Right (or Wrong) to Discriminate

We all have read the news about people being discriminated against based on their gender or religion, the recent news was ‘Woman in Mumbai denied flat for being Muslim’. I am here making a case that discrimination is something we practice in our lives every day and therefore the property owner’s decision was not legally wrong, but simply him exercising his right to choose..

Let us try to be Sherlock Holmes and understand the logic.

I have a new salon near my house which is unisex. Before I went to this new salon, I tried barging into a “women’s only” one, which I got chucked out of, for being male. I felt cheated and discriminated against. Another day, I went to a bar and they didn’t allow me in because I was wearing shorts. I was amazed because they should have focused on my spending capacity, or my drinking capacity, but they stopped me on the basis of my clothes!
These incidents pushed me to read sections of The Constitution of India that deals with the rights that it guarantees me. Right to Equality, which includes equality before law, prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, gender or place of birth, and equality of opportunity in matters of employment, abolition of untouchability and abolition of titles.

With my limited knowledge of law, I assume that when state enforces something that basically means everybody has to follow the law and do accordingly, or you are in violation of the law. But the Constitution also guarantees you Right to Freedom — which includes freedom of speech and expression, assembly, association or union or cooperatives, movement, residence, and right to practice any profession or occupation. We can interpret this as the right to associate yourself with one and disassociate with another. Under the constitution, it is clear that you are allowed to have preferences but does not specify what these preferences should be. Does the right to not be discriminated against then conflict with the Right to Equality?

If you ask me, I will say “Of course it is right to discriminate against people, and exercise your preferences. In fact, RIGHT TO DISCRIMINATE should be a FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT”. You will pull your hair and wonder how this is even possible. Here is my argument. A few months ago, I was dating my not-so-significant-other. I picked her over other girls, based on certain parameters that I have. Isn’t this discrimination? I’m choosing a person based on their looks, their personality and rejecting other individuals who do not have those same qualities. I am discriminating.

As Walter E. Williams has mentioned; in a free society, there should be support for people’s right to choose. The true test of one’s commitment to freedom of choice does not come when one allows others to choose in ways deemed right. The true test comes when one permits others to choose in ways he finds objectionable. If there is a moral dimension to preference indulgence, it’s when it involves threats, violence, and government subsidy. The clearest case where racial discrimination has no place is in government-financed services such as schools and libraries. If schools and libraries are publicly financed, every citizen, regardless of physical attributes, is entitled to access.
If everyone can discriminate based on their own preference and choice, then why is it bad to associate or not associate with someone who is from other religion or sex or orientation? If I as a Muslim am not interested in giving my flat to a non-Muslim, what is the trouble? How is it that this incident suddenly becomes immoral while all other decisions are my preferences?

Let us go back to the same example which we started the discussion with. Here, as has happened, there is a possibility that the person who discriminates will lose respect in society, and possibly even their credibility in the market. Others might not associate with you because they don’t want to do business with one who is uncivil with people from other communities.
A lot of philosophers, economists and thinkers including me, have already talked about Human Action and how people are independent and follow their own minds. Discrimination is something we practice all the time. Picking one shirt over another, a small car over big.

I am not making the case that we must all be horrible people and treat each other badly. The fundamental tenet of a free society is that we all cooperate and find ways to serve ourselves through service to others. But this must be as a result of our freedom to associate with whomever we want. While a lot of us, including me, find certain kinds of discrimination morally repulsive, we must at the same time acknowledge that freedom of association should be our meta-value — we cannot legislate virtue, and we cannot legislate away preferences.