"White women are the most dangerous upholders of white supremacy in Silicon Valley," writes white woman who really hated her boss because she was mean, and told her what to do, and was mean, and did I already say she was mean because she really was...

I don't know about you, but whenever I have had a problem with my boss my first instinct is to sit down and write a 4000-word polemic suggesting everyone who shares her skin color and gender are "dangerous" while simultaneously detailing my own emotional troubles being sure to never once suggest that maybe the problem was with me and not an entire industry.

I think I read that on LinkedIn or something.

Which brings us to former Webflow executive, Britt Caldwell.

Why does this sound familiar?

“White women are the most dangerous upholders of white supremacy in Silicon Valley, and holding them accountable could cost you your career, your community, and your sanity.” https://t.co/2yYsiCvorh

— Marshall Steinbaum 🔥 (@Econ_Marshall) April 25, 2021

Clearly she needs therapy.

I decided to take therapy seriously for the first time since my father passed in 2009.

Okay, more therapy.

Anyone can publish anything on Medium, it's a writer's platform, so there was no one around to tell her, no, we're not going to run this.

I don't necessarily recommend you read the entire 4000-word essay, but it is a tour de force of narcissistic victimhood and so much more revealing than I think she had intended.

And honestly, if that was all this was about I'd ignore it and wish her well in working through her problems.

But people pay attention to this kind of thing. They use it. They cite it. Caldwell just claimed in a very public way that "white women" are "dangerous upholders of white supremacy," because she didn't get along with her boss, and we no longer have the luxury of dismissing these kinds of things as harmless.

She starts:

After two years at Webflow, I am saying goodbye to more than just a job I once loved. I'm risking the most important possession I've acquired. The very thing that I've sacrificed family, friends, and good health to attain. The thing I've held on a pedestal for 15 years — my career — to speak my truth.

Anyone else get the feeling that there's a lot more going on here with Caldwell? This sounds a bit like regret over the choices she herself made.

When any non-cishet/white/man is in power (not the least of which are white women)...

Caldwell earlier wrote that, "white women are considered checkmarks on tech's list of DEI requirements," and here she is considering "non-cishet/white/man" as checkmarks on her own personal list of grievances.

"Cishet," which I had to think about for a moment, "white," "man," none meant to be flattering. Your sexuality, race, and gender, immutable characteristics you were born with and can't control, are intended to be insults.

Kind of like what someone who is prejudiced, sexist, and racist, would do.

...and exudes traits of toxic masculinity, their behavior is more conspicuous, subjecting them to more damaging discourse and tarnishing of their reputation than her superiors would receive. This not only makes white men more covertly dangerous,... Yet white women continue to senselessly defend their toxic behavior.

So, she's saying white women are man-adjacent?

It's all so complicated.

White women often ascend the ranks in supremely toxic work environments, adopting and also benefiting from the same white supremacy that steps on the necks of their sisters and daughters along the way.

Colorful! Deranged, but colorful.

Keep in mind she's a white woman. This is not healthy.

The more they exhibit authoritarianism, the higher they progress.

"Authoritarianism."  She does know these are people in positions of authority, right?  That's kind of part of the boss job description.

And because they climbed the highest mountain and sparkled in a sea of others who might cry at work, they feel uber accomplished and outstanding.

Are you starting to feel some resentment? I'm starting to feel some resentment here.

Many go on to intentionally inflict the same, or worse, traumas they endured because they believe they are stronger because of it.

Because maybe they are? The notion of coming out stronger after enduring hardship is hardly novel.

We've seen it time and time again, in every industry, from the people we admire most. From my former favorite chef, April Bloomfield, to treasured feminist J.K. Rowling, but we'll get to her later.

And she does, later writing that Rowling held "deeply harmful transphobic views" and linked to this tweet from Rowling as proof.

Dress however you please.
Call yourself whatever you like.
Sleep with any consenting adult who’ll have you.
Live your best life in peace and security.
But force women out of their jobs for stating that sex is real? #IStandWithMaya #ThisIsNotADrill

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) December 19, 2019

She lumps that, a statement that is at worst benign, and in any case was considered true five minutes ago, with Bloomfield who was accused of sexual harassment.

There is no sense of proportion with people like this, no ability to distinguish real harm from imagined, self-imposed phantom harms.

Much of the piece is made up of a list of grievances Caldwell had against her former boss, starting with the headaches she'd get after one-on-one meetings with her and then progressing.

I started experiencing intense migraines a day or so after my weekly 1–1s with my current boss. Who doesn't get headaches? I stare at a computer screen all day and barely get up to pee, let alone drink water...

Eventually nausea surfaced during our 1–1s and profound fatigue followed into the evenings. Who isn't nauseous and tired? We're in a pandemic. I couldn't connect the dots.

So many dots to connect.

I remembered the most recent director's offsite where she told me, the only woman besides herself invited, that I needed to stop giving feedback. That I need to understand that "because I said so" is enough context for me to get my work done.

I wasn't there, but if your boss is telling you to shut up in front of your colleagues, the problem could very well be you. And yet this never occurs to her. Not for one moment. She has thoughts! She needs to speak her truth!

No one cares!

When I looked at my male peers in disbelief, their heads were down in their laps.

Again, I was not there, but this sounds like they were embarrassed for her, no matter their gender.

She spends a few paragraphs discussing how she felt she was complicit in this, being a white woman and all.

Our abusers don't just look like us — they are us. Recognizing it makes us question our own identity....

A whole bunch of that, and then this.

My white-woman-girl-boss...

Wow. Just, wow.

...and I got scarily similar results to the same bull%$#@ personality test and instead of wanting to vomit,...

I need a new word that means "wow" but more.

...I smirked on the inside momentarily. Does this mean what I think it means? I must be destined for VP-dom too.

No, it doesn't, and I think that's part of the problem.

And then the pieces of the puzzle started fitting together.

First dots connecting, and now puzzle pieces fitting!

This is starting to sound like a children's activity book.

Sadly, at no point were "pictures colored" or "words unjumbled."

When she was applying for the job and I was interviewing her and she dodged every question and turned it around on me.

It's Silicon Valley. The employees get to interview their future bosses. This is exactly what I would expect of a future boss. Exactly.

When she made the entire marketing team take personality tests her first month at the company and wouldn't share the results.

Not that unusual. It's her prerogative. She's the boss, not you.

When she scolded me for allowing my direct reports to have their cameras off in meetings and be idle on Slack, while she operated on stealth mode.

I know you know she's your boss because you explained that in the beginning. She can leave her camera off if she wants to.

And insisting your employees have their cameras turned on during video conferences? Save for brief moments, say they need to move to another room, why wouldn't you insist on this? I would, and have.

Again, she's the boss, not you. I'm definitely starting to think that's the real problem she has.

When she said "I've got news for you, sister. This is how it is at startups" whenever she disagreed with me (as if I was new to this).

Her boss sounds like Pol Pot and Hitler all rolled into one. She's one unkind word away from committing genocide. Emotional genocide. The worst kind when you think about it but not for too long.

When she told me to try having an optimistic attitude in a group meeting after I asked how the sudden change in strategy would affect the roadmap.

Regardless of what kind of boss she was, there is one thing we can be sure of reading this.

She thought Caldwell was a terrible employee.

That doesn't necessarily mean she was, or is in every circumstance, or with everyone, but from the very beginning, from that first interview, these two were toxic for each other, that much is clear.

Making the leap from that to "white women are the most dangerous upholders of white supremacy," is Grand Canyonesque in scope.

It gets better. After she said she was leaving, she believed her treatment got worse.

Imagine that?

There was some back-and-forth regarding the boss wanting her to stay a bit or go, pretty standard by my experience. But there were also these additional complaints.

When she failed to communicate that I had been awarded a performance increase and I found out by checking my bank account.

She's upset she got a performance increase because a pat on the head didn't come with it.

I've had this exact same thing happen to me, exact, and I was extremely okay with it because the far more common complaint in the corporate world is the opposite, the pat on the head, or "employee award" in lieu of cash.

When she asked me to stay on Zoom in front of the group instead of scheduling a 1–1 to rob me of the chance to prepare.

She's referring to staying on the job. Okay, poor manners perhaps, but I'm not seeing the white supremacy here.

When she threatened to fire me if I didn't have her back, work hard, not take time off, and keep a positive attitude for the remainder of my transition period.

And? I'm not saying that's great behavior, I wouldn't do it quite like that, but everyone has their own style and this is not unusual, no matter your race or gender.

When she immediately changed her tone with me, ignoring me, and withholding necessary information for me to smoothly transition my work and my team.

You quit your job and she "changed her tone?!?!"

And "withholding necessary information?"

You're leaving the firm. She's just protecting their IP. Of course she's withholding information.

When she didn't acknowledge my two years' worth of contributions or do her part in "presenting a united front" when I posted my departure plans on Slack.

As her boss might say, "look sister, this ain't a quilting club."

Actually, there are quilting clubs that are rougher than this.

...and finally when she formally initiated stripping me of all possible authority and my firing.

You said you were leaving, and she thought you were an awful employee. So...

There were some accusations that were not totally unhinged. Refusing bonuses to black employees, perhaps not accommodating disabled employees, which is certainly possible, but when you take that into account with everything else she said it does not exactly help her credibility on those charges.  And those felt like afterthoughts. The vast body of complaints were all about Caldwell not getting the proper respect from a boss who clearly didn't respect her.

There is certainly the very real possibility that her boss was a jerk. Okay, so she was a jerk, and you didn't get along with her. Where in the world does this white supremacy nonsense come from?

It's near-impossible to influence changes in behavior from white women in power.

Oh, right. It just is.

Once white women are in positions of power, their networks solidify their tenure. What starts as one human inflicting harm one-to-one soon becomes few-to-many as they grow teams and promote their own kind.

"Their own kind." 

Eventually, and rapidly, an indestructible black widow's web is spun that traps people and cements processes. By the time anyone notices, the damage has extended beyond what the eye can see. While men are inescapably the biggest perpetrators and creators of white supremacy, once a white woman benefits and profits from the system, she becomes its fiercest advocate.

All this, because she had a mean boss.

There's more. She details various emotional struggles, including having had an abortion and being psychologically abused by family members and so on, but I think you get the idea.

This essay should have met one of two possible fates:

1. As a personal therapeutic exercise, perhaps shared with a trusted friend or a professional, but otherwise kept private.
2. An anonymous Glass Door review.

But it should never have been published in a public forum.

This has nothing to do with white supremacy, white women in Silicon Valley, and no broad conclusions regarding either should be drawn from it.

The experience she had is the exact same experience pretty much every employee working for every intersectionality throughout all of time has had at one time or another.

There is one thing about this that could have broader implications.

If you follow the Twitter conversations about this piece going on here, you will find a lot of women bashing women bosses. It is the dirty little secret of the corporate (and government) world: Many women don't like working for other women.

Why Women Don’t Want a Female Boss https://t.co/wGNEKQ3vyb

— CRC (@CRC57325971) August 3, 2020

I've heard this. You've probably heard this. Talking about it out loud might be potentially productive, because it seems like something that is resolvable.

But when you racialize it, when you try to shoehorn it into a woke narrative, it becomes counterproductive and destructive.