We as a society are degenerating into a something pre-enlightement. Instead of equal individual rights for all in theory and in practice it’s more and more about following a set of dogmas, enforced by zealous extremists. Collective rights trump individual rights.
And if that were not bad enough, the dogmas themselves couldn’t be more idiotic. The UBS list @Gesk is linking to above is a great example thereof. Not only are they decrying masculinity as something bad, which is gender-discrimination. Their list of “bad, masculine” words also don’t make sense. Have a guess which words of the following pairs are forbidden and which ones are deemed ok:
chief - lead
vigorous - active
determine - decide
rationality - logic
Maybe it’s just me, but in my view the first ones are all at least as “masculine” as the second ones, if there is any difference at all. Thing is, as per UBS the first ones are all ok, it’s the second ones which are deemed too “masculine”.
And you think this issue would warrant curbing capitalism/free-market to mandate that companies do not adopt a behaviour that they assessed is beneficial to them?
edit to reply to Patron as well: same consideration as above, do you have data to determine that adopting this behaviour is less beneficial to the shareholders than not adopting it?
I’d prefer companies to stay out of the culture wars, yes. There are here to make money, not propaganda.
Furthermore, I’d wish we would all agree to uphold individual rights and freedoms and abstain from discriminating against anyone, including - gasp - the new bogeymen - pardon - bogeypersons, white old men. What UBS, Neon and others are doing is gender discrimination, so I don’t care if they make money from it, it’s wrong.
That this is even in question or needs to be discussed is a sign how much we already have degenerated as a society.
Again, your first point relies on the same assumption as Patron: do you have data to demonstrate that adopting this language or “propaganda” does not translate into them making more money? I wouldn’t lightly assume that, as an outsider, I am more qualified to define how a bank could make more or less money.
Regarding your second point and gender discrimination, I’m not sure I understand where exactly the discrimination is, for instance in the article about UBS. Could you refer me to a specific example?
@Patron: again, same question: do you have data to determine that adopting this behaviour is less beneficial to the shareholders than not adopting it (be it for Neon or UBS)? “Overdoing it” might also be Neon committing more to a specific approach because they believe they are maximizing their profit?
And you don’t find defining one gender as bad, and declaring words associated with that gender forbidden, as discriminatory? Would you approve if words like mother, sister, daughter were forbidden? Oh wait, they all actually are, as per SwissRe’s language rules… Also the word “woman” is increasingly seen as discriminatory (women are to be called people who menstruate, which clearly is much shorter, more elegant and completely encompasses what it means to be female).
I feel like “absence of data” should result in “I don’t have enough data to question the approach they have taken, given that they probably have internal data I don’t have access to” rather than the opposite. But then again, I’m no expert on this matter.
But anyway, if this is “unethical”, does it mean that they should refrain from maximizing shareholder value for ethical reasons?
@Myfirsttime As to the discrimination question: I didn’t understand the UBS news as “defining one gender as bad”, but simply that certain words carry an undertone (that you might define as “woke”) and that those undertones as not desirable to maximize profit. Might boil down to a difference in interpretation though… Also, legally, they are not held to the same standard as the government for instance. That’s why if you go clubbing you also sometimes see parties where the entrance fee is waived for women. Might be a lack of taste, but I’m not sure that’s illegal. If they maximize their profit that way, is it still an issue?
it seems to me that some people are easily offended by inclusivity or the attempt to. anyway could we stay on topic here please? feel free to start a thread about the good old days of systemic oppression or how to monetise social movement in your business.
women != people who menstruate, that’s the whole point of using inclusive language. If for some reason, menstruating is relevant, you can say people who menstruate, which will be the most precise way (because there are women who don’t menstruate and people who menstruate who are not women).
If you’re talking about women (because somehow that’s the group you want to address), you can say women.
It is so, so, SO fucked up… that blows my mind how people can get along with that.
When are they going to enforce 50/50 male/female quotas on:
Construction workers
Sailors and fishermen
Army
Bus drivers, truck drivers
Mechanical garages
Security guards
Professional Divers
Etc.
Oh, wait, no. Only on office jobs and public jobs like police, firemen, etc. which are super comfortable jobs compared to the ones I mentioned above. For that, yes, 50/50. For the rest, fuck off men (they should have studied something). So, so, so criminal and unfair.
And that’s what’s wrong with so-called “inclusive” language. It blows the over-sensitivities of a tiny minority out of proportion and forces everyone to use a kind of doublespeak (really 1984 should be read by everyone, again and again, until they understand it). A language designed to break the link between word and meaning. A system that is forcing people to deny reality, to deny what their eyes are seeing, namely that there are two biological genders and the members of each are easily distinguishable from each other (there are very rare medical exceptions, of course).
A man can therefore never give birth to a child, for example. You can redefine what the word man should mean, of course, just as you can order everyone to call a chair a table, but you cannot redefine the meaning behind it. A chair is a chair, even if you call it table. By redefining words you are obscuring reality, make understanding reality harder and derive people and their identities of the means to express themselves.
Wokist gender definition (self-identification / pronoun choice) is tautological, it has no meaning beyond its definition. A woman is a person identifying as such, nothing more. The very word then becomes useless, as it describes nothing, unless you follow wokism and believe in the totemic importance of pronouns.
By contrast, the experiences and identity of the vast majority lose the word to describe themselves. To be a woman is more than to menstruate, just as there are fundamental differences between transwomen and biological women. Transwomen deserve to chose and express their identity, but biological women do as well. There is nothing wrong with calling a chair a chair. A woman is a woman and a transwoman is a transwoman. Of course everyone should be polite and tolerant, but no one should be forced to deny reality because some people demand that.
Duly noted, so that leads us to the next difficult question imho: in these cases, who has the authority to determine whether X or Y is ethical or not (or even whether it is a question of ethics at all)? I’m sure many people here on this forum or more generally in Switzerland or the world would agree with you, and others would disagree. How would a company determine which direction it should follow here?
I totally agree on the merits. But it is our nature that you mainly promote your peers.
There are few ways of doing it start forcing equality and diversity and from there you can move on or enforce polices to promote it and let the things go.
Anyway the problem that we have is another (you just mention) the head needs to be an expert and skill on the topic. I think is totally wrong and out dated. Your head needs to lead and not be an SME.
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