1. Well - given what we have learned so far, I don't see this touching on hiring people who DON'T have merit. My insider told me this Friday: "We're all men, taking the training and agreeing to the principles but yet still hiring all men all the time." I think the point is that women would get a fair shake if they ever applied.
Well again i'm not talking about hiring people who don't have merit, i'm talking about hiring the person with the most merit and therefore not discriminating against people.
2. This is politics. White men have a HUGE advantage in getting elected, just based on their gender and race. It can't be denied. The voter, as much as they are expected to use intelligence in making their choice, really only select candidates in the same way they select grocery store items based on the package.[/quote]
Men in general have an advantage in politics because some ignorant people are sexist in their voting preference. When it comes to race, the dominant race in any given constituency will always have an advantage because virtually all ethnicities contain many racist people who will prefer to elect someone of their own ethnicity, this seems especially true amongst the older and more close-minded of population who haven't been exposed to other ethnicities as much as younger people have. Lots of whites prefer to elect or hire white people, and lots of ie: South Asians prefer to hire or elect other South Asians. You look around Vancouver area or GTA and it's pretty obvious, whether in stores or at MP's and it seems pretty obvious.
This is obviously ethically wrong because racism/sexism is wrong, the question is what do we do about it? My argument is that two wrongs don't make a right, and discriminating against people because others are discriminated against is wrong, not to mention the social science people use to make up whatever hiring decisions or quotas is usually terrible or non-existent. (As far as quotas go, you don't need hard quotas written into policy, because someone can say "we have too many white people, let's hire a few POC". This is a quota, albeit a soft quota someone has pulled out of their butts. "Too many of race/gender X" or "Not enough of race/gender X" is a quota)
If 'Black Woman' is the flavour of the month, then that's in the mix. You really want to stop at this point and say race and gender shouldn't matter ? Quit while you're ahead, I say. Do you think the Republicans would pick a black woman ? Do you think it's ok for that bias to go one way only ?
Race and gender shouldn't matter for general hiring decisions, which is the whole point.
Of course it's ALL bad. So, great then - take it out of politics. How are you going to do that exactly ?
Keep telling people to stop being racist and sexist and judge everyone not by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character etc.
3. There's no way to enforce a rule that the 'best person' be picked because:
a. You are comparing apples and oranges and a set of different capabilities that are all different
b. Electability is the most important part of being the best person
Sure, but you also don't have to have policies that specify that the most qualified person doesn't need to be picked and that skin colour and gender are hiring criteria.