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CES continues to be men only

by on08 January 2018


No women keynotes or protection against sexual harassment


CES is looking like a men only event with no women keynote speakers and no moves by organisers to protect women from sexual harassment.

CES, the showcase for the latest consumer electronics from televisions to self-driving cars, is known for mostly male attendees and ‘booth babes’ showing off the new technology.

Liliana Aide Monge, chief executive of California coding school Sabio, said that she is skipping CES for the second year in a row because of the lack of women and minority speakers.

“The fact that this large global gathering of tech leaders is totally ignoring this issue makes them completely tone deaf and irresponsible”, she said

The organisers of CES drew criticism last month from executives at Twitter and other tech companies for a keynote list dominated by white men. CES made a concerted push to diversify its entire speaker lineup, but failed to find a high-ranking female executive for an individual keynote address.

It blames the industry for not having enough women at president/CEO level in recognised companies.

Karen Chupka, who oversees the event as senior vice president at the Consumer Technology Association CTA said: “As upsetting as it is, there is a limited pool when it comes to women in these positions. We feel your pain. It bothers us, too. The tech industry and every industry must do better.”

Less justified was the fact that CES did not create a code of conduct for behaviour for attendees geared to protect women attendees from being harassed. Other conferences had adopted similar codes of conduct to encourage women to attend. Several conferences with these codes, including hacker convention DEF CON, CoreOS Fest and Cloud Foundry Summit removed attendees after reports of harassment.

The need for a code of conduct became apparent at Finland’s Slush tech startup event in 2016 when multiple women spoke up about being inappropriately touched and receiving unwanted propositions for sex by male attendees as well as being ignored by investors who were only interested in working with male entrepreneurs.

The following year, it doubled security, trained staff on how to handle reports of harassment and instituted a code of conduct, including a requirement to wear name badges at all times as a way to make it easier for attendees to identify a harasser.

Chupka said it was not needed because CES assumes everyone will be held accountable to the standards of being in an office. However, most offices have strict codes of conduct regarding harassment, so it is unclear why CES doesn't think it was necessary.

“Unacceptable” behavior would be addressed by the executive team and legal counsel as necessary, the CTA said. “We have the right at any time to revoke a show badge and/or trespass an individual.” CES notes that it has received no reports of sexual harassment at the event in recent years.

However women subjected to uncomfortable situations at or near past CES gatherings told Reuters that they did not report incidents because they were too used to it or did not recognize there was a way to do so.

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Last modified on 08 January 2018
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