Clarissa Bye: Let’s choose our best, not to fulfil sex or race quotas

NSW Treasurer Matt Kean has brought in ‘formal gender diversity targets’ for state-owned corporations. But why would we sideline merit in favour of gender, asks Clarissa Bye.

Every so often I take my mum swimming at the Roselands outdoor swimming pool. It’s a classic old-fashioned Aussie pool, built in the idealistic and egalitarian late 1960s.

Unlike the cramped indoor pools being currently built, there’s lots of space, easy parking, gum trees in the parkland surrounding it, and it’s not hard to get in and out of the water.

It attracts a mixed demographic; youngsters, pensioners and people from all walks of life.

The other day I was taken aback to see it is now offering “women only” sessions on Sunday mornings ­between 9am and 11am. Tough luck bringing your son along.

Over at ­Auburn, something similar has been going on since 2017. The council ­decided to erect curtains around one of their indoor pools for women-only swimming sessions, to cater for a Muslim demographic. Those sessions still run on Wednesday and Sundays for a total of six hours.

Dividing up society based on group affiliation is identity politics set in stone, writes Clarissa Bye. Picture: Terry Pontikos

On Friday night, the rainbow-­obsessed Inner West Council is hosting a “Trans and Gender Diverse Swim Night” at Ashfield Pool. The “trans and gender diverse community and allies” will “enjoy FREE exclusive use of Ashfield Aquatic Centre”, the council says.

“You’ll have access to the outdoor program pool, children’s inflatable, indoor pools, spa, sauna and steam ­facilities” from 7pm until 10pm. It’s shut to everyone else.

Earlier this month NSW Treasurer Matt Kean decided to bring in “formal gender diversity targets” for state-owned corporations like Sydney Water and Essential Energy.

“Gender balance on treasury boards will rise from an impressive 40 per cent to a balanced 50 per cent,” he breathlessly tweeted.

He was lauded by left-wing media, who urged him to turn his sights to the representation of female Liberal MPs, bemoaning that ex-premier Gladys Berejiklian had “avoided weighing into gender issues”.

Unlike the Labor Party, which has a gender quota of 40 per cent female MPs, with the goal of increasing the quota to 50-50 by 2025, Liberal women are not subject to set mandates. They’ve resisted, so far, the temptation to give in to the seemingly benign idea that everyone’s going to be better off with set numbers and proportions of representation according to your group identity.

Treasurer Matt Kean is a fan of quotas.

Quotas have been touted as a wonderful panacea for some years now — they used to be called “affirmative action” but that’s been sidelined lately in favour of the more fashionable term “diversity”.

Perhaps that’s because the new phrase sounds more encompassing, as though it’s opening things up to a bigger range of people. But it’s the exact opposite.

By putting in rules and exclusions based on group identity, you are ­limiting opportunity and your pool of talent.

Where is all this taking us?

At the National Gallery in Canberra, the woke administration has brought in a “five-year gender equity plan” requiring that all acquisitions, exhibitions and commissions represent a split of 40 per cent female artists and 40 per cent male.

Even more absurd, the remaining 20 per cent will be saved for non-­binary people, or gender diverse ­people, or trans women and men and “those who do not wish to identify”.

Acclaimed artist Tim Storrier described it as “social engineering” and questioned how you can put quotas on quality.

He also pointed out how the Soviet Union and Germany in the 1930s subjected art to “quotas based on racial terms”. In Malaysia, it’s ­become impossible to get rid of racial quotas which were brought in back in the 1960s for state-funded institutions and public sector jobs to help out the indigenous Malay population, even though they are now widely thought to be a massive handbrake on the country.

It’s as high as 90 per cent in education programs, dooming the chances of many straight-A Chinese and Indian-heritage children.

Mortgages are even discounted according to race. The Diplomat magazine calls it the “Malay First Malaise”, leading to corruption and a stagnating society. But because the majority of the population are ­Malays, they won’t vote it out.

Dividing up society based on group identity, whether it be gender, race, age, religion or sexuality, is an insidiously bad idea. It’s identity politics set in stone.

You’re not judged by your individual character, ability, talents but ­rather by what group you fall into.

According to Canadian psychologist and author Jordan Petersen, this kind of segregating is essentially a Marxist world view.

Research shows there are far more differences between individuals within a group, he says, than there are between groups themselves. So there’s less of that “diversity” coming to the fore.

“Group identity takes priority over individual identity,” he says. “It’s ­unbelievably dangerous because when people are identified … primarily by their group identity you can also attribute group guilt to that group.” He cites the bloody history of the 20th century.

Quotas are said to redress past prejudices. But, like all rules giving out special entitlements, they’re virtually impossible to repeal.

Is Mr Kean arguing prejudice against women of talent is still so bad, such a roadblock, that the actual idea of merit itself needs to be sidelined in favour of gender?

Petersen offers a more down-to-earth explanation. There are differences between men and women large enough to play a role in affecting what career you pick. And women do often want to go part-time when they have children.

Swimming against the tide of fashionable ideology might be hard work.

Especially if there’s no virtue-signalling cheer squad on the pool deck sidelines.

But a prosperous egalitarian ­society, where a brain surgeon is there because of ability, not because of sex or race quotas, is the gold medal we should be striving for.