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California Has a New Law: No More All-Male Boards (cnn.com)
Companies headquartered in California can no longer have all-male boards. From a report: That's according to a new law, enacted Sunday, which requires publicly traded firms in the state to place at least one woman on their board of directors by the end of 2019 -- or face a penalty. It also requires companies with five directors to add two women by the end of 2021, and companies with six or more directors to add at least three more women by the end of the same year. It's the first such law on the books in the United States, though similar measures are common in European countries. The measure was passed by California's state legislature last month. And it was signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown on Sunday, along with a trove of other bills that look to "protect and support women, children and working families," the governor's office said in a release. A majority of companies in the S&P 500 have at least one woman on their boards, but only about a quarter have more than two, according to a study from PwC.
Yes, I am a white male.
Yes I have witnessed discrimination against women.
Yes, I have also witnessed discrimination against men.
Yes, I have witnessed discrimination against minorities too.
Yes, I do believe measures must be taken to eliminate discrimination.
No, I do not think laws such as this would fall under the measures to eliminate discrimination” category, nor that they would do any good.
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
What happened to simply choosing the best candidate for the job instead of meeting quotas?
...And what about simply letting the shareholders decide? Whatever the state owns, they can do with as they please, but ONLY shareholders should decide who they want on their board---the government shouldn't say who is and who isn't eligible to be on the board :-/
Should be placed due to qualifications, not gender.
This is the same misconception I see time an time again.
Equal representation does not equal not being sexist. It is actually just more sexism as you have to fill the role taking into account their gender.
There is also a second sexist thing that is going on, as long as it sexism is against the gender that is thought to be in the wrong. This type of sexism is deemed ok. I strongly disagree with this. It just more sexism.
Equality is for all, not just one gender.
On one side, we have those who believe that the "best" candidate should always get the job. They don't really know what "best" means, because they clearly keep hiring the guy who is not the "best", but he's a great guy from a great family from the best schools, so there.
One the other side, we have those who believe that the government should phone them up with a great job while they finish another game level and devour another bag of Cheetos in mom's basement.
There, that about sums up the flaming about to happen here.
I deny that I have not avoided attaining the opposite of that which I do not want.
What could possibly be more insulting to women than to suggest that they cannot negotiate power on their own as individuals? What's next? CA demands that VC invest at most 50% of their capital investment into companies started by men? These people need to be driven out of Sacramento with pitchforks and blowtorches.
Aldous Huxley was a communist and user of entheogens. He was a proponent of sustainable living and production, environmentalism, and cooperative living. Also a good buddy of Timothy Leary. I'm surprised you think you can predict his opinion on anything.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I am really looking forward to the lawsuits deciding whether a post-op or pre-op transgender person (is transgender the right term to use? I honestly don't know) is one gender or the other as it comes to sitting on the board for some company.
Is an operation even necessary? I mean can't a person merely say they personally identify as a female and as per California values that's the end of the story, the person's declaration MUST be honored.
You actually think board selection is a meritocracy? The further one goes from doing measurable tasks, the more social issues play into selection. The office is chock full of politics and social maneuvering. I can tell you boatloads of stories.
Table-ized A.I.
If "choosing according to merit" magically selects only straight white dudes, your definition of "merit" badly needs examining because you're basically saying that straight white dudes are somehow objectively superior.
Nope. Its saying that only straight wide dudes were being properly prepared. Mandating board seats does not fix the qualification problem, it merely is equality theatre. Nothing more. A placebo for the dimwitted. But if you fail to see this its not your fault, you weren't properly educated and prepared to understand reality.
Want to fix the actual problem rather than have equality theatre, then make sure young women get properly educated, trained, mentored, etc and then we'll have honest actual diversity. Which is sort of happening, female enrollment in MBA programs is getting better and better each year.
Lol choosing the best candidate. Listen to yourself.
95% of the time on slashdot we rightly bitch and moan about how incredibly shit upper management is. You know making short term decisions that benefit them personally and not the company. But now it's forced not to be all men all of a sudden they were all the best people for the job.
So the your loaded about "what happened to simply choosing the best candidate?": that was never the case and we both know it.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
... No really. Just say "I identify as a woman".
Game over.
why? Because the inter-sectional Marxists have swallowed a whole lot of contradictions and conflicting interest groups in their quest for power.
Opposing forces have behaved in a dumb "reactionary" pattern where they don't really change what they're doing but merely cite their disagreement with things. This is idiotic.
The point of intersectionalism is to conflate as many interest groups as possible with analogs of classical "class struggle".
The way to fight this is to not treat these various ploys separately and not appreciate the wider context but rather to hammer at the very glue that holds these groups together... which is generally a deceit that suggests that if you give X power then all these contradictory interest groups will get what they want.
So the black power groups will get what they want, the feminist groups will get what they want, the islamic organizations will get what they want, the hispanic groups will get what they want, the trans activists will get what they want.
It isn't possible to satisfy these agendas at the same time. Which is why in practice they're not satisfied at all. Look at Detroit. It went from being a mecca of blue collar success to a warren of endless crack dens. But the people that took power when that started are still in power.
Weird, huh? The only people that will ultimately get power are a few elites and some politicians and some political party here or there might pick up power. But the endless ranks of dupes that fuel this nonsense will get nothing.
Women will get nothing.
name the racial group will get nothing.
The various agitating ethnic religious factions will get nothing.
It is a big silly game.
And THAT is the weakness.
By declaring yourself a woman, you hammer on one of the more glaring incompatibilities in "intersectionalism" which is the conflict between Feminism and Trans-sexualism.
The Feminist movement holds that all gender norms are social constructs and that women should be advanced above men generally to address historic favoring of men.
The trans movement holds that gender is biological and that one can "feel" like a woman inside or a man or whatever indifferent to social constructs. And that one can shift between being "male" or "female" simply by citing yourself as one or the other. A medical procedure is not required, nor is changing your sexual partners, nor is changing your preferred clothing, etc. So a 55 year old guy in a suit can just say he's a woman according to the Trans sexual movement. He doesn't have to do anything besides that.
The feminists have predictably been giving ground to the Trans movement even though they make up at best something like .01 percent of the population or something. It is a pretty common tell with intersectionalism that individual interest groups will always subordinate their interests when they come into conflict with the collective intersectional power structure. This has already lead several feminist conventions to stop performing the vagina monologues. And quite a few of these things will have it openly cited that "not all women have vaginas".
This is the weakness of intersectionalism. The greediness of it to gather too many conflicting interests under one banner.
So don't attack any of the hydra heads. Attack the body that connects them. The hydra heads are endless. A giant waste of time to argue with any of these interest groups directly. Rather go after what gives them the national thrust they have... break up the alliances by forcing them into conflict with each other.
Short of that, intersectionalism will continue until the people primary interested in their own personal power have total control over everything... and then basically tyranny until systemic corruption and inefficiency destroys the society.
Either/or.
Here some zealot for the cause may tell me that a zillion contradictory interests can be satisfied at the same time. Not without divine intervention, bucko. Only one planet and one reality. The oppression pyramid is a pyramid scheme. Wise up.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
These types of laws have the opposite effect. Women on these boards will be seen as only having the position because the laws demand it, so they won't be taken seriously. This is a blow to female advancement, not an improvement.
It'll also stifle new companies. A group of male friends won't be able to form a public company if they can't find a female to help. And where is the corresponding law which says all female boards need a male member? I wish people in the government used their brains more for the overall benefit of the population rather than their own benefit.
And what about companies that only have female board members? Shouldn't they be required to have at least one male board member? If there's no such requirement, this law is clearly sexist and can probably be legally challenged on that ground.
If the law doesn't also require at least one man on a board of directors, I don't see this passing a challenge that it violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
Proportional to what? You probably mean proportional to the general population. For tech companies that should scare the hell out of anyone since what graduates from university is not a proportional representation of the general population at all....
0x or or snor perron?!
Anti-trans bigotry from the left at a Pride March should shock and appal you. Why doesn't it?
So every woman from now on that actually manages to climb the corporate ladder and punch through the glass ceiling will be dismissed as the "quota bitch". Great work, feminists, turn your own movement of empowerment where women were supposed to become self-confident and self-reliant into a social program that reeks more like a hand-up for handicapped people who can't accomplish anything themselves.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Yep... Amazing isn't it?
That's my problem with "liberalism". At the core it really is hypocritical.
Liberals hate discrimination against women, but will champion discrimination for women.
Liberals demand there are no true differences between the sexes, but will support a law based solely on sex.
Liberals will rail against racial discrimination but will support laws that "fix" that by mandating selections based only upon race (affirmative action)
Sexual and racial discrimination suck. They really do, but the fix is not sexual and racial favoritism. You can't have solutions that mirror the problem. Education is the only way you can really fix a problem.
I'm not racist not because the government told me I couldn't be. I'm not racist because I've worked and been near people of all races and learned that they're just people.. Racism is taught. Tolerance is taught. Mandating legal solutions to social problems rarely works and there tends to be a lot of collateral damage.
No we're saying that the best candidates *should* be chosen...
The best candidates are often not being chosen currently, and still won't be chosen under these new laws.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
As with most affirmative action laws, this one is probably made around the idea that women are being excluded from boards for reasons other than a lack of qualities relevant to the job, and forcing companies to take on women in such roles will reduce such sexism over time to the point where affirmative action isn't needed anymore. A bit like offering a free sample at a supermarket: if you like it, you'll hopefully buy more. Except this is mandatory. And not free.
So no: there will be no law that says you can't have an all female board, because there's no widespread bias against men when selecting board members. The all-male boards aren't the problem, the bias is. And once that has been addressed, presumably the law will be repealed and it'll be ok again to have an all male (or all female) board.
With that said, I am not so sure if there really is a significant bias against women in this day and age. There are other factors that affect a woman's career differently than a man's, both cultural and biological. And I don't think we should compensate for any natural disadvantages certain groups may or may not have, because then you're definitely doing away with selecting the best person for the job. I also don't know if affirmative action laws are terribly effective at addressing that bias, if it exists.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Can we also have laws requiring firefighters to be 50% female? And construction workers, truck drivers and lumberjacks?
How about sports teams? Shouldn't they be mixed, too?
That would be affirmative action but I don't see many people campaigning for it. They only want to cherry pick the 'good' stuff for themselves.
(although I'm not sure what's so great about working all the hours that a big company CEO works, maybe the reason there's not many female CEOs is that they're not psychopathic enough)
No sig today...
Asians are more likely to enroll at college, and more likely to succeed there.
Asians are a minority in the US and other western countries, and yet they are highly successful.
The success of asians shows that there is no inherent discrimination by whites against minorities, if that were the case then asians wouldn't be doing well either. The fact is opportunities are there for everyone, and it is these other minority groups which are failing to grasp them - in many cases because their culture and attitude is self destructive.
The same can be said of the world in general. While many white countries are leading world powers either economically or militarily, several asian countries are up there too but there are no african countries of any great significant on the world stage. There are also many small and insignificant white countries.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
Am I the only one thoroughly enjoying the fracturing that is happening in this movement?
The only thing that makes me sad here is that people who are truly fighting for us being decent to each other get a bad rep by proxy...
You can try to find arguments as much as you like, and I do understand your point, but in this day and age you simply cannot make laws that apply to one sex but not the other. If you want to abolish sexism, don't use sexist laws.
I've said it before, we only have true equality when we have an equal mix of male and female garbage collectors.
-=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
if you can't use sexist laws to combat sexism (which is a fair point), what alternatives are there? Many people keep saying "this law sucks", but I don't see anyone providing an alternative.
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
Replace "women" with "blacks" and you have 60 years of affirmative action to look back on. If it really does work, then why are blacks still at the bottom of society by just about every metric?
If you take affirmative action to its logical conclusion, what you end up with is South Africa. Having dismantled apartheid in 1994, South Africa has turned the tables on its white citizens and has been actively oppressing them for 2 decades. Any white person that had the means to leave has already left. And now the country is falling apart. The government is hopelessly corrupt, murder rates are through the roof, and the economy is declining year over year.
Did one cause the other? I wouldn't know. But I do wonder, if we try too hard to put unqualified people in charge, would we also end up in such a downward spiral?
How about "do nothing"? If a company excludes the best qualified workers for whatever reason - gender, ethnicity, hair color - then the company and its shareholders suffer the consequences of poorer overall performance. That's a choice that should be allowed - as adults, we all know actions have consequences, and we live with our choices. (And the high-perfoming people who were excluded can go someplace else, maybe even form a competitor, and improve that business's results. Payback time.)
The fundamental inconsistencies are too great for this dynamic not to collapse on itself sooner than later. It's one thing to badger conservative straight white men into saying "ma'am" through clenched teeth when some bald potato of a man in a dress walks up to the counter, but it's different when you start badgering the very people who are used to doing the badgering. Feminists are now faced with a world where all the women's sports records are held by dudes and a lesbian who won't suck cock is called a bigot. The only thing holding it all together seems to be solidarity in their mutual hatred of white men.
That being said, the irony of feminism as an institution being usurped by men is kinda fucking hilarious.
So with the new law, they'll hire a rich white dude with the proper connections, and his wife.
They're not saying 50%.
Yet.
And why only women? Why not one black, one Asian, one Hispanic, all required by law?
(and with a minimum mixture of gender identities among them, of course)
I can see one immediate problem: If there's only three members on the board then which group gets priority? There's obviously no answer to that so we have to require a minimum number of board members, too. Make sure nobody is left out.
The problem with left-wing politics is that there isn't a clear line which says "we went too far" when you cross it.
No sig today...
You're not shocked by trans people being attacked by gay rights activists because Trump?
That will soon be a requirement for boards of director, too.
At least one homosexual and one trans-gender on the board.
This insanity is not designed to actually work in the real world. It's meant to fail and create chaos. Then when people cry out to the government to "fix it" the government will say that, to prevent more chaos, the government will appoint itself the board of directors for all corporations. Create the problem then step in to 'save the day'.
At least the trains will run on time, right?
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
Yet.
And why only women? Why not one black, one Asian, one Hispanic, all required by law?
Because the goal is not to force equal numbers, it's to overcome a specific obstacle. By requiring one woman on every board the hope is that it gets easier for the second woman or the non-old-white-guy.
Unfortunately it's literally impossible to have a debate about this on Slashdot, but I'm well beyond caring about the karma at this point.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
I didn't hear a requirement for all female boards to add men or for white people in the racial mix.
Literally impossible because you refuse to do it? You can't stand losing the debates? Literal means something and literally impossible is the only condition I can think of that is literally impossible statistically.
It is to overcome a specific obstacle which is assumed and not proven. A measure like this is wrong, the state has no business dictating to shareholders (who can be men or women without prejudice) who they want on their board of directors. It is also extremely sexist, they aren't requiring gender diversity they are specifically attacking males in favor of females.
Most importantly this is a LAW, it is forever, and it has encoded sexism in law. The logic being used to justify it doesn't allow room for the possibility your "specific obstacle" will ever be behind us.
Currently my post is scored 20% flamebait and 20% overrated. For the sake of argument let's discount the overrated and assume that moderation is genuine.
There are people out there for whom merely disagreeing with them on this topic, merely contradicting their narrative is incitement. It angers them so much that they can't allow it to be discussed or visible at +2. This is a problem for Slashdot because it prevents effective debate by hiding half of the argument and discouraging people from expressing those views lest it destroy their karma.
"Most importantly this is a LAW, it is forever"
That's not how laws work.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC