Why Women Are Really Mad About Ashton Kutcher's Plans to Discuss Sexism in Tech

We all know that Silicon Valley doesn't exactly have a great track record when it comes to sexism: Recent headlines have centered around the resignations of Uber's CEO and of Justin Caldbeck, a major figure in venture capital, both after accusations of sexual harassment. Not to mention the thousands of little things—creepy emails, unresponsive HR departments—that make women's lives harder on a daily basis.

But one Silicon Valley venture capitalist, who happens to be none other than Ashton Kutcher, is hosting a Facebook chat about gender equality and sexism in the workplace on Monday morning to help move things forward for women. Unfortunately, it's already off to a pretty rocky start.

He posted the announcement on Thursday through his LinkedIn page, including a list of talking points:

"Couple questions that I would love to include public commentary on: What are the rules for dating in the work place? Flirting? What are the clear red lines? Where does the line between work life and social life stop and start? Given that in the short term we are clearly bound by the existing educated talent pool in STEM, other than promoting STEM education parity going forward, how do we stop gap a solution? Should investors invest in ideas that they believe to have less merit so as to create equality across a portfolio? How do we create channels to promote female entrepreneurship? What advice should we be giving to female entrepreneurs? Are there known mentorship programs for female entrepreneurs? Are there any aggregated or clear pieces of media or educational platforms to help men understand where their blindspots may be? Are these the right questions?"

When it comes to the answer to his last question, the answer so far has been a resounding "no," as more than a few women—including Paradigm founder and CEO Joelle Emerson—pointed out.

Instead, his list of questions basically highlights why a conversation—and real change—needs to be made. As some women have pointed out, the talking points themselves "reflect the misunderstandings and need for dialogue". A skewed approach is obviously problematic for the conversation—and the direction it will go—from the start.

First, why exactly is flirting the very first topic of discussion? And there's also the "Should investors invest in ideas that they believe to have less merit so as to create equality across a portfolio?" question. It seems to imply that women have bad business ideas to start with, or that men should lower the bar to accommodate women (who, um, don't need the bar lowered because they have awesome ideas too).

But it ignores the reasons why men are more likely to invest in men: As the Huffington Post points out, "What often happens is that men are more receptive to ideas from other men. Or male investors simply don’t understand the idea a woman is pitching." Like Spanx, HuffPo points out—which is now worth $1 billion.

Kutcher responded to the criticism by taking to Twitter with a series of tweets:

At least he owned up and seems ready to learn. But we hope he'll show up with a more informed list of questions (maybe ones that women have an input in?) and—maybe, just maybe—a woman to moderate the discussion with him.

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