Dress code: blue tie and male

http://elektronista.dk/kommentar/dresscode-blue-tie-and-male/

by chrismealy • 14 years ago

353 141 14 years 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• 14 years 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.

ahi2• 14 years ago

Part of that might be a bad translation.

callil• 14 years 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• 14 years 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.

aptwebapps5• 14 years ago

The fact that nearly everyone there was an employee might have something to do with it.

_delirium2• 14 years 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• 14 years 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.

olavk6• 14 years ago

In the danish version of the article (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.

jlgreco3• 14 years ago

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

Tyr42• 14 years ago

I had to click back to the site after reading your comment, as I didn't even notice it, so YMMV.

FuzzyDunlop• 14 years ago

Actually impossible when you want to zoom in, because the text is fairly small.

Groxx2• 14 years 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.

jlgreco3• 14 years ago

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.

antidoh2• 14 years ago

I hate these. Who wouldn't.

Firefox: View/Page Style/No Style turns the page into plain, readable text.

Think of all the effort someone went through, to take perfectly good content and deface it.

jtoscano42• 14 years ago

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

perspectiveless• 14 years 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?

tomjen33• 14 years ago

Chock can do that -- and somebody has to be the first guy to get up, which can be quite scary.

antidoh2• 14 years ago

"You're getting a Dell, dude."

I guess that was a typo, one too many commas.

shasta2• 14 years ago

And it was "dude, you're getting a Dell"

orcadk3• 14 years 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.

spoiledtechie2• 14 years 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• 14 years ago

Most likely not.

Mads Christensen is kinda the danish equivalent of John Smith

orcadk3• 14 years ago

We are not, completely unrelated. The surnames are spelled differently too - Christensen (show-off) vs. Kristensen (BlogEngine).

nigelsampson• 14 years ago

Thank you, I was wondering where I had heard the name before.

AJ007• 14 years ago

So this would be the equivalent of someone complaining about a popular US comedian well known for making racist jokes?

orcadk3• 14 years ago

I wouldn't go as far as saying he's explicitly known for making racist jokes. He is however known for (and markets himself as) being politically incorrect - which may very well include both racism and chauvinism.

stfu2• 14 years ago

Rumor has it that Rickles is still doing the occasional corporate gig...

olavk6• 14 years ago

He is not a comedian, more like a fashion, lifestyle and relationship expert. When he says that men should learn to say "shut up, bitch" it is not intended as a joke but as legitimate relationship advice. His viewpoints are well known, and Dell got exactly what they could expect. What is surprising is that Dell thinks this kind of relationship-advice is appropriate entertainment for a business conference.

pavel_lishin• 14 years ago

Sounds some what like a corporate Tucker Max. (Well, before his recent repentance.)

dhughes• 14 years ago

Like a non-political Rush Limbaugh?

bitops• 14 years ago

More like Glenn Beck.

mahyarm• 14 years ago

So he's a Danish Sacha Baren Cohen? (Borat, etc)

olavk6• 14 years ago

No, Borat etc. are clearly acts separate from Cohen. Christensen is not an actor, he believes what he says, although he uses exaggeration to get his point across.

vellum• 14 years ago

So he's basically the Danish Tucker Max?

MaysonL• 14 years ago

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

tomjen33• 14 years 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.

gfodor4• 14 years 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• 14 years 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.

spindritf2• 14 years 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.

philwelch5• 14 years ago

According to Wikipedia (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.

gfodor4• 14 years 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.

stfu2• 14 years ago

This is a arguable subject. For me personally I prefer a company that took some risks with their presentation and failed, over one that had some human-bot-figure reading the corporate-lawyer approved cards. Sure, based on the narrative of that visitor the whole story comes across very negative, but then again I would find it utterly amusing to have some insult-comedian perform at a corporate event just to watch all the let-me-tweet-how-offended-i-am faces.

ryanmolden• 14 years ago

>And it's not always in that form, sometimes it's closer to Clinton's "mistakes were made".

That phrase far predates Clinton, probably Nixon or earlier was the first I heard it attributed. There is also a great book by that title (Mistakes were made, but not by me) that talks about the psychological drive to quell dissonance and how it can lead to absurd scenarios.

jerrya• 14 years ago

Well it was either Reagan, or Nixon, but never Clinton.

I think you owe the Clintons an apology.

sambeau• 14 years ago

It's either 100% lack of spine or 100% no clue.

Look at how well startups apologise when they get things wrong compared to long-established companies. They admit wrong and seek to put things right as soon as they are called on it. This is not just good PR: It's good morality, but it takes backbone.

Startups, though, are still run by their founders: people who know what they started their company to achieve and what moral code they were determined to adhere to while they achieved it…

…Dell on the other hand is, these days, run by some guy called "Michael Dell". Oh. Hang on.

wvenable• 14 years ago

I've been on hacker news long enough to know that many startups are just as bad at apologizing. Some established companies are very good making things right. I don't think you can generalize so easily.

philwelch5• 14 years ago

Actually apologizing admits to wrongdoing, which opens one up to liability and other consequences. Not apologizing at all is seen as callous and only incites the mob against you. A non-apology apology is still enough to settle the mob but not enough to open one up to liability. The only downside is that it upsets intelligent people like you and I who are capable of actually parsing and understanding these kinds of statements. Most people are content with something that sounds like an apology.

petercooper2• 14 years ago

Not apologizing at all is seen as callous and only incites the mob against you. A non-apology apology is still enough to settle the mob but not enough to open one up to liability.

Historically, I'd agree, but my observation (and opinion) is that real time mass communications and an ever dropping attention span mean that half-hearted apologies (or even sincere ones!) merely fan the flames, whereas radio silence lets the storm clouds pass because people's attention spans are so short.

rsynnott• 14 years ago

> Actually apologizing admits to wrongdoing, which opens one up to liability and other consequences.

I can't imagine that there are actual liability issues here; it's more than Dell (incorrectly, I suspect) thinks that using weasel words looks better than saying "oops, we're horribly thoughtless and incompetent".

hej2• 14 years ago

I’m not sure where (legal) liability comes in play here. I don’t think there is a way to successfully sue Dell for this (nor do I think there should be).

essayist• 14 years ago

IANAL, but in various contexts, apologies actually work to defuse the situation and prevent legal action. I've read research into malpractice and product negligence that indicates that sincere apologies actually reduce lawsuits, because, in many cases, the lawsuits are sparked not by the initial negligent act, but rather by stone-walling. I can't find those references tonight, alas.

But there is this research into problem resolution for German Ebay customers

http://www.psmag.com/culture/were-sorry-not-all-apologies-ar...

that indicates that a real apology from a vendor is more effective than (some amount of) cash in getting a customer to withdraw negative evaluations.

cbsmith4• 14 years ago

I actually think there are lots of cases where it is perfectly warranted.

It's a big world; if you are on the world stage, it is quite difficult not to offend somebody no matter what you do. There are experts in the fields of diplomacy and etiquette who devote their careers to getting this stuff right, and usually even then there is someone offended about efforts to be so "proper". ;-)

So, I think it is a perfectly valid apology if basically the only thing you regretted about your actions was that it made someone upset. Most people don't get off on pissing other people off, but they do want to live their life and go about their business. That apology is perfect for that context.

What's freaky is when it is used for cases where you'd think there'd be a lot more that someone ought to be sorry for. What's even freakier is when someone everyone pretends it is apologizing for more than it is.

brown9-2• 14 years ago

So, I think it is a perfectly valid apology if basically the only thing you regretted about your actions was that it made someone upset

This is what makes it a non-apology.

gfodor4• 14 years ago

I don't understand this viewpoint. What is an apology? An apology, at least to me, is a statement that you regret an action you performed, and hence are saying that if you were transported back in time and could relive that moment, you would have acted differently. Saying you are "sorry people were offended" does not imply that you would have acted differently.

If you do not wish you would have acted differently, do not apologize. If you do, then perform a real apology saying you made a mistake and wish to correct it. If you simply say that you regret others being offended, all you are really saying is you lament the fact there are people that exist that were offended by your statement. Ie, it is a shame that people disagree with you or are offended by your words, much like it's a shame that a stranger got a flat tire or that science has yet to cure the common cold. Ie, it's their problem, or at the very least, an existential observation of how you think things ought to be, not something that is your problem or responsibility to correct.

kiba2• 14 years ago

Can you give evidence for what you believe in?

erikpukinskis• 14 years ago

This has nothing to do with being "upset" or "offended" or "proper" or "etiquette".

It has to do with little girls growing up thinking there are entire categories of things they can't do. And it has to do with grown women being unable to do their jobs because too much of their time is spend dealing with the fact that their coworkers can't handle working with a woman. I'm not "offended" that Dell is contributing to that, I'm sad.

antihero• 14 years ago

> it is quite difficult not to offend somebody no matter what you do.

Avoiding having a guy that is blatantly sexist and misogynistic is not exactly hard nowadays.

byrneseyeview• 14 years ago

But that's exactly what they're sorry for. It's not like Dell's going to say "We're sorry we hired a jerk." That implies that they meant to hire a jerk. "We're sorry you're offended" means "We didn't do this out of malice, but we recognize that it was hurtful regardless, and that's why we're sorry."

I always get the feeling that what they're really supposed to do is grovel--to admit that it wasn't an honest mistake, but that they really were being evil, and that they've finally been caught and forced to own up. I don't think people are comfortable with diversity when it means that some people think it's totally okay to do something that other people would find horribly offensive.

I'm sorry if that's offensive. But that's all I'm sorry for.

DanBC• 14 years ago

"We're sorry. We made a mistake." == taking responsibility for what they did.

"We're sorry you feel that way." == passing the responsibility back onto the other person.

gfodor4• 14 years ago

> But that's exactly what they're sorry for. It's not like Dell's going to say "We're sorry we hired a jerk." That implies that they meant to hire a jerk.

Say what? That doesn't imply that at all. It implies they made an error of judgement, be it due to poor due diligence, a misperception of what is appropriate, weighing the options between "controversy" and "politically correct" and falling too far to the one side, and so on. It has nothing to do with intent, it has to do with making an error and telling your customers/audience that you learned from the error and will not make a similar one in the future.

chris_wot3• 14 years ago

Then it's not enough. If they aren't sorry for blatant sexism (despite Dell global policies) then they should be. And if they aren't they should lose sales. IMHO :-)

its_so_on• 14 years ago

I do think it is the correct response to nutjobs - so whenever I see this, I read it as a statement that the company is REALLY saying "I disagree with your points completely: still, I would prefer if you weren't offended right now!"

If a nutjob were to tell you, "Hey gfodor, your comment is extremely offensive to those of us working in public relations. We're the people who are actually trying to placate the population, yet you paint us as disingenuous, calculating, and shallow. Even though we have NO other job than to placate the public after we mess up. That's the ONE THING we do. How can you be so offensive to us?"

Then the proper response would be "Well, I'm very sorry if you are offended. I do like companies to take genuine corrective action, and any company that has public relations employees who make true apologies out of regret for the hurt and other negative effects they have caused, especially if these people also have enough power and will within the organization to effect policies to ensure the company can't do such a thing in the future, is a company that I support."

see, the nutjob was completely misreading you. You don't have to apologize to them.

This is the CORRECT use for "Well, I'm sorry you feel this way." It means you disagree, but still, would prefer the other side see things correctly. You care about them, but you stand by your actions.

In summary, I completely agree with you. But given the number of nutjobs out there, sometimes a nutjob-placating response is appropriate. Whenever I see nutjobs attacking a company for completely stupid reasons, I am glad to see this response trotted out. In the present instance, like you, I am not happy to see it.

Also, if an intelligent person uses this formula with me, "I'm sorry you feel this way" it means that they are interested in my understanding and feelings, and interested in talking about why I feel this way, but feel that they are justified (without crossing their arms and lifting their chin about it). This is very valuable feedback, and can open the dialogue to where either I or this person modifies their view. It's a lot better than just shutting down or blindly apologizing! No one should apologize 'genuinely' just to placate people, if they feel they did the right thing. They should at least give the reasons for their actions. On the other hand, if they know they did do the wrong thing, then they should take responsibility for it.

Tichy• 14 years ago

What would be the better apology? Giving one million dollars to everyone in the audience, for mental pain inflicted?

unimpressive3• 14 years 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/

EDIT: Let this be a lesson to other companies out there, vet the people you book for...anything.

dredmorbius• 14 years ago

Humor, irony, and subtlety, even with the xkcd link, are generally lost on the HN crowd.

unimpressive3• 14 years 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.

drats• 14 years 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_wot3• 14 years ago

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

petercooper2• 14 years 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• 14 years 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.

olavk6• 14 years 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• 14 years 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.

MBlume2• 14 years ago

I don't recall Hitch ever being "over the top" about religion -- he simply called spades spades.

duck• 14 years ago

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

MBlume2• 14 years 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.

polemic3• 14 years 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• 14 years 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_beli...

ktizo• 14 years ago

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

etherael4• 14 years 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 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 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?

polemic3• 14 years 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'.

etherael4• 14 years 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.

johnpowell• 14 years ago

I'm pretty sure Andrew Dice Clay will not be on stage at WWDC.

fusiongyro3• 14 years ago

Thank you, I've been struggling to remember his name since I heard about this! That sounds like exactly what this would be like.

olavk6• 14 years ago

It is not an act. He is not a stand-up comedian or actor, he is a writer of self-help books about lifestyle and relationships.

He uses exaggeration, hyperbole and humor to get his point across, but he do actually sincerely believe the core of his message, and his show is intended as a pep-talk to men to help them "be real men", and stand op to the women who is pushing them around.

josephcooney3• 14 years 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• 14 years 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• 14 years ago

If only it were Home and Away...

josephcooney3• 14 years ago

Yes, I think so.

aperrien• 14 years ago

I agree. I cannot see why he did not do this, as not doing it implies that he's really just a shadow of his former self...

Sad, really.

megablast• 14 years ago

Where you there at the show? Is this whole thing being overblown?

maclaren• 14 years 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.

peterwwillis2• 14 years 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!

peterwwillis2• 14 years 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!"

board7786• 14 years 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.

Dress code: blue tie and male

Related Stories