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Sexist Presentations At Startup Competition Prompt TechCrunch Apology
beaverdownunder writes "Silicon Valley technology conference organizers TechCrunch have been forced to apologize after two Australian men pitched a smartphone app called "Titstare" in front of a nine-year-old girl. The Sydney duo's presentation had the mainly male audience laughing, but angered Twitter users and reignited a debate about sexism in the technology sector. The two entrepreneurs — Jethro Batts, 28, and David Boulton, 24 — pitched their 'tongue in cheek' idea at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco on Sunday after winning expenses for the trip to the US in a similar competition, AngelHack Sydney. In their pitch, Boulton explained to an audience of hundreds (plus thousands online) that it would allow users to 'take photos of yourself, looking at tits'. 'It's science my good friend, science,' Boulton said. TechCrunch also apologized for another pitch for a product called Circle Shake, in which a man simulated masturbation."
While I don't approve of either act, there's a difference for what an entertainer does onstage and what happens in a supposedly "professional" environment.
Entertainers do crazy stuff onstage for attention all the time. This is the industry that gave us Lady Gaga and Kylie Minogue, and introduced the term "wardrobe malfunction." It's a show. It's designed to provoke, and entertain. If you're not into it, don't watch MTV (I don't understand why anyone would have in the last 10 years, but there I go being old again).
A professional technology conference is not an entertainment venue. It's for serious business. Sure, you can inject humor into a presentation or two to make people smile and keep it light. But it's not a venue for shock or "look at me!" attention grabbing. It's where we as an industry come together to share our knowledge with each other. It's where we showcase the best of what being in technology is.
So to inject something fairly deliberately offensive into that environment reflects on the industry. And not just the presenters. It's everyone who didn't walk out. Who laughed. Who applauded at the end. They, more than the presenters, are the problem.
If you're in the industry, you can't "opt out" of going to events like this without hurting yourself professionally. Unlike pure entertainment, it shouldn't be incumbent on the audience to "just don't come if you're offended" in CASE something like this is presented. Either this is who we are as a technology industry, or it's not.
Me. And a number of my married male friends.
Supporting feminism has nothing to do with your gender or sexual preference. It's about recognizing that women are still not treated with equal regard and respect in certain spheres -- the tech sphere being one of them.
If you support the rights and reproductive freedoms of your sisters, daughters, female friends, girlfriends, wife, and mother, then you might find interesting news and political writing on feminist blogs. If you're unconcerned about these issues but are curious about why so many women are angry at the treatment they get in society, you might want to read a few of those blogs to get an idea.
Koans and fables for the software engineer
Nonsense. This is an isolated incident.
Yes, men staring at tits, talking about staring at tits, finding new ways to stare at tits, finding new tits to stare at, or rating tits is all a new thing, invented by the giant sausage factory that is technology development.
Normally men choose to do this without women around, I suspect that the lack of gender balance at these things tends to bring out the frat boy mentality that would otherwise be suppressed.
Objectification of women is conventionally considered sexism. Objectification of men is just hunky dory. Seems to me that women ought to clean their own house before bitching about when men do it. Or at least make some meaningful effort to do so.
Not to mention all the TV, movies and video games that reduce the role of a man to a paycheck or cannon fodder.
The ones at fault here are the ones bringing 9 year olds to a Techcrunch conference. Much more "adult" stuff than this could have been discussed, and within context too.
The 9 yr old had a better app & presentation than the 20 something immature idiots did.
She was more professional than they were.
So why shouldn't she be there?
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
Their display at a professional event was also uncalled for.
I like breast, but I don't go around staring and women's tits, not do a refer to them as 'tits'*, nor to I try to compare tits to them.
Walk around comparing and judging breast in your work place and see how that goes. I suspect the term 'lacks professionalism' will be on you walking papers.
" It is killing what true sexism is, real discrimination."
It makes women** feel like the industry is hostile to them, how is that not discrimination?
How about the app 'niggerstare'? It's just comparing colors, right?
*except when the contest calls for it, like this conversation.
**generalization
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on