This week, a start-up called Sqoot got their brush with “fame” when they offered women as a perk for hackathon attendees. No, really, that’s actually exactly what they did. Under “Great Perks“, they listed this gem: “Women: Need another beer? Let one of our friendly (female) event staff get that for you.”

It’s almost sort of impressive what they’ve done here. They’ve managed to be offensive on four levels simultaneously.

1. They’ve implied that all coders are male.
2. They’ve implied that all male coders are straight.
3. They’ve sexualized women. (Possibly fine when you’re out drinking with your buddies; totally inappropriate when you’re at work.)
4. They’ve treated women (and their female staff, no less) as objects offered as a perk. [define:objectify]

Congratulations, boys.

What’s really remarkable here is that many people are still saying that it’s “just a joke” and we just need to lighten up.

I get the impression, from Sqoot’s terrible apologies, that they think much the same thing.

Apology #1 [snipped - read the full thing]

While we thought this was a fun, harmless comment poking fun at the fact that hack-a-thons are typically male-dominated, others were offended. That was not our intention and thus we changed it.

We’re really sorry.

Apology #2 [snipped - read the full thing]

When we put together the original event page, we used language that we now realize was reckless and hurt efforts to diversify gender in tech. We immediately and deservedly received an enormous backlash. While we aimed to call attention to the male-dominated tech world through humor and intended to be inclusive, the gravity of our wording was just the opposite. Our words completely undermined our intentions and went further to harm the world we’re trying to have a positive impact on.

Their first apology failed to actually recognize what they’d done wrong; in fact, it blamed those who were offended.

Their second apology was much better. They recognized the harm and admitted that people had a right to be offended. But… then there’s that little part where they claim that they “aimed to call attention to the male-dominated tech world through humor” and “intended to be inclusive.” How on earth would explicitly offering women as a perk to bring the men beer be “inclusive”?

So their second apology is insufficient because, well, it’s a lie. They were most certainly not trying to be inclusive. They probably didn’t have malicious intent, but they obviously didn’t care too much that they were making sexist comments. Probably because they thought, “Who cares?!? It’s just a joke!”

Why This is a Big Deal

Here’s what Sqoot, and everyone saying we’re just being “too sensitive,” need to realize: context matters. When I read Sqoot’s hackathon ad, I’m coming at it from this context:

• I hear language everyday that just “forgets” that female coders / execs exist. Language like “we needed to have a business guy as CEO” is not okay (Paul Graham, I’m looking at you…).
• I frequently get emails directed to “Mr. Gayle” or “Mr. McDowell.”
• 70% of the comments on my Cracking the Coding Interview YouTube video are sexual or sexist. Things like this charming comment: “wow shes hot. she should be a in strip club.”
• People at networking events ask which company I’m recruiting from. Or just ask me out.
• Articles state that I was a recruiter, despite my very clearly telling the reporters that I was a software engineer.
• I’m always “the girl.” I can never blend in. I will always be different. (Different is great! But I’d prefer to be different because of what I’ve done, not how the genetic lottery played out.)
• People assume I’m a PM or a tester (or marketing / recruiting). Anything but a programmer.
• If my husband and I ever go to a tech event together, I’m assumed to be just “tagging along.”

And this is just the stuff that I see, regularly. There’s a lot more happening in people’s minds that isn’t vocalized.

So Sqoot and others may say, “What’s the big deal? It’s just a little joke!” But I, and many other women, see it as one of the many, many instances of sexism that we see on a daily basis. You try being harassed about something regularly and see if you think the “joke” is funny.

Speaking personally, it’s the little stuff that’s the hardest. Because I see it everyday. Because it adds up. Because if I say something, I’m hypersensitive and I will certainly get no support. Because it’s a lot harder to brush it off as “well, that person is just a jerk” when it happens all the time. If that person’s a jerk, then I’m surrounded by jerks and by people who will only see me as technical / smart / whatever when I fight a little harder. And, frankly, it’s exhausting.

So this is the context that I, and many women, are coming from. This is why we’re so offended by it. It’s not just a little joke. It’s one more example of the crap we deal with everyday.

What Sqoot Needs to Do

#1. Understand what you’ve done. This was not just “one mistake.” This is the third time that Sqoot has unnecessarily used sexual imagery / remarks [see one | two]. You’re a daily deal company. These images have no place on your company blog:

I get that you’re trying to make a cute little pun. But eww. And why? You’re not Pepsi. You don’t need to use sex to sell. This isn’t even good marketing for you!

So you need to start talking with people to understand – really understand – why they’re offended. Because I don’t think this was a one-time mistake, and I don’t think you get it. Yet.

#2. Issue another apology. Yes, I know that you apologized twice already. But those weren’t good enough. Sorry. Try again.

Your apology needs to

1. Take full responsibility. Do not blame those who were offended.
2. Explain, in your own words, why what you did was bad. This shows people that you understand.
3. Explain yourself — but not make excuses. Your explanation can be ”we were stupid and immature;” it shouldn’t be “we were trying to be inclusive.” Because you weren’t.
4. Explain why a commitment to non-sexist and other (*ist) language is so important. This will help show people that you believe in diversity and also hopefully educate those who maybe don’t, yet, “get it.”

#3. Demonstrate a commitment to diversity and inclusiveness. When the University of Pennsylvania’s Computer Science club proposed making “brogrammer” shirts, many people were offended (and many were not). The idea was eventually rejected. But afterwards, they held a forum to discuss sexism in Computer Science. That shows that they care, and that matters.

You need to do your own thing, but you need to do something. Maybe it’s a hosting a forum to discuss sexism. Maybe it’s a new hackathon sponsored with some women’s groups. Maybe it’s just finding ways of recognizing more women in Computer Science. I don’t know. But you need to do something.

Show us that you care.

The gist of Arrington’s post is this: Stop blaming us for the lack of women as speakers / subjects of articles.  We try, but there’s just not as many women.  And don’t blame the men either.  Silicon Valley is a true meritocracy, and women have a ton of advantages in tech / entrepreneurship.  Women are not pursuing this field, and it’s probably something innate.

He’s partially right, and I can understand his frustration.  TechCrunch probably tries to attract female speakers, and it must be frustrating that, despite all that effort, people are criticizing them for not having enough women.  I get that.

The rest of the article is where Arrington goes wrong.

1. Silicon Valley is a not a full meritocracy.

Your network is incredibly important in getting press, attracting employees, getting funding, etc. Can people assume you’re less technical, less credible because you’re female? If you’re female, do you have to do more to prove your credibility? Absolutely.

2. Women have many disadvantages as entrepreneurs.

He states that “statistically speaking women have a huge advantage as entrepreneurs”. He makes a common mistake here. Yes, women have some advantages. Are there disadvantages to being female? Of course. I’ve had so many people comment on my desire to start a company and ask, “what will you do when you have children?” If people are directly asking me that, I can only assume that VCs, potential partners, etc, will be wondering the same thing. And somehow I don’t think my fiancé John would get the same questions. I can tell you countless stories from business school, tech environments, etc about people making assumptions. I do get some advantages from being female, but I also have to work harder in some respects. And I, unlike Arrington, would not be so presumptuous to assume that it falls so heavily on one side or the other.

3. When you say “women have it easier,” you’re also usually saying “I assume women are worse.”

Here’s a conversation I’ve had many times with different people:

Person: “Oh no, I’m not sexist, but come on, women have a lot of advantages getting a tech job or doing other stuff. There’s so much pro-women stuff.”

Me: “So you’re saying that it’s easier to get into, say, Google if you’re female?”

Person: “Of course. Look at what they do to recruit women.”

Me: “I see. So then if it’s easier getting into Google as a woman, then you must believe that the average woman is less qualified?”

Person: “Well, right, that’s true.”

Me: “So when you see a woman in tech, you assume she’s worse than the average man? Even though you know that she’s at Google, she would probably have to more to prove her credibility?

This is the point where the person usually stutters.   (The “person” can be either male or female. Men are not necessarily any more sexist than women.)  Arrington introduces this conversation with a comment about how he assumes that the acceptance rate for women-founded businesses in Y-Combinator is higher than that of men-founded businesses.  Does the rest of this conversation follow?  Most likely.

4. Early sexism is relevant.

There’s everything that happens before people become entrepreneurs. All the implicit sexism. The high school teachers who think maybe you want to be careful before taking that college level calculus class over the summer – it’s really hard, you know. The people who aren’t surprised when you struggle in math and science – who don’t expect as much of you. Young girls looking around and seeing the people like them working “normal jobs” rather than having super-successful careers. Arrington suggests that women are just inherently less inclined to be entrepreneurs, and completely ignores that maybe someone’s childhood affects their goals and values.

5. Women are genetically less and more inclined to be entrepreneurs.

Ok, Arrington doesn’t directly say this, but he certainly suggests it as a theory.  People have been asserting things like “oh women are just inherently less inclined to do X,” only to have it equalize later on in life. I also know that there are just as many female math majors as male in the US, suggesting that it’s maybe not that women are inherently less quantitative.

Virtually every time people introduce some study to show why things are just as they should naturally be, the reasoning is flawed.  It usually goes something like: “A study showed that men are better than women at X.  X is a component of Y.  Therefore, men are just inherently better at Y than women.”  That only follows if X is the only component of Y.  Let’s find some reasons why women should be naturally more inclined to be entrepreneurs, shall we?

• Women are better multitaskers.  [study]
• Women make better managers. [study]
• Women, more often than men, have a secondary source of income (yes, their spouses).  Thus, a women pursuing entrepreneurship is less likely to be gambling their child’s education, family well-being, etc.

Now, those top two are according to just one study / article.  There may be studies that contradict it.  That’s part of the problem, after all.  People bring one study to suggest that women are inherently less inclined in one aspect of entrepreneurship, and use it as a comprehensive explanation of a very complex problem.  It doesn’t work like that.

I don’t know why there aren’t more women in tech or more women entrepreneurs.  But I do know that it’s a really, really complex problem, and there’s a lot men and women can do to help solve it.

Think of a 17-year-old girl. Most of the time she’s a high school senior, still living at home with Mom and Dad.

Ok, thinking, thinking… got it: A 17 year old girl, terrified to admit to her parents that she not only has sex (gasp!), but had unprotected sex. Will she take the chance at pregnancy to avoid telling her parents? Yeah, probably.

She still needs her parents in the tough times. But they will be cut out of a traumatic situation.

Wait, what’s traumatic here? The sex? That’s not traumatic. Unprotected sex? Not traumatic, as long as it doesn’t result in pregnancy. So, actually, we’re preventing a traumatic situation.

Now keep in mind birth control pills require a doctor’s prescription, but a drug that is more powerful doesn’t?

Ok – so maybe we should make birth control pills over the counter too? And, also, while Plan B is more powerful per pill, but birth control is a much more serious health concern because you’re on it for weeks, months, years. The depression and other things that can result from birth control isn’t really a risk with Plan B.

Some argue that a girl can get an abortion without parental notification in some states, so why not Plan B? But just because those states got it wrong by leaving parents out of the loop doesn’t mean others should follow suit.

Let’s make sure we can follow his argument here (where the “>” means “more serious than”): Abortion > Plan B > Birth control pills. States allow abortion without parental consent, but that doesn’t imply allowing Plan B. But, earlier, he basically used the opposite logic: if states don’t allow birth control, why would they allow a more serious drug? Inconsistent logic.

In most states, minors can’t get a tattoo, body piercings or go to a tanning salon without a parent’s permission, but we are going to leave them alone to take Plan B.

Well, yes, this makes sense because of the consequences of not providing access to Plan B: pregnancy. What’s the consequence of not providing access to tattoos?

Timing is essential to the drug’s effectiveness, Plan B supporters say, so getting parents and doctors involved would unnecessarily delay the teen’s ability to pop the pill the “morning after.” Does it really take that long to get a prescription?

First, it can take a while if it’s on a weekend (and teens do have this tendency to have sex on weekends). Second, it would unnecessarily prevent the teen from telling her parents. Do you not know teenage girls? They don’t really like getting grounded or barred from seeing their boyfriends.

The New York Times reports that since 18-year-olds were allowed to get Plan B without a prescription in 2006, there has been no evidence of it having an effect on the country’s teen pregnancy or abortion rates.

True, but they also showed no increase in risky behaviors. So, 1 point for each side here.

We’re enabling teenagers to act carelessly with an easy way out.

Yeah! Let’s punish them with unplanned pregnancy! Brilliant!

“Teenagers are known for thinking they’re untouchable and here we are saying that they can continue to do that and that there aren’t any consequences.”

Ah, so you admit that teens tend to think that nothing bad could happen to them? So, given that attitude, if they have unprotected sex, will they tell their parents so that they can get Plan B? I didn’t think so.

The boyfriend will talk his girlfriend into unprotected sex with the promise of buying the “morning after pill” the next day.

Please, show me some data stating that this is a concern. Last I checked, boys were also scared of pregnancy – especially since, as you stated, Plan B is only 89% effective. (In fact, boys might be more scared of pregnancy, since they don’t get any say in abortion.)

Yes, this could encourage unprotected sex and that means a greater risk for sexually transmitted diseases.

(A) Studies have shown that it doesn’t increase promiscuity. (B) Isn’t Plan B like $40 a pop? I don’t think people are going to really rely on this as their sole method of birth control.

What about the 17-year-old girl who may get Plan B for her 15-year-old sophomore friend?

What about it? I’m ok with that, since it’s certainly better than the 15 year old not taking it at all.

Yes, teens have sex and difficult situations will arise, but should we open the door for our girls to go through this alone? That is not what is best for our daughters.

See, here’s the thing: Plan B supporters are trying to make sure your daughters don’t have to go through “this” at all (where “this” is an unplanned pregnancy).

And, allow me to make a few additional points:

1. The average age in the US for people to lose their virginity is about 17. So to say that parents need to be informed that their 17 year old is having sex is a little extreme. If you have a 17 year old, they’re probably having sex. This is not a crisis that needs to be averted. It’s normal.
2. When a 17 year old girl has to chose between taking Plan B and informing her parents, and not taking it at all, she just wouldn’t take Plan B. So, the parents won’t be informed that their teen is having sex anyway.
3. It’s not that I want parents to be uninformed. It’s that I don’t want unplanned pregnancies. Given that, I’ll take uninformed parents and fewer unplanned pregnancies.
4. In an entire article about why 17 year olds should need a prescription to get Plan B, Galanos never even responds to the core reason why many people disagree. That’s a rather glaring omission.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court heard argument on a case where a 13 year old girl – an honor student who had never been in trouble – was strip searched at school because she was suspected of having ibuprofen. Now, if that doesn’t infuriate you already, listen to the facts of the case:

Redding says she was then asked to strip down to her underwear and stood there while the nurse and secretary inspected her clothes and shoes.

“Then, you know, I thought they were going to let me put my clothes back on, but instead they asked me to pull out my bra and shake it, and the crotch on my underwear, too,” Redding says.

Redding says her whole body was visible to the school administrators. She kept her head down so the nurse and the secretary couldn’t see her fighting back tears.

And all this for what is basically Advil. Ugh.

This was more than a strip search. This was assault:

1. A young girl was forced to show her private parts.
2. The school did not search the girl’s locker or desk, but they did search the girl’s crotch.
3. The harm in traumatizing a girl far outweighs the harm of a couple of students from taking ibuprofen.

When you look at these facts, you see that the school’s search was not conducted in a way to find the ibuprofen (since they didn’t search the girl’s locker or desk), nor did they balance the harm of an invasive search against the risks of mild pain killers. Thus, it seems that the administrators were on a powertrip that ended in assaulting a girl.

I hope that the Supreme Court makes the right decision. While there is a time and place to do strip searches (eg, in jail), school officials are not trained to do so. If you think a student poses that much of a danger that an invasive search is required, then call the cops. Strip searches should never be conducted by school officials.

The most frustrating part is that people don’t even see the racism and sexism. A Google coworker who had a “Hillary Nutcracker” displayed in his office window – he probably didn’t think about how that’s dripping with sexism. Nor did the Republican friend who asked online for one good thing that “Barack HUSSEIN Obama” has ever done. Nor does the other friend who asserts that Colin Powell only endorsed Barack Obama because he’s black.

We don’t see these things because we see them all too often. We’ve become immune to it. It’s time that we wake up and call these things out for the racist, sexist acts that they are.

In an odd – if not shocking – choice of words, Time Magazine describes the details as “sexy and surreal”. Instead of calling it rape, Time calls it “forcibly having sex.” It’s also called a “sex scandal.”

So how could Time possibly describe an abduction and rape this way? The rapist was a woman and the victim was a man.

Rape is not sex and it is never, ever, sexy.

I believe God, in order to make certain that the human race would continue on, made sex one of most powerful desires known to mankind. But here’s the problem. If a guy created a baby every time he had sex and he had to take care of each and every baby and it’s mother for the next 20 years of his life and… THERE WAS NO PLEASURE IN THE ACT… how many guys would have sex? None! You think God didn’t know that? Of course he did. So, he had to make the desire for sex so pleasurable that most guys would do just about anything to have sex, baby or no baby. That way the generations would go on and on.

But the problem is, what if he made both men and women with the same desire? What if all men and women had the same intensity sexually as men? What would happen to our society? We’d never get anything done. We’d have so many babies it would overrun the Earths capacity. It would be terrible.

But on the other hand, what if both men and women had the same sexual intensity as most women? What would happen to our society then? We’d die out in one generation.

If the (alleged) difference in men’s and women’s sex drives is just God achieving population control, couldn’t an omniscient, omnipotent God achieve this in other ways? Compared with creating the earth and the sun, tweaking fertility rates should be relatively easy.

Somehow, I find the evolutionary explanation a lot easier to follow…

The sworn virgin was born of social necessity in an agrarian region plagued by war and death. If the family patriarch died with no male heirs, unmarried women in the family could find themselves alone and powerless. By taking an oath of virginity, women could take on the role of men as head of the family, carry a weapon, own property and move freely.

When traditional Albanian culture accepts sworn virgins as men – complete with men’s responsibilities and duties – it is actually demonstrating a belief that women are just as capable as men. Why, then, do you have such strictly defined gender roles? Is it solely due to religion?

A few other thoughts:

On Transgender vs. Homosexuality

Taking an oath to become a sworn virgin should not, sociologists say, be equated with homosexuality, long taboo in rural Albania.

This line sort of caught me off guard. Next time you write about, say, theatre, why don’t you just throw in a line like “but enjoying theater should not be equated with homosexuality.” Gender identity and sexual orientation are very different things.

On Gender Pronouns
Normally, one should use “he” to refer to people who were born female but identify as male, yet this article uses “she.” Is this ignorance on the part of the reporter to this “rule”, an inability to accept a different custom, or do sworn virgins continue to use the female pronouns? Given the thoroughness with which they are treated as men (including use of the word “uncle”), I’m inclined to believe that they use the male pronouns. So why didn’t the article?

On the Future of Sworn Virgins
As women gain more rights, the incentives to become a sworn virgin become less and less. Some of the remaining sworn virgins, however, appear to encourage the same gender roles that pushed them into becoming men:

“Today women go out half naked to the disco,” said Ms. Rakipi, who wears a military beret. “I was always treated my whole life as a man, always with respect. I can’t clean, I can’t iron, I can’t cook. That is a woman’s work.”

The girls, ages early grade school to college, had come with their fathers, stepfathers and future fathers-in-law last Friday night to the ninth annual Father-Daughter Purity Ball. The first two hours of the gala passed like any somewhat awkward night out with parents, the men doing nearly all the talking and the girls struggling to cut their chicken.
…
For the Wilsons and the growing number of people who have come to their balls, premarital sex is seen as inevitably destructive, especially to girls, who they say suffer more because they are more emotional than boys. Fathers, they say, play a crucial role in helping them stay pure.

Between STDs and pregnancy, it’s great if a girl chooses abstinence. However, the Father-Daughter Purity Ball is saying so much more than that. It’s specifically fathers and specifically daughters. If purity is so important, where are the sons? Is virginity not important for boys? If it’s about encouraging virtue, why aren’t the mothers there supporting their daughters?

Instead of encouraging girls to respect and value their bodies, this propagates a distorted world view in which boys are the blameless aggressors, girls are the guardians of purity, and their strong, manly fathers must protect from those silly boys. After all, boys are boys – can they really be expected to keep their d*ck in their pants? Better make that the girl’s responsibility.

“Fathers, our daughters are waiting for us,” Mr. Wilson, 49, told the men. “They are desperately waiting for us in a culture that lures them into the murky waters of exploitation. They need to be rescued by you, their dad.”

Indeed, rather than encouraging a girl to choose abstinence, this promotes the idea of a girl being unable to make her own decisions about her body and needing a man to make the decisions for her. Guess who’s going to make the decisions when she gets a boyfriend?

Furthermore, purity balls like this one can be counterproductive as parents are unlikely to educate their children on safe sex:

Recent studies have suggested that close relationships between fathers and daughters can reduce the risk of early sexual activity among girls and teenage pregnancy. But studies have also shown that most teenagers who say they will remain abstinent, like those at the ball, end up having sex before marriage, and they are far less likely to use condoms than their peers.

Parents: Encourage your children to wait to have sex. That’s great. But encourage all of them equally – boys and girls. And, just in case the kids don’t listen (as kids are known to do) teach them about condoms and safe sex. Preparing for the “what if” scenario is just common sense.