Barely Ok: a subgroup of employees organizes it on their personal time (meaning: not using work email to send an "all@" message, or using work email at all). It's not discussed in the office, and no important work topics are discussed at the event. (So the people who didn't go don't hear "oh yeah we discussed that at Hooter's and decided ...")

Not OK: even if the event is independently organized, pictures posted on company site or circulated via company email; tweets or social-media postings about the event including the company name (including "at Hooter's with my buds from Company X!") all send the wrong message.

If you and your dudes from work HAVE to go to one of these places (keep telling yourself it's "ironic"), you should treat it like buying ointment for an embarrassing disease. Something you do quietly at weird hours hoping nobody you know sees you.

Aside from Hooters, what are other examples of "these places" that should be avoided? Our startup's engineering staff is all male- any advice that will keep us out of such embarrassing situations is appreciated.

No strip clubs and porn shops obviously, but that's apparently not far enough.

No place that hires attractive women or even hints at human sexuality as being a positive thing, apparently.

Naturally, the point of trying to promote a professional, inclusive workplace is really a scheme to reinforce sexual shame on a mass scale.

How about places that just don't objectify a group of people?

Professional and inclusive? Why does every company have to have the same watered down, one size fits all culture?

Are there any situations left in the workplace where we should be expected to vote with our feet?

You know what, I actually think I agree with you more here then you probably think I do.

I don't actually think that all workplaces should become banal, corporate, photocopies of one another.

What articles like this seem to show by the commentary they elicit is that many of these things aren't conscious choices.

I think if a company consciously decides to foster a work environment that promotes a specific culture (within the boundaries of the law), that's their prerogative. But for me, the key word there is "consciously".

And it seems that a good portion of this phenomenon currently isn't conscious. And I feel that is incredibly harmful.

This article tries to portray this topic in a way that I think is very useful, which is to say, it's not making a moral judgement. It's saying "hey, these types of actions have a consequence. That consequence is that it will negatively effect your candidate pool, and probably make you unattractive to investors."

People are free to read that and say "I don't care about that. To me, having a company culture that reflects my values is worth the negative consequences."

I'd be happy with a culture that is at least aware of this (which our current culture appears not to be).