s issues of legality, confidentiality and lots of imperfect information flow.
Edit note: I at first had “local point” instead of “general point”, which I meant in a mathy way, like the local logic of the situation point rather than speaking to any of the context, but looking back I don’t think that was very clear so I’ve edited to clarify my meaning.
Hey, thanks for the response. I think simply acknowledging my message and telling me you are working on it is a great first step, and I really appreciate that. Saying “We’re looking into this, hold on for a few weeks” is actually genuinely helpful.
I also recognize that you and the Community Health team have a very difficult job even under the best of circumstances, so I have a lot of sympathy for this being very hard.
So I apologize though that my role here still has to be pushing you for more information, since I run an organization with multiple concerned staff members (including myself). Like you, I am also under a lot of pressure here, especially given it is an unusually tense time.
So to be clear, I am not looking to learn the identity of the person. Though I’d love to know who it was, I understand it may just not be possible to know. I get that. I don’t even really need details. But I would really love to hear about (A) whether this person is still in the movement and (B) whether they still have a role that allows them 1-1 contact with a lot of young women. I don’t particularly need any details, though I guess an (A) Yes (B) Yes answer would definitely make me want more details. Also given the lack of response, you must understand that imaginations naturally run rampant to fill the gaps in negative ways, as much as we might want to tamper them.
I totally understand how you’re seeing your role and why you’re pushing here. I’m really sorry, I can’t answer questions right now, but really hope to be able to next week.
Thanks Chana. I’m glad we can both see each other’s perspectives. I look forward to hearing more next week. Committing to a response and a rough timeline is already very helpful.
Just to be clear so I don’t look better than I deserve now (and possibly worse in some future timelines), the “hope” is operative there; I wish I could make a firm commitment, but I can’t. But it gives us a starting point that we can come back to if needed.
Hi Peter—these posts (from Owen and from the UK boards) + comments from me and Julia on the latter have just gone up that might have the information and comments you’re looking for.
Thank you. I am still considerably unhappy with how this situation was handled but I accept Julia’s apology and I am glad to see this did come to some sort of resolution. I’m especially glad to see an independent investigation into how this was handled.
I imagine not many people would meet the description of the person , so I think it’s plausible that publicly providing further information of that sort would allow for the person’s identification—despite what I understand to be the harassment survivor’s request that the person not be publicly identified.
I don’t need any description of the person. I just want to know in broad strokes what the risk level is, so I can advise my organization accordingly. Hence the two-part yes/no questions.
I’m saying that Time gave a description that likely narrowed down the list to a few people. Let’s say there were five to ten people it could reasonably apply to. If CH told you the person is no longer in EA, or is in EA but no longer performing that role, you could probably identify the person by looking into what those five to ten were up to nowadays. Even if there were more candidates, presumably you could significantly narrow the list with those answers.
Thus, if CH doesn’t have permission from the survivor to answer those questions and had agreed to keep the person’s identity confidential, answering them could breach that promise. They would need to go back to the survivor and ask permission to make additional disclosures.
I don’t see how confidentiality would prevent anyone from literally saying “The person doesn’t have the role, but we are bound by some kind of confidentiality we agreed when removing them from post”, which would actually be a reassuring thing to hear.
Two posts (from Owen and from the UK boards) + comments from me and Julia on the latter have just gone up that might have the updates you’re looking for.
Thanks—I’ve already commented. I’m pretty disappointed that Owen resigned 3 days before my comment and I was filibustered. (I’ve already commented there about the timeline, very curious to know what can possibly have been going on during that period other than getting together a PR strategy).
Two posts (from Owen and from the UK boards) + comments from me and Julia on the latter have just gone up that might have the information and comments you’re looking for.
Would someone from CEA be able to comment on this incident?
’A third described an unsettling experience with an influential figure in EA whose role included picking out promising students and funneling them towards highly coveted jobs. After that leader arranged for her to be flown to the U.K. for a job interview, she recalls being surprised to discover that she was expected to stay in his home, not a hotel. When she arrived, she says, “he told me he needed to masturbate before seeing me.”‘
Was this ‘influential figure in EA’ reported to Community Health, and if so, what were the consequences?
[Caveat: Assuming this is an influential EA, not a figure who has influence in EA but wouldn’t see themselves as part of the community.]
I also found this incredibly alarming and would be very keen to hear more about this.
The woman did bring this concern to us. I don’t want to share details that would break her privacy, but I did my best to follow her wishes as far as how the matter was handled. My post on power dynamics was informed by that situation.
Looking back at the situation, I’m not sure about some aspects of how I handled it. We’re taking a renewed look at possible steps to take here.
Thanks. Is this person still active in the EA community? Does this person still have a role in “picking out promising students and funneling them towards highly coveted jobs”?
Seconding Peter Wildeford’s questions.
Just bumping this in case you’ve forgotten. At the moment there only seem to be two possibities: 1/ you forgot about this comment or 2/ the person does still have a role “picking out promising students” as Peter asked. I’m currently assuming it’s 2, and I imagine other people are too.
We are working actively on this, but it is going to take more time. As a general point (not trying to comment on this situation in particular), those are not the only two possibilities, and I think it’s really crucial to be able to hold on to that in contexts where there’s issues of legality, confidentiality and lots of imperfect information flow.
Edit note: I at first had “local point” instead of “general point”, which I meant in a mathy way, like the local logic of the situation point rather than speaking to any of the context, but looking back I don’t think that was very clear so I’ve edited to clarify my meaning.
Hey, thanks for the response. I think simply acknowledging my message and telling me you are working on it is a great first step, and I really appreciate that. Saying “We’re looking into this, hold on for a few weeks” is actually genuinely helpful.
I also recognize that you and the Community Health team have a very difficult job even under the best of circumstances, so I have a lot of sympathy for this being very hard.
So I apologize though that my role here still has to be pushing you for more information, since I run an organization with multiple concerned staff members (including myself). Like you, I am also under a lot of pressure here, especially given it is an unusually tense time.
So to be clear, I am not looking to learn the identity of the person. Though I’d love to know who it was, I understand it may just not be possible to know. I get that. I don’t even really need details. But I would really love to hear about (A) whether this person is still in the movement and (B) whether they still have a role that allows them 1-1 contact with a lot of young women. I don’t particularly need any details, though I guess an
(A) Yes (B) Yesanswer would definitely make me want more details. Also given the lack of response, you must understand that imaginations naturally run rampant to fill the gaps in negative ways, as much as we might want to tamper them.Thank you again for all your work.
I totally understand how you’re seeing your role and why you’re pushing here. I’m really sorry, I can’t answer questions right now, but really hope to be able to next week.
Thanks Chana. I’m glad we can both see each other’s perspectives. I look forward to hearing more next week. Committing to a response and a rough timeline is already very helpful.
Just to be clear so I don’t look better than I deserve now (and possibly worse in some future timelines), the “hope” is operative there; I wish I could make a firm commitment, but I can’t. But it gives us a starting point that we can come back to if needed.
Hi Peter—these posts (from Owen and from the UK boards) + comments from me and Julia on the latter have just gone up that might have the information and comments you’re looking for.
Thank you. I am still considerably unhappy with how this situation was handled but I accept Julia’s apology and I am glad to see this did come to some sort of resolution. I’m especially glad to see an independent investigation into how this was handled.
I imagine not many people would meet the description of the person , so I think it’s plausible that publicly providing further information of that sort would allow for the person’s identification—despite what I understand to be the harassment survivor’s request that the person not be publicly identified.
I don’t need any description of the person. I just want to know in broad strokes what the risk level is, so I can advise my organization accordingly. Hence the two-part yes/no questions.
I’m saying that Time gave a description that likely narrowed down the list to a few people. Let’s say there were five to ten people it could reasonably apply to. If CH told you the person is no longer in EA, or is in EA but no longer performing that role, you could probably identify the person by looking into what those five to ten were up to nowadays. Even if there were more candidates, presumably you could significantly narrow the list with those answers.
Thus, if CH doesn’t have permission from the survivor to answer those questions and had agreed to keep the person’s identity confidential, answering them could breach that promise. They would need to go back to the survivor and ask permission to make additional disclosures.
I know I’m probably being dense here, but would it be possible for you to share what the other possibilities are?
Edit: I guess there’s “The person doesn’t have the role, but we are bound by some kind of confidentiality we agreed when removing them from post”
No, it’s a reasonable question. I hope to be able to answer these questions better next week. I’m really sorry, I know that’s not very helpful.
I don’t see how confidentiality would prevent anyone from literally saying “The person doesn’t have the role, but we are bound by some kind of confidentiality we agreed when removing them from post”, which would actually be a reassuring thing to hear.
Hi Simon -
Two posts (from Owen and from the UK boards) + comments from me and Julia on the latter have just gone up that might have the updates you’re looking for.
Thanks—I’ve already commented. I’m pretty disappointed that Owen resigned 3 days before my comment and I was filibustered. (I’ve already commented there about the timeline, very curious to know what can possibly have been going on during that period other than getting together a PR strategy).
Agreed. There’s a lot of harrowing claims in the piece, but this one had me go “What the fuck” out loud.
Hi Marzhin -
Two posts (from Owen and from the UK boards) + comments from me and Julia on the latter have just gone up that might have the information and comments you’re looking for.