Do you agree with affirmative action policies for men and women?

Question

The new UK Equalities Bill is to legalise preferential hiring policies so that employers can discriminate in favour of men or women where they are attempting to balance all-men or all-women teams.

Whilst this sounds equality minded on the outside, I'm still not sure whether affirmative action is a good thing at all - isn't it still judging people on the basis of their gender, rather than their qualifications and experience? What do you think? :-)

Answer 1

That is exactly the point but it produces mixed feelings all over the world.

It's the "still" you write about that troubles me. Because until the Bill is passed you would "still" be hired base on qualifications and experience. That's not always fair, because generally men are seen as having higher qualifications and experience, and actually that could be the case, because a woman that spent 10 years -or whatever- raising the children will come out of them with poor "working" skills and no experience.

"Still judging people on the basis of their gender" can be read as meaning that affirmative actions are introduced because women are less capable than men -which would actually be judging on the basis of s*x. But that is the fact that is being challenged. Affirmative actions are introduce to generate a new balance through artificial means so all can realize that social disadvantages are not physical disadvantages.

This creates a lot of confusion. See for example Trekbabe's answer. She definitely believes that work has been distributed "as it is" by nature so that men do activities more suited for men and women those "according to their nature". That ideas has prevailed through centuries. It could have because we are physically different -though mostly in strength- but it wasn't because society's aren't built upon pure reason but rather on power.

Answer 2

Affirmative action should only be used in industries that have a proven record of gender discrimination.

Answer 3

I am ALWAYS against AA - no matter the case.  I would like to think that companies create teams with members who are the best at what they do - regardless of gender.  And if that results in an all women or all men team, why should we worry?  It means that the best qualified for the team are members.  

Basing hiring upon gender is NEVER a good idea - and will result, ultimately, in substandard performance, eventually....

Answer 4

The way you've explained it here, and other articles I've read about this, it seems like it's giving employers more opportunity to select the people they want to make up the team they want for their business.

Of course, you are right ~ legislation always sounds super good on paper, the proof is in the day to day results.

It will be interesting to see how it works out.

Cheers :-)

Answer 5

While it can be seen as attributing to gender bias it is not always the case.

Let me use an example: I work for a company that provides care for people with disabilities. It is largely a female team (as women are more likely to be professional carers than males) and there are always people looking for employment at this company (partly because there is so little work around here that everyone wants in). Huge numbers of people apply for very few jobs but one thing that must be looked at is not the qualifications of the applicant but the gender. this is because we have both male and female clients and only get funded for a specific number of contact hours between staff and clients. Some of the clients will only respond to male carers and for others it would be irresponsible to put someone of the opposite gender in a situation with them, such as sending a single (as in 1 worker, nothing to do with whether they are dating) male worker to a female clients house, or getting a well qualified but petite female worker with a larger male client who is known to be violent to female workers.

Gender biases as a rule are bad but when teams are only comprised of one gender or another then it shows a culture in the organization that already biases that gender, this structural barrier is the issue not really the "Affirmative Action" laws that you are discussing.

Answer 6

I am not in favor of any type of racism or sexism, and that is exactly what Affirmative Action is.

Answer 7

I'm a hardcore meritocrat, so no, I don't believe in affirmative action for anyone. But this UK Equalities Bill seems pretty pointless.

Answer 8

I would accept affirmative action if it was 50/50 or like Sweden 40/40 and the other 20% can be either gender.

Sadly in most other Western countries the affirmative action for gender expects 50% women in all roles by 2010 that are above such as politicians and board members. They have no interest in 50% males in any jobs what so ever.

While speaking to one member of the feminist team I asked, "What happens if you get more women than men? Will you make it 50% men?"

She answered, "No, men have ruled for thousands of years and we would love to have 100% women if possible."

This feminists is the head of NZ Human Rights Commission.

The other thing I don't like about the affirmative action plan is what the Women's Commissions are doing. They are picking which women can take these positions. If you don't agree whole heartedly with the feminist agenda you can't get the job.

That is communism, not affirmative action.

Answer 9

Judging someone on their gender alone is undeniably unfair.  If a particular job is better performed by women then perhaps that should be who tends to do it.  Equally, a job better suited to men should perhaps be dealt with mostly by men.  People should be judged only on their ability to do the job, not by whether their genitals are inside or outside!! Ultimately, discrimination (whether positive or not) is still discrimination.