[nailer]

That's perfectly fine to send to a consenting partner. But completely inappropriate for the workplace.

Edit: not sure why this is being downmodded (not complaining about it, just curious). Is it somehow not completely fine for consenting adults to have whatever kinks they want?

Rubin deserves to be punished for sexual harassment. Kink shaming is unnecessary.

[danso]

Slight nitpick: it's not clear that this particular email was about a workplace relationship (or sent on company time/servers). It was an email included as evidence in a civil suit by his ex-wife:

> In a civil suit filed this month by Mr. Rubin’s ex-wife, Rie Rubin, she claimed he had multiple “ownership relationships” with other women during their marriage, paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to them. The couple were divorced in August. The suit included a screenshot of an August 2015 email...

[puzzle]

The email was from 2015, but he had left Google in 2014, so it wasn't sent on company time/servers.

Even if it had been sent earlier, Andy Rubin had been named in enough patent lawsuits and deposed enough times to know that multiple plaintiffs had lawyers billing $700/800 per hour (at the very least) to go through all his corporate account's messages. He must have had tens of litigation holds.

[asianthrowaway]

Vanilla person here. Do women actually find it "hot" to be "loaned" like a sex slave? Given the circumstances I don't think it's absurd to assume that this was his fantasy and his only.

[nikanj]

With about 7,000,000,000 people out there, you can safely assume that for any given X, there's plenty of people who find X really hot.

[DonHopkins]

And 21 to 70 million of those real people out there are actually slaves, owned by other real people, who are not just role playing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_21st_century

[ahthrowaway]

Throwaway for obvious reasons.

In my experience at a college in the northeast, it was about 10% that had actually thought a lot about it already and really wanted to do it. Around 50%, however, were more than happy to try it after learning about it.

This is definitely pretty far on the spectrum (the loaning part more so than the slave part), but I've said the 'loaning' part to people many times in a certain context and never actually meant it. I'd bet it just stayed as a fantasy between them.

[blattimwind]

Some do. Some even engage in 24/7 play or undergo training, though those are certainly on the more extreme end of a very large spectrum indeed.

[sudosteph]

Since the comments here seem to be mostly like "well at least some of them do", I'll just go ahead confirm your suspicion as a woman who has talked to other women about their relationships. Liking to be denigrated is not the norm at all, it's kinda gross and demeaning. However, much like many other sexual practices that many women find distasteful, some women will play along or pretend that they're into it to make their partners happy. Most of the time the partners aren't trying to be controlling or whatever, they're just imitating porn which normalizes that kind of thing. So yeah, there's a high chance this was a one-sided fantasy like you suspect.

[nailer]

> woman who has talked to other women about their relationships

That's less relevant as actually having sexual encounters with a woman. People often don't know their close friend's fetishes, but they do (or should) know what their lovers enjoy.

For a counterpoint: open a book of women's fantasies written by and marketed to women.

[sololipsist]

Rubin deserves to be punished for sexual harassment....

IF, in fact, he sexually harassed, right?

A) What in the hell was his partner doing reporting to his place of business that she felt like he had compelled her to have sex with him in a hotel room? What does that have to do with work? That smells like using an accusation as a weapon to me.

B) What does "compelled" mean? I had a girlfriend once who was into kink and I wasn't. We did kink all the time and it wasn't fulfilling to me, and once time in particular I was trying very hard to just get her to have sex with me (which I thought was going to be part of the relationship and was just beginning to realize it was not). I kept asking, she kept saying no. Eventually she gave in. After our break-up she cited this as a rape to a friend. Is this rape? Is it even sexual harassment?

There are so few details here it's shameful it's even being reported on.

So what if Google gave a severance to someone who was accused of harassment? It's not even clear, from the details, that he did. Shit, what if they did an internal investigation and determined that he didn't?

What's wrong with people here, acting like this is something we know he did?

[danso]

A) The article states that the two were in a relationship. Meeting someone at their hotel room doesn't automatically mean a consent to sex.

B) I'll give you the benefit of the doubt for your particular experience. But keep in mind that many sexual misconduct accusations involve the victim refusing but eventually "giving in". Harvey Weinstein, for example:

https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/from-aggressive-ove...

> Shit, what if they did an internal investigation and determined that he didn't?

I hate to say "did you read the article?", but your question suggests that you may have skimmed the details. The article specifically states that Google investigated Rubin, and decided to terminate him as a result of the investigation. The investigation did not "prove" the accusation, but apparently the accusation was credible enough for Google to decide it was better to part ways with one of its most important executives.

> Google’s inquiry ultimately found the complaint against Mr. Rubin credible, said the two company executives familiar with the incident. While Mr. Rubin denied the accusation, it became clear that — at the very least — the relationship was inappropriate, they said. Mr. Page decided Mr. Rubin should leave, they said.

[bronson]

> What does that have to do with work?

She worked for him. Not sure if it's intentional but your reply seems full of willful ignorance.

[sololipsist]

So what? People who work together have sexual relationships, and people who have relationships will have conflict.

"People who disagree with me are ignorant." Come on, man. Seriously? You sounds like a college kid on facebook.

If a company is not going to prohibit employees from having sexual relationships with each other, horizontally or vertically, that company also need to expect those employees to work their conflict out outside of work. If google does want to prohibit this, they should have disciplined both of them the moment they heard about it and fired them if it continued.

What's with people expecting companies to be mommy and daddy when we have conflicts in our relationships? That's crazy.

[JoeAltmaier]

Ignoring the 'she worked for him' part, where her pay and career were subject to his whim? That's the issue. Its classic blackmail. Google doesn't have to be 'mommy' to oppose blackmail when it finds it occurring within their walls.

[sololipsist]

And what if she's using the relationship to get ahead? What, are we going to pretend that women are powerless, agentless puppets that smart, capable men can use?

If the company you're in doesn't prohibit relationships, if you get into one you need to resolve conflict in those relationships outside of work.

[JoeAltmaier]

Again, ignoring the likelihood she had no choice, or perceived it as the only way to go forward.

[danso]

> People who work together have sexual relationships

The parent commenter said:

> She worked for him

[sololipsist]

I said:

> horizontal or vertical

[dang]

You're basically trolling now. Please stop.