Disappointed with our new head of DEI

Who interviewed him & awarded him the job? Didn't they ask him about this? Or do they not understand it either?

As a person who does not have a gender identity but is a biological female, I'd want to know how he will enact his duty to address equality issues which impact on me. It can't be about gender because I don't have one. of course that doesn't make me any less likely to be paid less or passed over for a job.

This shouldn't be ignored, he's basically admitting he thinks that sex is unimportant, and that he's legally obligated to consider it but he'd rather not. Which shows a complete disregard for everything that women might suffer based on biology, which is nearly everything that we suffer. He is showing that he will be unable to address matters of equality and discrimination for women, which makes women in the company vulnerable.

I would officially complain about him. Imagine if he'd said "we're beholden to protecting race under the Equality Act, but it's a narrow definition based on physical appearance, and it's more useful to treat people as individuals, we're all the same underneath". He'd probably have to resign.

Easy for a man to say that sex is less important than some bollocky word salad about nonsense. He’s admited he’s going to disregard a protected characteristic - one that impacts half the population.

I agree that beholden to the law was an odd usage. It gives the impression that he was gritting his teeth and saying that, unfortunately, they aren't allowed to put transw on an untouchable pedestal, at the expense of women.

And that he sees the company as burdened by need to pay attention to things like pay equality. Because he sees protected characteristics based on physical bodies as narrow.

Well he could hardly have opened the door wider to sex discrimination cases. Head of DEI literally just said he doesn't think sex discrimination is significant.

This. Totally different relation to it - it's a shield, not a burden.

It seems to me that what he is saying is that he thinks the Gender" category will pick up sex discrimination issues, while also picking up gender discrimination. So, pregnancy leave would be sex related, but uniform related issues might be gender even for a woman.

'Gender discrimination' is not - legally - a thing. The protected characteristic is 'gender reassignment'.

Dinosaur companies with uniform policies that require women to wear makeup, tights and high heels (or ban them from wearing trousers) are discriminating on sex, not gender.

You are right, I didn’t word it well. What I was trying to say is that they frequently come from the minorities within a PC that historically have suffered more discrimination e.g. disabled, ethnic minority, LGB etc.

Indeed.

“and are beholden to the Equality Act 2010 under which sex is a protected characteristic. “

A woman might see it as being “protected by” the Equality Act, rather than beholden to it.

'beholden' was an interesting word to use.

Isn't it depressing to see so many ignorant men people being promoted despite their adherence to flat earthism, misogyny and profound ignorance about sex based oppression?
And I'll bet he's paid handsomely for displaying his inbuilt prejudices against women.

Well this is timely. (Gender meaning sex here, obviously).

Could you set up an anonymous Gmail account to email him from to discuss further?

Just to note that most of the discrimination women face is directly sex-based, not based on wearing dresses or high heels etc. Employers prefer workers who cannot get pregnant, beliefs about women being less suited for leadership positions are based on arguments about innate biological differences and so on. And sexual harassment is almost entirely based on sex-related factors so that the harassers are predominantly male and the harassed predominantly female.

So it's not something about chromosomes and other things too narrow to deserve much attention. And if you look more widely, you will find religions and many cultural traditions directly advocate differential treatment on the basis of sex, to the detriment of women and girls.

I thought it was the maternity pay gap, in reality, rather than sex or gender and there's data to back this up? How does that fit with his 'it's not about biology' bollocks.

Categories are supposed to be narrow. They're supposed to group things or people according to a particular characteristic and exclude all things and people who do not have that characteristic. That is literally the whole point of them.

I honestly would be raising merry hell about this and making him rue the day he ever applied for this job.

This is a man who has decided that discrimination against the female sex is unimportant, is it, aye?

So is it. his view that it is feminine people who are underrepresented on company boards, and they are underrepresented because they are feminine?

Double post

It seems to me that what he is saying is that he thinks the Gender" category will pick up sex discrimination issues, while also picking up gender discrimination. So, pregnancy leave would be sex related, but uniform related issues might be gender even for a woman.

I think he's wrong, but I can also see how someone might think in their head this makes some kind of sense, if they aren't very clued in, which I think many people in these roles aren't (sorry people in this sector.)

What I would point out is that actually, if you don't differentiate, you would have no idea if most discrimination women face is gender rather than sex based.

There are other issues too, like whether gender is even a think that has a separate vector than sex, or what it would really encompass, but that is the one I would tend to put out there in this instance.

I have found ED&I leads, and staff, often have one or more protected characteristic. This makes sense because they usually have encountered discrimination due to their PC.

Everybody has at least 6 of the 9 protected characteristics. The only ones that aren't universal are disability, gender reassignment and pregnancy and maternity.