Would you be doing this for any post on any social media for any subject you (presumably) consider to be a CT? Would you do this across the board? Who would decide what is or isn’t a CT? If they have 9/11 CTs, or if they are against nuclear energy, or if they ascribe to the myriad left or right wing CTs that abound…would they all also be subject to this? Or is this just about Trump or the election and election fraud? Also, what if they have in the past ascribed to election fraud in other elections…and, oh, say posted that on a message board such as this one? Should those people also be eliminated from contention?
I think what you are proposing is a slippery slope, depending on how you push it forward. I think it could open you or your organization up to accusations of bias, though depending on the post and how offensive it is I think it is probably, technically, ‘legal’ in most cases. But in the specific case you give here I think someone could make the counter case for why weren’t others censured for thinking there was election fraud and posting about it in the past…and many, many people have in several US elections. Hell, we went through years of it after the 2000 election, and it popped up many times, even in the last 2-3 years with people saying how unreliable our election system is or was. It only seems to be NOW that anyone even talking about the possibility is being shut down hard, to the point you are using it as an example of removing someone from a valid candidate pool over.
While I tend to side with the slippery slope argument on this one, I don’t think all things are equal.
If you feel strongly about using ‘being a nut-job Trump supporter’ as an exclusionary qualification for a hire, simply asking them on what evidence they base their belief in a CT like the ‘election fraud’ canard would be good enough.
If they can’t even cite a single shred of credible evidence to support their belief, then … maybe they could still do manual labor (eg, mow my lawn), but I think it would be disqualifying for anything requiring even a modicum of critical thought.
Lots of people can compartmentalize well. I might not be comfortable betting the success of my business on ‘this type’ being able to adequately do so.
It may not be an effective tool by which to get them to change their mind, but that’s not really the goal in this hypothetical. It’s enough to get them to damn themselves out of a job.
Which – to repeat – is at odds with the slippery slope issue that I think should be well considered.
If a candidate’s Facebook feed was full of 9/11 truther, anti-vax or other CTs, yes – I would likely move them to the reject pile as well. That said, enthusiastic support for Trump (even before this post-election insanity) is a CT in a category all by itself, since IMO it requires buying into an alternate reality that connects a number of barely coherent conspiracy theories.
Yes, it is. That’s why I was asking only about the ethics of doing it at my made-up company, not the legalities of making it a recommendation for businesses across the board.
Just after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, my boss was interviewing candidates for a job opening. One of the candidiates was from Louisiana, and she mentioned something about how awful things were happening in New Orleans.
At the time, there were a lot of false stories about poor (black) people running amok and raping and pillaging people. There were people with guns standing on bridges preventing desperate survivors from leaving flooded areas.
Any way, this candidate’s response used the term “let the animals out of their cages.” He compared desperate survivors of a catastrophe to animals. She did not consider him among the final candidates.
To me, most CTs require one to buy into an alternative reality…and I include my own quirky CT leanings in this as well. The trouble is that a LOT of folks buy into one or more CT, so picking and choosing which ones would make one ineligible for a given position would be difficult unless you took an across the board approach…or just said you were going to allow your personal bias free reign to pick the ones you, personally dislike enough to disqualify someone.
I think, ethically, it’s better to not allow personal bias into the process, and so not use this as a criterion for selection…depending. If the person has obvious, disturbing writings on their social media then that may change all of this.
I’m sure it happens. I remember (no cite, and really not worth looking for one) stories back in 2008 about “conservative” employers threatening to fire anyone with an Obama bumper sticker. I don’t know how much truth there was in the stories, but plenty of people in this thread have declared that they would refused to hire someone based on a belief that the last election was stolen, and perhaps simply because an applicant is a Trump supporter. I do not doubt that there are right-wing employers who would do the same kind of thing (for different reasons, of course).
So if this kind of thing really gets going, it’s going to be a war with a lot of casualties. Do we really think this is a good thing?
Also, does anyone think that threatening people’s livelihoods, making it impossible for them to feed and clothe their children, is going to change any minds? Win any converts?
What it’s actually going to do is confirm every CT belief they have. “See, the liberals will destroy you if you don’t conform and get your mind right!”
Except this time they’ll be right.
Where as actually hiring people with differing, even extreme, political views might actually serve as a bit of a melting pot. Aren’t we all supposed to be the change we want to see, and all that?
The problem here is I need people to be able to do the job they’re being hired for. My work demands people who are able to look at a lot of (sometimes competing) evidence and make a rational decision based on that evidence.
If you are absolutely unwilling to look evidence that contradicts your world-view, you can’t do a good job here. You will fail, and you will hurt other people along the way.
At this point, if you are hard-core “the election was stolen because I saw these things on Facebook (or Parler, or OANN) and I am not going to look at CNN or MSNBC because they’re liars,” you have demonstrated that you are unwilling to look at evidence that contradicts your world-view. If you will do it in one area of your life, you probably will in other areas, and if you do it at work that will harm MY livelihood. A workplace as melting pot is a worthy goal if and only if it does not cause injury to the people we serve and undercut the continued existence of this workplace.
Of course. But I’d bet that the vast majority of jobs can be done just fine by a CT-believing Trump supporter.
I myself firmly believe some things that some here at SD believe demonstrate that I cannot think rationally.
So where’s the line? What jobs would you deny to a Trump supporter who believes the election was stolen? Fry cook? Plumber? Receptionist? Janitor? Engineer?
In the current environment, I need somebody willing to follow current scientific consensus and government mandates about topics such as masks and social distancing. From what I’ve seen, many hardcore MAGA-heads (a subset of Trump supporters or Trump voters) are NOT willing to follow the rules, because mask mandates are just a librul attempt to enslave real 'Muricans or some such. If you’re not willing to wear a mask and stay six feet away as much as possible, then no, you can’t be my receptionist or janitor or fry cook or hold any other job interacting with fellow employees or the public.
Now, does belief that the election was stolen correlate 100% with refusal to wear your mask correctly? Almost certainly not, but there is definitely a pretty strong overlap.
It would be an interesting exercise to see how much overlap there is between refusal to consider the authority/expertise of elections officials and refusal to consider that of the Authority Having Jurisdiction (plumbing inspector, plan reviewer, health officer, etc.) for your plumber or engineer or even fry cook. I haven’t thought much about that because I don’t have much need to hire plumbers, but if I did, that would be a topic for much consideration.
Then why wouldn’t you just explain that at this workplace there’s a requirement that all employees wear an approved mask at all times, and ask if they’d comply with such a requirement?
I felt strongly that Judge Kavanaugh proved himself to be temperamentally unsuited to a lifetime appointment to the SCOTUS.
Which didn’t mean he couldn’t get a job, or even keep his current job. Neither did it mean he was being deprived of life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness.
It meant that he demonstrated personality traits that would seem to be wholly incompatible with the job he was seeking.
As I said, for some kinds of work, basing a significant portion of your life on pursuing and propagating a CT as irrational and baseless as the ‘fraudulent election’ canard speaks very poorly of a person.
It doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be able to find gainful and meaningful work, or get a mortgage, or live where they like, or pursue happiness.
But they might not be able to get the job they want, with any company they want.
It’s not as simple as their willingness to comply with a rule.
It was in the post to which I replied. That poster specifically made it about mask-wearing and social distancing.
That said, I still think this is a dangerous road to head down.
Creating a class of angry unemployed people seems to be a sure-fire recipe for disaster. The people who ultimately became Trump supporters had enough legitimate grievances (that have not yet been addressed). Why give them another one?
Me, I’d rather convert them than crush them. As St. Francis may or may not have said, “preach the Gospel at all times, and if necessary use words.”
I think the totality of that post speaks to concern about a larger issue – an issue that the ‘masks and social distancing’ example describes. Not speaking for its author. Just how I read it.
But I do agree with the slippery slope quality in this one.
If your political opinions cause you to be shunned by polite society, maybe you should take a good hard look at your political opinions rather than reflexively blaming polite society.
Besides, aren’t these the people that traditionally love free markets? If you can’t get hired because of your opinions, you are perfectly free to seek a job at a company where management shares your opinions. If no such company exists, maybe you should reflect on why so few successful people share your opinions. Or you can start your own Trump-loving company.
So, in short, I don’t see an ethical problem. Unless a person is a member of a protected class, I’m free to hire people that I like and not hire people I don’t like. And if you like Trump, I’m not going to like you.
You also have the option of keeping your reprehensible opinions to yourself if you want to work for me.
Do you think there should be “protected classes” (whatever that means to you)? Or do you think that’s an unjust restriction on your freedom to hire people that you like and not hire people you don’t like?
Yes, I’m a strong believer in protected classes. I also understand the concept of mutability that’s behind it. I’m not going to refuse to hire you because of what you are, but I can certainly refuse based on what you say and do.
They could follow the rules when it comes to mask wearing and other workplace rules when it comes to health issues, but if they only follow those rules the instant they enter the workspace and stop following those rules the instant they leave the workplace, then there is a problem.
Can I count on them to wear the mask (correctly!) even when I’m not watching? Is it going to be a mask compliant with the CDC recommendations (two or more layers, close-fitting, no exhalation valves, worn over nose and mouth), or am I signing up for constant battles over whether a gaiter or a single layer of netting is compliant? If the governor or the county commission or my boss issues a new mandate, maybe that you won’t enter the building if your body temperature is over 100 degrees or you must now stay 10 feet apart, are they going to comply readily, or am I going to have to hunt them down and browbeat them to secure their agreement to comply? How much supervising and managing are they going to require if they don’t at some fundamental level trust in science and respect the authority of various officials to issue public health orders?
Not if there strong indications that what they are strongly influences what they do. In those cases, it wouldn’t be me as the employer not being able to separate the two, it would be them.