Sir, – Dave Slater's letter (November 14th) is the kind of random thinking that drives me to despair.
Yes, the overwhelming majority of those who reach the summit of Everest are men, because a greater number of men decide to make the ascent. If more women chose to make the climb, we would expect that they would be equally successful in reaching the summit because the gear and support they would receive would be the same.
However, the situation regarding many professions is entirely different.
There are as many women entering the professions that Mr Slater names as men – and many of them possess higher academic qualifications – but the support they receive is not the same.
If it were, then Emily Peck would be incorrect when she said that women chief executives were like shark attacks, “extremely rare, but so well-covered by the media we think they’re pretty common”.
The fact is that senior positions in professional life, whether the arts or business, are being picked from a limited gene pool.
You only have to look at the merry-go-round of board appointments in this country to see that the golden circle is almost exclusively white, male and of a certain age.
It is not the case that women lack the competence to advance in the professions or the arts.
But the lack of gender balance points to the fact that women have to be exceptionally talented, determined and motivated to succeed, whereas their male counterparts merely have to be adequate. – Yours, etc,
SHEILA O’FLANAGAN
Clontarf ,
Dublin 3.