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0 pointsCryoLogic7y ago0 comments

He has a point if just by the math. I get it you want to support women, but many companies do discriminate against perfectly qualified men in order to get that. There is a far smaller supply of qualified women in engineering and engineering leadership right now.

I've been on a team before where one member was adamant about throwing out resumes from white men for the sake of diversity. I know it happens.

So yes, the company probably did partake in sexism and discrimination to get there. Otherwise they are very lucky and a statistical outlier when it comes to qualified female applicants applying.

0 comments

abalone7y ago

You offer no evidence, only unsourced anecdotes. Reaching out to underrepresented groups is not the same as discriminating against massively overrepresented groups. How likely are women to apply to organizations that reflect status quo sexist attitudes? A reputation for fairness can act as a beacon for undervalued talent.

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toomuchtodo7y ago

It’s really disappointing to see organistions legitimize discrimination in their efforts to support diversity for the PR/talent acquisition signaling. Actively discriminating against white men is no different than discriminating against other races and genders.

I too have seen what you’ve described take place.

clay_the_ripper7y ago

I think you need to familiarize yourself with employment law. Specifically the idea of a protected class:

Protected Class: The groups protected from the employment discrimination by law. These groups include men and women on the basis of sex; any group which shares a common race, religion, color, or national origin; people over 40; and people with physical or mental handicaps. Every U.S. citizen is a member of some protected class, and is entitled to the benefits of EEO law. However, the EEO laws were passed to correct a history of unfavorable treatment of women and minority group members.

https://www.archives.gov/eeo/terminology.html

The idea that men are being discriminated against is a farce.

reefoctopus7y ago

It's dscrimination by definition if you're throwing out resumes based on the color of someone's skin and what is between their legs. You can argue all you want that it isn't illegal, but that doesn't make it any less alienating for those of us on the wrong side of it. Equality of opportunity is what we should aim for not equality of outcome.

Jack0007y ago

> He has a point if just by the math

Mathematically the percentage probably falls on a bell curve and is heavily dependent on priors like industry and workplace culture. Given the large number of companies we should expect at least some outliers to occur naturally. Additionally almost every company should expect to be outliers in some kind of arbitrary metric.

danenania7y ago

I wouldn't say anyone's resume should be thrown out, but building a team with diverse backgrounds and ways of thinking is a reasonable goal. A team of the top n qualified applicants (as individuals) isn't at all likely to be the best qualified team.

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