Despite how politically charged this topic is, as a female founder myself, I'm glad PG wrote this.
"[...]YC has slightly over 3x the venture industry average." Yes, 3 out of 12 female partners may be great compared to the industry average, but I'm disappointed that this is the first argument he makes for why he's not sexist. I'm not saying that PG is sexist, but all this argument proves is that gender discrepancies are still a problem (even if YC is above industry averages). 28% of US businesses are women-owned.
Everyone has biases (including myself)...it's a fact of human nature. It's no wonder VCs are somewhat biased considering in the past, the "successful" founders were almost always white males. I think PG so defensively saying that he and YC are NOT biased is problematic in itself. I wish he would have accepted that he (like every other human) is likely biased. It would have been nice to come away from reading this feeling that PG, personally, has a growth mindset.
It's great that PG and YC are trying to do more for female founders, but I'm a bit disappointed in the way his arguments were conveyed.
"[...]YC has slightly over 3x the venture industry average." Yes, 3 out of 12 female partners may be great compared to the industry average, but I'm disappointed that this is the first argument he makes for why he's not sexist. I'm not saying that PG is sexist, but all this argument proves is that gender discrepancies are still a problem (even if YC is above industry averages). 28% of US businesses are women-owned.
Everyone has biases (including myself)...it's a fact of human nature. It's no wonder VCs are somewhat biased considering in the past, the "successful" founders were almost always white males. I think PG so defensively saying that he and YC are NOT biased is problematic in itself. I wish he would have accepted that he (like every other human) is likely biased. It would have been nice to come away from reading this feeling that PG, personally, has a growth mindset.
It's great that PG and YC are trying to do more for female founders, but I'm a bit disappointed in the way his arguments were conveyed.