Sounds like giving up.

You’re arguing we should take turns being discriminated against because fixing the system is too hard. I’d rather actually try to reduce the total amount of discrimination instead of just spinning the wheel to see whose turn it is to lose.

“Someone has to get the short end” isn’t wisdom: it’s defeatism, and toxic at that.

The issue is not “discrimination is happening”. The issue is that systematic discrimination has biased outcomes and under represented certain demographics, and that needs to be addressed.

Discrimination against individuals is not a problem.

“Discrimination against individuals is not a problem” is quite possibly the most dystopian sentence I’ve read on HN.

I’m one of those individuals. So are the women and minorities you claim to be helping. We’re not statistical abstractions to be shuffled around in service of demographic targets.

If your solution to systematic discrimination requires you to declare that discriminating against individuals doesn’t matter, you’ve lost the plot entirely.

I can say the same thing at you. If your solution to large demographics experiencing systematic discrimination over decades leading to worse outcomes is to tell them that from now on it’ll be different but that all the disadvantages they experienced will not be dealt with then you’re either insane, or trying to disguise your bias.

You literally just said discrimination against individuals isn't a problem. I'm objecting to that specifically.

I've proposed structural solutions throughout this thread. You've proposed accepting discrimination and deciding whose turn it is to experience it.

These are not morally equivalent positions.

No you haven’t. You’ve offered platitudes. “I think about it all the time” ok, what are you actually going to do about it?

The grow the pie approaches you mentioned only works while the pie is growing, and we’ve had layoffs for the past 2 years. What is your solution now that the pie isn’t getting bigger?

It sure sounds like your solution is telling people to wait 150 years and hope the problem solves itself.

When growth stops, you focus on evaluation bias and institutional barriers. Blind resume screening, structured interviews with standardised criteria, expanding recruiting beyond homogeneous networks, addressing sponsorship patterns in promotions. None of these require growth.

None require discriminating against anyone.

But here's the thing: I'm not the one who needs to justify my position. You're asking me, someone who's been explicitly discriminated against multiple times, to solve systemic inequality for you, whilst simultaneously defending discrimination against individuals as acceptable policy.

I've spent two decades becoming exceptionally good at what I do. I ensure fairness in my own decisions. I can't fix capitalism or rewrite history, and it's absurd to demand I present a complete solution to systemic inequality before I'm allowed to object to being told I'm the wrong demographic for jobs I've earned.

Your position is that discrimination is fine as long as it's against the right people. Mine is that discrimination is wrong. One of us is being a hypocrite here, and it's not me.

No hypocrisy on my end, so it must be you.

You want the injustices to remain unaddressed, and the people affected to wait longer until they are because you never got to benefit from discrimination and now it’s your turn.

I don’t expect you to solve everything, I expect you not to get in the way of the solution.

You’ve argued that:

- Discrimination against individuals doesn’t matter

- I should accept being discriminated against

- Objecting to this makes me the problem

- This is somehow not hypocrisy

I grew up in generational poverty, worked myself to the bone for two decades, ensure fairness in my own decisions, and proposed structural alternatives. Apparently none of that matters because I look like people in power.

There’s no productive conversation left to have here.

You’ve been through all that and yet here you are, successful.

You never had to worry about being the first female manager someone has had. You never had to worry about being judged unfairly because of your accent. You never had to deal with your colleagues saying mildly racist things to your face and expecting you to be ok with it.

And nobody is taking your success away! All I’m saying is that you’re gonna have to wait a bit longer because it’s not your turn anymore.

But apparently that’s not enough, so you’re throwing a fit about it.

And again, your “structural solutions” are platitudes. They don’t work.