Women & Discrimination

au:

Did you see the episode on "Third Watch" , where the MATURE woman cop went out on patrol with the young immature male cop? When the bad guys appeared on the scene, the male WET his pants, and the female cop had to corner and arrest the bad guy, all by HERSELF!



Good thing the female knew how to shoot her gun!

New Haven
I am sure that they are shooting guns and know how to use them if need be. What however, does that have to do with employing unqualified women and in positions for the sake of political correctness?
So called political correctness has done more damage than good. It has destroyed our school system. But that is another subject.

New Haven
Third Watch? I don't watch the idiot box very often so no. Is it a true story or a Hollywood version?

I apologize if my post was not in keeping with where the train of posts was going here. I thought regional takes on sexual discrimination would be appropriate.

In regard to my post, that particular gentleman has actually offended males here with his comments, too. So, maybe it's more of a personality quirk than a male ego issue.

A while back I wrote a senryu about this male-loving, homophobic culture:

A Date with Bubba

He sports her like his belt buckle,
Then ignores her
To go play with the boys.

dupre - great senryu (cousin to haiku?) I lived in GA for 5 years. It was a very different world. I didn't much venture outside Athens.

au - who's hiring unqualified women?

littlek
Unqualified for the physical requirements. Police and fire departments.

littlek, thanks for your response and for empathising with my cultural quandery. Yes, senryu is related to haiku, offering a satirical social commentary.

au - i hope that unqualified men and unqualified women are not hired by the fire and police departments where i live. i also hope that the fire and police departments make more of an effort to ensure that both men and women on staff maintain the fitness requirements to effectively do those jobs.

i will say that what i see at my local fire hall is many fit men, 2 or 3 extraordinarily fit women and a handful of frighteningly unfit middle-aged men. i know that i want people from the first 2 groups responding if there's a fire on my street. i don't want rescue apparatus wasted on any out of shape firefighter. the women seem to either have to, or feel a need to, maintain a much higher standard of physical fitness than men in equivalent positions.

I believe this is a subject that like many others is filled with irony and contradiction.

In several important ways the feminist liberation has saddled young women with far more constraints and expectations than both their brothers and their mothers have had to face. Women now must succeed both professionally and as mothers & homemakers. While she can share the housekeeping duties with husband (or whatever) only she can have the babies, and time off for this cannot help but affect most careers.

One of the great social and economic ironies of the age is the fact that in doubling the work force we somehow expected we would not, as a result, halve the value of labor. Now only the few can sustain a desirable standard of living on one salary. In freeing women for careers we broke down a structure of laws and mores that protected them and the families they both nurtured and depended on. We, in the USA are so far the exception, but in most developed countries the result is a rapid decline in fertility - Except for Ireland, every nation in western Europe is ageing fast and beginning a rapid decline in population.

I find it remarkable that we so easily persuaded so many people that fulfillment in life is to be found in work.

My experience has been that, while there are real differences in the average behaviors of men and women in the workplace and everywhere, the individual traits of people usually dominate. Stupidity, insecurity, wisdom, and ability are fairly uniformly distributed. In addition self selection tends to minimize the problems associated with physical differences: people, both male and female, tend to seek - and find - the jobs they can do.

I attended male only parochial schools and then entered the Naval Academy. A couple of decades in all male fighter squadrons, carriers & stuff like that, and then into the business world where I, for the first time, encountered women in the workplace. No big deal. They're just as vain & stupid as guys. Often better to look at though.

Hi George,

No problem with that Angie. I was commenting on the rapid demise of what is now termed "stay at home moms" and on the many complications that have been added to the lives of young women who seek both professional success and children, home and family.

I have sons and daughters in the early stages of their professional lives. I observe that the course seems tougher fror the daughters, and not because they are either constrained in their career choices or undercompensated for their work.

You're certainly right about the "complications", George.

Most mothers and fathers recognize the importance and value of having a significant day-to-day role in raising their children. Unfortunately, at the present time, there are not enough job situations that attempt to accomodate families with this need.

Several years ago, I gave up a teaching career to be a stay-at-home mom. The environment was not at all flexible. I offered to take on a part-time position, but was told "no" and had to give up both my position and my tenure entirely.

There are ways to make the situation less rigid. Flexible hours, at-home work, part time positions, on site child care facilities, etc. - all can help for both mothers AND FATHERS, too, a great number of whom would welcome the chance to take a more active role is child rearing. It is the mind set that needs to change. Once that happens, good old American ingenuity and creativity will provide the suitable options.


BTW, I have no problem at all with any mother or father who chooses to be a full time stay-at-home parent.

Yes, I am aware of discrimination.

My employer officially recognizes internal employee organizations which exist to promote people based on gender, sexual orientation, etc.. I see this as discriminatory and problematic both as an employee who might be discriminated against as a non-member of these special groups, and also as a stockholder who fears such endorsed discrimination might be actionable.

I happen to work for a company that has such a diverse workforce that when they looked at the numbers they found NO EVIDENCE of any disparity in hiring or promotions based on gender, yet this has not stopped the forming of an organization within our company which has the stated purpose of working to get rid of the "glass ceiling" the data clearly shows DOES NOT EXIST.

Sadly, company execs are too concerned at being perceived to be on the wrong side of political correctness to point this out.

Of course, I support any group of employees getting together for any purpose they choose, so long as it is not something that hurts the company, but when the company puts it's official stamp of approval on a group like this, it raises serious concerns for me.

On the bright side, my comments regarding these concerns have landed me a position on the company's "diversity committee". Talk about your round peg in a square hole! At least I can say that the quest for "diversity" at my company seems to extend to diversity of opinion.

tw
The first employee that thinks he has been overlooked because of the companies policy real or imagined will be sueing your company. And maybe even you. Lot's of luck.

au - This is just one of the points I have raised with the powers that be. If a female manager is a member of the women's group at work--who have stated as their goal to mentor and advance women at the company, what happens when that manager is filling a position from within the company, and chooses a woman over a man. Even assuming the woman is more qualified, the man could make a reasonable argument that the manager's priorities can be questioned.

I am a trained first responder and fire fighter. I am no longer qualified to do either, because of age and not being able to run far, or with endurance. A little common sense here people.

I firmly believe in equal pay for equal work, but this opens up another can of worms. How does an average woman think she can keep up with a average man.
I am sorry but physical abilty can be a deciding factor in a lot of jobs. Yes day to day a woman can be a very good police officer, but what happens that one day when you needed some physical backup?
Maybe the situation could be handled with no gun play but since it is a woman officer she must pull her gun because she is not physically able to handle the situation, maybe some innocent bystanders get shot, maybe she gets shot only because she pulled her gun first.
I am very sorry but just as an example, to be a fireman or a police officer and be backed up by a woman would not give me a big warm fuzzy feeling in my soul.
Does this mean I want to discriminate against women? No I just want to be safe myself. I love women and would much rather spend the night riding around talking to a woman than a man. But then I want to be able to ride around tomorrow night too. Dats all

Slimmerson- I hear what you are saying, and I agree with you......partially. There are many men who are not strong enough to be police. I believe that the tests for police and fire fighters should be the same. If a woman (or a man,) can't hack it, then they should not get the job.

There is a 2nd possibility. There are enough positions in the police and fire fighters that there could be tests for two levels of jobs, one that requires great physical strength, and another that doesn't.

Slimmerman please qualilfy average woman, average man.

Please qualify work areas, manual labor, blue collar, white collar - educational levels?????

Myself personally I worked in the telephone industry for over 20 years in inside plant and was a union steward - most of the displinary cases envolved men. Women proved more relilable in most cases, fewer accidents, less alcohol and drug abuse.

More men flunked pole climbing than women, women could read schematics better than men. Thank God for the union, or the telephone company would be all women. Discrimication works both ways.

Slimmerman,

Fair assessment, as far as you went, but you didn't go the distance.
As an old crone with weakening physical abilities, and being deaf in one ear with impairment in the other, I was a weak member of the interior structure firefighting team, and knew it. Better suited to being an engineer on the tanker, calculating and directing the flow of water. Doing admin jobs like budgets, bill paying, expense allocation, etc.

When I requested the above, I was ignored, but then again, this particular fire department was in deep doo-doo for other reasons.

But in the end, I had to withdraw, as there was no interest in letting me do what I could do well. They just wanted me to respond when the pager went off and go fight fires. They lost. I lost. The community lost.