Ellen Pao Loses Silicon Valley Gender Bias Case Against Kleiner Perkins

vivaoporto writes As reported by the New York Times, USA Today and other publications, a jury of six men and six women rejected current Reddit Inc CEO Ellen Pao's claims against her former employer, the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Ms. Pao's suit, that alleged employment discrimination based on gender, workplace retaliation and failure to take reasonable steps to prevent gender discrimination, asked $16 million in compensatory damages plus punitive damages. The jury decided, after more than two days of deliberation and more than four weeks of testimony, that her formed employer neither discriminated against the former junior partner for her gender, nor fired the complainant because of a high-profile gender discrimination lawsuit against the firm in 2012. She alleged that Kleiner Perkins had promoted male partners over equally qualified women at the firm, including herself, and then retaliated against her for raising concerns about the firm's gender dynamics by failing to promote her and finally firing her after seven years at the firm after she filed her 2012 lawsuit.

Comments

Re:One more view.

[fey000]

Jury: Kleiner Perkins not liable for Pao’s gender discrimination claims [Updated]
Trial highlighted Silicon Valley's male-dominated tech and investment culture. via http://arstechnica.com/tech-po...

Absolutely loving the reasoning here. There are two possible outcomes.

1. Kleiner Perkins freed of all charges. This highlights just how male-dominated and sexist the tech industry is.
2. Kleiner Perkins guilty of all charges. This highlights just how male-dominated and sexist the tech industry is.

Perhaps this could be used as some sort of Turing test for feminazis?

The perfect summary of the case:

[ckatko]

"Ellen Pao gender-bias lawsuit is a setback for women"
http://www.cnbc.com/id/1025377...

Written by a female ex-CEO.

In a nutshell, the case is obviously frivolous, and if it had succeeded it would have been another barrier for women in the industry because companies would see a female applicant and go, "Is she worth the risk?"

Re:N4N?

[ADRA]

Because surprisingly enough, most of the people on this site work, and of those workers, many work in technology. Furthermore, many work in America with jobs held by companies that are required to abide by laws. Once an important / relevant law causes a cascade of business changes (think the whole API copyright fight between Oracle and Google), people reading this site will care. A LOT.

I know you're a troll an all that, but sadly, many don't see how immediate any change like this can have to their own lives. I personally think discrimination bias should absolutely be investigated and addressed on a case by case basis, though considering they found no obvious discrimination then mission accomplished! Just like John Oliver's Infrastructure segment: "Congratulations guys, nothing happened!".

Re:One more view.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ellen Pao comes from a culture of lying for victimhood and money. She and her kind actually make it more difficult for women to get hired, due to fear of false claims actually succeeding.

Good job.

Re:One more view.

[ckatko]

Half the juriors were WOMEN. And ALL of the Asian juriors voted against her.

When you assume every women who loses a case is because of "male domination", then nobody takes you seriously when you have an actual case of discrimination.

Ars Technica just lost my respect and readership. If they can be this biased toward their agenda even when the facts are obviously to the contrary, they can't be trusted to report on anything.

Wouldn't Want To Be In The Same Room With Her

[Anonymous Coward]

Man has an affair on the job, expects to get fired, woman has an affair on the job, expects $16M. Nothing coming out of this case makes it look like she had even the tiniest shred of evidence she didn't deserve what she got besides her gender.

This whole issue needs to be buried

[Karmashock]

I don't mean the article but this gender bias issue which is almost entirely factious and where not factious almost always radical hyperbole.

The gender wage game since the 1970s has been less then TWO percent not 30 percent WHEN you factor in years on the job. Nearly every comparison between men and women that cite a large gender pay game ignores that the women often take as many as ten years off while they raise children. To compare that person's value to the company against someone that didn't take those ten years off is either gross incompetence or calculated deceit. And that was in the 1970s and that is only when factoring for a SINGLE additional variable.

There are other variables that can easily account for the remaining 2 percent and then some.

Subject this garbage to the cold light of reality and it evaporates into nothing.

By all means, contradict me... but if you do, provide some logic and if you cite evidence, expect it to be audited.

I will accept nothing from anyone that isn't open to examination.

Re:This whole issue needs to be buried

[Karmashock]

No one is forgetting that. But why is the employer responsible for it either?

You want to take ten years off and then come back and earn the same as the man OR woman that didnt' leave? How is that fair?

The best way to track the effect of children on the earning power of a woman is is to compare the earning power of women that don't have children versus the ones that do.

The women that do not have children earn almost the exact same amount as men.

That was how the gender cap statistic was first debunked. They just removed all the women that have children and the gap vanished.

Now you say we need kids? No disagreement. But that is a different issue from gender discrimination or a wage gap.

All you're asking for now is maternity welfare. Which already exists. Nearly all the public subsidy money for healthcare etc goes to women. Roughly 90 percent goes to women.

So... you're being paid. And the next time you want to talk about how hard it is being a woman, lets look at the gender imbalance in homeless people. Nearly all homeless people are men.

This issue is bullshit. It needs to be cut in to little pieces, dosed with holy water, and then buried on opposing sides of a church on holy ground. Otherwise known as another fun way to deal with vampires.

The issue is bullshit. Nuke it from orbit.

Re:This whole issue needs to be buried

[Karmashock]

There's no stigma against working women with children. The stigma is against an employee not showing up for work for ANY reason. Ultimately the employer doesn't pay you to take care of your children. They pay you to do your job. You do that well and you're more valuable to the company and will be paid more. You do it worse and you're less valuable to the company and will be paid less.

That isn't discrimination.

There is a big problem with people conflating "equality of outcome" with "equality of opportunity".

Equal opportunity does not mean you're going to make the same as anyone else. It means you "COULD" have made the same.

If you make choices that reduce your earning power that isn't anyone else's fault. It isn't a civil rights issue. It isn't discrimination.

Its like blaming your employer for not hiring you to be a doctor even though you don't have a medical degree. You COULD have gotten one but you chose not to go to school for 8 years to get it. And as a result... you're not a doctor and they're not employing you as one.

This whole "equally skilled women are being paid less than equally skilled men" doesn't take into consideration years worked on the job. Which means it can't possibly evaluate if the people being hired or paid are actually equally skilled. All they're doing is looking at what people studied in college. If you studied the same thing in college and passed... those statistics consider you "equally skilled" which completely ignores so many fucking things it is beyond retarded.

Re:This whole issue needs to be buried

[Karmashock]

As to why the woman takes care of the children... I need to take some deep breaths here... *calms down*

Okay, first responsibility and rights go hand in hand. For women to share responsibility they must share rights... over the child. If they are doing that, then their male sperm shooting buddy will probably be sharing that responsibility.

Second, even if the guy has no rights over the child, he generally has to pay child support. Which renders your whole comment about why men don't help out completely silly.

Third, the attractiveness and value of men is tied to their utility to the family and their ability to "nest build" for women. This is why rich dudes marry poor women with big tits and poor men are not as often married by rich old women. It doesn't really happen. We're sexually dimorphic. To further address your point, if a man stops working when his wife has a child and says "I'll take care of the baby" it puts more strain on their marriage than if he keeps working and she stops working. What is more, many women literally prefer to take the time off to spend with their child. And guess what, that has career consequences... Get the fuck over it.

Fourth, what makes your statement about men abandoning women so mind numbingly painful to listen to is that there are instances of women literally drugging men, tying them up, raping them, the man reporting the rape, nothing happening to his rapist, her giving birth, and then him having to pay child support for her rape baby. That has literally happened. Another fun example, some lesbians asked a guy to donate sperm so they could have a baby. The understanding was that he would not be responsible for the baby. He either shot it in a cup or has sex with one of them until she got pregnant. After birth, the other lesbian abandoned her partner and her partner went on welfare. Then the people at the welfare office said she had to declare the father for paper work reasons. Then the welfare office demanded child support from the guy that donated his sperm to the lesbians. And from this you conclude that men are just let off the fucking hook?

I don't want to live on this planet anymore... there are far too many retards.

Re:This whole issue needs to be buried

[Karmashock]

No, my view is of someone that understands the employer employee relationship.

As to society needing children, yes... but it is not the corporation's responsibility to do that. That is up to the family and the community. Not the company.

What is more, the community does help women. Again, about 90 percent of government medical subsidies go to women. Why is that?

What percentage of homeless people are men versus women? Why is that?

Women are taken care of far better by our society than are men. We recognize that women must be protected. But no one owes you a job. And if you show up with this entitlement that you should be paid more than you are worth, then you are in for disappointment.

You will be paid what you are worth. What you get beyond that will be charity.

Furthermore, if the point is for women to have children, then why are we putting women into the labor force and encouraging them to have careers? This does not help women have children.

What is more, why do we not encourage women more strongly to be bound into some sort of sexual relationship with the opposite sex? It would help the birth rate.

You can't have it both ways. You can't say society should give you a career because society needs babies. That is not an argument for giving women jobs. That is an argument for denying them jobs, compelling them into the kitchen, and giving their male partners the jobs instead.

The argument for giving women careers is EQUALITY. Not babies. Equality. And equality means you get paid what you are worth.

You cite babies and I have to ask how giving you a career helps society get babies? Limiting the opportunities of women has a proven track record of improving birth rates. Actually, the more opportunities women have, the lower the birth rate becomes.

Think about it.

You can't use babies in this argument. If society really needed the babies then the last thing it should do is give women anything to do besides have babies.

Again.
Think.
Be.
Rational.

As to your various welfare recommendations, that is fine. The government can raise taxes and give more women welfare and subsidies. That is however not the company's responsibility. You can tax the company and use those taxes for various things. But as an employee you're going to get paid what you are worth.

Crying discrimination when you're not being discriminated against is dishonest and foolish.

Re:slashdot - daily news about whiny bitches and S

[Mashiki]

They're starting to enclave up in videogames, much like what happened with the atheism movement. It took a few extra years but the "atheism+" crap is now collapsing under it's own corruption and regular atheism is going along just fine still. And of course there's now a similar thing to gamergate starting in comic books and heavy metal. Everything they touch they turn into a political issue, and when they don't get their way they claim sexism, bigotry, racism, or whatever else to try and make people back down. Funny enough, many of them actually sexist, bigots or racists and that can be easily seen in their social commentary on twitter or facebook.

Re:One more view.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ars Technica just lost my respect and readership.

For reporting the jury's verdict? The phrasing is very much "legal-ese": The jury held that KP is not liable for her claims. Don't see why that bothers you so much.

The subtitle is a statement of why the case was even remotely interesting: it is an indisputable fact that the tech industry and investment banking are "dominated by" men. Men make up the overwhelming majority of people in both of those industries, and the skew is even more pronounced at the executive levels. And at question during this trial was the behavior of those men towards women: which means... the trial DID highlight the male-dominated tech and investment banking cultures in Silicon Valley. That was the FOCUS of the case.

By describing the tech and investment banking industries as "male dominated," they are, in fact, being as absolutely factual as if they were writing a story about the "female dominated" nursing field. There was nothing in the article about "male domination" being the reason for Ms. Pao's loss; nor was there any presumption that "male domination" somehow influenced the jury. I think you need a refresher course in reading comprehension, friend. Your sense of outrage is clearly cutting off your oxygen.

Pao is like her husband with lawsuits

[Sara Chan]

For some great background on how corrupt Pao and her husband are, see "Some Thoughts on Ellen Pao’s Marriage", by Richard Bradley. Basically, Pao's husband has a history of dubious lawsuits, and Pao seems to have gone along in his family suing business.

That seems correct. Mod parent UP.

[Futurepower(R)]

That seems correct. A lot of companies will think: "Don't hire women. They may accuse someone of "gender bias" or "sexual harassment". In the U.S. at present, that is an easy way to get money without earning it.

A long time ago, I was dating an attractive woman who had 2 jobs in traditionally male areas. I said to her, "Women often say they have trouble with unacceptable male attention." She told me, "They ask for it!" (Exact quote) I questioned her and learned that opinion of hers was very strong and rooted in considerable experience.

She always dressed in a way that made people respect her.

Re:Wasn't it 3 out of 4 claims denied?

[russotto]

4th claim isn't a gender bias claim, but a claim she was fired out of retaliation for filing this lawsuit.

Damage has been done

[Anonymous Coward]

No matter win or lose, the lawsuit itself has done much damage to the Silicon Valley

In the eyes of the investors the Silicon Valley no longer represents a place where technology means everything, where one can get the best talents to work on and create marvelous new and fancy and profitable ways to boldly forge new pathways towards the next technological frontier

No

The Silicon Valley, thanks to the feminazis like Ms. Pao, has turned into a place where one can get sued just because one bases one's hiring on the best qualified candidates - and not on the basis of creed, gender and/or racial background

The world today that we live in the Silicon Valley is no longer the only place where the investors can find talents - nowadays there are so many options for the investors - They can also go to Europe or India or Korea or Japan or China or Singapore or even Africa / South America

If America does not stop these kind of frivolous lawsuits from happening, it gonna make the Silicon Valley a very unwelcome place for those with money to invest - and investors in general do not like to invest in places where 'political minefield' are abound

Re:Damage has been done

[elrous0]

The partner (?) who did not want to invite the women in the company to a getaway with Al Gore because it would "kill the buzz." The buzz would be killed because the excluded party were women, not because they were unpleasant people.

Maybe that was because the partner recognized that Pao was just the kind of sensitive narcissist who would do things like keep enemies lists and sue people who she perceived as wronging her. Yeah, having someone like that along would in fact be a pretty big "buzzkill" for any fun retreat.

Pao was stupid to sleep with the Indian sleazebag and that probably gave her a reputation in the office. But let us assume she's an utter whore and slut. Do the married men in the company have absolutely no control over themselves?

That argument, of course, cuts both ways. It could as easily be rephrased as "Do the women at KP have absolutely no control of themselves when it comes to married men?"

Re:Damage has been done

[rjlieb]

Starting in the 1970's many symphony orchestras began using "blind auditions" to hire musicians. Applicants performed behind a screen which shielded them from the judge's view. Since this practice began, the number of woman in American orchestras increased from about 10% to 35%. Studies conducted since then attribute about 50% of this increase to the use of blind auditions.

If you had asked these orchestras what criteria they were using to select musicians back then, I'm sure they would have told you that they were hiring the "best qualified candidates." And yet we now know that there was a clear, although possibly unconscious, bias in their selection process.

Putting aside the merits of Ms. Pao's particular case, the notion that Silicon Valley has been hiring and promoting the "best qualified candidates" all along has no real supporting evidence. You could argue that technology firms do the best they can with the information available to them. But, that's not a valid argument to maintain the status quo.

Re:One more view.

[Anonymous Coward]

But that's been the standard MO with feminist for a while now-

Assist women: benevolent sexism.
Don't assist women: supporter of rape culture.

Cite lack of voting rights for women: proof of misogyny.
Point out universal suffrage for men is tied to conscription: patriarchy hurts men too.

Feminism has been a wonderful exercise in mental gymnastics to where everything can be spun as proof misogyny. And even when pointing out glaring hypocrisies: there are several branches of feminism, and the particular one you are debating does not support that particular contradiction.

But then again, a woman is always free to change her mind.

Re:One more view.

[ganjadude]

Actually ars seemed to be one of the few places ive seen reporting the trial at hand throughout, and not making it all biased towards her. Ars was pretty nutral but the reporting made it seem as if she was a spoiled entitled brat.

Re:slashdot - daily news about whiny bitches and S

[ganjadude]

Did you ever notice that only assholes and douchebags ARE SJWs?

FTFY

It will be interesting...

[denzacar]

...how will this reflect on her husband's Ponzi scheme lawsuits.

Those $16 million would have probably come in handy.

Yes, it is important

[Anonymous Coward]

Ellen K. Pao, with her husband Alphonse "Buddy" Fletcher , are both Harvard Educated scam artists

Read the following link to see how Ms. Pao's hubby has stolen more than $150million from many victims, including Massachusetts and Louisiana cops and firefighters

http://nypost.com/2015/02/18/case-builds-against-former-ny-hedgie-buddy-fletcher/

Re:One more view.

[ShanghaiBill]

Half the juriors were WOMEN.

You should not assume that women are more pro-woman. Many female managers will tell you they have a lot more problems with female subordinates than with males. This is especially true if there is a significant age difference: if a talented young woman is put in charge of a team that includes older women, you will often have a lot of friction.

agree with one part of that

[raymorris]

Based on the technical women I've worked with, I have to agree with one thing you said:

Women comprise over 50% of population and any ... that can tap that ... suddenly has a tremendous advantantage

Kidding, of course. Seriously, what you said is true not only of countries, but of COMPANIES. Companies who hire and promote people who do well have a tremendous, almost insurmountable advantage. A company who wasted half of their good people and good candidates would quickly be beat by the competition. Therefore, tremendous successful companies like Google MUST be promoting people who are both technically and with "people skills", employees who work well with others. If Google systematically ignored half the available talent, Apple or Microsoft would wipe the floor with them. They'd never had gotten this big because Yahoo would have had twice as many really good people. Therefore natural forces are such that companies that identify and nurture effective people (effective technically and as a team member) will grow and will win.

Re:One more view.

[elrous0]

I've been here a while too. Long enough to remember when /. was so reflexively liberal and dogmatic that only one voice on any topic was ever heard. That wasn't such a great place for those of us whose views are more nuanced, who don't just parrot the party line. Here are some harsh truths that never got a voice in those days:

Not every allegation of sexism/racism/rape/etc. is true.

White, heterosexual, American males are not responsible for all evil in the world.

Sometimes conservatives are wrong, but sometimes they're right too.

It's not okay to support censorship when it comes to Islam unless you're also okay with supporting censorship when it comes to Christianity. Judaism, Hinduism, etc. too.

Bill Gates isn't a Borg and sometimes does some good in the world. Conversely, Steve Jobs isn't a flawless god, and did some bad things in his life.

I could go on, but you get the picture.

On the other hand...

[Mr2001]

A study on anonymous hiring practices in France showed that anonymization resulted in fewer minority candidates getting hired. Their explanation is essentially that the companies who care enough about diversity to participate in this sort of study are already subtly biased in favor of minority candidates, and anonymization put a stop to it. Considering the amount of focus big tech companies are putting on diversity, there's a fair chance the same thing is happening here too.