AIBU to think this isn't fair

Aidan

This is from the recruitment page of a (hopefully, future) employer:




What are people's thoughts? Does anyone else agree with me and that someone's chances of a job should rest only on their abilities and qualifications and skills, and not who they are?

Kathleen07

Yeah, I kind of agree, tbh. You already said the basic form of what I was going to say

Aidan said:

that someone's chances of a job should rest only on their abilities and qualifications and skills, and not who they are?

Aidan

Would anyone wanna take a guess on what type of job this is? Based on what it says on the recruitment page? Especially with the part about guaranteed interviews for disabled people, it might surprise you!

MsBingo

Hi @Aidan

I think that employers should make an active effort to employ people from minority groups. I have seen studies about BAME individuals using 'white names' on their CV's receiving more interviews than those who didn't. I think a lot of the time discrimination is subconscious, so employers should have policies in place to make sure that these people are made more visible in the application process.

I also think that employing more minorities has lots of benefits for organisations. My uni has been in the news recently for its poor treatment of disabled staff and students, and I think that lots of their bad decisions could have been avoided if someone on the senior leadership team had personal experience of disability so that they could have given their input.

However, I agree that someone should meet all the criteria for the job.


I'm trying to guess what job its for but I really dont know! The support staff part made me think that maybe its something to do with care work for some reason?

Aidan

I know diversity is good to get a big range of skills and experiences, but at the same time it's important not to hire people purely on the basis of who they are. I'm sure everyone must meet the criteria, as there's quite a bit of criteria including mental and physical examinations you need to pass and you'll see why shortly.

I see what you were thinking about care, in my job hunting I've come across countless ads for care jobs that have required potential employees to be either a woman, or LGBT. Also instead of ads for 'serving staff' I see ads for 'waitresses'. I can understand why they want that, but discrimination is wrong always, not sometimes.

@MsBingo it's the recruitment page of our local fire and rescue service!

Skive

MsBingo said:

Hi @Aidan

I think that employers should make an active effort to employ people from minority groups.

Positive discrimination is still discrimination. Race, skin colour and sex should have no bearing on employers efforts to find employees in all but a very few rare cases.

Aidan

I agree with you @Skive that discrimination working in reverse is still discrimination. I understand this framework is meant to combat discrimination against minorities, but I still think that someone's eligibility for the role alone should affect someone's chances of getting an interview or a place.

Jellyelephant

I think it’s good. There are so many barriers to disabled people getting into work and this only means they will get an interview, not the job. So they will have the chance to say what they can do alongside able bodied candidates. People with disabilities experience so much discrimination and barriers that I don’t think we can begrudge them being offered an interview if they meet the criteria. 

davcr0ck

I have an strong option on this topic, being rejected for apprenticeship and part time jobs because of my medical and mental health history but I won't share it because I will probably end up having an argument with soneone

Aidan

I think people with disabilities don't have enough doors open to them, maybe being guaranteed an interview gives them a chance to introduce themselves and their skills and experience where otherwise they might be overlooked for their disability. My concern was that, on a management level, someone who is disabled may be hired to tick a box of having a disabled person on board, and have the skills and experiences of themselves, and competing job-hunters, overlooked for that.

I think I also made the assumption that disabled people would be considered for the role of a firefighter- when actually there may be appropriate roles for them in a fire service I had never considered!

Sorry to hear about that @davcr0ck and I want you to know that your opinion is valid

Take care everyone!

Skive

Fighting for equal opportunities and the rights of minority groups not to be discriminated against is a good moral position. 
However positive discrimination maintains the distinction and hence the division between groups of people, and therefore at odds with the principle of inclusion.

Mike

Skive said:

Fighting for equal opportunities and the rights of minority groups not to be discriminated against is a good moral position. 
However positive discrimination maintains the distinction and hence the division between groups of people, and therefore at odds with the principle of inclusion.

Interesting outlook, @Skive. Do you think there could be a healthy balance with positive discrimination, or would you say it's never a good option?

Skive

Mike said:

Skive said:

Fighting for equal opportunities and the rights of minority groups not to be discriminated against is a good moral position. 
However positive discrimination maintains the distinction and hence the division between groups of people, and therefore at odds with the principle of inclusion.

Interesting outlook, @Skive. Do you think there could be a healthy balance with positive discrimination, or would you say it's never a good option?

In the main, I think positive discrimination is not a good option because it's divisive and will inevitably result in resentment between different groups. What happened to the principle of equal opportunity and people being given jobs on merit rather than some arbitrary distinctions?

Surely this is no good for individuals in minority groups either? Do you really want to say you got the job because your black/disabled/gay or because you were the best person for the job? 

There are clearly some exceptions with regards to employment. I wouldn't expect a woman's charity looking after female rape victims to employ male councillors for instance.

Aidan

In the main, I think positive discrimination is not a good option because it's divisive and will inevitably result in resentment between different groups.

This made me think of something.

Remember the black man who was arresting in the US for loitering in a Starbucks? 

In response to the public backlash, Starbucks made a policy of 'race training' staff.

In response to the 'race training', staff resentment of minority races actually went up, not down.

Mike

Aidan said:

In the main, I think positive discrimination is not a good option because it's divisive and will inevitably result in resentment between different groups.

This made me think of something.

Remember the black man who was arresting in the US for loitering in a Starbucks? 

In response to the public backlash, Starbucks made a policy of 'race training' staff.

In response to the 'race training', staff resentment of minority races actually went up, not down.

Would be interesting to see a source on this if you have one, @Aidan.

Aidan

There were positives receptions to the training as well, here's one that critiqued the race training:

“They told us we need to be ‘color brave’ instead of color blind and it was the whitest thing I’ve ever heard,” she said, describing a journal and discussion portion held mid-way through the session. “Me and my coworkers of color felt uncomfortable the entire time.”

Minority race Starbucks worker talking about the training. From http://time.com/5294343/starbucks-employees-racial-bias-training/ 

The training did however have positive effects in some areas, as the article mentions too.

A paper written in 2011 titled "Ironic Effects of Antiprejudice Messages: How Motivational Interventions Can Reduce (but Also Increase) Prejudice" which stated:

Ironically, motivating people to reduce prejudice by emphasizing external control produced more explicit and implicit prejudice than did not intervening at all.

which suggests this method of combating a bias has the opposite-than-intended effect.

I wouldn't be a fair argument to not mention the paper continues:

Conversely, participants in whom autonomous motivation to regulate prejudice was induced displayed less explicit and implicit prejudice compared with no-treatment control participants.

Showing that prejudice can be combated with autonomous motivation, not external control as used in Starbucks' case.

The abstract for the paper can be viewed here https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0956797611427918 but access to the full thing appears to be behind a paywall.

It's very interesting how reverse psychology can work!

CarolineV

As a disabled person, I have a lot of thoughts on this! (Examples specific to my own field, but I expect there are similar situations in other fields)

In academia in particular, success is often measured by the number of papers you've published, and it's incredibly likely that interviewees will be selected by number of papers, in comparison to number of years since PhD completion-if that's lower than expected you won't be invited to interview. As a disabled person who can't work full-time, my number will always be lower than others, and through positive discrimination it'd mean I could still be granted an interview, where I could prove myself in other ways.

I imagine similar situations could arise for women/people of colour and other minority groups, who through systematic bias have not risen through their career as "expected", but are perfectly capable and qualified employees when given the chance.

Skive

CarolineV said:

I imagine similar situations could arise for women/people of colour and other minority groups, who through systematic bias have not risen through their career as "expected", but are perfectly capable and qualified employees when given the chance.

You don't fix systematic bias by employing a different type of systematic bias. By doing so you are still limiting the opportunities for someone. What you are advocating is not equality of opportunity. 

Recruitment should be done on merit and suitability for the job alone.

With regards to your field, is the number of papers published really a good indicator of success? Perhaps it shouldn't be, though volume of work completed is an often used measure in determining suitability it is not the only measure. Is the quality of the work not considered?

Mike

Skive said:

@CarolineV said:

I imagine similar situations could arise for women/people of colour and other minority groups, who through systematic bias have not risen through their career as "expected", but are perfectly capable and qualified employees when given the chance.

You don't fix systematic bias by employing a different type of systematic bias.

@Skive reckon there's any merit to temporarily using one to balance the other?

I think most people would agree that positive discrimination shouldn't be the end goal, but more a way to compensate for the biases against minority groups until society has caught up and it's no longer needed (assuming that happens at some point).

Skive

I don't think it results in balance. Are you not just shifting the problem around, replacing one type of discrimination for another. It shouldn't be a case of men vs women, disabled vs abled, white vs black et, but that is precisely what discrimination (positive or otherwise) does as far as I can see

If you're an advocate of equality and subscribe to the principle that discrimination is wrong, how can you argue for discriminatory policies? I've always believed that the fight for equality was about furthering inclusion, not creating more division.

Salix_alba_2019

Skive said:

If you're an advocate of equality and subscribe to the principle that discrimination is wrong, how can you argue for discriminatory policies? I've always believed that the fight for equality was about furthering inclusion, not creating more division.

Interesting argument and valid points . I'm curious to know what your solution to this problem would be? 

Perhaps someone could tempt all the cis white able bodied males with irresistible treats into caves, long enough for marginalised groups to apply for these positions 😏😉

In all seriousness, what if these work forces benifit from these marginalised groups, what happens then? How do you increase their numbers without discrimination ? You could even argue that these groups come with very unique experiences and incite that act as bonuses on top of their suitability for the job. One example being the mental health system. It benefits hugely from the diversity because you're getting people from various backgrounds/genders/disabilities accessing the services who can then receive better treatment as result. 

Kasa2103

YANBU. Any type of discrimination whether it is positive or negative is still discrimination just like what @Skive mentioned. However there are certain circumstances where YABU but that is for another comment.

Skive

Salix_alba_2019 said:

Skive said:

If you're an advocate of equality and subscribe to the principle that discrimination is wrong, how can you argue for discriminatory policies? I've always believed that the fight for equality was about furthering inclusion, not creating more division.

Interesting argument and valid points . I'm curious to know what your solution to this problem would be? 

It depends on what you are trying to achieve. Do you want equality of outcome or do you want equality of opportunity?