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Comment by tomelders

I think it's mildly offensive to both sexes to present the lack of female founders in this way. To women is says; all you lack are role models and community support. Which has a 1950s, "even a woman can do it!" Ring to it.

To men, it reinforces the idea that women are being kept down by men. Maybe that's true and I'm simply not getting invited to the meetings where men gather to conspire to keep women down and out of the board room. Or maybe that doesn't happen and the real reason there are fewer women in the very high positions is a result of something else.

There is a vocal minority of dick heads out there who hate women and happen to be in tech. My guess is that they hate women for the very reason you would expect a "geek/nerd" to hate women; because girls ignored them, and were probably mean to them. The power balance in school between boys and girls goes a long way to explaining the animosity between some men and women in my opinion.

If I were asked to organise a talk to encourage women to become founders, I would ask an expert in risk assessment to speak, because we know it to be true that women are more risk averse than men. And that is why there are more male founders AND more male prisoners. To talk about anything else is just pretending there are no real, measurable and relevant differences between men and women. And I don't see how that helps anyone.

parent tomelders 12 years ago

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