Discriminatie

Inquiry.

N. A Turkish woman works as a doctor’s assistant. One day, she decides to wear an Islamic headscarf. The doctor says that her headscarf gives the patients the wrong impression. He wants to fire the woman if she doesn’t take of her headscarf.
Does the doctor discriminate her?

E. What if the same Turkish women now works at a trendy hairdressers salon. The owner always makes sure that the hairdressers have a nice, trendy haircut, as to be representative for the salon. The owner says that he will fire the women if she doesn’t take of the headscarf.
Is her boss discriminating her?


N. In a small, traditional town there is room for one new restaurant.
The choice is between a Turkish restaurant and a Chinese restaurant. The municipality chooses the Chinese restaurant because it’s more common. The Turkish restaurant on the other hand would attract more Turkish teenagers who would cause annoyance.
The municipality says that the Chinese restaurant would fit in better in the more traditional town.
Does the municipality discriminate?

E. A commercial broadcasting station is looking for a sexy blond hostess fore one of their shows.
Does the station discriminate?

N. A company has a limited budget for taking care of the children of their employees. The company’s policy is that the children of female employees have the priority.
Does the company discriminate?


What is discrimination?

Discrimination is the unfair treatment of people on grounds of their looks, their religion, their ideas, their culture, their sex, their age or their sexual preference.
Discrimination is, in short, the bullying of people on grounds of little, irrelevant differences and it’s forbidden by the law.

For example: if someone isn’t hired as a chauffeur because he hasn’t got a drivers license, that’s understandable.
But if someone isn’t hired because of his skin colour that’s discrimination.


There are two kinds of discrimination; direct and indirect.
Direct discrimination is when you say to people right in there faces that you don’t like them because of their skin colour or because of a different reason. For example: you’re black and you’re not allowed in a club because of your skin colour.

Indirect discrimination is when you don’t say it right in peoples faces that you don’t like them because of their skin colour but make up some stupid excuse. For example: when you're not allowed in the club because they say you’re wearing the wrong clothes, while a white person wearing the same clothes does get in.

Most of the times it is pretty hard to prove that it’s a case of indirect discrimination, because it's easy to hide.
Why do people discriminate others?

People discriminate others mostly because they are different and a minority.
We see the same behaviour with animals: when a wolf is different in colour from the rest of his pack he will always be the lowest in rank. When the pack has a tough winter, the wolf with a different colour will be chased out of their territory. In the spring and summer, when there is enough food, the pack can use an extra hunter and won’t mind the other wolf’s company. But as soon as the times get tough the outsider will be kicked out.
In WO II basically the same thing happened with the humans; times were rough and most people didn’t have a job. So what did they do? They just blamed it on the Jews, they have always been different, they are a minority, so lets just kick them out!

Another reason why people may discriminate others is when they feel threatened, like when their territory is invaded. Also a very bestial side of human nature. Even a cute fluffy bunny can be a dangerous opponent to another bunny when his private territory is invaded. The bunny will attack the intruder and chase him out of his territory.
People act pretty much the same. When someone with a different colour comes to your land and invades your territory, a lot of people get a bit itchy and uncomfortable. They feel the new person is a threat because he’s different; a different colour, a different culture that they don’t understand, etcetera.

The other people will soon get the idea that the stranger is dangerous and just a little thing can set the hostility in motion.

Especially young people like teenagers have the idea that their country is theirs alone, and that they don’t have to share. They feel threatened because of the large number of strangers and they act instinctively: they try to scare the intruders away. It’s pure instinctive territorial behaviour; kick them out before they kick you out.

Most discriminating behaviour can be traced down to the source: primitive, animal like instincts. With animals that’s ok, but humans have been given a better developed brain so that they can think about the implications before they act.