What I makes me annoyed is that there are many, many talented women who could be in IT or CS but who don't participate because of sexism or hostility in the workplace ecause of their gender.
So what if there is a lack of women in IT? There is a lack of men in Human Resources and child care. Why is it an issue? Why does our society need to be specially engineered to reflect demographics in some industries and not in other.
Having said that, I don't believe such remarks should have a place in any professional conference.
Wouldn't it be wiser to spend time and energy trying to get coverage within your startup's domain rather than technology blogs? Obviously tech coverage would be good for networking, funding negotiations but why is domain specific coverage not even mentioned, surely it is vastly more important?
What industries do these women participate in?