On Thu, Apr 25, 2002 at 04:22:32PM +0000, Rob Casko wrote:
> Discrimination, on the the other hand, is ACTING on a racist or otherwise
> stereotypical belief in such a way that there are differences in how one
> group of people is treated.
>
> THAT is wrong. That should be illegal.
Please don't redefine words.
Discrimination \Dis*crim`i*na"tion\, n. [L. discriminatio the
contrasting of opposite thoughts.]
1. The act of discriminating, distinguishing, or noting and
marking differences.
For 'discriminating', I look WordNet's definition:
discriminating
adj 1: showing or indicating careful judgment and discernment
especially in matters of taste; "the discriminating
eye of the connoisseur" [ant: {undiscriminating}]
2: marked by the ability to see or make fine distinctions;
"discriminate judgments"; "discriminate people" [syn: {discriminate}]
[ant: {indiscriminate}]
3: having or demonstrating ability to recognize or draw fine
distinctions; "an acute observer of politics and
politicians"; "incisive comments"; "icy knifelike
reasoning"; "as sharp and incisive as the stroke of a
fang"; "penetrating insight"; "frequent penetrative
observations" [syn: {acute}, {incisive}, {keen}, {knifelike},
{penetrating}, {penetrative}, {piercing}, {sharp}]
It is discrimination to dislike Budweiser. It is discrimination to hate
plaid pants. It's even discrimination to choose one job applicant over
another, even if the reason is based on who has more skills or will work
for less money. Discrimination is simply 'making choices based upon
differences'.
This is a good thing, when the differences are applicable to the choice,
it is how you succeed in businsess and life and is the benefit of being
a rational being. When the choices are based on meaningless things
(refusing to hire someone because they were said plaid pants), it is a
bad thing in that the choice of clothing doesn't infer an ability to
perform the job and you may end up with an inferior person in the
position.
Discriminating based upon race, creed, national origin, etc, is illegal
in some circumstances. It isn't illegal in all circumstances. (And,
where things like 'quotas' are concerned, racial and/or gender based
discrimination is mandated by the law.)
The term for discrimination based on race is 'racialism', though that's
an ugly word, it's what we have (and English does lack orthogonal words
for other common 'bad' discriminations ... there is no word for
'discrimination based on sex').
