Discrimination?

[Octavo]

Okaaaay. And do we have any evidence that the company in the OP are actually doing what the OP claims?
<snip>
The truth is men are just highly unlikely to use them, but they don't actually refuse to insure on grounds of gender.

It's a marketing ploy, also known as spin. I have a sneaky feeling the company mentioned in the OP is doing the same thing.
<snip>
You can discuss discrimination all day if you like but until someone provides a link to the company in the OP we have no idea what they're actually claiming.

Bolding is mine.

At 1st for Women, we will always endeavour to take care of you. Because we know that women are better drivers we offer women savings of up to 40% on car insurance. That's why you know that you'll get the right cover at the right price.

Think of it as unique tailor-made Car and Home Insurance, that's especially for women. Although 1st for Women Insurance is exclusive to women, you can put your family onto your 1st for Women policy as well.

I would link to the site, but I'm below 15 posts


As for the comments about gender vs racial discrimination, I'd like to point out that in SA *both* are unconstitutional.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Do unisex bathrooms have urinals? And if so, do women feel obligated, because of principles of equality, to attempt to use them? "I must try, otherwise I'll be betraying Susan B. Anthony Dollar-Coin!"

I knew someone who was giving lessons to women on how to pee standing up.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Flat rate insurance policy, that's blind as to sex, gender, ethnicity, religion (or lack thereof), etc. Possibly age, up to a certain limit, though I'm more dubious there.

Now you are still discriminating against bad/unlucky drivers. You discriminatory bastard.

 

[Lonewulf]

Now you are still discriminating against bad/unlucky drivers. You discriminatory bastard.

Which is SO MUCH WORSE than discriminating based on chromosones, I know.



I swear, do you just put on an act of stupidity, or are you the real thing?

So, let me get this straight...

If I'm against discriminating by sex, I MUST be against discriminating by any other means, including by one's actions or attitude? It's either nothing, or all?

There we go! Bring back segregation, bring back racial profiling, let's discriminating all groups all the time -- it goes just according to your moronic argument. Congratulations! You are now either a fool or a bigot.

After all, to a <fool/bigot> like you, apparently it's just as logical to judge someone by their skin, than it is to judge them by their actions. If we can't jail someone because of their skin or gender, then we can't jail them because they committed a crime. Makes perfect sense to you, I'm sure.

Anyways, I'm done discussing this with you. I'll stick with people like Ziggurat, who actually seem somewhat reasonable.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Which is SO MUCH WORSE than discriminating based on chromosones, I know.



I swear, do you just put on an act of stupidity, or are you the real thing?

So, let me get this straight...

If I'm against discriminating by sex, I MUST be against discriminating by any other means, including by one's actions or attitude? It's either nothing, or all?

Wrong, you are against discriminating based on way more than sex, including experience. You are willfully ignoring that inexperienced drivers are much more likely to be in accidents. So you are lumping a great many bad drivers and driving up good drivers rates. You just don't care as you get lumped in with the bad drivers.


What about location? Is it fair to penalize people for where they live?

There we go! Bring back segregation, bring back racial profiling, let's discriminating all groups all the time -- it goes just according to your moronic argument. Congratulations! You are now either a fool or a bigot.

As opposed from what you have posted I know you are a fool.

After all, to a <fool/bigot> like you, apparently it's just as logical to judge someone by their skin, than it is to judge them by their actions. If we can't jail someone because of their skin or gender, then we can't jail them because they committed a crime. Makes perfect sense to you, I'm sure.

You don't want to judge people by their actions, or you would not be so against age being as important as it is. It lets people prove that they are good drivers, and get a lower rate by doing so, your system you assume good driver and then punish those who are not. Why is this better? In your system you can never get out of being lumped in with inexperienced drivers.

Insurance companies care about one thing, money, so they base the rates on as near as they can figure based on your statistics what the average ammount they will have to pay out for you is. You want them to base this on as little information as possible.

 

[Lonewulf]

Wrong, you are against discriminating based on way more than sex, including experience.

I don't like being judged by my age, no. I also do not see what is inherently bad about my idea for a flat rate, with changes made for actual actions.

You are willfully ignoring that inexperienced drivers are much more likely to be in accidents.

Experience is automatically age? If a 40 year old man suddenly signs up for driving, he's automatically more experienced than a 20 year old man, even though they start at the exact same amount of time driving?

Oh, I'm sorry, did I blow a hole a mile wide in your argument? Age is not necessarily the same as years driving.

But, I'm glad you show you still think of human beings as number on a statistics board. Good for you.

So you are lumping a great many bad drivers and driving up good drivers rates. You just don't care as you get lumped in with the bad drivers.

Whatever that means.

What about location? Is it fair to penalize people for where they live?

No, it's not fair.

As opposed from what you have posted I know you are a fool.

Sure I am.

Go play in your pigpen and let the big boys talk, m'kay? You obviously have nothing to contribute.

Insurance companies care about one thing, money, so they base the rates on as near as they can figure based on your statistics what the average ammount they will have to pay out for you is. You want them to base this on as little information as possible.

They only care about money, therefore it's justified. Uh huh.

 

[tkingdoll]

Bolding is mine.

Ah, OK, from the 'exclusive to women' part, it does sound like they've gone the whole way. There is legislation in Europe which protects companies here, but I notice that other women-only providers also have the 'add your family/partner' caveat too so I imagine that's a legal obligation if the law is the same there.

You can add the link if you change the www to zzz to fool the bot

 

[ponderingturtle]

I don't like being judged by my age, no. I also do not see what is inherently bad about my idea for a flat rate, with changes made for actual actions.

There is not other direct way of estimating experience

Experience is automatically age? If a 40 year old man suddenly signs up for driving, he's automatically more experienced than a 20 year old man, even though they start at the exact same amount of time driving?

Remember this is all about grouping risk. In any grouping you there will be varying risk between individuals, so all grouping is wrong then. And you keep arguing for a flat rate independent of any traits and claim that you are not.

Oh, I'm sorry, did I blow a hole a mile wide in your argument? Age is not necessarily the same as years driving.

No you did not. It is about average risk, not individual risk. So on average a 40 year old will get into fewer accidents, and so pay less for insurance. It might well not hold for an individual, but this is about the average not the individual.

But, I'm glad you show you still think of human beings as number on a statistics board. Good for you.

That is what they are for insurance purposes. Insurance is all about statistics and estimated risk.

They only care about money, therefore it's justified. Uh huh.

Yes I know you think that all businesses should not care about being able to say meet the pay outs that they will have to do for all the undercosted inexperienced drivers who are on average being subsidized by older more experienced drivers.

I know that you want all the subsidies you can get from society at least now, when you start having to be the one in the low group because of age you would start bitching about all the kids driving up your insurance rates because of their lack of experience.

 

[Beerina]

My thoughts: I don't like being discriminated against because I'm a young driver that has an SUV.

But I am, because of statistics.

Oh, I'm not *kept* from buying insurance, but rates are so high that I might as well be.

The day will come. "Congratulations, sir. You can pay less because you are now officially old."

Ummm. Yay?

My question is how can this be justified and why is no one screaming discrimination? You can bet the farm on the fact that if I had to start an insurance company that precluded black people from signing up, that I'd be in the constitutional court quick as a wink.

In the US, Social Security used to pay out less to women so that, statistically, they'd receive the same total amount as a man. That wasn't corrected by legislation, but by the courts. IIRC, it was during the more liberal Jimmy Carter years, but I could be wrong.

(They were so liberal back then they actually took a case where nurses were claiming that they were paid less than the hospital gardener, and that, since their jobs were so important to society, they should be paid proportionally. Mercifully for the future of humanity, the court denied them [imagine long lines clogging to become the favored worker class, then the government starts handing out permission slips. Oh what a tangled web we weave when e'er we practice to be power hungry], but that they even got that far is stunning itself.)

 

[bigred]

Hi all!

I'm proud to be a South African and living in our new, reformed society. Unlike the dark days of the previous government, we now have a pretty liberal constitution and our own version of the bill of rights. In this new society it is illegal to discriminate based on race, age, creed, religion, sexual orientation etc.

However, we now have an insurance company called First for Women. Their business is selling motor insurance - but only to women (because they are statistically less likely to be in accidents than men).

My question is how can this be justified and why is no one screaming discrimination?

Because you have been....AMERICANIZED :hurl:

It's like this: America, in all its brilliance, doesn't consider something discrimination if it discriminates against whites and/or males. It's what I call the Great American Double Standard, and it's been all the rage here for oh, several decades now.

"Idiotic" doesn't begin to describe it.

 

[bigred]

Isn't this the same rationale that can be used for racial profiling? African-Americans commit more crimes per capita than whites, therefore it is okay to single out African-Americans for more traffic stops and searches? Doesn't seem much different to me.

It isn't.

You didn't expect consistent logic from the law did you?

 

[bigred]

It could be argued that men still have the choice of a number of other companies where they can get good deals.

Not intelligently it couldn't.

Along the same lines, one could ban blacks from nightclubs (restaurants, corporations, etc etc) and say there are plenty of other good ones to choose from.

 

[bigred]

Well over here discrimination on just about any basis is unconstitutional and we have dedicated constitutional courts set up to deal with these issues. The only real exception to this is BEE (sometimes BBBEE -- broad based black economic empowerment) and affirmative action. Basically these policies state that a company's staff should be representative of the population in the area and that when awarding contracts, black owned businesses are always the preferred choice. Any company employing more than 50 people by law must have a plan in place to address any imbalances in staff and this applies to all levels (in other words, you can't cheat by having an all white board of directors while all of your blue-collar workers are black). Affimative action basically says people in the "previously disadvanted" category get automatic preference when hiring new staff.

Previously disadvantaged includes all non-whites (except those of asian descent), women and those with physical disabilities.

lol

Yep yer Americanized alright

 

[Octavo]

lol

Yep yer Americanized alright

I'm not really disagreeing with you, but I do think there is more of a rationale for these types of policy in this country. The black majority were historically treated like 3rd class citizens and that only ended in 1992 (we got our first democratic government in 1994, but apartheid ended before then). Black people weren't allowed to own property or businesses and had to carry "passes" with them when outside of the townships. The list of abuses is pretty shocking and the fact that we managed to transition to a democracy and a black led government without civil war or reprisals is something of a political miracle (just one of the many reasons Mandela is so highly regarded).

Never the less, this left the new government with a new massive problem. They had been elected to power by the poorest and least educated of the people. Their historical enemy - the whites - owned all of the infrastructure and businesses. The government had to address this imbalance in a way that would keep them in the good graces of the masses, while not scaring away the desperately needed skills and investment capital of the whites. Affirmative action and BEE have so far proved very effective and in fact now, after 13 years of democracy, government is considering repealing affirmative action or at least rewriting it to some extent, as it has already had a massive impact and true equality in drawing ever closer.

 

[bigred]

Fair enough and well said. It's not the same situation as the U.S. for sure. Just that the double-standard here (and the mindless acceptance/ignoring of it here by the mindless/spineless masses) is a HUGE pet peeve of mine.

 

[Lonewulf]

You gotta remember, in numbers alone, whites are a very small minority in South Africa, from what I understand.

Yet, they had the most influence in politics, owned the most land and property, etc.

 

[Octavo]

You gotta remember, in numbers alone, whites are a very small minority in South Africa, from what I understand.

Yet, they had the most influence in politics, owned the most land and property, etc.

Exactly -- whites make up roughly 9 - 10% of the population but because of apartheid own about 80% of the wealth... that is changing slowly though.