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An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

noconformity.co

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Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#21

Post by nsxwolf »

This seems prudish. This is a restaurant, not a strip club. There is no nudity. They have national TV ads. If you go in, you'll find families with children. You can find that questionable if you want to, but clearly many people don't mind bringing their children there.

Most restaurants hire a lot of female servers. Most have very nice looking women. This is not a coincidence. Most have them wear clothes that in some way accentuates their sexuality, even if it's just nice form fitting attire that shows no skin. They're not given burquas.

Why do good liberal folk rail against the supposed repressed sexuality of the United States, holding up European countries as some kind of enlightened ideal, and as soon as a woman decides to empower herself by working wherever she pleases, including a place that shows her midriff, we all suddenly prude out and talk about lawsuits?

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#22

Post by nsxwolf »

jimboyoungblood wrote: post #18
esperluette wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Barely Ok: a subgroup of employees organizes it on their personal time (meaning: not using work email to send an "all@" message, or using work email at all). It's not discussed in the office, and no important work topics are discussed at the event. (So the people who didn't go don't hear "oh yeah we discussed that at Hooter's and decided ...") Not OK: even if the event is independently organized, pictures posted on c…

Aside from Hooters, what are other examples of "these places" that should be avoided? Our startup's engineering staff is all male- any advice that will keep us out of such embarrassing situations is appreciated.

No strip clubs and porn shops obviously, but that's apparently not far enough.

No place that hires attractive women or even hints at human sexuality as being a positive thing, apparently.

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#23

Post by mindcrime »

planetguy wrote: post #13

The issue doesn't have much to do with gender, really. Firstly, one need not be male in order to be happy going to a place like Twin Peaks. The only time I've been to Hooters, I was dragged there by a bunch of chicks. Secondly, one need not be female in order to be unhappy going to a place like Twin Peaks. Older, more respectable-looking men, men with daughters who would be round about the right age to be waitresses…

Well said. The issue is being considerate to people in general.

Anyway, the point of the story is to organize your company outings, if you must have them, at someplace everyone will enjoy.

Do you mean on a case-by-case basis though? IOW, if you had a group where everyone was happy going to Hooters, would you do it, or are you saying that one should always stick to the "safe" choice? If the latter, I wouldn't really agree, as that seems very limiting and likely to lead to a bland experience.

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#24

Post by fibertbh »

m0nastic wrote: post #17
rafalG wrote: post #11

One of the big reasons I love the hacker culture is the lack of sexism, if you are good you are good, doesn't matter what sex, race or religion. The only thing true hackers care about is your level of skill and dedication.

I really wish that were true, but it's not what I've observed in general. Granted, the "hacker culture" I'm most familiar with is the "security-type" of hacker (as opposed to developers/makers), but its culture is rife with every kind of 'ism imaginable (sex, race, what have you). I suppose there's some solace in the fact that at least the discrimination isn't exclusionary.

Agreed. Also look up "sexual harassment at conferences" for a handful of recent examples.

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#25

Post by tptacek »

mindcrime wrote: post #12

Weirdly, I both care tremendously about gender equality, and also think this is much ado about nothing. I guess the issue is my libertine nature, and refusal to assume that anything with sexual overtones is innately hostile, offensive, insulting, etc. One of the co-founders at Fogbeam Labs is a woman, so this is not empty rhetoric on my part. I respect women tremendously, and would not have invited this woman to join…

You said,

Anyway, I believe in celebrating human sexuality and wish that more people (male and female) could quit being so damn defensive about the fact that men like women and women like men.

The simple fact is professional women don't feel this way. Due to power dynamics, due to gender differences, due to concern over personal safety, due to a general feeling of alienation because of being minority, and due to probably 100 other reasons I'm not insightful enough to cite, professional women as a general rule do not want to celebrate sexuality in the workplace.

So my reply to you is get over it already. Every time one of these threads comes up, some geek has to make the rest of us geeks look bad by pointing out, as if it was somehow interesting, that "men like women and women like men". People do all sorts of things that we don't allow in the workplace. Some of them are bad, some of them are totally innocuous, and that ambiguity is why we came up with the word "INAPPROPRIATE".

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#26

Post by rdl »

planetguy wrote: post #13

The issue doesn't have much to do with gender, really. Firstly, one need not be male in order to be happy going to a place like Twin Peaks. The only time I've been to Hooters, I was dragged there by a bunch of chicks. Secondly, one need not be female in order to be unhappy going to a place like Twin Peaks. Older, more respectable-looking men, men with daughters who would be round about the right age to be waitresses…

I think she's arguing that even if 100% of the current employee participants are happy going to a hooters restaurant, posting a photo of it will deter future female hires.

In reality, it won't deter only female hires. I have nothing against going to places like this (or strip clubs: subsidized steak, at least in Oregon) socially, but a fair number of people wouldn't want to go socially, and I absolutely wouldn't want to go in a work context.

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#27

Post by doubleconfess »

This is probably as much a function of age inequality as much as gender inequality, to be honest. Get a bunch of 21-25 year old men together for long periods of time, and shenanigans of a crass and sexist and possibly misogynistic nature will ensue.

All men have been there, most men outgrow it.

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#28

Post by planetguy »

mindcrime wrote: post #23
planetguy wrote: post #13

The issue doesn't have much to do with gender, really. Firstly, one need not be male in order to be happy going to a place like Twin Peaks. The only time I've been to Hooters, I was dragged there by a bunch of chicks. Secondly, one need not be female in order to be unhappy going to a place like Twin Peaks. Older, more respectable-looking men, men with daughters who would be round about the right age to be waitresses…

Well said. The issue is being considerate to people in general. Anyway, the point of the story is to organize your company outings, if you must have them, at someplace everyone will enjoy. Do you mean on a case-by-case basis though? IOW, if you had a group where everyone was happy going to Hooters, would you do it, or are you saying that one should always stick to the "safe" choice? If the latter, I wouldn't really a…

Well personally, I wouldn't want to go to Hooters with my workmates anyway... it seems like a form of unwanted intimacy. I prefer to think of my workmates as machines that consume dollars and produce work; seeing them leering at women would force me to think of them as people, and that's just getting dangerously close to blending personal and professional relationships.

(I'm exaggerating above, of course, but the thought of going to Hooters or similar with my workmates or especially with my boss fills me with a feeling of ick. Boundaries, people, boundaries.)

But in answer to your question, if some other people at a company I don't work for all want to go to Hooters (or the male-stripper equivalent) together then I'm not gonna sit around and disapprove of that. Or, closer to home, my workmates and I all do eat steak [I assume] so if we go to a steak restaurant we need not worry about the hypothetical vegetarian who might be our next employee.

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#29

Post by scottschulthess »

planetguy wrote: post #13

The issue doesn't have much to do with gender, really. Firstly, one need not be male in order to be happy going to a place like Twin Peaks. The only time I've been to Hooters, I was dragged there by a bunch of chicks. Secondly, one need not be female in order to be unhappy going to a place like Twin Peaks. Older, more respectable-looking men, men with daughters who would be round about the right age to be waitresses…

Agreed, this has little to do with gender.

Other common situations are going to bars for company outings when people don't drink; doing outdoor type outings when people are physically impaired (obese or old or whatever).

Some people are going to have to be left out of certain situations, it's unavoidable, for a variety of reasons.

I probably wouldn't organize a company outing at hooters, but that said it's really not that controversial of a restaurant. I've seen families there the few times I've been there.

Re: An Open Letter To All Startup Founders

#30

Post by mindcrime »

hythloday wrote: post #9
fein wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the decision to go was unanimous then how is this a problem? They went to a restaurant that advertises the objectifying of women, with employees (of the eatery) that are totally OK with it as well. Now, if one of those employees decided to voice resistance to the idea and they carried on despite this, we would have a problem. I don't see a problem with the author's specific instance, nor would I have a problem wit…

It is a problem because it is an explicit sign to women thinking of applying to that company that they would not be welcome in the organization. Fewer organizations that welcome women mean a less attractive industry for women, which is the polar opposite of avoiding gender inequality. Pretty much any time you're discussing inequality, if you reach for "it would be OK if the situations were reversed", you are choosing…

It is a problem because it is an explicit sign to women thinking of applying to that company that they would not be welcome in the organization.

Is it really, though? If so, why? Men who enjoy going to Hooters are not necessarily crude, aggressive louts who treat women poorly. And a company that has lunch at Hooters is hardly a place where women are automatically unwelcome, or treated as inferior. In fact, I see very little connection her at all. As a man, I find that appreciating beautiful women and celebrating sexuality are completely orthogonal to my desire to treat women as respected peers and colleagues in the workplace and to treat women with respect based on factors other than their physical appearance.

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