Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site sphinx.UChicago.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!crsp!gargoyle!sphinx!mmar
From: mmar@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP (Mitchell Marks)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: women in combat (really physical job requirements)
Message-ID: <735@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 26-Jun-85 16:02:26 EDT
Article-I.D.: sphinx.735
Posted: Wed Jun 26 16:02:26 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 29-Jun-85 01:22:21 EDT
Organization: U. Chicago - Computation Center
Lines: 58


[][][]

> > {J. Eric Roskos}
>
> > However, I noted with an extreme degree of irritation how many congressMEN
> > made the blatantly sexist remark, "obviously no one feels women should have
> > to go into combat;" and even more, I noted that no women I knew challenged
> > this statement.  They generally agreed with it.

>  {karen@randvax.UUCP (Karen Isaacson)}
> OK, I'll challenge it.  I think (subject to requiring a certain level of
> physical strength, as we do with fire fighters) that women should have to
  ^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^  ^^ ^^ ^^ ^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^^^^
> go into combat if men do.  Of course, I'd just as soon no one had to
> go to war at all, at all.

[ BTW, pause here to endorse K.I.'s views on war.]

Certainly some jobs involving physical work seem to require in the worker
a minimal standard of strength or build or agility.  Then there's a
temptation to entirely back off, and say to those employers "Okay, you
can set those requirements, and give those tests, even though we're aware
that, statistically, more men than women will be be able to pass the
requirements.  So we won't complain, so long as you apply the tests fairly,
and women who do pass them are not further discriminated against."
     It seems to me that this could be a reasonable stance, as long as it
doesn't mean accepting the particular _content_ of the physical tests
uncritically.  They should be scrutinized carefully.
    I'm thinking of a particular recent case involving fire-fighters.  I
can't find the article where I learned of this, and I apologize if details
are incorrect here.
    It was either in NYC or here in Chicago, I think.  A suit was brought
by two women whose applications to the Fire Department had been rejected
because they hadn't passed the physical test.  They challenged the
reasonableness of the particular requirements.  One test was scaling a
five-foot wall (carrying equipment?) .  Offhand, that _looks_ reasonable:
firefighters probably need to scramble into difficult places.  But the
plaintiffs brought in some veteran firefighters, and asked them things
like "How often have you scaled a five-foot wall, while actually fighting
a fire?"  The general answer was "Never".
     The finding was for the plaintiffs.  If I recall correctly, the court
went further, and found (on the basis of when and how the tests had been
instituted and revised) that the test was intentionally discriminatory.
This placed the burden of proof on employers: they have to go beyond saying
"This is a physically strenuous job, so we have to set physical requirements",
they have to go further and demonstrate the relevance of each specific
requirement to actual on-the-job activities. I don't know how high a court
this was, or therefore how wide a precedent it set.

Height requirements, in particular, have notoriously been manipulated to
effect discrimination against women as well as against men from racial
or national-origin groups that had a generally lower height distribution
curve than men from groups the employer was trying to favor.

            -- Mitch Marks
               @ UChicago (linguistics)
               ihnp4!gargoyle!sphinx!mmar