
Women Entrepreneurs Created A Fake Male Cofounder To Dodge Startup Sexism - mamurphy
https://www.fastcompany.com/40456604/these-women-entrepreneurs-created-a-fake-male-cofounder-to-dodge-startup-sexism
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mamurphy
A reddit discussion thread:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/TwoXChromosomes/comments/6wsj1h/the...](https://www.reddit.com/r/TwoXChromosomes/comments/6wsj1h/these_women_entrepreneurs_created_a_fake_male/)
. I didn't see this submitted here anywhere.

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steanne
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15127055](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15127055)

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mamurphy
How did you find that? I would love to know for future reference.

I did a google site search with the title, then another with the URL, and both
missed it.

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DrScump
Entering "cofounder" in any HN search box brings it right up.

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mamurphy
steanne's way worked for me -- I am unaware of any HN search boxes. What do
you mean?

This rabbit hole is getting pretty deep.

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steanne
very bottom of the page

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zaqokm321
“Okay, girls…” offended them ? I am not sure why, after all the startup scene
is full of these feel good things like high 5s and free lunches. Would “Okay,
ladies…” be offensive, or maybe “Okay, Maams…”.

This is business, get over “Okay, girls…” as there will be a lot more to be
offended and agitated about. I have seen men make other men cry in board
meetings, and it wasn't as polite as this. If you are offended by the person
you have hired then you set boundaries and fire them if they cannot be met.
Basically they allowed that person to be in control.

And control was what it was about, they allowed people to control them and
then invented a fake persona which they could use. Heck this is something I've
done in many meetings ... "Hey John, my CEO is not going to be happy" ... it's
not about sexism it is about control.

> “I think because we’re young women, a lot of people looked at what we were
> doing like, ‘What a cute hobby!’ or ‘That’s a cute idea.'”

How about this happens to just about everyone, male and female.

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hoodoof
How does fraud get to higher moral ground?

Or are there no boundaries, limits and barriers in the battle against
prejudice.

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lhopki01
Your first thought is that this is fraud not that it's crazy that this is
still needed?

Also where is the fraud? They haven't registered him anywhere legally.

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jlebrech
surely someone would be able to check the registered directors and see no
mention of Keith Mann and were there one wouldn't it be illegal?

Of course they just deploy that persona for problematic people that wouldn't
be smart enough to cross reference company registration documents.

This also reminds me of the show Remington Steel.

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jaclaz
>This also reminds me of the show Remington Steel.

Exactly, and that happened in the '80's, and seemingly the idea of the show
dates back to the late '60's (when it was reckoned to be too "advanced" for
the time).

But the use of a male nom de plume has much longer traditions in literature,
George Sand or George Eliot to mane just two of them, and even the Brontë
sisters originally published under the male names of Currer, Ellis and Acton
Bell.

What is surprising is that - in some occasions - it is still _needed_ ...

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jlebrech
no doubt in some industries it'll work the other way round too.

