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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Well done Attorney General

90 replies

AndStand · 04/08/2022 06:25

DM link.
Is the tide beginning to turn?

Attorney General Suella Braverman hits out at diversity training mol.im/a/11078419 via dailym.ai/android

OP posts:
JustSpeculation · 04/08/2022 21:49

Diversity and Inclusion make sense if you separate them out from Social Justice, and think about how they benefit your organisation.

achillestoes · 04/08/2022 21:59

How do they actually benefit the organisation? Say you run a trucking company and you need to hire a supplier to build a mathematical logistics model. What is the benefit to you of doing that in an ‘inclusive’ way rather than giving people equal consideration based on how good a job they might do?

This isn’t an anti-diversity position, btw. I really want to know what the benefit would be.

Skyellaskerry · 05/08/2022 00:08

This is being discussed just now on LBC.

FactsAreNotMean · 05/08/2022 00:08

achillestoes · 04/08/2022 21:59

How do they actually benefit the organisation? Say you run a trucking company and you need to hire a supplier to build a mathematical logistics model. What is the benefit to you of doing that in an ‘inclusive’ way rather than giving people equal consideration based on how good a job they might do?

This isn’t an anti-diversity position, btw. I really want to know what the benefit would be.

Probably less so from the trucking company perspective but more from the mathematic modellers; I actually work in this kind of field, and there can be a real issue with lack of diversity of thought which stiffles creativity and innovation. We take grads on every year, and they're practically clones - mostly young men, mostly white (although not exclusively), who have generally come from nice middle class backgrounds and done the exact same courses at a handful of universities. The course gives them good technical skills, but they have all been trained the exact same way and so the way they approach things tends to be very similar.

Bringing in people from different backgrounds really shakes that up sometimes and creates a diversity of thought. That leads to better, more robust products in most cases because flaws that would otherwise be missed are spotted, questions which weren't even thought of are suddenly asked.

So from the trucking company perspective I think there is a reasonable chance that the more diverse company might have a stronger product - but how you define diverse is the important thing as you could theoretically tick a lot of the big boxes and still end up with a culture which doesn't benefit from that diversity because they've still looked for people who fit a particular mold.

achillestoes · 05/08/2022 02:33

@FactsAreNotMean

Can you share some examples of how white middle class male graduates approach modelling things ‘in the same ways’ and how this can be an issue in something like logistics? I hear a lot of this sort of thing but for the life of me I don’t understand what people mean. How do you know the ‘diversity of thought’ is a result of bringing in people who aren’t (for example) male/white/young? Don’t people think differently regardless of where they’re from? Would you say, for example, that all black female people thought in the same way?

BellaAmorosa · 05/08/2022 08:59

JustSpeculation · 04/08/2022 17:24

I know your question is a bit rhectorical, but I'm going to answer anyway.

I think having a wide range of different types of people leads to a wider range of viewpoints, skills and attitudes. It breeds discussion, avoids complacency and immobilising conservatism (by which I mean a tendency to do things the way you've always done them because that's what you've always done). It leads to a wider understanding of the people involved in your area of business. It facilitates innovation and original, creative thinking. It leads to an increase in the amount of critical thinking that goes on, leading people to evaluate things in ways they may not have previously thought of. And it leads to a more open minded assessment of people. You notice what more they have to offer in a way that can be hidden in a dreary uniformity. It's a good thing.

Inclusivity requires positive action in that it is frequently not immediately obvious what barriers are preventing people getting involved, and sometimes not even obvious to the people themselves. Again, going out of your way to include people who are not getting involved gives you both a better appreciation of their abilities, and of the internal barriers to getting things done that your organisation may suffer from.

This is all good. And the fact that marketed, evangelical EDI courses often do the exact opposite to this does not detract from it.

I don't have issues with less diverse organisatons either, in principle. But I've been in companies that have collapsed because they never thought of changing. No one challenged the status quo and they boiled frogged themselves into oblivion.

👏
Yup!
Otherwise you get turnstiles into women's loos which are too narrow for a buggy to get through
Supposedly neutral" lighting states in a TV studio which are too dark for black people.
A podium at the SPOTY show which has no disabled access.

The designers didn't set out to be sexist, or racist, or ableist. They just didn't have access to other people's life experiences.

achillestoes · 05/08/2022 09:04

‘Otherwise you get turnstiles into women's loos which are too narrow for a buggy to get through.’

Surely all toilet turnstiles should be wide enough to admit a buggy, not just women’s?

BellaAmorosa · 05/08/2022 09:11

@achillestoes
True.
Point is, it was a woman peer in the House of Lords who brought this up. And since in the world which we currently live in women do most of the childcare, narrow turnstiles would inconvenience women more in practice.

achillestoes · 05/08/2022 09:39

@BellaAmorosa

Yes, probably. But it inconveniences us even more for companies to therefore make only the women’s toilets accessible to buggies. We need equality, not divisive ‘equity’ that leaves us (still) holding the baby.

TullyApplebottom · 05/08/2022 09:46

For those who want to understand more how the EA is framed and should work in practice, and how it gets distorted by the EDI industry, I recommend following Audrey Ludwig on Twitter. Expert lawyer and a lovely lady to boot. I need to think about these issues as a non expert and I find her posts insightful and helpful.

ThinkingaboutLangClegosaurus · 05/08/2022 10:12

Excellent news. I'm hoping the sane, common-sense attitudes towards EDI and genderism of Tory women like Suella Braverman will spread and make it increasingly safe for other people to speak out. Just too bad the Tories' economic policies are so disastrous.

Also, good coverage in the Daily Mail.

I wish they (Braverman and the Mail) wouldn't call the gender identity movement 'left-wing', when identity politics is the opposite of left-wing. Most normal people think it's rubbish, and I don't like seeing it bundled in with genuine left-wing demands such as renationalisation of public services. But I can't deny that liberals and the left are the most faithful servants of the genderists, so that was an open goal for the Tories.

ThinkingaboutLangClegosaurus · 05/08/2022 10:17

achillestoes · 04/08/2022 06:55

The EDI industry is just that: an industry. People are being paid by the taxpayer to invent a grotesque caricature of our culture - racist, homophobic, transphobic (but not sexist) - and then come up with ways in which people must do penance to be considered humble enough not to be bullied at work. It must stop. We can’t afford it and it’s not a good idea even if we could. Private businesses can obviously do what they want with their money but the government has a responsibility to make sure people can get an appointment for a persistent cough before they spend money on this drivel.

Well put, and sadly true. EDI may have been set up with good intentions, but it certainly hasn't achieved them, quite the opposite.

ThinkingaboutLangClegosaurus · 05/08/2022 10:27

Pluvia · 04/08/2022 13:08

You might feel differently if you lived in Wales, where we have had a Labour administration for more than 20 years, a lot of that time with a majority that has meant that they can pretty much do what they want. Mark Drakeford, our First Minister, is in total thrall to Stonewall and trans ideology. All LGB and TQ+ matters, including policy, has been outsourced to Stonewall. Apparently he has said that he thinks that Stonewall Cymru is different and better than Stonewall in England.

He's surrounded by a coterie of true believers (Jane Hutt, Hannah Blethyn and others) and there are a number of gay male Special Advisors who are all entrenched in trans ideology. They are buoyed up by the knowledge that Plaid Cymru and the Lib Dems (their main threat here in Wales) are also under the trans spell. When anything involving LGB and TQ+ comes up and they want advice beyond Stonewall the Welsh government turns to a group of trusted advisors including infamously foul-mouthed Pride promoter and trans ally Lu Thomas and transgender medical specialist and ally Dr Sophie Quinney, who has been censured by her own profession for her plans for an affirmation-only model here in Wales.

Over the last three years the Welsh Government have utterly refused to hold discussions with well-established women's groups such as Merched Cymru. They can barely bear to meet their own constituents. My own MS (Labour/ female) has treated me with complete contempt since I approached her to raise this issue.

From where I'm standing here in Wales the Tories look like a beacon of rational adult behaviour. They listened to what women had to say, they didn't apparently bully or shun people who spoke up and, having investigated, they've changed their opinion and are putting things right.

Those of us who effectively live in single party states, in single-chamber 'democracies', in small countries where everyone appears to know everyone else and politicians routinely serve a few years in office before taking up a position at a Welsh university or running one of Wales' many voluntary organisations, before circling back into politics, are trapped.

That's a frightening picture of reality in the sort of smaller, devolved regional administration that seems attractive on paper. Thanks for posting, Pluvia.

BellaAmorosa · 05/08/2022 10:52

achillestoes · 05/08/2022 09:39

@BellaAmorosa

Yes, probably. But it inconveniences us even more for companies to therefore make only the women’s toilets accessible to buggies. We need equality, not divisive ‘equity’ that leaves us (still) holding the baby.

@achillestoes
She wasn't calling for only the women's toilets to be accessible, and she may not even have said women's toilets specifically needed wider spaces. That could be my faulty memory. The point is that it was a woman who pointed out the need.

achillestoes · 05/08/2022 11:58

@BellaAmorosa

Which is perfectly fine and normal. It’s normal for people not to have a granular understanding of what everyone else might need. That’s why organisations should consult and improve things.

But perspective and proportion are also necessary. I believe toilets should admit buggies. Of course they should. But this morning I’m reading on Twitter that, spurred on by EDI, an organisation is banning the term “master document”, in case the descendants of enslaved people find it triggering, and I think that is disproportionate and rather foolish behaviour. I’m reading about businesses being pressured to give women (or ‘people who menstruate’) regular menstrual leave, and again I think that’s foolish. I’m reading about men being dissuaded from applying for jobs because their company is seeking a ‘diverse’ candidate, and I think that’s discriminatory.

These teams are doing far more harm than good.

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