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Here's what people get wrong about discrimination laws IMHO. If you accept the premise that humans are anything significantly more than just a sum total of arb

Here's what people get wrong about discrimination laws IMHO. If you accept the premise that humans are anything significantly more than just a sum total of arbitrary biological attributes that they can't control i.e. skin color, gender, sexual orientation, etc. then you have to admit that diversity or anti-discrimination laws are the antithesis of what they claim to be. This is because the laws actively reduce individuals to a minutiae of attributes which the people themselves cannot control and then judge those people based on this gross reduction, actively ignoring - in this diversity equation - personal character, abilities, achievements, and essentially everything which an individual can indeed manipulate and claim some responsibility for. On top of this ill-defined diversity metric, the laws draw broad generalizations of groups and apply them always and only to individuals, regardless of the wants and desires of the particular individual. Thus, the proponents of anti-discrimination always speak of "whites" or "blacks" or "men" or "women", but at the end of the day it is a particular person who is given a job and another particular person who is refused a job all based on absolutely nothing which either one of them could control. To me this seems to be the worst form of discrimination, for it is completely unfounded and truly morally malevolent.

usgroup 9y ago
Descrimination happens on broad characteristics (sex, race,etc) because that's how people descriminate. The central issue is that they descriminate unfairly and that the scope is broad. It's an empirical phenomena rather than a theoretical one. There are laws in many places that protect some characteristics. The laws are reactionary and there to fix an empirically scoped problem. Positive descrimination aims to fix a similar problem with a different prescription.
- jfaucett 9y ago
  > It's an empirical phenomena rather than a theoretical one. Agree. > The laws are reactionary and there to fix an empirically scoped problem. The laws are reactionary and there to fix an empirically scoped problem. Again agree with the statement. Its the scope definition that I think is ill-defined, and in the main, my point is that the actual repercussions of these laws on individuals are ignored. If groups had feelings and emotions and human rights positive discrimination would make more sense. However, only individuals have feelings, desires, a sense of moral right and wrong, and without knowing any details how can someone punish one individual and reward another based off of nothing either of those individuals can control and while simultaneously knowing no relevant details about the actual context in which the supposed "fairness" action should take place? Imagine in a society the distribution of people of attribute X has a lower mean educational attainment than those of Y and that both distributions are normal - this is the empirical datum. As a legislator you see this datum and think its horrible, as you rightly would, and so you enact some positive discrimination laws which make it more difficult for Y's to get accepted into and graduate from schools and easier for X's to get accepted into and graduate from schools. This all seems fine and in a few years perhaps the distributions close in on each other. The actual question is this: was that a morally and ethically good thing to do? How can you find out? You could look at the group distributions and you might be happy, but I think this ignores the ethic responsibility a society has to being just and fair towards every individual in a like manner. Thus if Bob has a score of 250 and Jane has a score of 300 on a collegiate entrance exam - ceteris paribus - then Jane should be admitted to the school irrespective of her being a member of set Y because to not do so is to act out unfairly against a real individual, who has done nothing to deserve this, who has feelings and a right to self-actualization of her own. At the very least, each society should look at the effects positive discrimination laws have on real individuals, detailed subcategories based on controllable factors such as personality, skills, etc - instead of groups, and honestly weigh the costs. As a last example, how many Asians get turned down each year who would otherwise have been admitted to ivy league schools and made better lives for themselves and their families if it were not for the unfortunate fact that they were arbitrarily shoved to some group labeled Asians, which had been assigned higher entrance exams scores than the rest of the applicants, and their worth weighted heavily based on this group assignment? Is this fair and justifiable at the level of the individual applicant?
  - usgroup 9y ago
    Having to hire 30% women and how you choose to find the right ones is unrelated. Again descrimination happens categorically. The positive descrimination also happens categorically offsets that. I get your point about individuals but talking about means is not the same as talking about the emotions of groups (as if they could have them). I think "levelling playing fields" is a better metaphor. Just as the best boxer doesn't win every fight, policy hopes for fairer outcomes in the main. Often positive descrimination policy is introduced based on measurably successful precedent set elsewhere.

usgroup 9y ago

Descrimination happens on broad characteristics (sex, race,etc) because that's how people descriminate. The central issue is that they descriminate unfairly and that the scope is broad. It's an empirical phenomena rather than a theoretical one. There are laws in many places that protect some characteristics. The laws are reactionary and there to fix an empirically scoped problem. Positive descrimination aims to fix a similar problem with a different prescription.

jfaucett 9y ago
> It's an empirical phenomena rather than a theoretical one. Agree. > The laws are reactionary and there to fix an empirically scoped problem. The laws are reactionary and there to fix an empirically scoped problem. Again agree with the statement. Its the scope definition that I think is ill-defined, and in the main, my point is that the actual repercussions of these laws on individuals are ignored. If groups had feelings and emotions and human rights positive discrimination would make more sense. However, only individuals have feelings, desires, a sense of moral right and wrong, and without knowing any details how can someone punish one individual and reward another based off of nothing either of those individuals can control and while simultaneously knowing no relevant details about the actual context in which the supposed "fairness" action should take place? Imagine in a society the distribution of people of attribute X has a lower mean educational attainment than those of Y and that both distributions are normal - this is the empirical datum. As a legislator you see this datum and think its horrible, as you rightly would, and so you enact some positive discrimination laws which make it more difficult for Y's to get accepted into and graduate from schools and easier for X's to get accepted into and graduate from schools. This all seems fine and in a few years perhaps the distributions close in on each other. The actual question is this: was that a morally and ethically good thing to do? How can you find out? You could look at the group distributions and you might be happy, but I think this ignores the ethic responsibility a society has to being just and fair towards every individual in a like manner. Thus if Bob has a score of 250 and Jane has a score of 300 on a collegiate entrance exam - ceteris paribus - then Jane should be admitted to the school irrespective of her being a member of set Y because to not do so is to act out unfairly against a real individual, who has done nothing to deserve this, who has feelings and a right to self-actualization of her own. At the very least, each society should look at the effects positive discrimination laws have on real individuals, detailed subcategories based on controllable factors such as personality, skills, etc - instead of groups, and honestly weigh the costs. As a last example, how many Asians get turned down each year who would otherwise have been admitted to ivy league schools and made better lives for themselves and their families if it were not for the unfortunate fact that they were arbitrarily shoved to some group labeled Asians, which had been assigned higher entrance exams scores than the rest of the applicants, and their worth weighted heavily based on this group assignment? Is this fair and justifiable at the level of the individual applicant?
- usgroup 9y ago
  Having to hire 30% women and how you choose to find the right ones is unrelated. Again descrimination happens categorically. The positive descrimination also happens categorically offsets that. I get your point about individuals but talking about means is not the same as talking about the emotions of groups (as if they could have them). I think "levelling playing fields" is a better metaphor. Just as the best boxer doesn't win every fight, policy hopes for fairer outcomes in the main. Often positive descrimination policy is introduced based on measurably successful precedent set elsewhere.