Kemi Badenoch: Diversity policies should not "come at the expense of white men"

[AdamRyan]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1879473/kemi-badenoch-diversity-white-men/amp

https://www.independent.co.uk/business/kemi-badenoch-diversity-initiatives-can-be-ineffective-and-counterproductive-b2515403.html

Two links with different headlines but the gist is the same.

White men are disproportionately represented in a number of organisations (including the RAF which Badenoch highlighted). Any activity that increases representation of any other groups including women is necessarily therefore going to come at the expense of white men.

I know KB is anti-woke but I hadn't realised she was also anti-feminist. I cannot get my head round this statement at all. It's all a bit "people, know your place"

OK so is it fair to say a lot of people posting think the overrepresentation of white men in positions of power, wealth and influence is a historical hangover from 20 years ago when there were far fewer women and people of different heritages at work?

Because I started work 20 years ago and I don't remember it being expected women weren't going to study/work in an equal way to men. Quite the opposite.

If you were talking about the 50s, maybe. But those people are all retired now.

Women are seriously over-represented in higher education. And they do as well or better in the workplace too, generally.

What changes things is having children. Nothing else creates such a radical differentiation between the life choices made by men and women.

Unsurprisingly. It's the fundamental physiological divider between males and females.

The data has been available foy many years to show that is a very significant component of differences between men and women in the workforce, so I am surprised to see anyone who cares about it a lot being unaware that this is the case.

That's not what I'm saying Adam.

I'm saying it's multifaceted and discrimination in employment isn't the answer.

But you seem to think it's uni factorial and the problem is discrimination and the answer is more discrimination.

It's really so important to break down data.

Even in the US, supposedly the home of deep unconcious bias to anyone black, if you break that group down, what you see is that there are really significant differences.

Break down ethnicity - those who have immigrated from Africa, or the Caribbean, aren't anything like the "average" American black experience. They are typically more educated and better employed and have a lot more money. In the case of some Africans, they are among the highest achieving and most educated in the nation. Clearly they are getting admitted to universities and hired to good employment.

Or you can break it down by class. If you look at working class vs middle class black families, what you see is that the working class families are almost indistinguishable from the white working class families, and the middle class ones similarly are very much like white middle class families.

Importantly, those families who really struggle will generally continue to do so intergenerationally, whatever race they are.

The idea that it's bias in admitting members of certain minorities to universities or hiring that is causing these disparities just doesn't seem that plausible when it suddenly disappears for some of those people when you look at the data more closely.

That's not what I'm saying Malaga.

I'm saying white men do better at work and I want Badenoch on focusing on improving outcomes for other groups, rather than worrying about diversity coming at the expense of white men.

It's not a particularly out there idea for a feminist to want women to have equality with men.

Men have children too.
There is no reason in the 21st century that "having children" should be accepted as a reason to explain why women aren't equal to men.

Just to muddy the waters: in advance of the Hate Crime Act going live in Scotland on (I joke not) 1st April, Police Scotland say on their website, https://www.scotland.police.uk/what-s-happening/campaigns/2023/hate-crime/

"We know that young men aged 18-30 are most likely to commit hate crime, particularly those from socially excluded communities who are heavily influenced by their peers. They may have deep-rooted feelings of being socially and economically disadvantaged, combined with ideas about white-male entitlement." [my emphasis]

In this context, I find it hard to fathom who is at (and where is) the bottom of the pack. What does diversity and inclusion mean?

Why is it permissible to point a finger at this particular ethnic/economic/age and sex group as being somehow problematic? WTF is going on?

I'm a feminist and absolutely in favour of ensuring that both sexes, all ethnicities and sexualities are included at every level of the workplace, according to merit, not by tickbox - but why the fuck does everyone ignore class as the ultimate barrier to participation?

Stop with the diversity and inclusion training - it's cart before horses. Put the all of that money and more into things like Sure Start and literacy and numeracy in primary schools, where you can reach every child (without fear of favour) and make a difference to their lives. Then the workplace will be transformed in ways we can't imagine now.

I’m absolutely not ok with the dominance of older white men.
But being careful about how we address and discuss that seems reasonable.

Being unable to discuss things because of accusations of racism etc doesn’t help.

Whether white working class lads are over implicated in hate crime and under represented in education, or black working class lads, then we need to be able to talk about it.

And without a doubt women are succeeding in some areas and not in others and are massively impacted by having children. Far more so than men. Sometimes that impact is from the workplace, but not always.

Yes as regards race. I am abit older than you (55) and when I started work there were hardly any ethnic minorities in my workplace as much fewer in the country. So stands to reason that there will be fewer ethnic minorities in Board positions as they are my contemporaries who worked their way up (unless professionals who immigrated since then). I have a professional qualification and know I could have done much more with my career but instead took time out to raise 4 children (which I was lucky to be able to do with a higher earning husband and house prices being more affordable then). I have got much more out of raising my family than career - why do you think working in the rat race is the only thing that matters? Maybe you should value other things more?

I am still gutted the Conservatives scrapped sure start because I agree with you about how important they are.
To me it's an "and" not an "or". We do need schemes to ensure workplaces are inclusive. As a woman in STEM I've worked in environments where the organisation really cared about EDI and ones where they just paid lip service. The latter organisations are not ones I'd recommend any woman worked in.

Also a good EDI initiative should be about getting the most out of the staff you have, not about "point[ing] a finger at this particular ethnic/economic/age and sex group as being somehow problematic".

White men in themselves are not problematic. Their overrepresentation in powerful, better paying, influential jobs is, if you believe in equality of opportunity for everyone. Because it demonstrates we aren't there yet.

I have got much more out of raising my family than career - why do you think working in the rat race is the only thing that matters? Maybe you should value other things more?

I don't think its "the only thing that matters". I want people (men as well as women) to be able to choose that option if they want. I bet you don't say to your husband that he's priorotised "the rat race". So why say it to a working mother?

What has changed over my life time is its become increasingly difficult for a family to survive on one income. So most people don't have a choice - both parents have to work.

Given that it seems unfair for women to continue to be penalised because we are the sex that can give birth. I'd quite like our women and Equalities minister to focus on that, but the impression I get is she's far more concerned about winning the "anti-woke" vote than she is about doing her job.

“Given that it seems unfair for women to continue to be penalised because we are the sex that can give birth. I'd quite like our women and Equalities minister to focus on that, but the impression I get is she's far more concerned about winning the "anti-woke" vote than she is about doing her job.”

Or perhaps , like you, she cares about both and doesn’t see it as an either or?

I just googled this dude. Really? I get enough "thoughts" from middle aged white men in STEM at work (where throughout my career I've usually been the only woman in the room and regularly dismissed as "not technical enough" to understand by which they mean lacking the testicles of objectivity).

I wish you'd posted a woman in STEM's thoughts.

What she writes about gives an impression of what she cares about. Nowhere in that article (or anywhere else I don't think) has she talked about discrimination against women. I haven't seen her share any examples from Pregnant then Screwed, yet she's shared more than one about white men being discriminated against.

I don't know what she actually thinks, because I don't know her. But based on what she says and does its hard for me to see that she cares about discrimination against women.

For whatever reason white men rule the world, created all the western types of countries ( imagine all English speaking also). So white, English and men. There is nothing you can do about it, despite the many daily fashion political waves, which come and go.

You still make a baby with a man and a woman, you still need food to survive and a house to live in. All the best to the rest of those who have spare time to engage in endless fruitless debates

That's my point, we are not penalised, but realistically it is very hard for both partners to get to senior levels with children so one of them has to take a step back. Because of biology this is likely to be the woman so in a meritocracy there should always be more men at the top. I would argue that inadequate women have been overpromoted to get around this (see Paula Vennells) and yes I know that there are crap men running organisations but more likely to be inadequate if you promote on anything other than merit. As others have said the main issue is class - the lack of opportunities for working class people has visibly got worse in my lifetime.

This is a very interesting article (old but still relevant) which outlines what I mean - Badenoch has a feminist body but does she have a feminist mind? I can't see any evidence she does.

https://bylinetimes.com/2022/07/14/feminist-bodies-or-feminist-minds-in-the-conservative-leadership-contest/

That is factually incorrect. White men don't "rule the world".

In fact the closest thing we've had to someone who "ruled the world" geographically was a white woman - Queen Victoria.

In terms of world dominance over the longest period, that would be the Chinese.
So white, English and men. There is nothing you can do about it
One of the great things about humans is we can shape out environment. So I don't believe that for a minute.

Sorry did you just seriously imply there are more mediocre women leaders than men? And that women leaders are there because of tokenism?

I'm very taken aback. That's an extremely anti-feminist view and not what Id expect on a feminist board. The GC cause definitely makes for strange bed fellows.

How are you going to shape your environment? By forcing white men out of your town, city or country? By bringing forcefully people of colour once again from other continents?? - you are dellusional and anti-social

As others have said the main issue is class - the lack of opportunities for working class people has visibly got worse in my lifetime.

I do agree with this, but I'd say it's been a roller coaster in my lifetime with it getting worse under the Conservatives. Unsurprisingly because the Tories stripped out all the social mobility activity Labour brought in under the guise of "austerity". Now we are in the position of your parents wealth being the biggest predictor of your own success and affluence. That's not really OK and if the Conservatives were serious about it, they would have done something with their levelling up agenda.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-68574010.amp

😂
No, far more boring than that. For me personally it means encouraging my boys to see themselves as equally important and involved in parenting. Supporting my daughter to know her value, trust her instincts and see her needs as equally important to anyone else. Challenging racist and sexist behaviour from colleagues, mentoring my colleagues to be more inclusive at work. And voting where I think the most support to disadvantaged groups will come from.

I'm not going to be grateful for the largesse of the "ruling class" aka white English men as you put it. This isn't the middle ages.

It's not an excuse, it's an explanation. If you don't understand why something happens you don't even know if it should change, much less how to do it.

Men neither get pregnant, nor suffer the potential aftermaths of pregnancy, and they don't experience the fourth trimester. They don't breastfeed, neither do they experience the hormonal and physiological processes that are designed to prompt them to care for their infants in the same way.

Even without considering that many women want to be the ones to care for their infants and young kids, even if you just take the effects and aftermath of pregnancy, that first year, and extrapolate it across the population, it is going to make a significant differernce to the outcomes. You will have a host of women taking one, two, and maybe more years off for infant care and breastfeeding, depending on how many kids they have; you will have some that have to stop work during pregnancy; you will have some that find they have to stop work after pregnancy, for a time or occasionally permanently.

This is just the reality of sexed bodies like we have, and until we start growing babies in bags t's going to affect workplace outcomes. And personally I hope we never start growing babies in bags, that is an anti-woman dystopian solution.

Seeing every part of life perfectly composed of population levels of groups is not necessarily an outcome that is important or even desirable.

My cousin works for a company that a year or so ago announced a target of recruiting 40% from ethnic minorities - which by itself discriminates against white people. One of their main bases was in part of the UK where the population of ethnic minorities is lower, so they relocated a substantial part of their business to a city in the midlands in order to help achieve this target. This left behind/undermined local initiatives and a new college campus set up to meet the needs of this employer in an area with poor achievement by the group which is actually the most underachieving group in the UK - white working class boys from seaside towns.

They are now finding it difficult to recruit sufficiently skilled staff in their new base.