The Irish just went full retard - Legalizing gender discrimination

[TheRealJoeFish]

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In such cases, where candidates who compete for Top Level Appointments Committee positions are of equal merit, then priority would be given to the female candidate where they are under-represented on the management board of the department or office in question.

... Aren't you supposed to be hiring based on qualifications and merits? ...

First off... yes. Yes you are.  And that's why they say only after a merit analysis has determined the candidates are of equal merit will priority be given to the female candidate.

Let's suppose, as an example, that there's a 10-person management board, and that they're trying to fill a vacancy.  8 of the 9 people on the board already are men.  If the best candidate is a man, they'll hire him and 9 of the 10 will be men.  If the best candidate is a woman, they'll hire her and 8 of the 10 will be men.  If there are two candidates that are deemed to be equal, then being underrepresented breaks the tie, and they hire the woman. 

So, what they're really saying is "we want to be fair to all of the candidates, and evaluate them on their merits.  If that doesn't get us a clear winner, then we'll also factor in the value of having a diverse committee, and that will favor the underrepresented candidate."  Sounds all right to me.

And, of course, it also leads one to wonder: what was the reason there were 8 men and 1 woman on the committee?  Is it because men are better at this task than women?  Is it because there are far more men in this field than women?  Is it because the men in this field advance farther than the women in this field? Is it because, every time there's been an open position with two equally-qualified applicants, one a man and one a woman, the male-dominated board has chosen the man?