“At the time, we thought it was hilarious. In fact, we thought this was so funny that we spent weeks joking about it. Eventually, the head of our program heard our jokes and reported the incident to HR. We spent a week telling our story, and ultimately the guy was told he could no longer be an intern manager.

I no longer think this is funny.

I think this is disgusting and appalling and horrifying, and this happened at a company that is much loved and respected in Silicon Valley.”

Hm, the world in which it’s possible to laugh something like this off seems like a nicer world to me? Just a thought.

I’m saying this as someone who used to be socially inept (probably not THIS socially inept, but still). And for people who are socially inept, sometimes it’s possible for them to develop complexes around fear of people seeing them as disgusting/appalling/horrifying if they make a social misstep.

Based on these sentences of yours, it almost makes me wonder if what happened was not you coming to some kind of deep important realization, but rather just adopting a common Silicon Valley fashion: seeing male behavior which in most cultures would merely be considered inept and boorish, and interpreting it as disgusting/appalling/horrifying. With all due respect, I don’t see what purpose this serves, and it’s easy for me to see how strong reactions of this sort could cause harm. (See: flaming culture wars that get certain people elected president as a reaction to perceived over-reliance on shaming others for mildly norm-violating behavior.)