Huge VC Firm Finally Wears Down Ellen Pao in Legal Battle
After losing a widely-publicized gender discrimination lawsuit against her former employer Kleiner Perkins on all four counts this past March, it looks like former interim Reddit CEO Ellen Pao has finally reached her limit. In a statement to Re/code today, Pao has announced that she will not be seeking an appeal.
This decision comes in the wake of a particularly loud, particularly contentious portion of Reddit’s success in driving Pao from the site with a vicious, virtual witch hunt. From Pao’s interview with Re/Code:
I think I brought these important issues to the forefront of the conversation, but the online aggression has had a toll on me and my family. That so many people heard what I had to say, against all that was brought to bear against me, is a testament to the depth of the problem related to women and tech … [But] I have gone as far as I can go and cannot commit the resources and time that would be needed to continue.
Pao had accused the high-powered Silicon Valley VC firm of blatant gender discrimination over a period of several years after being denied a promotion worth millions; she noted that others in the company retaliated against her for reporting it at all. Kleiner Perkins, however, argued that Pao—who boasts an engineering degree from Princeton as well as an MBA and J.D. from Harvard—simply didn’t have the leadership skills or “genetic makeup” to be a venture capitalist, and that was better suited as support staff.
While Kleiner continues to claim that she has no grounds for an appeal, Pao made a point to note that her decision to drop the appeal does not mean she’s reached any sort of settlement with her former employer, saying “Settlement might have provided me with financial benefits, but only at the great cost of silence.”
You can read Pao’s full statement over at Re/code here.