Democracy Gone Astray

Democracy, being a human construct, needs to be thought of as directionality rather than an object. As such, to understand it requires not so much a description of existing structures and/or other related phenomena but a declaration of intentionality.
This blog aims at creating labeled lists of published infringements of such intentionality, of points in time where democracy strays from its intended directionality. In addition to outright infringements, this blog also collects important contemporary information and/or discussions that impact our socio-political landscape.

All the posts here were published in the electronic media – main-stream as well as fringe, and maintain links to the original texts.

[NOTE: Due to changes I haven't caught on time in the blogging software, all of the 'Original Article' links were nullified between September 11, 2012 and December 11, 2012. My apologies.]

Wednesday, October 09, 2013

Twitter CEO Attacks Professor For Pointing Out Board Has No Women

What was Dick Costolo thinking?

On Sunday, Twitter's CEO pushed back against criticism of the company's apparent lack of female higher-ups with an ad hominem attack against one of its critics.

Twitter's list of board members, executive officers and investors released in its IPO filing last week features only one woman, New York Times reporter Claire Cain Miller pointed out in an article. “It’s the same male chauvinistic thinking," Stanford professor Vivek Wadhwa told Miller for her story. "The fact that they went to the I.P.O. without a single woman on the board, how dare they?”

Costolo didn't take kindly to Wadhwa's words.

Instead of addressing Wadhwa's point, Costolo compares him to Carrot Top, a comedian generally criticized for being excessive and irritating. (Costolo would know, being a former improv comedian himself.)

The tact is surprising, considering how fraught the issue of women in tech has become in Silicon Valley. Driving home the discrepancy even more is the fact that more female than male Internet users are on Twitter, according to a 2012 Pew report.

Twitter declined to comment for the New York Times piece, but Costolo has reportedly made finding a woman to join the board a priority, according to Miller.

In another tweet, Costolo does acknowledge the gender imbalance in Twitter's top brass. "I *think* I have an acute understanding of the topic & host of related issues," he wrote. "Of course, proof is in deeds."

Original Article
Source: huffingtonpost.com
Author: Alexis Kleinman

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