New evidence that British workplaces are losing viewpoint diversity

That's pretty wholesome and reasonable, but I don't think that's they type of behavior and views tha people are worried about.

I have a feeling the type of progressiveness that people are concerned about is this kind:

> "Sixteen percent [of progressives] have tried to have something banned, versus a seven percent national average.

>"We asked whether it is “fair or unfair for people who say grossly offensive things to be at risk of losing their livelihoods?” Nationally, 48 percent believe it is “fair,” but this figure rises to 65 percent for social democrat-aligned Labour voters, compared with 39 percent for right-leaning Conservative voters."

>"Our polling found that while the most popular word selected, from a list of nine, by Conservatives to describe people “with strongly different political views to my own” was “honest” (39 percent), the most popular among Labour voters was “closed minded” (28 percent)"

I think a lot of this boils down to power and bias, and a lot of the discussion around race/gender/sexuality seems overly simplified (they are correlated with certain patterns of power and bias, but not perfectly so). I think the aspect of class is generally underappreciated in public discussions, and in my context the minimum-wage and pay-equity concerns have a pretty significant racial component (when I refer to location adjustments that's primarily about continents, not urban/rural).

One of the purposes of meetings (in person or remote) is to get a sense of the other group's values, and how they will treat the least of your staff. As a vendor, it's critically important to listen carefully and not interrupt. Conversely, I've rejected vendors when they've talked over one of my colleagues. I don't care how good the product is... if they are not going to be good collaborators.

Edit: This is related to the above comment -- a colleague may be summarizing an uncomfortable experience not in terms of behavior (a rude vendor that talked over them) but in terms of identity (white male).

I think we have a miscommunication and an issue with a lack of common definitions between the two of us.

>The idea that the pay is based on someone's innate abilities or merits is insane

Merit is not innate ability. Merit is just ability - not natural ability. This is a combination of skill, willingness to learn, hard work, grit, access to resources, and (yes some innate factors such as disability status) other factors contained inside the person - but very few of these are predetermined. Overall, merit is 'how good you are' and innate ability is 'how good you could be' by my definition. I am not talking about innate ability. I feel that i did not do a good job of explaining that.

>If you're claiming some inherent characteristic at birth is fatalistic in determining one's outcome, you are greatly mistaken

I am not saying it is 100% fatalistic. That is an extreme view that I did not claim. Let me explain further. What I am saying is that, in theory, and what I am responding to OP with in regards to his/her statement about the gender pay gap, is that some careers are, from an early age, taught to us as being more masculine (engineer, doctor, that sort of thing) than others (teaching, social work, those sorts of things). And, further, more classically masculine jobs tend to pay better than the more classically feminine job. No one person is 'predetermined', but we, as a society, instill a values system that says girls do 'x' and boys do 'y'; also 'x' is valued in 'x1' career fields (lower paid) and 'y' is valued in 'y1' career fields (higher paid). Therefore, society is at least partially responsible for a disparity in employment in certain fields, which leads to the pay gap originally claimed. Yes, individuals have responsibility for their own futures, but there needs to be an acknowledgment and work toward overcoming the arbitrary barriers society has put in place for some people based on innate characteristics such as gender.

>People choose work because they are driven by money (which your argument focuses on). Other people choose work on if it's their passion. Or they might want to make the world a better place. Assuming it's all about money is a huge mistake.

I am not assuming it's all about money. I am simply using that metric, because it's what we started with, and it seems to be the easiest/most popular.

What I am saying----- the playing field is not level for all contenders, based on external factors. These factors do NOT predetermine outcomes, but they absolutely DO influence choices. If the playing field were level, and men still chose some careers over others, and women some other careers over the first, that's fine. It's about equality in opportunity, not equality in outcome.

God, I hope that makes sense.

> I now long for the type of television programs that I remember from my youth—talking heads discussing and debating serious topics.

I never had that in my youth, but YouTube recently started suggesting videos from The Dick Cavett Show from the 60's and 70's. The show was broadcast on TV and I think counted as light entertainment, so I don't presume it's very special for it's time, but seeing these interviews conducted at a pace where people can actually express themselves with anything but pre-canned anecdotes, with an interviewer who is actually listening and engaging with the topic is such a breath of fresh air compared to what I am used to. A lot of the interviews I've watched seem like they touch on pretty controversial subjects for the time (religion, LGBT, race, drugs, alcoholism etc)

(of course it helps that the clips that get uploaded and recommended are of historical figures, so there's a lot of survivorship bias there)