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Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

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Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#111

Post by Eddy_Viscosity2 »

rowanG077 wrote: post #87
tmoertel wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the OP, but: This is actually a thorny problem. Say you have an advertising system that knows nothing about a user’s gender. This system, by construction, cannot vary its ad selections based on gender. But the system does remember whether users have expressed interest in the ads it has previously shown them. Now say you have a job that in general appeals to one gender almost exclusively. The system will, given ti…

Taken to its logical conclusion you essentially have to make targeted ads illegal. Now it's gender, next it's race, then it's socioeconomic standing. Then it's age. Etc etc.

I think making targeted ads illegal is a great idea all by itself. It would kneecap the entire surveillance and data industry built around tracking people for f**g ads. The gov will still track you though, but that's a different nut to crack.

Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#112

Post by hunterpayne »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #86
hunterpayne wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do realize that the people who work there are economically incentivized to think that? In exactly the same way that Uncle Bob (who has never been a coder) is economically incentivized to talk about clean code or a salesperson is incentivized to talk about the product they are selling.

Mathematicians who are paid for their research are incentivized to prove theorems. It doesn’t make their proofs wrong.

The reason we think their proofs are correct is that other mathematicians without incentives say they are correct. Also, they show their work. By your logic, we should believe everything any salesperson says.

Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#113

Post by fastball »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #61
fastball wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are not owed either job. Getting a high-paying "boy job" is your own responsibility if you want one.

While any particular individual isn't "owed a job", it must be true that people as a whole are "owed" jobs and that if governments are incapable or unwilling to foster the economic environment that makes it possible for all working-age people to get jobs, then those governments are invalid. And, as much as we might want to deny it we do live in an era where it seems that maybe the economic environment does not provid…

No, people as a whole are obviously not "owed" jobs. Why would you be owed a job?

Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#114

Post by fastball »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #93
fastball wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is hiding anything. But the point about not being owed a job is that even if they were "hiding" something, that wouldn't be a problem. You are not owed visibility of a job in the same way you are not owed the job itself.

This is not true, at least in Europe. There exists well-established anti-discriminatory law, which dictates equal opportunity in employment. When targeted advertising is based only on demographic signals, it creates strong information asymmetry. Let’s say someone is not actively looking for a job, but gets information about new opportunities through ads more frequently, than someone else with same skills but differen…

This sub-thread isn't really about what is legal (or illegal) in Europe or any other jurisdiction. It is about what is right.

When it comes to legality and enforcement though, it does seem highly inconsistent to enforce something like this, which isn't actually discrimination on its own (rather it could lead to discrimination), when at the same time orgs are very obviously participating in actual discrimination ("we'd like this role to be filled by {insert group here}") in Europe and elsewhere.

Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#115

Post by ivan_gammel »

tmoertel wrote: post #79
paperhatwriter wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain why you think this?

Not the OP, but: This is actually a thorny problem. Say you have an advertising system that knows nothing about a user’s gender. This system, by construction, cannot vary its ad selections based on gender. But the system does remember whether users have expressed interest in the ads it has previously shown them. Now say you have a job that in general appeals to one gender almost exclusively. The system will, given ti…

>If the ad system stops showing ads for this job to the users who have demonstrated they don’t want to see them, is that gender discrimination?

No, because they demonstrated intent. However, if the ad system extrapolates this behavior to users which previously have not interacted with such ads strictly selecting only users of certain gender, it will be gender-based discrimination.

Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#116

Post by ivan_gammel »

rpdillon wrote: post #95
JuniperMesos wrote: post #3

> The Netherlands Institute for Human Rights said in a February 18 decision that Facebook’s algorithm reinforced gender stereotypes by mainly showing “typically female professions” to female Facebook users in the Netherlands and that Meta (META), the social platform’s owner, should have monitored and adjusted its algorithm to prevent that. > For example, ads for mechanic positions were predominantly shown to men, whi…

They accuse the algorithm of perpetuating gender stereotypes, but it's really society that's doing that. The ads are just trying to be the most efficient and in doing so they mirror the preferences of society. I don't know why anybody ever assumed that professions would ideally be 50-50 by gender, but that does seem to be something that people come into these arguments assuming. Put another way, what's the conversion…

>I don't know why anybody ever assumed that professions would ideally be 50-50 by gender

It’s not that. We know that in most professions there’s no reason to assume that they should have a preferred gender. This means that even if pool of candidates is 99:1, that 1 candidate must have equal opportunities for employment. And that means no pre-screening through targeted ads.

Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#117

Post by unparagoned »

HappyPanacea wrote: post #9
JuniperMesos wrote: post #3

> The Netherlands Institute for Human Rights said in a February 18 decision that Facebook’s algorithm reinforced gender stereotypes by mainly showing “typically female professions” to female Facebook users in the Netherlands and that Meta (META), the social platform’s owner, should have monitored and adjusted its algorithm to prevent that. > For example, ads for mechanic positions were predominantly shown to men, whi…

What is gained from allowing such bias?

Saves the employer money advertising. So schools save money. Also more realistically due to fixed budgets a school would get better quality staff. A fixed budget might mean previously the ad would be shown to 10 people interested. But if you are forced to show the ads to a bunch of people not interested you might only have it seen by one person interested.

Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#118

Post by ivan_gammel »

fastball wrote: post #114
ivan_gammel wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not true, at least in Europe. There exists well-established anti-discriminatory law, which dictates equal opportunity in employment. When targeted advertising is based only on demographic signals, it creates strong information asymmetry. Let’s say someone is not actively looking for a job, but gets information about new opportunities through ads more frequently, than someone else with same skills but differen…

This sub-thread isn't really about what is legal (or illegal) in Europe or any other jurisdiction. It is about what is right. When it comes to legality and enforcement though, it does seem highly inconsistent to enforce something like this, which isn't actually discrimination on its own (rather it could lead to discrimination), when at the same time orgs are very obviously participating in actual discrimination ("we'…

> This sub-thread isn't really about what is legal (or illegal) in Europe or any other jurisdiction. It is about what is right.

My argument wasn’t about whether it’s legal or not. It’s discrimination, which is both illegal and wrong.

> when at the same time orgs are very obviously participating in actual discrimination

I don’t think so. Please provide evidence. Which orgs and where? In Germany all job postings explicitly say „(m/w/d)“ in title (male/female/diverse). I would be surprised to see any demographic-related constraints as they are easily challenged in court.

Re: Facebook enables gender discrimination in job ads: European human rights body

#119

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft »

fastball wrote: post #113
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While any particular individual isn't "owed a job", it must be true that people as a whole are "owed" jobs and that if governments are incapable or unwilling to foster the economic environment that makes it possible for all working-age people to get jobs, then those governments are invalid. And, as much as we might want to deny it we do live in an era where it seems that maybe the economic environment does not provid…

No, people as a whole are obviously not "owed" jobs. Why would you be owed a job?

Yes, they are owed these jobs. But even if you reject that, the practical argument is that if we conduct society/civilization in a manner in which there are not enough jobs to go around, then they have no disincentive from burning it all down with the rest of us chained inside the building. This is the price of us building our civilization such that we left nothing for anyone to live without civilization... everyone has to get a livelihood or at least the potential for one, and we refuse to pay that price at our own peril.

This should be plainly obvious to anyone who bothers to think about it for even two minutes. I don't claim that they're "owed living wages", or "good jobs" or even "non-awful jobs". All those details can be hashed out later, no need to force them from the top down. But the "everyone working age gets a job if they want it" is extraordinarily non-negotiable.

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