Yet at the same time, most of the people who employ this
argument when combatting racism or sexism will also insist that it is wrong to
discriminate against disabled people.
Still more intriguing, these people are often extremely opposed to the
idea that it would be okay to discriminate against, say, the Irish, even if it
was determined that Irish people tend to have lower IQs, lower stamina, or
weaker verbal skills. If we take away
the foundation of the argument, the assumption of equal capability, we find
that many people are still against discrimination. The question is, why?
The third point is key, because it taught me that there actually is a narrow circumstance where discrimination is permissible. Is such permission justified? I think so. And with this realization, I had identified a transition point – a situation in which my views on discrimination would change. I don’t find anything wrong with sperm banks refusing applications from women looking to donate, because even if they did accept such applications it wouldn’t lead to any female sperm donors.
This is the path my thoughts took me some years ago when I
really started noticing that the way people talked about discrimination just
couldn’t be applied to disabled people. So
I poked around a bit trying to figure out what kinds of discrimination people
reject the most, and what kinds they are more okay with. Here are three important observations I’ve
made:
-When Group A is less capable than Group B only or primarily
because of discrimination, people are
against denying Group A an
opportunity. Furthermore, these people
are also against the discrimination that is inhibiting Group A’s capabilities.
Example: Racial
minorities in the US suffer from underfunded public schools because their
families are typically poorer. This
causes many such minorities to average lower scores on academic assessments. This is a major issue that anti-racists want
our society to address.
-When Group A is on average less capable than Group B, but
there are still members of Group A who are adequately competent, it is not okay
to deny Group A an opportunity.
Example: Short
people tend to be at a disadvantage when playing basketball, yet there are some
short yet amazing NBA players.
Note: It
sometimes considered okay if the opportunity given to Group A is
segregated. This is almost exclusively
seen in sports, which provide both women’s and men’s leagues. This has been ruled as 'not okay' when the segregation is based on race, though a large part of the rational for that was that 'colored' facilities were just plain shitty.
-When members of Group A are all literally incapable of a
task, it is perfectly acceptable to not consider them for membership.
Example: Nobody
complains about people assuming that a surrogate mother can’t be a man, nor
does anyone complain about sperm banks not accepting donations from women.
The third point is key, because it taught me that there actually is a narrow circumstance where discrimination is permissible. Is such permission justified? I think so. And with this realization, I had identified a transition point – a situation in which my views on discrimination would change. I don’t find anything wrong with sperm banks refusing applications from women looking to donate, because even if they did accept such applications it wouldn’t lead to any female sperm donors.
So let’s ask ourselves the golden question again, what
happens when the justification goes away?
What if we found some men who were capable of carrying a baby to term? (Don’t ask how, just roll with the
hypothetical.) Would it still be okay to
bar them from being surrogate ‘mothers’?
To this I would say no. And I
would say no even if only a very small percentage of men had this capability. And where’s the harm? Denying some men the opportunity to do
something that they are actually capable of.
This analysis is consistent with the three observations
above. It does not, I repeat, does not require equal capabilities between
groups. Even if Group A tends to be far less capable, the
existence of some competent members
of Group A means that discrimination will cause harm. Only in the case where literally zero members of Group A are sufficiently
competent will discrimination be harmless.
And you know what happens in such cases? Discrimination begins to look like non-discrimination! Even if an abortion clinic decided to start
offering abortions to men, I wouldn’t expect it to actually perform any. Because whether or not an abortion can even
be performed relies on things like “Carrying fetus?” And for men, the answer to that question is always a no. So “Is male” is all the
information you need. Sure you could gather
more, but that would just increase costs.
Since “Is male” gives us a perfectly reliable measurement of “Carrying
fetus?” there’s no need to look any further.
And since no more information is required, nobody blames abortion
clinics for rejecting patients based solely on their maleness.
And this is what makes most forms of discrimination not just
wrong, but downright dumb. When you bar
women from trying out for your football team, but judge the men based on their
performance, you are using a measurement of “Is female?” in place of a
measurement of “Is good at football?”
That’s a shitty measurement. Heck, even if 90% of women who want to join
your team would fail to pass muster, you’ve still got a serious error in your
analysis. So if you already have tools
for measuring “Is good at football?” directly (and you do, because you’re using
it for the men), you should just go ahead and make that measurement. It might even find you some stellar players!
And remember that even when discrimination is okay, when the
correlation is 100%, you would still reach the same conclusions by not discriminating. This tells us that even when we think the correlation is 100%, we should
hold off on discriminating until we are damn sure. So if you really, truly think that no man
will ever be competent enough to join your dance team, let the men try
anyway. If you’re right, you’ll have a
bunch of men showing all the naysayers just how incompetent they are. But if you’re wrong, then allowing male
applicants will let you strengthen your
team.
If there are
competent male dancers out there, barring them from tryouts isn’t just causing them harm, it’s also hurting your team. By relying on a shitty measurement like “Is
male?” instead of a more accurate measurement like “Can dance?” you are forcing
yourself to make decisions on unreliable information when you could easily
obtain more reliable data. And that’s
not just wrong, it’s stupid.
PS: The next time you respond to discrimination with a claim that sounds like "Group A is just as capable as Group B," try adding "And even if they weren't it would still be wrong."
PS: The next time you respond to discrimination with a claim that sounds like "Group A is just as capable as Group B," try adding "And even if they weren't it would still be wrong."
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