Or just a bunch of grrls?

In the paper today was a story about Westpac pulling out of a finance deal it had entered into for the building of a development that happened to be intended to house a brothel. The writer thought that Westpac "financing a brothel" was hilarious.

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/business/westpac-pierced-by-a-stiletto-20110819-1j27c.html

The story said:"sources confirm that Westpac's board and executive had been mortified at being hauled into the public spotlight as brothel financiers, especially in view of the gender of chief executive Gail Kelly and directors Elizabeth Bryan and Carolyn Hewson."

Now, I'm not sure what the gender of the directors has to do with the business decision, which had apparently withstood the scrutiny of the bank in the first place.

Can anybody enlighten me?

In another story elsewhere, Peter Beatty claims that female politicians are treated differently because of their gender, implying that this is unfair and has no relevance to their capacity to make good decisions, so why should the gender of these three directors have any impact on the bank's business decision to lend money?

I bank with both Westpac and Commonwealth and the gender of the boards has never been a subject I've considered as relevant to the banking decision. If they are to start playing gender games, perhaps I should reconsider my view. It surprises me that Gail Kelly would allow her name to be used in thsi way. If ever there was a female executive who's achieved on her own merits, she's the one.

LOL

Given the sort of chaos bankers have spread across the globe in the past few years I would have thought financing a new whorehouse was quite harmless.

BTW I consider prostitutes intrinsically more honest than bankers. With a prostitute you know what you're getting. There's no fine print.

I agree but Antiseptic they may well still finance it.
By becoming its best customers.
Why have we let sex be seen as so bad, if our private lives became public we would see the hypocrisy here.
Bet they fund Casinos or places pokers machines live.
No worries getting finance for high interest rate lenders .

Bankers with morals?

there are few words that are more disconnected from each other than these three.

*Now, I'm not sure what the gender of the directors has to do with the business decision,*

That is fairly easy to explain, Antiseptic. Brands matter, they
have value. What those pesky customers think matters, no matter
what the directors think.

So Gail Gelly, who is clearly a pragmatic sort of person, would
most likely have no problem at all financing a brothel. But
when the press got hold of it and made it a story, no doubt a
heap of feminist customers would have contacted the bank and
expressed their outrage.

So the bank would be caught between a rock and a hard place,
through no fault of their own. Would it have been a story if
a bank with a male CEO financed the brothel? Far less likely.

I don't think we should go into the relative merits of bankers and prostitutes. I think the comparison with pimps is more accurate, on the whole, which makes the whole brothel issue rather a contradiction.

Yabby:"Would it have been a story if
a bank with a male CEO financed the brothel?"

That was my point. Why? I understand your point about feminist agitation, but why should this bother a bank making a lending decision and moreover why does the gender of the CEO and some directors matter?

Even more fundamentally, what is the feminist issue here that the bank felt might cause trouble? Any of the feminists here care to have a go?