Well, I didn't say I thought it was particularly courageous, just that it was a good post. And I'm not sure you read Mike A's reaction to it right, though I can't say for sure. I was surprised there weren't more people reacting with hostility in that thread, but it appears that things have been pushed to the point where at least in some times in some places nobody wants to take a conservative position around matters like this. Hope things change, I think many people are working on it to greater or lesser degrees.
2006-09-19EDT16:36:22+00:00
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I apologise - Mike didn't explicitly support the post, but he hardly attacked Chris for the post - so I assume that he doesn't have a big problem with it.
I still question the 'courage' in writing a post for which nobody is really reacting negatively to. Saying we should have more women and minorities speakers at tech conferences is not really controversial or courageous. Saying the opposite *would* be controversial and require a lot more courage.
2006-09-19EDT17:56:16+00:00
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I still question the 'courage' in writing a post for which nobody is really reacting negatively to. Saying we should have more women and minorities speakers at tech conferences is not really controversial or courageous. Saying the opposite *would* be controversial and require a lot more courage.
I actually for the most part completely agree with you. I definitely agree with the sentiment that Chris was describing - that it's weird and embarrassing how all technology conferences seem to be full of white, straight, male speakers - but would also add that I'm definitely not convinced that the blogospheric response (by Chris or Shelley Powers or whoever) to this homogeneity is particularly useful. I believe that certain members of the community are sexist, but I don't believe that it's that many or that it really has a significant impact on the conference selection process. What I do believe is that there are very few well-known women in particular on the business / technology side compared to the number of men. This is something that needs to be worked on, but it's ridiculous to come out and blame conference organisers for this state of affairs.
2006-09-21EDT00:39:58+00:00
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