Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer complained about the “gender-charged” press during an interview with the Financial Times after Yahoo was sold to Verizon for $4.83 billion on Monday.
“I’ve tried to be gender blind and believe tech is a gender neutral zone but do think there has been gender-charged reporting,” said Mayer to the newspaper after selling the company, which was once said to be worth $125 billion, to Verizon for a mere $4.83 billion.
“We all see the things that only plague women leaders, like articles that focus on their appearance, like Hillary Clinton sporting a new pantsuit,” she claimed. “I think all women are aware of that, but I had hoped in 2015 and 2016 that I would see fewer articles like that. It’s a shame.”
The comments are a big departure from previous comments that Mayer made to the press last year, where she claimed to never “play the gender card” and added that gender was not much of a relevant issue in the tech industry.
“I never play the gender card … the moment you play into that, it’s an issue,” said Mayer. “In technology we live at a rare, fast-moving pace. There are probably industries where gender is more of an issue, but our industry is not one where I think that’s relevant.”
Mayer was hired by Yahoo as their new CEO in July 2012 in an attempt to revive the company’s former glory. During her reign as CEO, however, Mayer has been highly criticized by both employees at Yahoo as well as outsiders to the company.
One of the biggest criticisms of Mayer was her purchase of the micro-blogging platform Tumblr for $1.1 billion in 2013. Since the acquisition of Tumblr, it was reported that the worth of both companies had significantly dropped, with Yahoo writing down the value of the social media site by $230 million earlier this year and another $428 million in July.
The sale of over 3,000 patents cam in June, while in January Mayer was notably criticized for cruelly taunting her financially-concerned employees after declaring there would be “No layoffs… this week!” at a company meeting.
If Mayer is removed as CEO within a year of Verizon’s acquisition of Yahoo, she is currently set to receive around $55 million in parting pay.
Charlie Nash is a reporter for Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @MrNashington or like his page at Facebook.
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