Ethical to screen out Trump supporters applying for a job?

In My Humble Opinion
181

This is worth a bit of following up.

Trump did regrettably well in Brooklyn. He did well in the ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods, which is a pretty unique situation. And the issue of hiring or not hiring the Hasidim just doesn’t come up.

But he did well in the old blue-collar neighborhoods, too. And those people, in those neighborhoods, are my neighbors. And even relatives.

Their reasons for supporting Trump are, at best, misguided. And often just plain wrong and wrongheaded.

Still, denying them employment doesn’t seem to me to be the way to go.

No, I don’t want them to be unemployed. Making people angry and desparate never produces anything good.

182

Oh, please, this is ridiculous.

183

Huh? Does it not make sense to you that in hiring decisions, some characteristics are justifiable reasons for exclusion from employment while others are not? And that the reason we have protected classes in US employment law in the first place is precisely because it was considered socially acceptable to discriminate on the basis of those unjustifiable reasons?

If I’m applying for a job as a Chinese-English interpreter, for example, I would certainly hope that the employer would “retain the freedom to discriminate” against me on the grounds that I don’t know Chinese (which I don’t). That would be a thoroughly justifiable reason to discriminate against me as an applicant.

But if I did know Chinese, it would be unjustifiable and unreasonable to reject my application on the grounds of my being female, or my religious or racial background, or any other characteristic that constitutes a protected class in US employment law. You understand that fundamental difference, surely? If not, we may be in for some fairly protracted explanations here.

184

Please, stop this. You are interpreting what I said in an obviously ridiculous way to try to score points. We can do better than this in this discussion.

But if you need clarification, please allow me to state that not only do I disapprove of workplace harassment in any form, but I have never harassed anyone, ever, anywhere, at work or otherwise, whether that person reported to me at work or not, in my life. And I never will.

Good enough?

185

Well, people are making a tenuous argument that there is a strong correlation between the way one votes and the suitability of that person for employment. I’m sure all kinds of correlations could be made between groups of people and attributes suitable for employment yet if acted upon would rightfully be condemned as unjust. Sad thing is, shameless hypocrisy is a core component of leftist ideology and that’s highly unlikely to change.

186

Then what did you mean by “convert”?

187

He’s referring to how disagreements should be handled. It ought to be obvious. You can disagree and act in a rational form towards others OR you can eradicate them. Seriously, my reference to religious wars is no accident. We are seeing an irrational demand for conformity and ideological purity begin to develop. Perhaps religious war is incorrect. Maybe more like a Maoist purge.

188

I wish you’d let this go.

But if you won’t, please look at everything I said.

Remember where I quoted something St. Francis said? “Use words only when necessary,” or something like that?

What I meant was that Trumpists, if they’re actually treated decently by people whom they (wrongly) believed to be their enemies, might at least begin to rethink some things, to soften up a bit. Whereas if they’re actualy hurt, punished (and denying employment does hurt), they’re only going to harden their distrust of others.

But let the harassment thing go. I was not, and am not, advocating harassment of anyone. At all, every, anywhere, by me or anyone else.

189

But isn’t it reasonable for employers to prefer applicants who are not so demonstrably prone to making judgements that are “at best, misguided” and “often just plain wrong and wrongheaded”?

You seem to be arguing that poor judgment, low information, and even outright obstinate stupidity are things that job applicants ought not to be penalized for. I don’t think it’s unreasonable for employers to disagree with you on that.

I certainly don’t advocate going around spontaneously jeering at or reviling Trump supporters to make them feel bad, or deliberately trying to make them “angry and desperate”.

But you seem to be advocating here for a blithe disregard for the principles of personal responsibility and the consequences of one’s actions. Isn’t it a form of societal blackmail for people to declare, in effect, “I’m going to insist on being irresponsibly ill-informed, misguided, wrongheaded and wrong in my judgements, but don’t you dare hold that against me in future in assessing my suitability as a potential employee or you’ll make me angry and desperate and whatever bad stuff I do will be your fault!” ?

190

One does not put a rotten apple in a barrel to give the good apples a chance to turn it good.

191

You think folks who believe in and worship sky fairies based on books from tribes written centuries/millenia ago are rational when all scientific evidence consistently demonstrates that the supernatural is fiction? Should those irrational folks be excluded from society?

192

I repeat: Nowhere in this discussion am I seeing anybody saying that the mere act of voting should cause an employer concern. Nor is anybody even saying that identifying as a Republican, or supporting Republican candidates in general, should be considered problematic.

We’re talking specifically about the question of an applicant who has a visible public profile of supporting a very specific ideology of malicious, incompetent, delusional and toxic opposition to factual reality, scientific judgement, and the functioning of democracy. You should not be trying to normalize the pathology of Trump support as mere ordinary political partisanship.

Do you have a specific example in mind? Because your attempts to draw general conclusions from the mere existence of protected classes as a whole have so far not been very persuasive.

193

I think job applicants should be judged on their qualifications, or lack thereof, for the job in question.

I really don’t think that’s a radical position.

If I want to, say, have the floor replaced in a couple of rooms in my apartment (which I do), I’m not going to ask the tradesperson who he voted for.

Although I actually know who he voted for, because I know the guy. Let’s just say it ain’t the same person I voted for.

But he does really good work at a reasonable price. So, after the holidays, he’ll be tearing up the floors in my apartment.

I’m good with that.

You’re not? So be it. Nothing I can do about that.

194

Years ago, when it was a hirer’s market (when hasn’t it been, really ?), we tossed any resume that had a typo, pretty much no matter how small.

If you have an unambiguous typo on … your resume, fer Chrissakes … you weren’t a very detail-oriented person.

Or so the thinking went.

I’m not sure I feel any different about that now.

If you have a stack of resumes for a job that requires critical thinking, judgment, discernment, discretion, trustworthiness, and a keen analytical mind, why wouldn’t you toss out the person who you think is most likely to exhibit the antithesis of those traits ?

Large companies, AFAIK, still use screening tools like AVA and Myers-Briggs, no ? In many organizations, how well somebody ‘fits’ is a bona fide occupational qualification.

And many routes to ascertain that information are fair game. Not all, but many.

If my VP of Marketing candidate thinks it’s okay to kidnap, “try,” and execute Gretchen Whitmer … and implies so publicly … why would I hire that person again ?

Like so many things, this is a continuum of awfulness. It’s also very dependent on the job, the company, and about 300 other factors.

I don’t think there’s a binary yes/no on this one, personally, but I can imagine no end of situations in which – all things being equal (or nothing being equal) – I’d have to take a pass at the Proud Boy with an application in his hand.

195

No, and I don’t see anybody here disagreeing with you about it.

But presumably you agree that poor judgment, low information, and even outright obstinate stupidity can adversely affect the perception of one’s qualifications for certain types of jobs.

And I don’t see anybody here arguing that you should.

196

Moving the goalposts a bit, aren’t we?

I mean, saying, and even actually believing, that the election in, say, Wisconsin was rigged, and advocating the actual murder of anyone, are not quite the same thing.

197

And it is also entirely different from hiring someone to work for your company.

198

Not really.

It’s more that old joke about “We’ve already decided what you are. Now, we’re just haggling on price.”

Having voted for DJT in 2016 wouldn’t trip my trigger. Having voted for him in 2020 might be a different thing.

Calling the election ‘rigged’ with absolutely zero credible evidence is idiocy. Even mentioning the Whitmer thing with tacit support … is still another thing. That’s what the rest of my post talked to: a continuum of awfulness.

Helping to clarify where each of us might draw this line, IMHO, helps to refine people’s positions on this one.

199

Sure. But believing and publicly claiming that the election in Wisconsin was rigged, in open defiance of the total lack of factual evidence to date in support of any such claims, does not speak well for one’s critical thinking abilities or capacity to distinguish between reality and delusion.

It does not seem unreasonable to me for an employer to consider that kind of incapacity undesirable in a job applicant.

200

Why? All the risks I’d be be taking by hiring a Trump supporter to work at my company are presumably greater when I bring that Trump supporter into my home, where my wife and children live.

Believe me, I care a lot more about my family than I do about the company that pays me.