smb@ulysses.UUCP (Steven Bellovin) (11/16/84)
> From: brunson@usfbobo.UUCP (David Brunson) > Subject: re: "Gay Rights" > Message-ID: <215@usfbobo.UUCP> > Date: Thu, 8-Nov-84 22:59:09 EST > Once again, ONCE AGAIN, **ONCE AGAIN!**!@$%!!: THERE ARE > TWO PARTIES INVOLVED IN A PROPOSED LAWSUIT. ONE IS A HOMOSEXUAL. > THE OTHER IS A PERSON (it could be ANY person, Christian, Jew, > Moslem, Atheist, Bahai) WHO REFUSES TO HIRE HOMOSEXUALS. ONE PARTY > WILL WIN THE SUIT. THE OTHER WILL LOSE THE SUIT. *WHO SHOULD WIN > AND WHO SHOULD LOSE AND WHY?* I don't think you have the right to get so upset about people who assumed that you were posing a religious question -- at the very least, your original posting (remember, the one with the patronizing references to Jews, and how you would derive spiritual brownie points by hiring one) was so poorly worded that most respondents felt you were trying to set your religious beliefs above the law. Now you say, though, that your claim is simply that gays ought not be a protected class under the law. You seem to be going a step further, and implying that while (some classes of) disrimination are wrong, the law should not provide any protection at all. Neither of those propositions is inherently indefensible; indeed, many libertarians advocate the latter as an all-encompassing general policy. As a card-carrying liberal (I'm a member of the ACLU...), I strongly disagree. I'll make an equally sweeping counterclaim -- that any refusal to hire someone based on anything other than their ability to do the job is morally wrong, and should probably be legally wrong as well. In practice (and probably as a matter of principle), explicit legal protection is extended only to those groups where there exists a proven history of massive discrimination -- i.e., against blacks, religious minorities, women, etc. Given the widespread homophobia in our society, and many explicit calls that gays should not be hired, I therefore claim that sexual preference should be a protected class under the applicable civil rights statutes. --Steve Bellovin P.S. Given that the premise of the argument is now apparently political instead of religious, I've cross-posted this to net.politics. Future discussion should probably not take place in net.religion....
mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) (11/18/84)
=================
... I'll make an equally sweeping counterclaim -- that any refusal
to hire someone based on anything other than their ability to do the job
is morally wrong, and should probably be legally wrong as well.
...
--Steve Bellovin
=================
At first sight, this claim seems obviously correct, but when you look
a little deeper, you find that it is hard to determine what are the
bounds on "ability to do the job". If the presence of a heavy smoker
(good at the job) impairs the ability of a co-worker to do the job,
is this grounds for at least separating the two, or perhaps to not
hire the smoker? The overall efficiency of the company may be reduced
as compared to hiring an equally able non-smoker. Now carry this over
to psychological (and many would say unrealistic) ill effects caused
by prejudice. Where do you draw the line? If someone gets very
irritated every time he sees a white person working nearby, and therefore
cannot function properly in the presence of a white co-worker, is this
reason for the firm not to hire whites? If someone gets so turned-on
by a pretty woman that he can't work properly, is it a reason not to
hire women? Somewhere, there is a boundary between reasonable and
ridiculous, but simple "ability to do the job" cannot be the place.
I don't know where I would put it, but for me it would probably be
reasonable not to hire a particuarly abrasive person for work in
a close-knit team, or a heavy smoker for work in a close environment.
But then, I don't worry about people's sexual preferences or skin
colour, but I do worry about getting upset by smoke or interpersonal
agression.
--
Martin Taylor
{allegra,linus,ihnp4,floyd,ubc-vision}!utzoo!dciem!mmt
{uw-beaver,qucis,watmath}!utcsrgv!dciem!mmtscott@normac.UUCP (Scott Bryan) (11/25/84)
In article <> mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) writes: >================= >... I'll make an equally sweeping counterclaim -- that any refusal >to hire someone based on anything other than their ability to do the job >is morally wrong, and should probably be legally wrong as well. >... > > --Steve Bellovin >================= >At first sight, this claim seems obviously correct, but when you look >a little deeper, you find that it is hard to determine what are the >bounds on "ability to do the job". If the presence of a heavy smoker >(good at the job) impairs the ability of a co-worker to do the job, >is this grounds for at least separating the two, or perhaps to not >hire the smoker? The overall efficiency of the company may be reduced >as compared to hiring an equally able non-smoker. Now carry this over >to psychological (and many would say unrealistic) ill effects caused >by prejudice. Where do you draw the line? It doesn't seem at all obvious to me. Lets cure the disease and not the symptom. I agree that people have been unfairly discriminated against for whatever reason, but that doesn't give us the right to discriminate against employers. Why should someone have to hire someone they don't like? For whatever reason. Golly, Why would you want to go to work for someone who didn't like you? There are generally two ways to get people to do things. You can force them, in which case they don't to a good job and you waste a lot of energy policeing them, or you can make whatevery it is you want them to do economical, and make it uneconomical for them not to. So now the question becomes: How do we make it uneconomical to descriminate on the basis of sex, creed, religion, ...? Not just employers, but everyone. This is a much more challenging problem. Primarily because it already is uneconomical! (anyone who blindly descriminates for whatever reasons may be missing a good thing, if they spend the time to get rid of the person while a competitor does not then they will have a higher overhead, etc) The problem is that it is not uneconomical enough, or at least the social perception of it isn't there. The problem is that the society at large agrees with the sterotypes behind the discrimination. To fix anything else will only obscure the real problem and make things worse in the long run. The law you think should "probably" exist does in various forms and it is one of the reasons the original problem still exists. Get it? Scott Bryan
srm@nsc.UUCP (Richard Mateosian) (11/27/84)
> Golly, Why would you want to go to work for someone who didn't like you?
For almost exactly the same reasons you'd go to work for someone who
likes you.
--
Richard Mateosian
{cbosgd,decwrl,fortune,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo}!nsc!srm nsc!srm@decwrl.ARPA