1. Frank has a small business and a vacancy to fill. He interviews two candidates, Bill and Joe. Although Joe is otherwise a bit more qualified than Bill, Frank hires Bill because Joe has a high-pitched voice and Frank can't stand listening to men with high-pitched voices. Unethical?
2. Frank has a small business and a vacancy to fill. He interviews two candidates, Bill and Joe. Although Joe is otherwise a bit more qualified than Bill, Frank hires Bill because Joe is black and Frank can't stand the sight of black people. Unethical?
(Added: Inspired by this post and mini-exchange)
Nothing as Useful as a Bad Theory
4 years ago
21 comments:
#2 is clearly unethical. The only question is #1. I think that's clearly unethical because, at the very least, it's sexist -- he specifically doesn't like men with high voices. A tougher question might be if you changed the hypo so that he can't stand listening to anyone with a high voice relative to his or her gender's average vocal pitch.
Hm. I thought for a while (i.e., more than a minute) about what would be #1, looking for something that would be realistic but not objectionable. I considered whether anyone would find the high-pitched version sexist and concluded no.
So what about people with high-pitched voices relative to their gender's average. What about "... can't stand the sight of redheads?"
Redheads -- that would be racist against whites.
Joking, eh?
Why would you think I'm joking?
Well, for one, if you're serious, you should also have said something about the other option, chosen by yourself. Also, given modern dyeing technology, the option of being a redhead is available to people of all races. (I said nothing about natural redheads.)
Oh, and I added something to the post.
you should also have said something about the other option, chosen by yourself
Huh?
Also, given modern dyeing technology, the option of being a redhead is available to people of all races. (I said nothing about natural redheads.)
Similarly, someone of any religion might be called Mohammed. But if an employer had a policy of not hiring anyone named Mohammed, wouldn't that pretty clearly be prejudiced against Muslims?
Depends on what question exactly you're trying to answer. If you received the new information that an employer you know has a dislike of the name Mohammed, you'd want to adjust your estimate of the probability that the employer is anti-Muslim upwards. But the policy itself is not anti-Muslim, it's anti-Muhammad.
According to that test, wouldn't it be unethical to have a preference for pretty much anything? Because pretty much everything is more strongly associated with some groups compared to others - only in the Muhammad example the correlation's very strong.
Maybe I should be explicit about why I wrote this post. After that exchange with Troy Camplin at his blog (the link to which I added), I had the idea that most people didn't have an issue with employers taking qualities of an applicant other than those you find in a job description into account. But this changes once we're talking about certain qualities, race being the prime example. I feel the same way, but I couldn't think of a decent rationale (although it isn't hard to see the historical reasons for the difference).
If you received the new information that an employer you know has a dislike of the name Mohammed, you'd want to adjust your estimate of the probability that the employer is anti-Muslim upwards. But the policy itself is not anti-Muslim, it's anti-Muhammad.
No, the policy itself is anti-Muslim. If you refuse to hire anyone named Mohammed -- regardless of your mental state -- you will be discriminating against Muslims.
Similarly, if you discriminate against redheads, you will discriminate against whites (almost all redheads are white). If you discriminate against people under a certain height, you will discriminate against Asians (Asians have a shorter average height than other races). If you discriminate against people of a certain skin tone, you will discriminate against certain races and ethnicities (even though it's theoretically possible for a dark-skinned white person to have the same tone as a light-skinned black person). I don't even think any of this is my opinion -- these are just facts about the world.
According to that test, wouldn't it be unethical to have a preference for pretty much anything? Because pretty much everything is more strongly associated with some groups compared to others...
I don't see how you get to that conclusion. All that follows from my test is that it's unethical to discriminate based on an arbitrary factor that's correlated with a sociological category that's worth protecting, e.g. age, race, gender, sexual orientation, religion. Not all non-job-description factors are arbitrary, and not all non-job-description factors are correlated to demographic categories. So I stand by that principle.
"No, the policy itself is anti-Muslim. If you refuse to hire anyone named Mohammed -- regardless of your mental state -- you will be discriminating against Muslims."
That appears to be a question of mere semantics. An anti-Muhammad policy would certainly make it less likely that someone would hire Muslims. If you want to call it anti-Muslim despite the fact that it doesn't take religion into account, fine. I won't.
What's the criterion that distinguishes arbitrary from non-arbitrary non-job-description factors?
What makes a category worth protecting?
I guess it's hard to find factors that are completely uncorrelated with demographics.
What makes a category worth protecting?
Is it even necessary to give an abstract answer to this before you can conclude that race, gender, sexual orientation, and religion are worth protecting?
Well, you implied that some categories are worth protecting while others aren't; shouldn't there be a criterion or set of criteria that distinguishes one group from the other other than gut reactions?
Personally I have a hard time getting my head round the notion of protecting categories at all. Maybe it's just the wording?
Personally I have a hard time getting my head round the notion of protecting categories at all.
So you're in favor of discrimination.
Everybody's in favour of discrimination, the question is what kinds and why. Your comment is not particularly enlightening in that regard.
Everybody's in favour of discrimination, the question is what kinds and why.
OK, if "the question is what kinds," that implies there are some kinds you're not in favor of. Whatever those kinds are, those are the categories that should be protected.
Sorry if I've failed to give a treatise on protected classes in this comments section... There's plenty of material on it in U.S. Supreme Court cases, especially with regard to race. Since I'm from a country with a terrible history of discrimination, it's something I've had to think about.
Well, you obviously don't have the obligation to post anything here, but I thought the aim of rational discussion was to at least pinpoint the reasons for disagreement.
I'll overlook your last sentence.
I'll overlook your last sentence.
Apparently not.
Oh dear.
Wait, do you disagree that someone from a country with a horrifying history of discrimination has an extra responsibility to be aware of the badness of discrimination? I don't see how that's even arguable.
Use your imagination. The way this exchange has gone, I don't think a discussion about the matter would be particularly fruitful. And I don't like having my nationality held against me.
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