15 ms·

Turmoil at ‘Chief’ raises the question: is empowering corporate women enough?

25 points by tafda 4y ago

TheMoonToMyLeft 4y ago
[dead]
boeingUH60 4y ago
Of course, country clubs for privileged people never refrain from eating themselves when they throw politics into the mix. $7,900 a year and these folks acting like they're the saviours of the world, lol. To paraphrase the CEO, "We're a club for rich women and will like to remain that way..." which is fine by me.
yieldcrv 4y ago
501(c)4 and 501(c)5’s are the kinds of organizations that anyone can form or work for if they want their corporation to “use their platform” for social welfare in labor matters and helping marginalized people corporations formed for selling shares are simply not formed for these unrelated matters if you’re in a network for becoming executives at share selling corporations and want to be in a network for a group that does other things, then leave and go to that other network It seems like people who have tried (and failed) at reshaping the for-profit world are unaware of what actually exists to cater to their sentiment already, social welfare and labor groups
- snowwrestler 4y ago
  This is not correct, for-profit companies can do whatever their shareholders want them to do, including advocating on social or other issues. 501(c) organizations face more restrictions, especially financially.
  - yieldcrv 4y ago
    they can but they need to focus on revenue. regarding the 500-section tax code, there is a way to do anything. 501c4 and above fix most of the issues that c3's have. there is a way to navigate.
    - snowwrestler 4y ago
      All the 501c’s face reporting requirements and financing restrictions by dint of being nonprofits. For example, they cannot raise capital by selling shares. For-profit companies only need to focus on revenue if their shareholders want that. It’s perfectly legal to create a for-profit entity and invest capital for the sole purpose of spending it down, never realizing any revenue. Chan-Zuckerberg is probably the most famous example of that. For-profit companies can also have a mix of goals, for example making revenue and profits, but spending profits on a social mission, like Patagonia.
rayiner 4y ago
Not only does an organization aimed at empowering corporate women not need to tackle racial issues, they will cause harm by trying. Affluent, educated white women have interests that are fundamentally in conflict with the interests with those of most minorities, who are disproportionately working class. And their money and power makes it inevitable that, if they meddle in those issues, they will distort and disrupt organic movements by and within those minority groups. For example, black people are the most likely of any racial group to express the traditional view that being able to provide for a family is very important for a man: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/09/20/americans-see-men-as-the-financial-providers-even-as-womens-contributions-grow/ft_17-09-20_spouses_viewsonimportance https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/09/20/americans-s.... Among women without a college degree, which disproportionately includes racial minorities, fully 44% would prefer a homemaker role to working outside the home: https://news.gallup.com/poll/267737/record-high-women-prefer-working-homemaking.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/267737/record-high-women-prefer.... There’s lots of black women who would prefer the return of good union jobs so that they wouldn’t have to work outside the home. This is not surprising—if a career that confers power and money and social status isn’t realistically an option for you (and it will never be for the majority of people) then your other options look much different! Whenever affluent white people parachute into stuff like this, the minorities involved inevitably become a canvas for them to project their own interests and motivations. And varying interests within those minority groups get swept aside in favor of whatever happens to line up with those of the white people with money and power. It’s bad and wrong.
- bennysonething 4y ago
  Or it's a way to increase your status while not doing your actual job. "Look at how moral I am!". I'm wondering how long this crap will continue. I'm hoping it becomes a cliche and embarrassing soon.
  - JPws_Prntr_Fngr 4y ago
    The elaborate and nonsensical (and costly) virtue/fitness-signaling will only continue to escalate, because just like with clothing fashions, the difficulty and cost of staying in the trendy vanguard is the entire point. Scott Alexander (and probably others) had a pretty good analysis of the phenomenon.
malermeister 4y ago
This is the Sheryl Sandberg school of feminism, which is more concerned with already privileged, white, rich ladies accumulating the same amount of power as their male counterparts than helping the struggling single mother working three jobs trying to make ends meet. Class is the true defining factor. Not gender, not race, not anything else. If we want to encourage equality, we need to address the class issue. Stuff like this is just more class warfare dressed up as empowerment.
- Proven 4y ago
  [dead]
- orwin 4y ago
  The use of the word 'empowerment' in modern feminism itself, even by center-left collective, is the proof that we lost the last battle in the class warfare. Goldman, Beauvoir and feminists used emancipation. Now I even hear French feminist use 'empowerment', and that's just sad.
neonate 4y ago
https://archive.ph/CyAMW https://archive.ph/CyAMW
riskneutral 4y ago
> For admission to Chief, a women’s leadership network, members pay up to $7,900. That gets them executive coaching, big-name speaker sessions, a Rolodex of female executives and, for an extra cost, access to five sleek clubhouses. Chief is essentially an “old boys’ club” — for the ladies. The venture capital-backed company has grown to over 20,000 members and over $1 billion in value since it started in 2019. So ... can we have the "old boys' clubs" back now, for the other half of the species? Somehow I don't think so.
- paxys 4y ago
  If you truly think these "old boys' clubs" went anywhere you are simply not connected enough to be part of them.
  - scarmig 4y ago
    But I thought every man is part of the patriarchy and is given a free all-access pass to the old boys' club at birth.
    - theossuary 4y ago
      Patriarchy and old boys clubs are related but separate things. One hint they aren't the same is they are different words with different definitions.
  - riskneutral 4y ago
    I know that those networks still exist, but literal "boys only" country clubs are no longer socially acceptable as far as I know.
InTheArena 4y ago
From the article: 'The recent turmoil at Chief began on International Women’s Day, in early March, when a member of the network, Denise Conroy, declared on LinkedIn that she was leaving Chief and accused the group of sidestepping political issues and ghosting women of color who applied for membership. (Ms. Conroy, 51, later acknowledged that she had been reprimanded internally for trying to sell tickets on Chief’s platform to an external workshop she was running, which ran counter to the company’s policies.) .... Rachel Hassall, a supply chain executive, is one of the Chief members who chose to leave the organization this month. She had recently participated in a discussion that Ms. Conroy hosted about the book “White Women: Everything You Already Know About Your Own Racism and How to Do Better" Seriously. Who signs up for this? Imagine paying to be called a racist all day long, just so you can feel morally superior to others.
- bennysonething 4y ago
  Same as being a Catholic "sign up to feel guilty for the rest of your life". I should know, I was born one !
  - JohnDeHope 4y ago
    I'm in RCIA classes to convert to Catholicism. I'm skipping this Easter's big confirmation event to give it some more time. I'm chiming in to reply to this comment. Catholicism is a practical way to deal with the guilt you (should?) already feel.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - JPws_Prntr_Fngr 4y ago
      [flagged]
      - tptacek 4y ago
        This comment is gross in a whole variety of ways, but the practical thing I'll rebut here is: Catholics don't tithe, and indulgences are a concept from the 15th century.
engineer_22 4y ago
TL;DR: Self-selecting social club wasn't selective enough.

25 points by tafda 4y ago

[dead]

Of course, country clubs for privileged people never refrain from eating themselves when they throw politics into the mix. $7,900 a year and these folks acting like they're the saviours of the world, lol. To paraphrase the CEO, "We're a club for rich women and will like to remain that way..." which is fine by me.

yieldcrv 4y ago

501(c)4 and 501(c)5’s are the kinds of organizations that anyone can form or work for if they want their corporation to “use their platform” for social welfare in labor matters and helping marginalized people corporations formed for selling shares are simply not formed for these unrelated matters if you’re in a network for becoming executives at share selling corporations and want to be in a network for a group that does other things, then leave and go to that other network It seems like people who have tried (and failed) at reshaping the for-profit world are unaware of what actually exists to cater to their sentiment already, social welfare and labor groups

snowwrestler 4y ago
This is not correct, for-profit companies can do whatever their shareholders want them to do, including advocating on social or other issues. 501(c) organizations face more restrictions, especially financially.
- yieldcrv 4y ago
  they can but they need to focus on revenue. regarding the 500-section tax code, there is a way to do anything. 501c4 and above fix most of the issues that c3's have. there is a way to navigate.
  - snowwrestler 4y ago
    All the 501c’s face reporting requirements and financing restrictions by dint of being nonprofits. For example, they cannot raise capital by selling shares. For-profit companies only need to focus on revenue if their shareholders want that. It’s perfectly legal to create a for-profit entity and invest capital for the sole purpose of spending it down, never realizing any revenue. Chan-Zuckerberg is probably the most famous example of that. For-profit companies can also have a mix of goals, for example making revenue and profits, but spending profits on a social mission, like Patagonia.

rayiner 4y ago

Not only does an organization aimed at empowering corporate women not need to tackle racial issues, they will cause harm by trying. Affluent, educated white women have interests that are fundamentally in conflict with the interests with those of most minorities, who are disproportionately working class. And their money and power makes it inevitable that, if they meddle in those issues, they will distort and disrupt organic movements by and within those minority groups. For example, black people are the most likely of any racial group to express the traditional view that being able to provide for a family is very important for a man: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/09/20/americans-see-men-as-the-financial-providers-even-as-womens-contributions-grow/ft_17-09-20_spouses_viewsonimportance https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/09/20/americans-s.... Among women without a college degree, which disproportionately includes racial minorities, fully 44% would prefer a homemaker role to working outside the home: https://news.gallup.com/poll/267737/record-high-women-prefer-working-homemaking.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/267737/record-high-women-prefer.... There’s lots of black women who would prefer the return of good union jobs so that they wouldn’t have to work outside the home. This is not surprising—if a career that confers power and money and social status isn’t realistically an option for you (and it will never be for the majority of people) then your other options look much different! Whenever affluent white people parachute into stuff like this, the minorities involved inevitably become a canvas for them to project their own interests and motivations. And varying interests within those minority groups get swept aside in favor of whatever happens to line up with those of the white people with money and power. It’s bad and wrong.

bennysonething 4y ago
Or it's a way to increase your status while not doing your actual job. "Look at how moral I am!". I'm wondering how long this crap will continue. I'm hoping it becomes a cliche and embarrassing soon.
- JPws_Prntr_Fngr 4y ago
  The elaborate and nonsensical (and costly) virtue/fitness-signaling will only continue to escalate, because just like with clothing fashions, the difficulty and cost of staying in the trendy vanguard is the entire point. Scott Alexander (and probably others) had a pretty good analysis of the phenomenon.

malermeister 4y ago

This is the Sheryl Sandberg school of feminism, which is more concerned with already privileged, white, rich ladies accumulating the same amount of power as their male counterparts than helping the struggling single mother working three jobs trying to make ends meet. Class is the true defining factor. Not gender, not race, not anything else. If we want to encourage equality, we need to address the class issue. Stuff like this is just more class warfare dressed up as empowerment.

Proven 4y ago
[dead]
orwin 4y ago
The use of the word 'empowerment' in modern feminism itself, even by center-left collective, is the proof that we lost the last battle in the class warfare. Goldman, Beauvoir and feminists used emancipation. Now I even hear French feminist use 'empowerment', and that's just sad.

neonate 4y ago

https://archive.ph/CyAMW https://archive.ph/CyAMW

riskneutral 4y ago

> For admission to Chief, a women’s leadership network, members pay up to $7,900. That gets them executive coaching, big-name speaker sessions, a Rolodex of female executives and, for an extra cost, access to five sleek clubhouses. Chief is essentially an “old boys’ club” — for the ladies. The venture capital-backed company has grown to over 20,000 members and over $1 billion in value since it started in 2019. So ... can we have the "old boys' clubs" back now, for the other half of the species? Somehow I don't think so.

paxys 4y ago
If you truly think these "old boys' clubs" went anywhere you are simply not connected enough to be part of them.
- scarmig 4y ago
  But I thought every man is part of the patriarchy and is given a free all-access pass to the old boys' club at birth.
  - theossuary 4y ago
    Patriarchy and old boys clubs are related but separate things. One hint they aren't the same is they are different words with different definitions.
- riskneutral 4y ago
  I know that those networks still exist, but literal "boys only" country clubs are no longer socially acceptable as far as I know.

InTheArena 4y ago

From the article: 'The recent turmoil at Chief began on International Women’s Day, in early March, when a member of the network, Denise Conroy, declared on LinkedIn that she was leaving Chief and accused the group of sidestepping political issues and ghosting women of color who applied for membership. (Ms. Conroy, 51, later acknowledged that she had been reprimanded internally for trying to sell tickets on Chief’s platform to an external workshop she was running, which ran counter to the company’s policies.) .... Rachel Hassall, a supply chain executive, is one of the Chief members who chose to leave the organization this month. She had recently participated in a discussion that Ms. Conroy hosted about the book “White Women: Everything You Already Know About Your Own Racism and How to Do Better" Seriously. Who signs up for this? Imagine paying to be called a racist all day long, just so you can feel morally superior to others.

bennysonething 4y ago
Same as being a Catholic "sign up to feel guilty for the rest of your life". I should know, I was born one !
- JohnDeHope 4y ago
  I'm in RCIA classes to convert to Catholicism. I'm skipping this Easter's big confirmation event to give it some more time. I'm chiming in to reply to this comment. Catholicism is a practical way to deal with the guilt you (should?) already feel.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - JPws_Prntr_Fngr 4y ago
    [flagged]
    - tptacek 4y ago
      This comment is gross in a whole variety of ways, but the practical thing I'll rebut here is: Catholics don't tithe, and indulgences are a concept from the 15th century.

engineer_22 4y ago

TL;DR: Self-selecting social club wasn't selective enough.