marks and spencer

[DiscoDancer]

I'm not sure what is the purpose of your criticism in this case.

The simple purpose of my critiscm is:
Why do people pick up on stories, that suit and reinforce their view of the world in an attempt to vindicate that view? Are they trying to persuade us that their view is the "one true" attitude, or are they trying to justify their attitude to themselves? Or perhaps their attitude needs reinforcing to themselves occasionally? Why is that?

Why should we believe in god because there is no proof to the contrary rather than not believe in god because there is no proof to the contrary?

Why should we accept some people's interpretation to, subsequent assumptions and criticism of any episode without evidence for or against? Yet some are all too quick to jump to assumptions? Why is that?

We may believe some stories and not others with no proof for any of them ..../

Precisely. We choose which stories we believe, discuss and reproduce. Why is that?

 

[DiscoDancer]

(It's 'label', not lable!)

Sorry, can't be bothered with the spelchequer. The danger is using edit to correct my spelin eras.

 

[cajar]

I'm not sure what is the purpose of your criticism in this case.

The simple purpose of my critiscm is:
Why do people pick up on stories, that suit and reinforce their view of the world in an attempt to vindicate that view? Are they trying to persuade us that their view is the "one true" attitude, or are they trying to justify their attitude to themselves? Or perhaps their attitude needs reinforcing to themselves occasionally? Why is that?

It's a perfectly normal human trait to do this, known as one of the cognitive biases, indeed one may say that you have done this by jumping on some posts you consider prejudiced and therefore wholly wrong. It's fine as long as the person is willing to listen to opposing arguments and not be blinkered.

The god thing is an excellent example that you have managed to misapprehend though......there is no evidence one way or another for god, so we reasonably presume he does not exist because the likelyhood is so small. This is the answer to Pascal's wager, and it uses the reasonable judgement we all use in everyday life, including when reading articles in the news.

 

[EFLImpudence]

I'm not sure what is the purpose of your criticism in this case.

The simple purpose of my critiscm is:
Why do people pick up on stories, that suit and reinforce their view of the world in an attempt to vindicate that view? Are they trying to persuade us that their view is the "one true" attitude, or are they trying to justify their attitude to themselves? Or perhaps their attitude needs reinforcing to themselves occasionally? Why is that?

It's a discussion.
Should you prove me wrong, I will change my mind but until then that is what I think.
If I am disagreeing with you and am right I hope to change your mind so that you may be right.
It's a discussion.

Why should we believe in god because there is no proof to the contrary rather than not believe in god because there is no proof to the contrary?

Why should we accept some people's interpretation to, subsequent assumptions and criticism of any episode without evidence for or against? Yet some are all too quick to jump to assumptions? Why is that?

It's a discussion and we are discussing what was written.

We may believe some stories and not others with no proof for any of them .... based on the reason for and likelihood of them being invented.

Precisely. We choose which stories we believe, discuss and reproduce. Why is that?

I have reinserted my reasoning which you omitted and which I think answers your question.

Is it human nature with which you disagree or dislike?

 

[EFLImpudence]

my spelin eras.

Ah. Those were the days.

 

[DiscoDancer]

It's a perfectly normal human trait to do this, known as one of the cognitive biases, indeed one may say that you have done this by jumping on some posts you consider prejudiced and therefore wholly wrong. It's fine as long as the person is willing to listen to opposing arguments and not be blinkered.

But a reasonable presumption based on so many similar posts highlighting occasional episodes.
For example the OP failed to identify:
"A spokesperson for M&S said: "Where we have an employee whose religious beliefs restrict food or drink they can handle, we work closely with our member of staff to place them in suitable role, such as in our clothing department or bakery in foods."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25488259

And several more posts continued to berate muslims, in general, despite this: "But Khola Hasan, an Islamic law consultant, told Radio 4's Today programme she thought the M&S employee's refusal to serve the customer was "ridiculous"." (same website)

Why was that? Your excellent explanation provides the answer:
"A cognitive bias is a pattern of deviation in judgment, whereby inferences about other people and situations may be drawn in an illogical fashion. Individuals create their own “subjective social reality” from their perception of the input. ..."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_biases

But cognitive bias suggests the opposite of open discussion. Therefore I fail to see how I can be accused of cognitive bias if I am engaged in open discussion and I am waiting to be persuaded that my view of reality is illogical.

The god thing is an excellent example that you have managed to misapprehend though......there is no evidence one way or another for god, so we reasonably presume he does not exist because the likelyhood is so small.

Not a misapprehension, more an analogy.
There (oops spelling! Now corrected.) was a very small likelyhood of your assumptions being true. Yet you accepted them without evidence rather than dismissing them in the absence of evidence, as in the God analogy.

Just a late addition:

Obviously waited till enough muslims were in the job before coming out with this crap.

Point taken?

 

[cajar]

It was certainly as misapprehension, a misapprehension of the analogy to be precise, because when you attempted to use the logic, it brought you to the opposite conclusion about god than the analogy is designed to illustrate. Maybe you should give this consideration before proceeding as it is as blunt an example as any that your logic is faulty at some level.

It appears to me that you are determined to chill discussion on this topic by any small technicality rather than contributing positively (highlighting the use of the singular in the MnS statement). Bit like if I find my cookie jar empty and my son standing with chocolate all over his face, you would pull up an article saying not all children like chocolate that I've got to answer before I tell him off. Well, sorry but my experience and any person with reasonable judgement is fit to make the conclusion he's been scoffing.

I did already say that it was an agenda of some muslims, not all, to push islamic law on the west, as I had already read the articles that you are quoting from.

 

[DiscoDancer]

....../ because when you attempted to use the logic, it brought you to the opposite conclusion about god than the analogy is designed to illustrate.

It didn't bring me to any conclusion.
I used the analogy to question why didn't you arrive at the assumption that this behaviour wasn't endemic within the Islamic faith? You assumed it was endemic.

....../ Maybe you should give this consideration before proceeding as it is as blunt an example as any that your logic is faulty at some level.

I await your reasoning that brought you to your conclusion.

....../ It appears to me that you are determined to chill discussion on this topic by any small technicality rather than contributing positively (highlighting the use of the singular in the MnS statement).

You don't find it positively enlightening to indicate your cognitive biases?

....../ Bit like if I find my cookie jar empty and my son standing with chocolate all over his face, you would pull up an article saying not all children like chocolate that I've got to answer before I tell him off. Well, sorry but my experience and any person with reasonable judgement is fit to make the conclusion he's been scoffing.

That may have been a much more presumptive conclusion than your earlier ones, under the circumstances. And, I wouldn't interfere with your upbringing of your child, in front of your child. If I disagreed I might try to influence your future behaviour.

....../ I did already say that it was an agenda of some muslims, not all, to push islamic law on the west, as I had already read the articles that you are quoting from.

You are still demonstrating your cognitive biases by suggesting, even now, that this behaviour is endemic within Islam. Perhaps you could have gone further by including the information that I have included.

Enough for now. I have some reading to do.

 

[cajar]

It was me that drew your attention to cognitive biases, now you appear to be trying to school me in them. I'm aware I have them, everyone does. The important bit is knowing. For the rest of your post, the questions you ask are in the same post of mine you quoted from but not selected as quotes. I have also said several times the behaviour is not endemic in islam, just segments of it. What you are doing is making a strawman of my argument and then knocking it down. It's called the strawman fallacy. Look it up and feel free to pretend you introduced it later.

 

[DiscoDancer]

It was me that drew your attention to cognitive biases, now you appear to be trying to school me in them. I'm aware I have them, everyone does.

You may have coined the phrase to encapsulate the terms that I'd been using, such as "prejudice", etc. But you didn't invent the concept therefore you cannot claim ownership of it.
Anyway, I thought you would appreciate the irony of me using the concept, that you had introduced, against you.

The important bit is knowing.

The important bit is not just "knowing". It's important to make adjustments to deal with it. To use another analogy;
I know that traffic uses the road and I am in danger of being a casualty if I simply walk out into the road. So I adjust my behaviour accordingly, I look carefully before crossing the road.

For the rest of your post, the questions you ask are in the same post of mine you quoted from but not selected as quotes. I have also said several times the behaviour is not endemic in islam, just segments of it.

Just to refresh ourselves of what was said:

One of the reports, and I'll use the DIYnot syntax (as opposed to quotation marks ) to make it clear for you and avoid any future false accusations;

“Consuming alcohol is forbidden in Islam, and some Muslims refuse to handle it at all.”/......
......./ “A spokesperson for M&S said: "Where we have an employee whose religious beliefs restrict food or drink they can handle, we work closely with our member of staff to place them in suitable role, such as in our clothing department or bakery in foods.”/.........
......./“But Khola Hasan, an Islamic law consultant, told Radio 4's Today programme she thought the M&S employee's refusal to serve the customer was "ridiculous"./..........
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25488259[/QUOTE]

This article makes it quite clear that there was one member of staff involved. It also makes it quite clear that although there is no requirement for muslims to refuse to handle such commodities, some do. We have no data on the number involved.

Despite this your initial response was:

They want "us" to stop drinking and eating it, so this furthers their agenda by making it more difficult for shops to sell it. Obviously waited till enough muslims were in the job before coming out with this crap.

Later you claimed that you had read the article. Maybe, but through those glasses tinted with your cognitive biases:

…../
I did already say that it was an agenda of some muslims, not all, to push islamic law on the west, as I had already read the articles that you are quoting from.

It's good business acumen to be aware of employees' abilities, faiths, and needs.
If you were in charge of a swimming pool, would you insist that the non-swimmers work in that environment? Of course you wouldn't.
If you were in charge of a blood bank or transfusion centre, would you insist that the Jhehova Witness works there? Of course you wouldn't.
You'd be sensitive to the abilities, faiths and needs of your employees, or at least I hope that you would.

What you are doing is making a strawman of my argument and then knocking it down. It's called the strawman fallacy. Look it up and feel free to pretend you introduced it later.

Ahh, the good old red herring, otherwise known as a diversionary argument or tactic. Look it up and feel free to pretend you introduced it, because you did. I just labeled it.

What I have attempted to do is to reveal your cognitive biases and illustrate them with your posts laid naked in all their shame.
I thank you for your time and energy in this discussion.
I'm also grateful to you because you have helped me in refining my strategy in dealing with the exposure of such cognitive biases.
It's useful to wait for a few pages of diatribe to be written in order to provide ammunition for the later exposé.

Now I feel that this discussion has run its course. Any further discourse has the potential to go the same way as many DIYnot threads, such as:
"answer the question (he won't)"
"tell us what you think (he won't)"
"prove it (he can't)"
and even
"I kicked your ass (again)".

So, that's me signing off this thread, unless there are any significant developments in this discussion.

 

[JBR]

I have no wish to involve myself in an argument about semantics. However, in attempting to revert to the original topic of discussion, I feel that this comment misses something:

It's good business acumen to be aware of employees' abilities, faiths, and needs.
If you were in charge of a swimming pool, would you insist that the non-swimmers work in that environment? Of course you wouldn't.
If you were in charge of a blood bank or transfusion centre, would you insist that the Jhehova Witness works there? Of course you wouldn't.
You'd be sensitive to the abilities, faiths and needs of your employees, or at least I hope that you would.

Whilst I agree that it is good practice to be 'aware of employees' abilities, faiths and needs', I think we are possibly forgetting about the employer's needs.

Now, at the risk of being accused of racism (the old, rather hackneyed response), I believe that employers, when considering candidates for positions of employment, should be permitted to take into account any restrictions imposed by a candidate's religion or sociological background.

To take Joe's examples above, non-swimmers should not be offered employment at a swimming bath, and Jehovah's Witnesses should not be offered employment in a blood transfusion centre. It is the height of folly to be legally obliged to employ people with self-imposed practical limitations in positions where they would refuse to do the work required in those positions. However, that is the direction in which our employment laws lean these days.

I am all in favour of equality of opportunities, but there should be reasonable limitations.

 

[jockscott]

It's good business acumen to be aware of employees' abilities, faiths, and needs.
If you were in charge of a swimming pool, would you insist that the non-swimmers work in that environment? Of course you wouldn't.

So,, if you owned a public swimming pool, you'd expect an employee set on with the express purpose of taking money at the entrance, to be able to swim? You'd also expect any office staff, to be able to swim? Extend this a bit further and you'd expect the accountant to be able to swim? Where does it all end though?

 

[HERTS P&D]

The non swimmers can work anywhere, that's why you hire 'life guards'.

Andy

 

[jockscott]

The non swimmers can work anywhere, that's why you hire 'life guards'.

Andy

Exactly... That's why M&S employ people to operate the checkouts. If this one employee can say they are not going to serve customers, then that employee deserves dismissal. Where will it all end? Vegan employees refusing to sell leather shoes?

 

[EFLImpudence]

This is all getting a bit silly.

As far as I am concerned if she cannot or will not do the job then either M&S will be kind to her and place her somewhere it doesn't matter or dismiss her - end of.

However, what has not been said and asked is that if she is such a devout muslim then surely she should not be working at all.

Does she refuse to be alone with the male staff and/or the manager in his office or serve single men?
Does she wear the veil at he till?

As I said before I think she is just being awkward for whatever reason.


Caveat - Always assuming of course it is not a total fabrication.

P.S. Re swimming pool etc. I have seen a lot of taxi drivers who can't drive.