Discrimination

Abstract At the end of Part 2 I suggested that while we often say that everyone should have an equal chance of getting a job, we might only mean that their chances shouldn’t depend on other people’s prejudices; in other words, we might only mean that they shouldn’t be discriminated against on the basis of things like race1 or sex. I pointed out that as an idea this is really quite different to that of equal chances; and therefore that we should try to keep the two ideas separate. But I also noted that keeping these ideas separate raises the question of what exactly is wrong with discriminating against people on the basis of things like race or sex, if not that it leaves them with unequal chances. The question of what exactly is wrong with discriminating against people on the basis of things like race or sex might seem like the kind of question only a philosopher would ask. Isn’t it enough that we know discrimination is wrong, never mind exactly why? I don’t think so. For one thing, there are different ways of discriminating on the basis of race or sex-different reasons why people do this. Some of these ways might be obviously wrong, others less so. Consider, for example, the kind of case where an employer discriminates against women not because he doesn’t like them, but because he genuinely thinks they tend to be less good at the job. Is this wrong? And if so, is it wrong in exactly the same way as it would be wrong for him to discriminate against women because he didn’t like them? We will have no way of answering such questions unless we have already thought about the ‘obvious’ question of why it is wrong to discriminate against certain kinds of people simply because you don’t like them.