Bristol City Council have set aside a job (officially an extended training role) exclusively for ethnic minority candidates.
Today Harriet Harman has proposed to amend the Labour Party's rules to ensure a 50:50 split between men and women for cabinet positions.
Both of these ideas are rationalised on the grounds of guaranteeing proportionate representation for all groups in society. The idea is flawed on a number of levels, first of all it is hard not to notice that there are never plans for positive discrimination when white males are underrepresented, for example in medical schools.
Secondly the idea that there is something intrinsically awry if groups are not represented in proportion to their presence in the population. It isn't the case, men and women behave differently and different ethnic groups are just that different in their cultural capital, attitudes and social history.
Finally the harm caused by these sort of actions is much greater than any potential benefit. Seeing as only two candidates will get the Bristol job, it means that dozens of white applicants will feel that they have been denied a job, even though most of them would not have got the post anyway.
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8 comments:
'it is hard not to notice that there are never plans for positive discrimination when white males are underrepresented, for example in medical schools.'
Also there are areas where men are seriously over represented, but no 'remedial' measures a la Harperson are ever proposed to counter such over representation. For example, death and serious injury at work is still very largely a male preserve. Harriet's friends don't agitate for female quotas in those jobs where ,statistically speaking, death and serious injury is more prevalent. As always, grievance mongering, whether on ethnic or gender grounds, is highly selective.
How many children and teenagers are there in Parliament?
There are millions of them "not represented" in this sense...
The whole idea is daft; though in today's society I accept that it had become "necessary" to play the game to some extent, to avoid it being used as a political weapon by one's opponents.
On the other hand we do have a Cabinet with a certain number of reserved positions for Lib Dems...
And what do the Authorities plan to do to address ethnic imbalance in the "hideously Gujarati" newsagent and subpostmaster sectors, that's what I want to know. Eh? Eh?
"For example, death and serious injury at work is still very largely a male preserve."
So if we shoot Harriet Harman then it will be in the name of equality.
"How many children and teenagers are there in Parliament?"
By chronological age or emotional age?
Matthew- True.
Edwin- Exactly my point, when ethnic minorites dominate desirable occupations it is quite rightly attributed to their hard work and enterprise but when the reverse is true it is a problem to be solved.
Finally the harm caused by these sort of actions is much greater than any potential benefit.
Spot on. I wonder how many, hundreds or more, who read about this and made decision to vote BNP?
How those in the public sector can be so naive is beyond me.
"How those in the public sector can be so naive is beyond me."
I suppose if challenging this kind of thinking marks you out as a trouble maker the people who can see the downside keep quiet about it.
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