And I'm telling you this is not a foregone conclusion.
> If the conversation starts from an inconclusive or flimsy premise then it should be derailed.
No. It should include both the initial position and the specific cases that inspired it and then move to a broader case. This is not customer service, these are people's lives.
> It is far too easy to make bad decisions based on flawed studies.
Are you suggesting that the decision to pay women equally, carefully audit corporate promotions, and firmly and directly punish racist and sexist harassment are actually open for debate? Is there an outcome where we might say, "Oh no, actually it's correct to pay women less for equal work?"
> The first step is to work out if it's a real issue we could be, or should be, solving.
How many individual women need to risk their careers explaining unconscionable behavior by their managers and employers HR departments before you're satisfied anyone anywhere is allowed to have this conversation? You should put that number out there.
> But you have to actually make a case.
You may not realize you're doing this, but you're actually interfering with everyone's ability to make a case by derailing every conversation and making it all about you and your (higher than any other sociological or scientific field) standards for allowing discussion.
Look at you. You're here because marketing copy for an event triggered you. You're so angry you're willing to argue that maybe pay shouldn't be equal after all.