Edward Colston/Trans rights/Stamp collecting

rjsterry

pinno said:

Matthew Syed!? Annoying defensive chopper* with a 12 ft reach.
*Table tennis, before anyone says anything silly (Stevo).

Didn't know about the table tennis but yes, him.

rjsterry

nickice said:

rjsterry said:

nickice said:

Stevo_666 said:

rick_chasey said:

ballysmate said:

"There is at least person who some would say has chucked the accusation around quite liberally on here, shall we say"

As Stevo never mentioned any name. who do you think he meant?
Just for the benefit of those with comprehension difficulties, you understand.

It's me obviously.

So when I wrote

I honestly believe if you want to tackle racism seriously you need to be able to be on a level playing field where everyone is working towards less racism.

When you have that, you can then throw out the social baggage that comes from the term and rather than discuss racism in terms of motives (because, on that level playing field, everyone's motive is to not be), and then discuss it in terms of practical decision making and actions.

What do you, or Nick, or Stevo, think I meant when I wrote that?

Not sure how you think you can achieve that when people like yourself have made it such a massively sensitive issue and pretty much the worst thing anyone can be called. And you then think people can sit down have a nice little chat with someone over a cup of tea as to why they are racist (even if - patting them on the head - they don't really know they're doing it).

Personally I prefer to walk the walk and lead by example on this. I'm proud that I've built up my departments to be very good and diverse. I can count Brit, Polish, Dutch, Russian, Hong Kong and Iraqi nationalities in my team. White, Indian, Afro-Caribbean, Middle Eastern and HK Chinese are in the ethnic mix and the gender split is pretty even as well. Decent range of backgrounds and ages as well, although a degree education is generally needed for these types of jobs. The company as whole is also good in this respect.

So what I don't really need is a bunch of do-gooders assuming that sweet FA has been done and anyone of a certain generation needs 're-educating' in this area.

Very well put. And Rick Chasey is, I think, a straight white man so I'll look forward to him giving up his position in order to achieve more diversity.

Not what it's about.

Most of us work as part of some sort of team. Largely because it's just not possible for a single individual to amass all the available skills and expertise in their area of knowledge.

Say you are setting up a team for some complex task. If you decide you want the best possible people and set a rigorous exam for applicants, the top ten scores will all be excellent individuals, but the extent of there knowledge will tend to overlap with all the other high scorers because they all took the same test, leaving some big gaps in the aggregate skills and knowledge of the team.

If the team was more diverse - not necessarily in ethnicity, but anything that is relevant to the the task - then as a team they will cover more of the skills and knowledge 'space' and so have fewer blind spots and perform better overall than the team which just scored highest in the exam.

The tricky bit is working out what the relevant factors to the task are so that you can assess whether you have the diversity you need.

That's not really got anything to do with the diversity that rick chasey is talking about, though and it wouldn't be what most people would consider to be diversity. To be fair he has supported some kind of affirmative action previously.

I'd argue that it is. Ethnicity is just one small part of diversity and in some situations a very relevant part. But there are plenty of others.

blazing_saddles

Really a post for the Big Corona thread, but I wonder how this would play out in the UK, in the current climate.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-53316097

Unlike other Melburnians, residents of the nine towers cannot leave for any reason - they are subject to a police guard.
Hundreds of police were sent to the sites immediately after the order was announced live on TV by Victoria's Premier Daniel Andrews.

Many residents were caught unaware. When they tried to leave the building, they were stopped.

For many, as news of the confinement spread, alarm and panic followed.

The majority of residents have limited income and come from non-English-speaking backgrounds. Many are migrants - some who arrived as refugees - from African nations, Vietnam and China.

Can such an extreme measure even be called a lockdown?

rjsterry

blazing_saddles said:

Really a post for the Big Corona thread, but I wonder how this would play out in the UK, in the current climate.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-53316097

Unlike other Melburnians, residents of the nine towers cannot leave for any reason - they are subject to a police guard.
Hundreds of police were sent to the sites immediately after the order was announced live on TV by Victoria's Premier Daniel Andrews.

Many residents were caught unaware. When they tried to leave the building, they were stopped.

For many, as news of the confinement spread, alarm and panic followed.

The majority of residents have limited income and come from non-English-speaking backgrounds. Many are migrants - some who arrived as refugees - from African nations, Vietnam and China.

Can such an extreme measure even be called a lockdown?

Sounds grim if not entirely surprising.

rjsterry

Stevo_666 said:

rick_chasey said:

ballysmate said:

"There is at least person who some would say has chucked the accusation around quite liberally on here, shall we say"

As Stevo never mentioned any name. who do you think he meant?
Just for the benefit of those with comprehension difficulties, you understand.

It's me obviously.

So when I wrote

I honestly believe if you want to tackle racism seriously you need to be able to be on a level playing field where everyone is working towards less racism.

When you have that, you can then throw out the social baggage that comes from the term and rather than discuss racism in terms of motives (because, on that level playing field, everyone's motive is to not be), and then discuss it in terms of practical decision making and actions.

What do you, or Nick, or Stevo, think I meant when I wrote that?

Not sure how you think you can achieve that when people like yourself have made it such a massively sensitive issue and pretty much the worst thing anyone can be called. And you then think people can sit down have a nice little chat with someone over a cup of tea as to why they are racist (even if - patting them on the head - they don't really know they're doing it).

Personally I prefer to walk the walk and lead by example on this. I'm proud that I've built up my departments to be very good and diverse. I can count Brit, Polish, Dutch, Russian, Hong Kong and Iraqi nationalities in my team. White, Indian, Afro-Caribbean, Middle Eastern and HK Chinese are in the ethnic mix and the gender split is pretty even as well. Decent range of backgrounds and ages as well, although a degree education is generally needed for these types of jobs. The company as whole is also good in this respect.

So what I don't really need is a bunch of do-gooders assuming that sweet FA has been done and anyone of a certain generation needs 're-educating' in this area.

A further thought on this. You raised a couple of examples of organisations apparently overreacting to actions of employees. I think there was a DJ and a boss of a charity. Perhaps this overreaction is partly to do with a lack of understanding in those organisations. If they had the diversity you've illustrated in your firm, then the incidents may not have arisen in the first place, and if they had, management would have been better placed and more confident in dealing with them proportionately.

coopster_the_1st

rjsterry said:

blazing_saddles said:

Really a post for the Big Corona thread, but I wonder how this would play out in the UK, in the current climate.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-53316097

Unlike other Melburnians, residents of the nine towers cannot leave for any reason - they are subject to a police guard.
Hundreds of police were sent to the sites immediately after the order was announced live on TV by Victoria's Premier Daniel Andrews.

Many residents were caught unaware. When they tried to leave the building, they were stopped.

For many, as news of the confinement spread, alarm and panic followed.

The majority of residents have limited income and come from non-English-speaking backgrounds. Many are migrants - some who arrived as refugees - from African nations, Vietnam and China.

Can such an extreme measure even be called a lockdown?

Sounds grim if not entirely surprising.

Are you implying that the Aussies would not have put in place this lockdown had the tower residents been Australians?

rjsterry

I'm commenting on the post, not implying anything. Not sure what nationality has to do with it.

coopster_the_1st

rjsterry said:

I'm commenting on the post, not implying anything. Not sure what nationality has to do with it.

Welcome to new woke world that you endorse, where every post has to be taken in the view that you are implying racism.

rjsterry

If you say so. Personally I prefer to start with taking things at face value.

coopster_the_1st

rjsterry said:

If you say so. Personally I prefer to start with taking things at face value.

You've just spent the last 6 weeks implying that everything is racist and the first time this wokism gets raised against you, you backtrack faster than a rat up a drain pipe

rjsterry

coopster_the_1st said:

rjsterry said:

If you say so. Personally I prefer to start with taking things at face value.

You've just spent the last 6 weeks implying that everything is racist and the first time this wokism gets raised against you, you backtrack faster than a rat up a drain pipe

Eh? @Blazing_saddles posted the first comment. Ask him what he thinks. I said it sounds grim. Being confined in a building without warning does sound grim. I also commented that it wasn't surprising.

Public authorities treating social housing residents rather differently from other residents is not exactly unusual, is it? Was there a bit of racism in there as well? Maybe. @blazing_saddles presumably thought there might be as he posted it in this thread.

I'm not even sure what you mean by "wokism". My predictive text wants to make it something about Woking 😕

blazing_saddles

rjsterry said:

coopster_the_1st said:

rjsterry said:

If you say so. Personally I prefer to start with taking things at face value.

You've just spent the last 6 weeks implying that everything is racist and the first time this wokism gets raised against you, you backtrack faster than a rat up a drain pipe

Eh? @Blazing_saddles posted the first comment. Ask him what he thinks. I said it sounds grim. Being confined in a building without warning does sound grim. I also commented that it wasn't surprising.

Public authorities treating social housing residents rather differently from other residents is not exactly unusual, is it? Was there a bit of racism in there as well? Maybe. @blazing_saddles presumably thought there might be as he posted it in this thread.

To me this doesn't constitute lockdown in the accepted sense, it's government sanctioned imprisonment.
Is it OK simply because it's a tower block and can easily be turned into a temporary prison?
I doubt that the authorities would respond in such a draconian way, should there be a spike in a wealthy (influential) suburb.

I also think there would be a public outcry, if the government tried to use the same tactic towards a similar community, in this country.
Using Coopster's catch all: here I think "Wokism" would inevitably play a part.

rick_chasey

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/confederate-statues/

fivethirtyeight, the US polling aggregator (with a fairly stellar track record compared to its peers) is steadfastly neutral on most things (given it's about polling - so they do things like this how trump could improve his electoral odds), also covers other topics when data can be used in interesting ways.

In this instance, Confederate Statues Were Never Really About Preserving History

rjsterry

rick_chasey said:

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/confederate-statues/

fivethirtyeight, the US polling aggregator (with a fairly stellar track record compared to its peers) is steadfastly neutral on most things (given it's about polling - so they do things like this how trump could improve his electoral odds), also covers other topics when data can be used in interesting ways.

In this instance, Confederate Statues Were Never Really About Preserving History

No statue has ever been about preserving history.

Occasionally they are about creating a fictional history, like that ludicrous Boudicca statue in Westminster or the one of Alfred the Great. The Victorians have a lot to answer for.

surrey_commuter

rick_chasey said:

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/confederate-statues/

fivethirtyeight, the US polling aggregator (with a fairly stellar track record compared to its peers) is steadfastly neutral on most things (given it's about polling - so they do things like this how trump could improve his electoral odds), also covers other topics when data can be used in interesting ways.

In this instance, Confederate Statues Were Never Really About Preserving History

Not convinced by that analysis. Putting statues up 40 odd years after the cessation of fighting would coincide with living memories dying.

Was discussing the Civil war with a black American academic and she gestured at my obviously Southern colleague and invited me to ask her when the war ended. The jaw dropping answer was “ it hasn’t, we are in a temporary period of abeyance”

The academic explained that this was taught in Southern schools.

rjsterry

surrey_commuter said:

rick_chasey said:

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/confederate-statues/

fivethirtyeight, the US polling aggregator (with a fairly stellar track record compared to its peers) is steadfastly neutral on most things (given it's about polling - so they do things like this how trump could improve his electoral odds), also covers other topics when data can be used in interesting ways.

In this instance, Confederate Statues Were Never Really About Preserving History

Not convinced by that analysis. Putting statues up 40 odd years after the cessation of fighting would coincide with living memories dying.

Was discussing the Civil war with a black American academic and she gestured at my obviously Southern colleague and invited me to ask her when the war ended. The jaw dropping answer was “ it hasn’t, we are in a temporary period of abeyance”

The academic explained that this was taught in Southern schools.

You think that's bad? Have a look at Serbian nationalism. Yet another 19th century invention claiming a battle in 1389 as its founding event.

rick_chasey

surrey_commuter said:

Was discussing the Civil war with a black American academic and she gestured at my obviously Southern colleague and invited me to ask her when the war ended. The jaw dropping answer was “ it hasn’t, we are in a temporary period of abeyance”

The academic explained that this was taught in Southern schools.

How can you get an academic job when you literally can't hold down a material historical fact?

That's just nonsense.

surrey_commuter

rick_chasey said:

surrey_commuter said:

Was discussing the Civil war with a black American academic and she gestured at my obviously Southern colleague and invited me to ask her when the war ended. The jaw dropping answer was “ it hasn’t, we are in a temporary period of abeyance”

The academic explained that this was taught in Southern schools.

How can you get an academic job when you literally can't hold down a material historical fact?

That's just nonsense.

I meant it was said by my Southern colleague not the academic.

rick_chasey

surrey_commuter said:

rick_chasey said:

surrey_commuter said:

Was discussing the Civil war with a black American academic and she gestured at my obviously Southern colleague and invited me to ask her when the war ended. The jaw dropping answer was “ it hasn’t, we are in a temporary period of abeyance”

The academic explained that this was taught in Southern schools.

How can you get an academic job when you literally can't hold down a material historical fact?

That's just nonsense.

I meant it was said by my Southern colleague not the academic.

Ah right.

Blows my mind they allow blatant falsehoods to be taught in schools.

Nuts.

darkhairedlord

rick_chasey said:

surrey_commuter said:

rick_chasey said:

surrey_commuter said:

Was discussing the Civil war with a black American academic and she gestured at my obviously Southern colleague and invited me to ask her when the war ended. The jaw dropping answer was “ it hasn’t, we are in a temporary period of abeyance”

The academic explained that this was taught in Southern schools.

How can you get an academic job when you literally can't hold down a material historical fact?

That's just nonsense.

I meant it was said by my Southern colleague not the academic.

Ah right.

Blows my mind they allow blatant falsehoods to be taught in schools.

Nuts.

You've never been to school?

rick_chasey

darkhairedlord said:

rick_chasey said:

surrey_commuter said:

rick_chasey said:

surrey_commuter said:

Was discussing the Civil war with a black American academic and she gestured at my obviously Southern colleague and invited me to ask her when the war ended. The jaw dropping answer was “ it hasn’t, we are in a temporary period of abeyance”

The academic explained that this was taught in Southern schools.

How can you get an academic job when you literally can't hold down a material historical fact?

That's just nonsense.

I meant it was said by my Southern colleague not the academic.

Ah right.

Blows my mind they allow blatant falsehoods to be taught in schools.

Nuts.

You've never been to school?

Why what blatant falsehoods are in the UK curriculum?

rick_chasey

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

By background (gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disabilities, education, socioeconomic etc) but also “thought” diversity.


People with different backgrounds often have different perspectives, so one usually follows the other.

Sexuality? I wouldn't consider that to be anyone's business and certainly wouldn't consider hiring a gay man/woman as adding diversity.

I wanted to get back to this.

I think you're looking at it the wrong way around.

I think there are firms, and industries where it is more difficult to be openly gay and that may prohibit people from either being part of the firm/industry or feeling they are able to be themselves if they are.

To take an extreme, I don't think there are many, if any, openly gay male footballers in the premier league, for example. That's obviously not ideal.

Also if there's a firm or team-wide culture of homophobic jokes/banter, that can put people off working there or make it more difficult for people to fit in.

nickice

rick_chasey said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

By background (gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disabilities, education, socioeconomic etc) but also “thought” diversity.


People with different backgrounds often have different perspectives, so one usually follows the other.

Sexuality? I wouldn't consider that to be anyone's business and certainly wouldn't consider hiring a gay man/woman as adding diversity.

I wanted to get back to this.

I think you're looking at it the wrong way around.

I think there are firms, and industries where it is more difficult to be openly gay and that may prohibit people from either being part of the firm/industry or feeling they are able to be themselves if they are.

To take an extreme, I don't think there are many, if any, openly gay male footballers in the premier league, for example. That's obviously not ideal.

Also if there's a firm or team-wide culture of homophobic jokes/banter, that can put people off working there or make it more difficult for people to fit in.

What different perspective does a gay person bring simply by virtue of being gay?

I'm sure there are industries where it might be more difficult to be 'openly gay' but, in my experience, a lot of homophobes don't have anything against the actual fact of being gay more than the caricature of the effeminate gay man (which, interestingly, the majority of gay men don't go for). This is why I think Pride tends to do a disservice to the gay community (having said that a gay friend of mine says they put up with it as he said they're often the same kind of people who fought for gay rights) as it promotes that image.

Regarding the banter, it depends what it is. Surely, the ideal would be that gay people get treated exactly the same as straight people.

rjsterry

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

By background (gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disabilities, education, socioeconomic etc) but also “thought” diversity.


People with different backgrounds often have different perspectives, so one usually follows the other.

Sexuality? I wouldn't consider that to be anyone's business and certainly wouldn't consider hiring a gay man/woman as adding diversity.

I wanted to get back to this.

I think you're looking at it the wrong way around.

I think there are firms, and industries where it is more difficult to be openly gay and that may prohibit people from either being part of the firm/industry or feeling they are able to be themselves if they are.

To take an extreme, I don't think there are many, if any, openly gay male footballers in the premier league, for example. That's obviously not ideal.

Also if there's a firm or team-wide culture of homophobic jokes/banter, that can put people off working there or make it more difficult for people to fit in.

What different perspective does a gay person bring simply by virtue of being gay?

I'm sure there are industries where it might be more difficult to be 'openly gay' but, in my experience, a lot of homophobes don't have anything against the actual fact of being gay more than the caricature of the effeminate gay man (which, interestingly, the majority of gay men don't go for). This is why I think Pride tends to do a disservice to the gay community (having said that a gay friend of mine says they put up with it as he said they're often the same kind of people who fought for gay rights) as it promotes that image.

Regarding the banter, it depends what it is. Surely, the ideal would be that gay people get treated exactly the same as straight people.

You really can't imagine that a person's sexuality and specifically that it is viewed by a large part of the world as abnormal or deviant, might affect their experiences and form part of their view of the world?

And why equate "openly gay" with effeminate. These are two different things.

nickice

rjsterry said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

By background (gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disabilities, education, socioeconomic etc) but also “thought” diversity.


People with different backgrounds often have different perspectives, so one usually follows the other.

Sexuality? I wouldn't consider that to be anyone's business and certainly wouldn't consider hiring a gay man/woman as adding diversity.

I wanted to get back to this.

I think you're looking at it the wrong way around.

I think there are firms, and industries where it is more difficult to be openly gay and that may prohibit people from either being part of the firm/industry or feeling they are able to be themselves if they are.

To take an extreme, I don't think there are many, if any, openly gay male footballers in the premier league, for example. That's obviously not ideal.

Also if there's a firm or team-wide culture of homophobic jokes/banter, that can put people off working there or make it more difficult for people to fit in.

What different perspective does a gay person bring simply by virtue of being gay?

I'm sure there are industries where it might be more difficult to be 'openly gay' but, in my experience, a lot of homophobes don't have anything against the actual fact of being gay more than the caricature of the effeminate gay man (which, interestingly, the majority of gay men don't go for). This is why I think Pride tends to do a disservice to the gay community (having said that a gay friend of mine says they put up with it as he said they're often the same kind of people who fought for gay rights) as it promotes that image.

Regarding the banter, it depends what it is. Surely, the ideal would be that gay people get treated exactly the same as straight people.

You really can't imagine that a person's sexuality and specifically that it is viewed by a large part of the world as abnormal or deviant, might affect their experiences and form part of their view of the world?

And why equate "openly gay" with effeminate. These are two different things.

In the UK, like I mentioned upthread, your sexuality is not your identity and there is no reason to think that there is more diversity between a gay person and a straight person than there is between two straight people.

I'm not equating the two, I put it in scare quotes as I didn't know what he meant and found it very vague. It would be a bit strange for me to think being openly gay meant being effeminate given what I wrote just after that.

rjsterry

nickice said:

rjsterry said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

By background (gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disabilities, education, socioeconomic etc) but also “thought” diversity.


People with different backgrounds often have different perspectives, so one usually follows the other.

Sexuality? I wouldn't consider that to be anyone's business and certainly wouldn't consider hiring a gay man/woman as adding diversity.

I wanted to get back to this.

I think you're looking at it the wrong way around.

I think there are firms, and industries where it is more difficult to be openly gay and that may prohibit people from either being part of the firm/industry or feeling they are able to be themselves if they are.

To take an extreme, I don't think there are many, if any, openly gay male footballers in the premier league, for example. That's obviously not ideal.

Also if there's a firm or team-wide culture of homophobic jokes/banter, that can put people off working there or make it more difficult for people to fit in.

What different perspective does a gay person bring simply by virtue of being gay?

I'm sure there are industries where it might be more difficult to be 'openly gay' but, in my experience, a lot of homophobes don't have anything against the actual fact of being gay more than the caricature of the effeminate gay man (which, interestingly, the majority of gay men don't go for). This is why I think Pride tends to do a disservice to the gay community (having said that a gay friend of mine says they put up with it as he said they're often the same kind of people who fought for gay rights) as it promotes that image.

Regarding the banter, it depends what it is. Surely, the ideal would be that gay people get treated exactly the same as straight people.

You really can't imagine that a person's sexuality and specifically that it is viewed by a large part of the world as abnormal or deviant, might affect their experiences and form part of their view of the world?

And why equate "openly gay" with effeminate. These are two different things.

In the UK, like I mentioned upthread, your sexuality is not your identity and there is no reason to think that there is more diversity between a gay person and a straight person than there is between two straight people.

I'm not equating the two, I put it in scare quotes as I didn't know what he meant and found it very vague. It would be a bit strange for me to think being openly gay meant being effeminate given what I wrote just after that.

Fair enough. My misunderstanding. I think it would be more accurate to say that it doesn't have to be a key part of your identity. That said, if you are part of a majority, it's much more likely that your membership of that majority is not considered part of your identity. And vice versa. If you are or perceive yourself to be in a minority, you are more likely to consider membership of that minority part of your identity. For example, whiteness has only really started to be taken up as an important part of people's identity where they perceive (wrongly in most cases) that whiteness is threatened in some way. Where there's no perceived threat, it just becomes a default background of no significance.

nickice

rjsterry said:

nickice said:

rjsterry said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

By background (gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disabilities, education, socioeconomic etc) but also “thought” diversity.


People with different backgrounds often have different perspectives, so one usually follows the other.

Sexuality? I wouldn't consider that to be anyone's business and certainly wouldn't consider hiring a gay man/woman as adding diversity.

I wanted to get back to this.

I think you're looking at it the wrong way around.

I think there are firms, and industries where it is more difficult to be openly gay and that may prohibit people from either being part of the firm/industry or feeling they are able to be themselves if they are.

To take an extreme, I don't think there are many, if any, openly gay male footballers in the premier league, for example. That's obviously not ideal.

Also if there's a firm or team-wide culture of homophobic jokes/banter, that can put people off working there or make it more difficult for people to fit in.

What different perspective does a gay person bring simply by virtue of being gay?

I'm sure there are industries where it might be more difficult to be 'openly gay' but, in my experience, a lot of homophobes don't have anything against the actual fact of being gay more than the caricature of the effeminate gay man (which, interestingly, the majority of gay men don't go for). This is why I think Pride tends to do a disservice to the gay community (having said that a gay friend of mine says they put up with it as he said they're often the same kind of people who fought for gay rights) as it promotes that image.

Regarding the banter, it depends what it is. Surely, the ideal would be that gay people get treated exactly the same as straight people.

You really can't imagine that a person's sexuality and specifically that it is viewed by a large part of the world as abnormal or deviant, might affect their experiences and form part of their view of the world?

And why equate "openly gay" with effeminate. These are two different things.

In the UK, like I mentioned upthread, your sexuality is not your identity and there is no reason to think that there is more diversity between a gay person and a straight person than there is between two straight people.

I'm not equating the two, I put it in scare quotes as I didn't know what he meant and found it very vague. It would be a bit strange for me to think being openly gay meant being effeminate given what I wrote just after that.

Fair enough. My misunderstanding. I think it would be more accurate to say that it doesn't have to be a key part of your identity. That said, if you are part of a majority, it's much more likely that your membership of that majority is not considered part of your identity. And vice versa. If you are or perceive yourself to be in a minority, you are more likely to consider membership of that minority part of your identity. For example, whiteness has only really started to be taken up as an important part of people's identity where they perceive (wrongly in most cases) that whiteness is threatened in some way. Where there's no perceived threat, it just becomes a default background of no significance.

I understand that. It's basically anecdotal but one of my good friends and his ex and other friends don't see it as their identity. Of course, they recognise that the gay rights supporters tended to be people who did see it as their identity. My friend openly admits he never would have fought for gay rights as he prefers a quiet life.

rjsterry

And nothing wrong with that.

TheBigBean

rjsterry said:

nickice said:

rjsterry said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

By background (gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disabilities, education, socioeconomic etc) but also “thought” diversity.


People with different backgrounds often have different perspectives, so one usually follows the other.

Sexuality? I wouldn't consider that to be anyone's business and certainly wouldn't consider hiring a gay man/woman as adding diversity.

I wanted to get back to this.

I think you're looking at it the wrong way around.

I think there are firms, and industries where it is more difficult to be openly gay and that may prohibit people from either being part of the firm/industry or feeling they are able to be themselves if they are.

To take an extreme, I don't think there are many, if any, openly gay male footballers in the premier league, for example. That's obviously not ideal.

Also if there's a firm or team-wide culture of homophobic jokes/banter, that can put people off working there or make it more difficult for people to fit in.

What different perspective does a gay person bring simply by virtue of being gay?

I'm sure there are industries where it might be more difficult to be 'openly gay' but, in my experience, a lot of homophobes don't have anything against the actual fact of being gay more than the caricature of the effeminate gay man (which, interestingly, the majority of gay men don't go for). This is why I think Pride tends to do a disservice to the gay community (having said that a gay friend of mine says they put up with it as he said they're often the same kind of people who fought for gay rights) as it promotes that image.

Regarding the banter, it depends what it is. Surely, the ideal would be that gay people get treated exactly the same as straight people.

You really can't imagine that a person's sexuality and specifically that it is viewed by a large part of the world as abnormal or deviant, might affect their experiences and form part of their view of the world?

And why equate "openly gay" with effeminate. These are two different things.

In the UK, like I mentioned upthread, your sexuality is not your identity and there is no reason to think that there is more diversity between a gay person and a straight person than there is between two straight people.

I'm not equating the two, I put it in scare quotes as I didn't know what he meant and found it very vague. It would be a bit strange for me to think being openly gay meant being effeminate given what I wrote just after that.

Fair enough. My misunderstanding. I think it would be more accurate to say that it doesn't have to be a key part of your identity. That said, if you are part of a majority, it's much more likely that your membership of that majority is not considered part of your identity. And vice versa. If you are or perceive yourself to be in a minority, you are more likely to consider membership of that minority part of your identity. For example, whiteness has only really started to be taken up as an important part of people's identity where they perceive (wrongly in most cases) that whiteness is threatened in some way. Where there's no perceived threat, it just becomes a default background of no significance.

If you go somewhere where everyone isn't white, you may change your view.

rick_chasey

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

nickice said:

rick_chasey said:

By background (gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disabilities, education, socioeconomic etc) but also “thought” diversity.


People with different backgrounds often have different perspectives, so one usually follows the other.

Sexuality? I wouldn't consider that to be anyone's business and certainly wouldn't consider hiring a gay man/woman as adding diversity.

I wanted to get back to this.

I think you're looking at it the wrong way around.

I think there are firms, and industries where it is more difficult to be openly gay and that may prohibit people from either being part of the firm/industry or feeling they are able to be themselves if they are.

To take an extreme, I don't think there are many, if any, openly gay male footballers in the premier league, for example. That's obviously not ideal.

Also if there's a firm or team-wide culture of homophobic jokes/banter, that can put people off working there or make it more difficult for people to fit in.

What different perspective does a gay person bring simply by virtue of being gay?

I'm sure there are industries where it might be more difficult to be 'openly gay' but, in my experience, a lot of homophobes don't have anything against the actual fact of being gay more than the caricature of the effeminate gay man (which, interestingly, the majority of gay men don't go for). This is why I think Pride tends to do a disservice to the gay community (having said that a gay friend of mine says they put up with it as he said they're often the same kind of people who fought for gay rights) as it promotes that image.

Regarding the banter, it depends what it is. Surely, the ideal would be that gay people get treated exactly the same as straight people.

Don't get so hung up on the perspective and more, if your firm has culture that is various forms of hostile to being openly gay, you're reducing the talent pool or harming, to varying degrees, the chances of success of certain people in your firm, for something you say yourself shouldn't have anything to do with their success or failure.