11 ms·

Dress code: blue tie and male

353 points by chrismealy 14y ago

kylemaxwell 14y ago
I'll keep an open mind about the company for now, because I've not found their side of the story (this occurred a few weeks ago), but Michael Dell should personally and sincerely apologize for his company. This doesn't match at all what I have long understood to be their internal culture.
- sliverstorm 14y ago
  I'll keep an open mind about the company for now Seems like a sound approach. The whole thing was a surreal read; something has got to be afoot.
  - ahi 14y ago
    Part of that might be a bad translation.
    - tomjen3 14y ago
      I read the Danish version -- it did not provide any substantial new information, so I doubt it was the bad translation, (I am a native Dane, so I would properly have spottet it if this was supposed to be a joke).
- callil 14y ago
  If this is true, how were people not walking out? “The IT business is one of the last frontiers that manages to keep women out. The quota of women to men in your business is sound and healthy” he says. “What are you actually doing here?” he adds to the few women who are actually present in the room. Are you kidding me?
  - jquery 14y ago
    Honestly to me that sounds like a sarcastic joke. Surely he can't be serious. Regardless, that kind of "comedy" is wholly inappropriate for a corporate event.
  - aptwebapps 14y ago
    The fact that nearly everyone there was an employee might have something to do with it.
- _delirium 14y ago
  That's my feeling too. It's plausible that Dell outsourced the entertainment to a local Danish agency of some sort, and that to Dell it just looked like "Mads something, some Danish comedian". Although Mads Christensen is vaguely notorious in Denmark (for multiple things), afaict this is the first incident that actually made the English-language media, so you'd have to read Danish (or ask someone) to know who he was previously. Though whoever in Denmark recommended/booked him certainly knew who they were booking. Possibly Dell should've exercised a bit more control over the program. Definitely should've reacted more emphatically, though it's not too late to say something now.
- tjmc 14y ago
  Although Michael Dell is ultimately responsible, I think the blame here lies squarely with Dell's Danish office. Dealing with cultural differences is a minefield for multinationals. To take an extreme example - imagine running a similar event in Kyrgyzstan, where the rural population has a charming tradition of kidnapping teenage girls and forcing them into marriage. Reckon a local MC there would be a pillar of progressive commentary? One reason that Dell has regional offices is precisely to avoid offending the local population. If the Danish CEO said “To stay within code of conduct I don’t want to comment on what you just said. But you did a good job” then he should be harshly sanctioned and possibly fired. If he isn't called to account, well that is Michael Dell's responsibility.
- olavk 14y ago
  In the danish version of the article (http://elektronista.dk/socialt/dress-code-blat-slips-og-mand/ http://elektronista.dk/socialt/dress-code-blat-slips-og-mand...) there are some comments from people from Dell who was present. Most of them disparage the journalist for not getting the joke, and several finish with a witty "Shut up bitch" (the journalist is a woman), echoing what MC said in the show. Several commenters underline that it was only comedy and not intended to be taken seriously - and noting that it is typical for women not to be able to take a joke and overreact and play the victim and wanting special treatment. So I don't know if Dell have a culture of misogyny, but they clearly have their share of stupidity.
jlgreco 14y ago
Nearly impossible to read that article with that stupid bar thing hanging over the text on the left side.
- Tyr42 14y ago
  I had to click back to the site after reading your comment, as I didn't even notice it, so YMMV.
- FuzzyDunlop 14y ago
  Actually impossible when you want to zoom in, because the text is fairly small.
- Groxx 14y ago
  Eh, that's one of the less offensive ones I've encountered. Narrower than most, and not animated. edit: oh, it's just a bit buggy. make your window narrower, and it disappears :) that makes it way better than most I've seen.
  - jlgreco 14y ago
    http://i.imgur.com/nw6TM.png http://i.imgur.com/nw6TM.png That's what it looks like to me with my browser maximized. How people design things like this and don't do a quick check to make sure it works well for different reasonable browser window dimensions is beyond me.
    - ralphsaunders 14y ago
      I employ the 'readable' bookmarklet for situations like this. http://readable.tastefulwords.com/ http://readable.tastefulwords.com/
      - jlgreco 14y ago
        Yeah, that's what I eventually ended up doing. I only bothered to turn on my bookmark toolbar and use it in this case though because I had a particularly strong interest in reading this article. In most other cases I would have passed it by.
jtoscano42 14y ago
... did this seriously happen? How absurd that in 2012, people with hateful viewpoints such as these are given the stage.
- perspectiveless 14y ago
  It's mind boggling that this could happen. And that when it happened no one did anything. Why wasn't this person booed off the stage?
  - tomjen3 14y ago
    Chock can do that -- and somebody has to be the first guy to get up, which can be quite scary.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
antidoh 14y ago
"You're getting a Dell, dude." I guess that was a typo, one too many commas.
- shasta 14y ago
  And it was "dude, you're getting a Dell"
orcadk 14y ago
Just to give a short recap of who this Mads Christensen guy is, coming from a Dane: His tag line is "Denmarks big show-off" and he basically markets himself as a provocative bragging show-off, always with the rolexes, sports cars, slick hair and better-than-thy appearance. He's not perceived as a comedian but rather as an entertainer hired for various corporate events - some obviously less successful than others. Unless this was booked by Dell US without doing any kind of checkup, they would've been aware what would be coming. He's knowing for his provocative presentations and I have a hard time seeing exactly how a Danish Dell branch would find it appropriate or interesting to book Mads Christensen. If they wanted stand-up comedy we've got lots of skilled comedians. Mads Christensen is not in that line of work. To be fair I don't think Mads Christensen personally believes what he presents on stage. It's the persona he's built up. Not that that makes it better in this scenario, just so flak is directed where it's most appropriate - Dell, and especially whoever made the decision to book him.
- spoiledtechie 14y ago
  Are we talking about the same Mads who created BlogEngine.Net? Just curious? I would hope not, but if so, my entire image of him got thrown out the door.
  - Lewton 14y ago
    Most likely not. Mads Christensen is kinda the danish equivalent of John Smith
  - orcadk 14y ago
    We are not, completely unrelated. The surnames are spelled differently too - Christensen (show-off) vs. Kristensen (BlogEngine).
    - spoiledtechie 14y ago
      Thanks for that.
  - nigelsampson 14y ago
MaysonL 14y ago
Dell really should just liquidate and give the money to the shareholders.
tomjen3 14y ago
I am quite lacking words here. Not that some people believe this -- some people hates Jews, so why not women -- but that they would him on stage. The only guess I can come up with is that we currently, or until very recently, had politicians with power in the government who wanted quotas for the number of females in the boards of companies. This may be what he referes to when he talks about having a nice female ratio. What gets me though is that usually US companies go way too far on the other side on the PC issues like this.
gfodor 14y ago
How many times are we going to keep hearing the non-apology apology: "We are sorry if some were offended..."? I am so tired of it, it has become a cliche. When did the business world/lawyers decide this was the optimal legal response to customers? My blood boils every time I read it as it is the most disingenuous, calculated, shallow tripe you can trot out when you fuck up. What ever happened to just owning up to your mistakes? What exactly are the massive consequences between saying "We're sorry" and "We're sorry some were offended"? Is it liability, lack of character, "best practices", what?
- protomyth 14y ago
  Might be liability, but it seems like PR flacks tend to also work for politicians who have a long history of not actually apologizing.
- spindritf 14y ago
  > How many times are we going to keep hearing the non-apology apology: "We are sorry if some were offended..."? About as many times as we make powerful people apologise in public, especially when they're not really feeling guilty. And it's not always in that form, sometimes it's closer to Clinton's "mistakes were made". While most non-apologies are pretty standard, there is some variation and innovation.
  - jerrya 14y ago
    Well it was either Reagan, or Nixon, but never Clinton. I think you owe the Clintons an apology.
  - philwelch 14y ago
    According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistakes_were_made http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistakes_were_made), some version of "mistakes were made" dates back to Ulysses S. Grant, though it seems that Nixon popularized it.
  - gfodor 14y ago
    The thing I don't understand about this is that it seems to me that when public figures, companies, etc come out with genuine apologies, it ends up being a net positive. They garner respect from their friends and their enemies. They get good press. They often manage to repair most of the relationships that were in question. It almost seems like that even if someone were not feeling guilty, the logical thing would be to pretend like you are and submit a real apology. I find it hard to believe that folks who are already so good at stretching the truth to their own benefit like politicans would somehow let their personal ego and pride get in the way of them making a fake "real" apology if that would benefit them the most. It seems to me that there is some underlying calculus that all these actors have made that issuing a bogus one has a better net effect that a real one. I suppose I should be thankful that if this is the case then at least we are going to be able to tell the bullshitters from the honest people, since only the honest ones will be making genuine apologies despite their potential for harm.
unimpressive 14y ago
Review: Christensen is the best speaker I've ever heard, a paragon of equality. After hearing his deeply enlightened views on women in the workplace, my whole perspective on hiring and employee management changed. Absolutely recommended five stars A++. XKCD: http://xkcd.com/958/ http://xkcd.com/958/ EDIT: Let this be a lesson to other companies out there, vet the people you book for...anything.
- dredmorbius 14y ago
  Humor, irony, and subtlety, even with the xkcd link, are generally lost on the HN crowd.
  - unimpressive 14y ago
    It's funny because that comment shifts every half an hour or so between getting a few upvotes and then getting a few downvotes. Even if I end up with some downvotes in the end it's worth it just to watch the lovers and haters contest each other. EDIT: It's too bad people can't leave a reason for up/down voting, it would be interesting to see weather people actually think I believe that, or if they just didn't think it was funny.
    - spacemanaki 14y ago
      Although I think that XKCD comic is funny, I downvoted you for the reasons makeramen pointed out.
    - makeramen 14y ago
      I'm staying neutral on this one, but I can imagine that may people don't think this comment contributes much to thoughtful discussion of the topic. Promoting these comments, or even not downvoting them creates a culture where these comments become accepted. I can see a comment like this (if upvoted) easily starting one of those "pun trains" commonly seen on reddit. I don't see anything specifically wrong with the ironic humor of the comment, HN does need to lighten up sometimes, but if we let one of these get upvoted... it will only lead to many more by precedent. The line has to be drawn somewhere. I personally wouldn't want to see a HN where each topic has 10+ "witty/ironic/humorous" comments. I go to reddit for that.
drats 14y ago
That page had a totally obnoxious in-page pop-up which half-loaded and took a full 15 seconds to load all the parts (background image of popup and importantly the close button).
chris_wot 14y ago
Someone needs to be fired. Preferably the Danish CEO of Dell.
petercooper 14y ago
The crazy part of this is it seems once he started spouting this crap, no-one from Dell pulled him off stage and did any damage control! So people say "let's not judge Dell," etc but we can judge their employees' lack of action. If someone speaks like this at an event I'm running and I'm within earshot, I'm getting in their face, no matter how famous the speaker. I'd hope other organizers and chairs would act similarly.
losvedir 14y ago
Wait, so is he a comedian MC'ing the event? If it's a roast or something, and he's poking at the fact that there's not a lot of women in tech: The IT business is one of the last frontiers that manages to keep women out. The quota of women to men in your business is sound and healthy As in, what are you guys doing to cause not a lot of women to be in IT. It's almost as if there's a quota! If that's the case it's still terrible and tasteless, but at least sort of comprehendible. If he's serious and those are his actual beliefs, the situation is so far outside the range of reasonable corporate behavior, I don't know what to think. I'm just perplexed, really.
- olavk 14y ago
  He is not a comedian but kind of a pundit and lifestyle expert. He sincerely believes women are getting stronger and more successful than men, and men have to fight back. For the sake of entertainment he presents his viewpoints in an over-the-top and exaggerated manner, so it is hard to say how much is serious and how much is hyperbole.
- jsnk 14y ago
  He's an act, the similar manner Christopher Hitchens was about religion and Jeremy Clarkson is about cars. Not that they are fakers, but their presentations are intentionally over the top and insensitive to arouse interest and entertain the audience. Danish Dell fucked up this time. This is really not the kind of PR Dell can afford to receive.
  - MBlume 14y ago
    I don't recall Hitch ever being "over the top" about religion -- he simply called spades spades.
silassliph 14y ago
Mads Christensen is the best. World renowned expert at increasing hysteria by at least 50% each quarter! A++. Would buy again.
duck 14y ago
I wanted to read this, but the gigantic pop-up won't let me on my tablet. Oh well, now I don't.
MBlume 14y ago
This is beyond disgusting. How did the people in the room not simply walk out? ETA: Scripts are good for these things. It's difficult, in the shock and confusion of the moment, to decide what to do. So, here's one script. When you're in a presentation, and a speaker starts talking like this (or talking about "gang-bang interviews" or whatever else) you stand quietly, and you leave. You tweet what happened. If there isn't a clear apology (and we haven't heard one from Dell yet) you don't attend the conference the following year. This is how we, as a community, communicate to one another what kind of behavior is and is not acceptable.
- polemic 14y ago
  After a recent experience of being confronted with sexism and, ultimately, not handling it how I feel like I should have, I think this is a really good idea. Having a script (or at least thinking about what I would do, in advance) would've made a big difference. A lot of the time, our natural response is to freeze or act as if it didn't happen, and that's not ok. Raging on twitter after the fact is not nearly as effective as direct and immediate feedback.
- Lanzaa 14y ago
  I don't think leaving and tweeting about how you feel is a very useful response. It could lead to a form of evaporative cooling[1] and cause the behavior of the group to worsen. It may be better to put pressure on the group to change. Find someone who is in charge and complain about the behavior you find inappropriate and encourage other people who find the behavior inappropriate to complain as well. [1] http://lesswrong.com/lw/lr/evaporative_cooling_of_group_beliefs/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/lr/evaporative_cooling_of_group_beli...
ktizo 14y ago
If Dell are going to pull this kind of shit then don't buy things from Dell.
etherael 14y ago
I know it's fashionable to have a knee jerk reaction and not actually check backstory etc, but just quietly. http://www.madschristensen-foredrag.dk/mc/Aktuelt-og-media http://www.madschristensen-foredrag.dk/mc/Aktuelt-og-media This guy is clearly a comedian / over the top on purpose, to say that he actually genuinely believes the purposefully crafted bullshit on display in this particular article is to say that Les Patterson from Australia actually thinks that it's appropriate to be a permanent drunken idiot, or Guido Hatzis http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=domXumvTVI8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=domXumvTVI8 really thinks everything he says. Actually, do US comedians have this brand of self deprecating over the top humor? Nothing springs to mind, perhaps this is why it doesn't translate well? As to whether the choice of this guy was appropriate? Different question but even there you'd need to assume that the audience wouldn't "get" that this was all an act and honestly felt insulted by it. I guess it's already clear they've misjudged their audience but it maybe wasn't so obvious beforehand that this would actually be the result?
- polemic 14y ago
  Here's the thing: it's not humour. It's misogyny thinly dressed as an "edgy" dig so that anyone who protests can be deflected with this sort of defence. It's a tried and true technique to broadcast bigotry and slander with a wink and a nudge. I'm not saying you agree with his sentiments, but I am saying that it's not ok to say "it's just a joke". And it's not ok for Dell to let him continue to moderate their conference - even if they didn't realise what they were getting into, they should have removed him at the first sign things were not as they seemed. PS we have very different definitions of 'self-deprecating'.
  - etherael 14y ago
    > PS we have very different definitions of 'self-deprecating'. It's self deprecating when you make ridiculously over the top statements about how awesome you are because it makes you look like an idiot. That old "I'm a pretty big deal around here" chestnut. It is humour, whether or not it is taken as such is a different issue, when Bill Hicks gets up on stage and repeatedly tells people in advertising to kill themselves, he's not actually serious. Some might take that seriously but he's a comedian and it's humor. If an advertising exec is heinously offended that he was just repeatedly directly told he ought to kill himself because he will never amount to anything or accomplish anything good in his life, does that mean that it wasn't humor? You may well have a point about the venue potentially being inappropriate for this kind of thing, however to actually take the content of the comedy literally and seriously and be offended by it is just completely missing the point.
josephcooney 14y ago
Picture this if you will: Half way through Mads Christensen's 'spot/tirade' Michael Dell walks onto the stage carrying a microphone. Mad's microphone goes dead. "Well Mads, I know we (Dell) asked you to come along and speak today" says Michael "but your views about women are very, very wrong. They don't represent my views, the views of my company, and they have no place at this conference. We're going to have a 15-minute impromptu Q&A with Nicolai Moresco while I make sure the PR people who invited Mads here today never receive another cent from Dell, and then I'll host the panel. I'm deeply sorry for this mistake." Michael Dell stamps his authority on things, shows leadership, puts forward a positive message, guaranteed to be a memorable moment/talking point with attendees rather than some the usual bland corporate crap. Wouldn't the world be a lot better if there was more of this? Once when I was a kid the TV station (Channel 9 in Australia) ran a show with some highly questionable content. I was a kid so I didn't see it but from what I gather it was pretty base. Half way through the show the guy running it (Graham Kennedy I think) came out and said Kerry Packer (who owned the 9 network) had called up and cancelled the show. I didn't/don't care much for Kerry Packer, but I remember thinking at the time that this was a classy move.
- kingkilr 14y ago
  Was the show you were wathching "Australia's Naughties Home Videos"? I know that was cancelled half way through it's first episode by the network owner.
  - laumac 14y ago
    If only it were Home and Away...
  - josephcooney 14y ago
    Yes, I think so.
    - chris_wot 14y ago
      Yes. The story is that Kerry Packer, who used to actually watch the shows his network put to air, started watching it and after about 5 minutes and a number of segments of animals fornicating called the night shift operator and said "Get this shit off the air!". After which the Channel 9 logo graphics appeared, then it went to an ad break, after which they aired a rerun of Cheers. The host was Doug Mulray, who was fired the very next day and who said on his radio show that "I am the first man in Australian history to be pulled off by Kerry Packer". I doubt that Graham Kennedy would ever have put his name to the show. Sadly, after his death, someone decided that it would be a good idea to actually air the show. It wasn't as bad as Packer said. It was worse.
maclaren 14y ago
Unreal. It's especially brutal that people involved in tech believe they're changing ("improving") the world yet decide gender determines skill. What really matters: the people without prejudice - who will hire/work with talented engineers regardless of gender or race - will have an advantage via a larger talent pool.
peterwwillis 14y ago
Well, Dell is getting plenty of PR out of this, so congrats to the people who hired the Danish version of Andrew 'Dice' Clay. Little miss muffet, sat on her tuffet, eating her curds and whey. Along came a spider, who sat down beside her, and said, "What are all these bitches doing in Information Technology!" Eyyyyy!
peterwwillis 14y ago
Well, Dell is getting plenty of PR out of this, so congrats to the people who hired the Danish version of Andrew 'Dice' Clay. Little miss muffet, sat on her tuffet, eating her curds and whey. Along came a spider, who sat down beside her, and said, "What are all these bitches doing in Information Technology! Eyyyyy!"
coldarchon 14y ago
Dress code: blond locks and female? 5 pictures of blond locked women on that very same page, and you complain about cliché?
board7786 14y ago
While some might say I've missed the point of the article for making the following comment, I think it's somewhat relevant to the whole concept of the author's argument: USE SPELLCHECK. I don't disagree with the sentiments of the author. The tech industry is one that is very much male dominated, and one where women are very much underrepresented. Some of the brightest people I have worked with in my time in the tech field have been women, and I welcome the opportunity to work with them; or anyone regardless of race, creed, color, background or sex, as long as they're intelligent and can do their job and do it well. But when I read something put up for public display on a high-traffic blog such as this, and the author forgets to use spell check... I can't help but point it out.

353 points by chrismealy 14y ago

I'll keep an open mind about the company for now, because I've not found their side of the story (this occurred a few weeks ago), but Michael Dell should personally and sincerely apologize for his company. This doesn't match at all what I have long understood to be their internal culture.

sliverstorm 14y ago
I'll keep an open mind about the company for now Seems like a sound approach. The whole thing was a surreal read; something has got to be afoot.
- ahi 14y ago
  Part of that might be a bad translation.
  - tomjen3 14y ago
    I read the Danish version -- it did not provide any substantial new information, so I doubt it was the bad translation, (I am a native Dane, so I would properly have spottet it if this was supposed to be a joke).
callil 14y ago
If this is true, how were people not walking out? “The IT business is one of the last frontiers that manages to keep women out. The quota of women to men in your business is sound and healthy” he says. “What are you actually doing here?” he adds to the few women who are actually present in the room. Are you kidding me?
- jquery 14y ago
  Honestly to me that sounds like a sarcastic joke. Surely he can't be serious. Regardless, that kind of "comedy" is wholly inappropriate for a corporate event.
- aptwebapps 14y ago
  The fact that nearly everyone there was an employee might have something to do with it.
_delirium 14y ago
That's my feeling too. It's plausible that Dell outsourced the entertainment to a local Danish agency of some sort, and that to Dell it just looked like "Mads something, some Danish comedian". Although Mads Christensen is vaguely notorious in Denmark (for multiple things), afaict this is the first incident that actually made the English-language media, so you'd have to read Danish (or ask someone) to know who he was previously. Though whoever in Denmark recommended/booked him certainly knew who they were booking. Possibly Dell should've exercised a bit more control over the program. Definitely should've reacted more emphatically, though it's not too late to say something now.
tjmc 14y ago
Although Michael Dell is ultimately responsible, I think the blame here lies squarely with Dell's Danish office. Dealing with cultural differences is a minefield for multinationals. To take an extreme example - imagine running a similar event in Kyrgyzstan, where the rural population has a charming tradition of kidnapping teenage girls and forcing them into marriage. Reckon a local MC there would be a pillar of progressive commentary? One reason that Dell has regional offices is precisely to avoid offending the local population. If the Danish CEO said “To stay within code of conduct I don’t want to comment on what you just said. But you did a good job” then he should be harshly sanctioned and possibly fired. If he isn't called to account, well that is Michael Dell's responsibility.
olavk 14y ago
In the danish version of the article (http://elektronista.dk/socialt/dress-code-blat-slips-og-mand/ http://elektronista.dk/socialt/dress-code-blat-slips-og-mand...) there are some comments from people from Dell who was present. Most of them disparage the journalist for not getting the joke, and several finish with a witty "Shut up bitch" (the journalist is a woman), echoing what MC said in the show. Several commenters underline that it was only comedy and not intended to be taken seriously - and noting that it is typical for women not to be able to take a joke and overreact and play the victim and wanting special treatment. So I don't know if Dell have a culture of misogyny, but they clearly have their share of stupidity.

jlgreco 14y ago

Nearly impossible to read that article with that stupid bar thing hanging over the text on the left side.

Tyr42 14y ago
I had to click back to the site after reading your comment, as I didn't even notice it, so YMMV.
FuzzyDunlop 14y ago
Actually impossible when you want to zoom in, because the text is fairly small.
Groxx 14y ago
Eh, that's one of the less offensive ones I've encountered. Narrower than most, and not animated. edit: oh, it's just a bit buggy. make your window narrower, and it disappears :) that makes it way better than most I've seen.
- jlgreco 14y ago
  http://i.imgur.com/nw6TM.png http://i.imgur.com/nw6TM.png That's what it looks like to me with my browser maximized. How people design things like this and don't do a quick check to make sure it works well for different reasonable browser window dimensions is beyond me.
  - ralphsaunders 14y ago
    I employ the 'readable' bookmarklet for situations like this. http://readable.tastefulwords.com/ http://readable.tastefulwords.com/
    - jlgreco 14y ago
      Yeah, that's what I eventually ended up doing. I only bothered to turn on my bookmark toolbar and use it in this case though because I had a particularly strong interest in reading this article. In most other cases I would have passed it by.

jtoscano42 14y ago

... did this seriously happen? How absurd that in 2012, people with hateful viewpoints such as these are given the stage.

perspectiveless 14y ago
It's mind boggling that this could happen. And that when it happened no one did anything. Why wasn't this person booed off the stage?
- tomjen3 14y ago
  Chock can do that -- and somebody has to be the first guy to get up, which can be quite scary.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

antidoh 14y ago

"You're getting a Dell, dude." I guess that was a typo, one too many commas.

shasta 14y ago
And it was "dude, you're getting a Dell"

orcadk 14y ago

Just to give a short recap of who this Mads Christensen guy is, coming from a Dane: His tag line is "Denmarks big show-off" and he basically markets himself as a provocative bragging show-off, always with the rolexes, sports cars, slick hair and better-than-thy appearance. He's not perceived as a comedian but rather as an entertainer hired for various corporate events - some obviously less successful than others. Unless this was booked by Dell US without doing any kind of checkup, they would've been aware what would be coming. He's knowing for his provocative presentations and I have a hard time seeing exactly how a Danish Dell branch would find it appropriate or interesting to book Mads Christensen. If they wanted stand-up comedy we've got lots of skilled comedians. Mads Christensen is not in that line of work. To be fair I don't think Mads Christensen personally believes what he presents on stage. It's the persona he's built up. Not that that makes it better in this scenario, just so flak is directed where it's most appropriate - Dell, and especially whoever made the decision to book him.

spoiledtechie 14y ago
Are we talking about the same Mads who created BlogEngine.Net? Just curious? I would hope not, but if so, my entire image of him got thrown out the door.
- Lewton 14y ago
  Most likely not. Mads Christensen is kinda the danish equivalent of John Smith
- orcadk 14y ago
  We are not, completely unrelated. The surnames are spelled differently too - Christensen (show-off) vs. Kristensen (BlogEngine).
  - spoiledtechie 14y ago
    Thanks for that.
- nigelsampson 14y ago

MaysonL 14y ago

Dell really should just liquidate and give the money to the shareholders.

tomjen3 14y ago

I am quite lacking words here. Not that some people believe this -- some people hates Jews, so why not women -- but that they would him on stage. The only guess I can come up with is that we currently, or until very recently, had politicians with power in the government who wanted quotas for the number of females in the boards of companies. This may be what he referes to when he talks about having a nice female ratio. What gets me though is that usually US companies go way too far on the other side on the PC issues like this.

gfodor 14y ago

How many times are we going to keep hearing the non-apology apology: "We are sorry if some were offended..."? I am so tired of it, it has become a cliche. When did the business world/lawyers decide this was the optimal legal response to customers? My blood boils every time I read it as it is the most disingenuous, calculated, shallow tripe you can trot out when you fuck up. What ever happened to just owning up to your mistakes? What exactly are the massive consequences between saying "We're sorry" and "We're sorry some were offended"? Is it liability, lack of character, "best practices", what?

protomyth 14y ago
Might be liability, but it seems like PR flacks tend to also work for politicians who have a long history of not actually apologizing.
spindritf 14y ago
> How many times are we going to keep hearing the non-apology apology: "We are sorry if some were offended..."? About as many times as we make powerful people apologise in public, especially when they're not really feeling guilty. And it's not always in that form, sometimes it's closer to Clinton's "mistakes were made". While most non-apologies are pretty standard, there is some variation and innovation.
- jerrya 14y ago
  Well it was either Reagan, or Nixon, but never Clinton. I think you owe the Clintons an apology.
- philwelch 14y ago
  According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistakes_were_made http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistakes_were_made), some version of "mistakes were made" dates back to Ulysses S. Grant, though it seems that Nixon popularized it.
- gfodor 14y ago
  The thing I don't understand about this is that it seems to me that when public figures, companies, etc come out with genuine apologies, it ends up being a net positive. They garner respect from their friends and their enemies. They get good press. They often manage to repair most of the relationships that were in question. It almost seems like that even if someone were not feeling guilty, the logical thing would be to pretend like you are and submit a real apology. I find it hard to believe that folks who are already so good at stretching the truth to their own benefit like politicans would somehow let their personal ego and pride get in the way of them making a fake "real" apology if that would benefit them the most. It seems to me that there is some underlying calculus that all these actors have made that issuing a bogus one has a better net effect that a real one. I suppose I should be thankful that if this is the case then at least we are going to be able to tell the bullshitters from the honest people, since only the honest ones will be making genuine apologies despite their potential for harm.

unimpressive 14y ago

Review: Christensen is the best speaker I've ever heard, a paragon of equality. After hearing his deeply enlightened views on women in the workplace, my whole perspective on hiring and employee management changed. Absolutely recommended five stars A++. XKCD: http://xkcd.com/958/ http://xkcd.com/958/ EDIT: Let this be a lesson to other companies out there, vet the people you book for...anything.

dredmorbius 14y ago
Humor, irony, and subtlety, even with the xkcd link, are generally lost on the HN crowd.
- unimpressive 14y ago
  It's funny because that comment shifts every half an hour or so between getting a few upvotes and then getting a few downvotes. Even if I end up with some downvotes in the end it's worth it just to watch the lovers and haters contest each other. EDIT: It's too bad people can't leave a reason for up/down voting, it would be interesting to see weather people actually think I believe that, or if they just didn't think it was funny.
  - spacemanaki 14y ago
    Although I think that XKCD comic is funny, I downvoted you for the reasons makeramen pointed out.
  - makeramen 14y ago
    I'm staying neutral on this one, but I can imagine that may people don't think this comment contributes much to thoughtful discussion of the topic. Promoting these comments, or even not downvoting them creates a culture where these comments become accepted. I can see a comment like this (if upvoted) easily starting one of those "pun trains" commonly seen on reddit. I don't see anything specifically wrong with the ironic humor of the comment, HN does need to lighten up sometimes, but if we let one of these get upvoted... it will only lead to many more by precedent. The line has to be drawn somewhere. I personally wouldn't want to see a HN where each topic has 10+ "witty/ironic/humorous" comments. I go to reddit for that.

drats 14y ago

That page had a totally obnoxious in-page pop-up which half-loaded and took a full 15 seconds to load all the parts (background image of popup and importantly the close button).

chris_wot 14y ago

Someone needs to be fired. Preferably the Danish CEO of Dell.

petercooper 14y ago

The crazy part of this is it seems once he started spouting this crap, no-one from Dell pulled him off stage and did any damage control! So people say "let's not judge Dell," etc but we can judge their employees' lack of action. If someone speaks like this at an event I'm running and I'm within earshot, I'm getting in their face, no matter how famous the speaker. I'd hope other organizers and chairs would act similarly.

losvedir 14y ago

Wait, so is he a comedian MC'ing the event? If it's a roast or something, and he's poking at the fact that there's not a lot of women in tech: The IT business is one of the last frontiers that manages to keep women out. The quota of women to men in your business is sound and healthy As in, what are you guys doing to cause not a lot of women to be in IT. It's almost as if there's a quota! If that's the case it's still terrible and tasteless, but at least sort of comprehendible. If he's serious and those are his actual beliefs, the situation is so far outside the range of reasonable corporate behavior, I don't know what to think. I'm just perplexed, really.

olavk 14y ago
He is not a comedian but kind of a pundit and lifestyle expert. He sincerely believes women are getting stronger and more successful than men, and men have to fight back. For the sake of entertainment he presents his viewpoints in an over-the-top and exaggerated manner, so it is hard to say how much is serious and how much is hyperbole.
jsnk 14y ago
He's an act, the similar manner Christopher Hitchens was about religion and Jeremy Clarkson is about cars. Not that they are fakers, but their presentations are intentionally over the top and insensitive to arouse interest and entertain the audience. Danish Dell fucked up this time. This is really not the kind of PR Dell can afford to receive.
- MBlume 14y ago
  I don't recall Hitch ever being "over the top" about religion -- he simply called spades spades.

silassliph 14y ago

Mads Christensen is the best. World renowned expert at increasing hysteria by at least 50% each quarter! A++. Would buy again.

duck 14y ago

I wanted to read this, but the gigantic pop-up won't let me on my tablet. Oh well, now I don't.

MBlume 14y ago

This is beyond disgusting. How did the people in the room not simply walk out? ETA: Scripts are good for these things. It's difficult, in the shock and confusion of the moment, to decide what to do. So, here's one script. When you're in a presentation, and a speaker starts talking like this (or talking about "gang-bang interviews" or whatever else) you stand quietly, and you leave. You tweet what happened. If there isn't a clear apology (and we haven't heard one from Dell yet) you don't attend the conference the following year. This is how we, as a community, communicate to one another what kind of behavior is and is not acceptable.

polemic 14y ago
After a recent experience of being confronted with sexism and, ultimately, not handling it how I feel like I should have, I think this is a really good idea. Having a script (or at least thinking about what I would do, in advance) would've made a big difference. A lot of the time, our natural response is to freeze or act as if it didn't happen, and that's not ok. Raging on twitter after the fact is not nearly as effective as direct and immediate feedback.
Lanzaa 14y ago
I don't think leaving and tweeting about how you feel is a very useful response. It could lead to a form of evaporative cooling[1] and cause the behavior of the group to worsen. It may be better to put pressure on the group to change. Find someone who is in charge and complain about the behavior you find inappropriate and encourage other people who find the behavior inappropriate to complain as well. [1] http://lesswrong.com/lw/lr/evaporative_cooling_of_group_beliefs/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/lr/evaporative_cooling_of_group_beli...

ktizo 14y ago

If Dell are going to pull this kind of shit then don't buy things from Dell.

etherael 14y ago

I know it's fashionable to have a knee jerk reaction and not actually check backstory etc, but just quietly. http://www.madschristensen-foredrag.dk/mc/Aktuelt-og-media http://www.madschristensen-foredrag.dk/mc/Aktuelt-og-media This guy is clearly a comedian / over the top on purpose, to say that he actually genuinely believes the purposefully crafted bullshit on display in this particular article is to say that Les Patterson from Australia actually thinks that it's appropriate to be a permanent drunken idiot, or Guido Hatzis http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=domXumvTVI8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=domXumvTVI8 really thinks everything he says. Actually, do US comedians have this brand of self deprecating over the top humor? Nothing springs to mind, perhaps this is why it doesn't translate well? As to whether the choice of this guy was appropriate? Different question but even there you'd need to assume that the audience wouldn't "get" that this was all an act and honestly felt insulted by it. I guess it's already clear they've misjudged their audience but it maybe wasn't so obvious beforehand that this would actually be the result?

polemic 14y ago
Here's the thing: it's not humour. It's misogyny thinly dressed as an "edgy" dig so that anyone who protests can be deflected with this sort of defence. It's a tried and true technique to broadcast bigotry and slander with a wink and a nudge. I'm not saying you agree with his sentiments, but I am saying that it's not ok to say "it's just a joke". And it's not ok for Dell to let him continue to moderate their conference - even if they didn't realise what they were getting into, they should have removed him at the first sign things were not as they seemed. PS we have very different definitions of 'self-deprecating'.
- etherael 14y ago
  > PS we have very different definitions of 'self-deprecating'. It's self deprecating when you make ridiculously over the top statements about how awesome you are because it makes you look like an idiot. That old "I'm a pretty big deal around here" chestnut. It is humour, whether or not it is taken as such is a different issue, when Bill Hicks gets up on stage and repeatedly tells people in advertising to kill themselves, he's not actually serious. Some might take that seriously but he's a comedian and it's humor. If an advertising exec is heinously offended that he was just repeatedly directly told he ought to kill himself because he will never amount to anything or accomplish anything good in his life, does that mean that it wasn't humor? You may well have a point about the venue potentially being inappropriate for this kind of thing, however to actually take the content of the comedy literally and seriously and be offended by it is just completely missing the point.

josephcooney 14y ago

Picture this if you will: Half way through Mads Christensen's 'spot/tirade' Michael Dell walks onto the stage carrying a microphone. Mad's microphone goes dead. "Well Mads, I know we (Dell) asked you to come along and speak today" says Michael "but your views about women are very, very wrong. They don't represent my views, the views of my company, and they have no place at this conference. We're going to have a 15-minute impromptu Q&A with Nicolai Moresco while I make sure the PR people who invited Mads here today never receive another cent from Dell, and then I'll host the panel. I'm deeply sorry for this mistake." Michael Dell stamps his authority on things, shows leadership, puts forward a positive message, guaranteed to be a memorable moment/talking point with attendees rather than some the usual bland corporate crap. Wouldn't the world be a lot better if there was more of this? Once when I was a kid the TV station (Channel 9 in Australia) ran a show with some highly questionable content. I was a kid so I didn't see it but from what I gather it was pretty base. Half way through the show the guy running it (Graham Kennedy I think) came out and said Kerry Packer (who owned the 9 network) had called up and cancelled the show. I didn't/don't care much for Kerry Packer, but I remember thinking at the time that this was a classy move.

kingkilr 14y ago
Was the show you were wathching "Australia's Naughties Home Videos"? I know that was cancelled half way through it's first episode by the network owner.
- laumac 14y ago
  If only it were Home and Away...
- josephcooney 14y ago
  Yes, I think so.
  - chris_wot 14y ago
    Yes. The story is that Kerry Packer, who used to actually watch the shows his network put to air, started watching it and after about 5 minutes and a number of segments of animals fornicating called the night shift operator and said "Get this shit off the air!". After which the Channel 9 logo graphics appeared, then it went to an ad break, after which they aired a rerun of Cheers. The host was Doug Mulray, who was fired the very next day and who said on his radio show that "I am the first man in Australian history to be pulled off by Kerry Packer". I doubt that Graham Kennedy would ever have put his name to the show. Sadly, after his death, someone decided that it would be a good idea to actually air the show. It wasn't as bad as Packer said. It was worse.

maclaren 14y ago

Unreal. It's especially brutal that people involved in tech believe they're changing ("improving") the world yet decide gender determines skill. What really matters: the people without prejudice - who will hire/work with talented engineers regardless of gender or race - will have an advantage via a larger talent pool.

peterwwillis 14y ago

Well, Dell is getting plenty of PR out of this, so congrats to the people who hired the Danish version of Andrew 'Dice' Clay. Little miss muffet, sat on her tuffet, eating her curds and whey. Along came a spider, who sat down beside her, and said, "What are all these bitches doing in Information Technology!" Eyyyyy!

peterwwillis 14y ago

coldarchon 14y ago

Dress code: blond locks and female? 5 pictures of blond locked women on that very same page, and you complain about cliché?

board7786 14y ago

While some might say I've missed the point of the article for making the following comment, I think it's somewhat relevant to the whole concept of the author's argument: USE SPELLCHECK. I don't disagree with the sentiments of the author. The tech industry is one that is very much male dominated, and one where women are very much underrepresented. Some of the brightest people I have worked with in my time in the tech field have been women, and I welcome the opportunity to work with them; or anyone regardless of race, creed, color, background or sex, as long as they're intelligent and can do their job and do it well. But when I read something put up for public display on a high-traffic blog such as this, and the author forgets to use spell check... I can't help but point it out.