Friends,
I apologize, but today’s rather late newsletter will feature another detour. Normal services will be resumed next week come hell or high water. Pinky swear.
But.
It is an important one.
As you may (or more likely may not) know, I am both a strategist and a lawyer. Though I have not done any legal work in well over a decade, it is still usually enough for people to put me on par with the Devil.
One of the reasons why I left the legal field, though there were several, was that I could not stand the much too common business law firm view of women. As with any field in which the hours are as long as the tradition of doing things a certain way, the manner in which one was expected to behave included both impeccable behavior towards clients and anything but towards what inevitably was considered the weaker sex.
It is, of course, the same as that in finance. And real estate. And entertainment. And, as if anyone had any doubts, marketing.
In a widely shared powder keg of a recent post on the topic, Zoe Scaman retold the stories of a plethora of women including herself and their nothing short of vomit-inducing experiences. While I do not see eye to eye with her on almost anything to do with strategy, there was no disagreeing with the importance of the piece.
No, I know. Not all firms. Not all agencies. Not all men.
But we both know that the exceptions are too few.
As a society, we love to publicly proclaim that we stand up for our fellow men, yet privately remain sitting for our fellow women. As an industry, we talk endlessly about progressive values, yet rarely utter a single word when they are put to the test. Time and again, men get away with the unacceptable because those around them have accepted that it is easier to look the other way than look out for someone.
Enough is enough.
We have to stop celebrating only those who survive – and I do mean that literally – against the odds and start improving the odds for everyone else.
We can either talk about it or do something about it.
Of course, there will inevitably be displacements of power at play. It is a lot easier to speak up when one is not in danger of losing one’s job and thereby putting oneself at financial risk. But the fact is that women stand to lose a hell of a lot more than that.
And it is not enough to presume that someone else will, so to say, do it for you to do it for her. This will not go away until we all draw the same line in the sand. The upside, besides entire point of it all, is that if we all speak up, the only person in danger of losing their job will be whoever is trying to keep things quiet.
Right now, the explicitly inappropriate actions of the few are only covered by complicit silence of the many. By shutting up and putting up we allow them to keep it up.
It has to change.
We have to change.
If we want to be taken seriously, as strategists, marketers, planners, men, whatever, we have to drop the act, start to live our values and do what we can to actually make a difference.
It is long overdue.
Onwards and upwards
JP
PS.
I know that many find it tedious reading about sexism and inequality. But consider how fucking wearisome it must be to have to live it.
Every.
Single.
Day.
Well said