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From: scott@normac.UUCP (Scott Bryan)
Newsgroups: net.religion,net.motss,net.politics
Subject: Re: "Gay Rights"
Message-ID: <117@normac.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 25-Nov-84 02:53:29 EST
Article-I.D.: normac.117
Posted: Sun Nov 25 02:53:29 1984
Date-Received: Mon, 26-Nov-84 02:09:22 EST
References: <1058@ulysses.UUCP> <>
Reply-To: scott@unix.UUCP (Scott Bryan)
Organization: Normac, Lafayette, Ca.
Lines: 50
Summary: 

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