Dec. 04, 2020
I am opposed to the proposed rule changes for NASDAQ that serve to enshrine bigotry and racism in the public financial markets. The entire concept of quotas based on immutable aspects of a board member creates a perverse focus on superficial characteristics of the individual. Companies are best served by looking for the board members best suited to pursue their mission. Decision makers should be blind to skin color and sexual preference, while being wide-eyed to experiential and philosophical diversity. We will never eliminate bigotry in society-at-large by forcing companies to make bigoted decisions in order to be listed on NASDAQ. Furthermore, this rule is against the actual definition of diversity in that it permits some boards that lack diversity, such as: Board members that are all female. Board members that are all black. Board members that are all Hispanic. Board members that are all gay. Yet, the rule unequally disallows: Board members that are all male. Board members that are all white. Board members that are all straight. I believe that it is commendable for NASDAQ to encourage businesses to pursue board members that are outside of their own bubbles. That said, encouragement and enforcement are very different things. Skin color and sexual preference are grotesquely crude and blunt tools to use in order to take a measure of a person's capabilities and potential contribution to an enterprise. By mandating bigotry, NASDAQ crosses a bright line that would set us back further from the day that was dreamt by Martin Luther King, Jr. that we all be judged by the content of our characters instead of the color of our skins. Sincerely, Mark Blair