Live data from Hacker News

'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

reuters.com

141–150 of 163 posts

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#141
post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's similarly good reasons to not hire somebody old though - theyve already been trained in some other work method, have/spend time with their families, have retirement sooner, etc

> have retirement sooner By that logic, you shouldnt hire women, since they may get pregnant and take extensive leave on your company’s dime. Or men, whose partner could get pregnant (or adopt). > have/spend time with their families Applies to anyone over the age of 18. Probably under 18 too. > theyve already been trained in some other work method Which is why once you learn one programming language, you are immediat…

> By that logic, you shouldnt hire women, since they may get pregnant and take extensive leave on your company’s dime

Although you're presenting this as obviously absurd, taking that risk into account was long practice wasn't it? Forcing companies to pretend women are as likely to suddenly disappear for long periods as men is ultimately an economic choice and debatable as such in economic terms. It's essentially a kind of welfare that companies are made to pay, except instead of being an insurance scheme with actuarial rigor and smooth risk sharing over the entire population, it's a form of regressive taxation that disproportionately impacts smaller firms.

It can therefore be argued that it'd be better for society to take a different approach here, maybe more similar to (non-US) healthcare, e.g. mandatory maternity leave insurance, and then allow companies to simply price in the higher risk of extended absences. If they're no longer on the hook for paying wages this difference would be basically disruption risk and shouldn't be a particularly large difference for any but the tiniest firms, especially as motherhood comes with a much longer notice period than the typical resignation.

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#142
post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's similarly good reasons to not hire somebody old though - theyve already been trained in some other work method, have/spend time with their families, have retirement sooner, etc

Feel free to not hire someone because they say that they're going to use obsolete methods, or because they say they're going to take leave in excess of what's offered, or because they say they're going to resign in short order. Just don't use old age -- instead of statements like these -- to make assumptions! When someone is too young, however, there can be some guaranteed deficiencies that don't require any assumpti…

A young person could simply argue that requiring prior experience is a form of age discrimination no different to saying "We are looking to hire someone to run a project, no usage of obsolete methods allowed" and then not defining what that means. After all, "years of experience" is a rather arbitrary measure, it's easy for people to rack up years on projects and learn nothing, and it's common for young people to have insights their elders lack despite the YoE difference. See: Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, the young Steve Jobs etc. Lots of young world-changing founders out there who easily beat people with far more experience.

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#143
post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's because the ideas come from early 20th Russian bolshevism. It's an application of Marxism to race so you can't be "racist" towards White people because they're "oppressors." It's why I wish people would use "bigoted" instead of "racist" because it's less ambiguous to the extremists pushing the nonsense and the people listening to them.

Lol what the fuck are you saying ? Bolchevism was a white men thing like almost any political movement at this time. The idea that you can't be racist against white people is much more recent and it's popularity if not the concept itself comes from the USA

Bolshevism/communism was or is a worldview that divides the population into oppressors and the oppressed. There's no middle ground or nuance allowed in this concept - everyone is in one of those two camps.

The modern variant is that everyone is either "white" or "minority", but these labels have nothing really to do with race despite surface level appearances. They're just relabelings of the same old ideas. That's why the immediate reaction when you point out the illegal racism of woke people is they say "you can't be racist against white people because they're in power". That makes zero sense when interpreted literally because it's a direct statement of Bolshevik ideology, just with s/capitalist oppressors/white people/. The original formulation was wrong but at least coherent, whereas the modern formulation is completely nonsensical.

That's why so many people understand that the word "white" doesn't mean the skin color. It means anyone who stands opposed to leftism. If you look at how black conservatives are treated you can see this immediately. Just a few weeks ago a black pastor in the Church of England was fired (by a bunch of old white men) because he insisted that England wasn't in fact institutionally racist. By arguing that, he made himself unapologetically "white" in the eyes of the woke bishops and thus they had no moral difficulty with firing him. This sort of thing is commonplace.

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#144
post #139
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're proving his point.

He edited his comment to include the additional information. I assume that's easier than confronting that his worldview "has no basis in fact"

No, I was referring to the subtle implication that he belongs to or identifies with one or more of the following groups:

>right-wing politicians, fundamentalist religious leaders, political commentators in mainstream print and television media, and white supremacist terrorists

Which is basically dismissing his argument by calling him a racist. Instead you should quantify how different the situation at hand is than bolshevism or marxism. This would help people who have less information one way or the other to identify the truth more easily.

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> have retirement sooner By that logic, you shouldnt hire women, since they may get pregnant and take extensive leave on your company’s dime. Or men, whose partner could get pregnant (or adopt). > have/spend time with their families Applies to anyone over the age of 18. Probably under 18 too. > theyve already been trained in some other work method Which is why once you learn one programming language, you are immediat…

I just want to comment that your comment reminded me of min wage requirements. I'd love to hire a really Jr DevOps engineer but because of min wage and benefits that makes it impossible. If there was no min wage requirements I could hire a high school student with interest and not get destroyed financially by regulations

Which is exactly why there are regulations in the first place, to protect also that high school student with interest from being kicked out next year when a new round of high schoolers with interest comes around.

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#146
post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's because the ideas come from early 20th Russian bolshevism. It's an application of Marxism to race so you can't be "racist" towards White people because they're "oppressors." It's why I wish people would use "bigoted" instead of "racist" because it's less ambiguous to the extremists pushing the nonsense and the people listening to them.

Lol what the fuck are you saying ? Bolchevism was a white men thing like almost any political movement at this time. The idea that you can't be racist against white people is much more recent and it's popularity if not the concept itself comes from the USA

Only if you count jews as White.

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#147
post #139
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're proving his point.

He edited his comment to include the additional information. I assume that's easier than confronting that his worldview "has no basis in fact"

I would have rather replied but because I participate in these sorts of discussions from this side I'm often not allowed to.

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#148
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I initially read that I honestly didn't think it was all that bad. Inappropriate? Yes. Lawsuit worthy? No. But then, I imagined if the same thing were said to a 58 year old black woman, and immediately realized that it's severity. Is it just me, or has racism towards white people become acceptable/main stream (at least, much more so than racism towards other races)? I feel as if my lack of a visceral reaction to…

You don't need to imagine it happening to a minority group. It's a workplace violation against two protected classes: race, and protected age group (40+). It's lawsuit worthy in general, and your post makes it pretty clear you don't pay attention to your company's anti-discrimination training.

[deleted]

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#149
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I initially read that I honestly didn't think it was all that bad. Inappropriate? Yes. Lawsuit worthy? No. But then, I imagined if the same thing were said to a 58 year old black woman, and immediately realized that it's severity. Is it just me, or has racism towards white people become acceptable/main stream (at least, much more so than racism towards other races)? I feel as if my lack of a visceral reaction to…

You don't need to imagine it happening to a minority group. It's a workplace violation against two protected classes: race, and protected age group (40+). It's lawsuit worthy in general, and your post makes it pretty clear you don't pay attention to your company's anti-discrimination training.

The entire purpose of my comment was to point out my concern over the fact that I didn't have a response until I imagined it happening to a minority.

Re: 'Old white guy' can move forward with workplace bias suit against AT&T

#150
post #25
post #3

> Employees who have historically been entrenched in the majority are also entitled to protection under laws that were intended to assure equal treatment for women and racial minorities. To me this is obvious. A plain reading of EOCC employment discrimination regulations make this obvious. The mere fact that this is deemed as "novel" or newsworthy or intriguing is a poor reflection of society itself. Fortunately the…

>> Employees who have historically been entrenched in the majority are also entitled to protection under laws that were intended to assure equal treatment for women and racial minorities. >To me this is obvious. A plain reading of EOCC employment discrimination regulations make this obvious. I don't necessarily disagree, but I think this is less obvious when looking at how they define age discrimination. Specifically…

The similar concept of "protected class" exists in many states' race-crime laws. In New York, for example, only members of the protected classes are protected by race-crime laws, as per a statement by the NY AG office.
Post reply on HN