I think the problem is that you don't understand how you made a mistake. Therefore, you're unable to apologize.

The problem isn't that your intentions are wrong. Intentions aren't obvious things, and people are not authorities on their own intentions, especially when it comes to sex. A man will pursue a woman without realizing it; or they realize it "in the moment" but afterwords confabulate an alternative explanation.

But none of us are entirely in control of our desires, and nor should it be expected that, given certain desires, that we wouldn't try to satisfy them. But sexuality is full of ulterior motives, and this is what makes relations between the sexes so difficult. I upvoted Eliezer's post because the substance of what he said is correct, and if you said only the first paragraph I wouldn't have so much of a problem with it. Maybe it could have been said better, but it's only a blog comment.

But in the context of "making women more comfortable in online communities" I think we have to deal with the scenario where women have to adopt the heuristic of "guilty until proven innocent" whenever discussion seems to be the least bit sexually charged. This is the heuristic I think we all should adopt.

This may seem to be too complicated and error prone, or even unfair. But they say that our gesture of waving to each other came from when knights on horseback would wave their hand to signal that they didn't possess a weapon. The knight couldn't just object "But I don't have any weapons, why should I have to wave?" It has to be proven, because his intentions aren't clear.

So I think it is useful to find some sort of anti-erotic wave, a way of signaling to women, or others, that they don't possess any sexual intent. I think, when the subject of sex is touched, this is done by speaking in a way that isn't liable to produce a mental image. Just as when the knight waves, he proves he isn't carrying a weapon; by signaling an anti-erotic wave, you prove that you aren't carrying any erotic intent. And you do this by producing discussion which is erotically inert.

I understand completely why your discussion made sense to you, there's no indication that you were directing your post to any of the women here, and your first paragraph seems particularly on-topic in an enthymematic way. I don't think you did anything immoral; just next time, be sure to signal your anti-erotic wave.

This is also my attempt at a rational justification for this principle, so critique is welcome.