I joined an activism group in April. In August, we hosted an event for representatives from local groups to come together, meet each other, and get to know each other better.
One of the people who came, “Bob”, is an older man from a highly respected group in the area. When we asked for feedback at the end on the event, I noticed he was rude, but I filed it under him being brusque and moved on.
Fast forward to last week. We had a Zoom team meeting, and a newcomer came. Bob’s name came up in our meeting. (Not gossiping, just offhand mention.) Newcome later texts me saying she wants to give me a heads up about Bob, and I eventually learn from her that she used to work in his group, and he has a reputation for being disrespectful to women, especially women of color. Not only that, but he was s\*xually inappropiate with her (“Come over my place at 10pm so we can talk about \~job opportunities\~”) and has other claims of harassment against him.
She wanted to warn me and said she never wants to be around him again. I recently took over as team lead, but I’m new to leading and to this volunteer group, so I went to the former team lead who founded the group to ask for her advice.
She quickly dismissed the abuse part (I said he has “ab\*se allegations” against him; she said, “I don’t know about the abuse part, but…” Her quick dismissal was bothersome) but was quick to confirm he’s known for being an asshole to women and even to her.
She’s moving soon, so she no longer has a say. I’m leaning toward disinviting Bob, as I don’t want to be around a disrespectful asshole nor subject the newcomer or future women to his alleged s\*xual ab\*se.
We host these “activist group togethers” once a month. We’ve had only one so far. I’m looking for a way to tell the two people who run this event of ours to disinvite Bob and ask for someone else from that group to come, or disinvite the group altogether…being very firm, but also avoiding stirring up drama.All advice appreciated.
TL;DR Just got informed that a guy we invite to our volunteer meetings is an alleged ab\*ser and confirmed asshole. How do I eject this guy from the group without stirring up too much gossip/drama?
Words censored to duck sub filters.
8 comments
Is there something as simple as a Code of Conduct for this group? So it can be shown, “Bob, you are not meeting the baseline standard of expected behaviour from members and we now ask you to leave”?
You need to be cautious and wait to get more information from other groups or your own group before dis-inviting him.
Now that you have this info keep an eye on him and if he becomes rude and dismissive to others then use his own action to not invite him next time.
Damn, that’s a tough situation. First off, congrats on becoming team lead! But yeah, sounds like this Bob dude is bad news. I’d say just straight up tell the event organizers to not invite him anymore and find someone else from his group to come instead. Drama or not, it’s better than having an ab*ser around. Trust your gut on this one.
If he is one of a group, I think you could reach out to the group leadership team and ask for a one-on-one meeting. Be the leader you wish you had – be as blunt as you can about Bob being a disruptive influence in meetings, plus another attendees has been harassed by him, so you’d love for them to send another representative. Let the “how” of it be their problem.
You can have an honest talk with them about how activist spaces easily become covers for abusive behavior and you are attempting to not let the group fall into classic patterns of letting one man drive away multiple people because he hasn’t been called out on his behavior in the past.
There’s no way to avoid “stirring up drama” since Bob has already created the drama – by being rude and harassing. Throw the drama back on him by saying something like “At the last meeting Bob was rude and dismissive. Additionally I was approached by another participant who made it clear that she would not attend if he was there. As activists, while we don’t want to exclude people, we also want to make sure we aren’t excluding people by siding with an abusive personality with our silence. I believe that if we let Bob continue unchecked we’ll lose more than we gain by letting him continue. I, for one, don’t want to lose out on the participation of women simply because Bob chooses to act boorishly.”
Find and implement a code of conduct (an intersectional one, so it’s not just punishing people with lived experience – aka the woman you mention – who are rightfully upset/angry from speaking up against people who are being gross or gross situations). This should’ve already been in place but better late than never.
Based on what you know – specifically the fact he is known to be disrespectful and was to the other team leader and that a woman in your group said she felt uncomfortable around him – I think you could ask the group to send someone else. You could speak to more people to see if there are more people in your org who have experienced shit from him, which would back you up.
Or, you can explain clearly that breaches of the code of conduct will result in people not being able to participate, and wait til he inevitably is like this again. It’s shitty, especially for women who already feel unsafe working for him, but it would mean you’re acting on things you know and have seen so his group will likely have less push back.
How quietly can you put out feelers to see if everyone else realizes that he is an asshole? If everyone else already knows, then punting him is easy. If everyone else is denying that he is an asshole, you have some work ahead of you.
Least sex-pest infested socialist group
Do you have any texts and evidence about him approaching and behaving towards any of the women that way?
I dont know how your group is set up or if there are any rules or code of conducts around to follow. But unless you have seem him or have evidence of him behaving that way among others, addressed his behavior to him and his group (preferably throughbext or mail) and he broke behavior rules again, in official groups you’re only then okay to ban/disinvite that person.
This is perhaps unpopular but I would still go by this route if you don’t have any texts or chats of him misbehaving other than him being “normally” rude: you basically have to be able to cover your own *ss and show that you followed the correct steps. You can however use these signals to be watchful for any of his behavior
The problem with doing this on hearsay and not confirming it for yourself first, is that it also creates an atmosphere in your group, that if someone is sufficiently friendly with you, they can get you to bar people from joining without proof. That’s also not a precedent you want to set and invites an other kind of drama.