Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site dciem.UUCP Path: utzoo!dciem!mmt From: mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) Newsgroups: net.politics,net.social,net.women,net.flame Subject: Re: Discrimination and Affirmative Action Message-ID: <1562@dciem.UUCP> Date: Wed, 29-May-85 18:36:21 EDT Article-I.D.: dciem.1562 Posted: Wed May 29 18:36:21 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 29-May-85 20:08:07 EDT References: <566@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP> Reply-To: mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) Organization: D.C.I.E.M., Toronto, Canada Lines: 43 Summary: >Considering the long way society has come since the '30s and '40s it >would be far better to let things alone and the problem of discrimination >will disappear as it has been doing - things have been happening >without anybody really noticing. I'd like a bit of statistical data on that claim. My impression was that there was less sexual discrimination in the workforce during and after the war than now (or at least in recent years, until affirmative action programs began taking hold). > Racial/sexual/whatever quotas >will bring back the prejudices and hatred of the 40's - only worse >because the object of this hatred is mixed into the workplace. Then >everybody will be involved in it. You can see this happening up >here due to long-standing hiring policies of the Canadian Govt. >w.r.t. French speaking employees. What's that supposed to mean? Federal employees who are not French monolinguals hate those who are? Bilingual employees are hated by monolinguals because people HAVE to be bilingual in senior positions in this bilingual country? Come off it! I don't know where the machine "mnetor" is, but it doesn't seem to be in Ottawa, and if it is a Federal Government machine in Toronto, there is almost NO language requirement other than English for any but the most senior positions. I haven't heard from francophone bilinguals working in the Federal Government that they feel hated, or that they hate anglophones (bilingual or otherwise). The only places I have come across anti-French "hatred" are in newspaper reports out of rural districts of Manitoba and westward, where they object to bilingual cereal boxes as "pushing French down our throats." In Manitoba, there was a great fuss about giving the substantial French-speaking population equal legal rights with the English speakers, but that was hardly affirmative action in the workplace; it was simple bigotry of people afraid that allowing others equal rights might in some way jeopardize their own position. I guess a lot of this antipathy to affirmative action, ERA and so forth comes from this same fear (but not all; there have been some rational arguments as well). -- Martin Taylor {allegra,linus,ihnp4,floyd,ubc-vision}!utzoo!dciem!mmt {uw-beaver,qucis,watmath}!utcsri!dciem!mmt