Social Problem Discrimination Over Sexual Orientation in the U.S. Workplace Research Paper

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Sexual Orientation Discrimination

Discrimination can be carried out in the work place through many different ways. Federal and state laws go on to prohibit employers from carrying out unfair practices like hiring or terminating on the basis of religion, race, sex, national origin, physical disability or origin. All these are factors about a person that can be used either in his favor or against him. Some states have also declared employment discrimination laws that basically forbid employers from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation.

It was earlier in November that the U.S. senate went on to approve the legislation that basically prohibit workplace discrimination that is being carried out based on gender identity or sexual orientation. The legislation was approved 64-30 (Lopez) The employee non-discrimination act or ENDA was first brought out in the public in 1994. Even though it was been almost twenty years ever since it was first introduced, it has been made into a law just now. It should be noted that as of now only 21 states have protections for the Lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) employees. Discrimination against the LGBT community has become quite a problem in the professional world today. It has been seen that one out of the twenty complaints that are made in the workplace are from the LGBT employers.

Objective Condition

In order to look a social condition, the researchers need to view it from two different perspectives. Fuller and Myer stated that all social problems bring the objective elements along with them. It is quite important to have both the subjective and objective side to the social problem. The objective condition or definition can be measured or checked to see if really does exists or not. This can be either carried out through studies or researches where this community is interviewed and results and displayed in a statistical manner. Bias against this community is a major cause of discrimination in the work place. Many people are still against the mindset that this community has and therefore they dislike them from before. We should work to see why this discrimination occurs and what the consequences of this discrimination are. The point here is to collect the data and the proof and show that there is discrimination present in the workplace that is against sexual orientation.

Subjective Definition

On the other hand, a subjective definition is basically the awareness of the problem that is present. Eitzen et.al insisted that the subjective side of the problem would depend more on the time and the audience (p 8) This means that discrimination against the LGBT community would be seen more by people who belong to that community or are more accepting of that community now. Kirsch stated that discrimination faced by the lesbians and gays in the United States has been recognized by many of the theorists today. Subjective definition goes onto provide the solution to the problem as well. The objective condition would quite clearly show the consequences of this problem. However, the subjective definition goes onto provide with solutions to make the society better. The discrimination that is occurring in the workplace regarding this matter is going to create more and more unrest many different workplaces. This would really discourage these men and women and they would retaliate in negative ways. Another way subjectively, this problem is becoming more recognized now because this community has more rights now. The National Center for Human Rights Education went on to state these communities have just as much rights as all the other people living in the country. This led on to the amalgamation of the gay rights movement with that of principles of fairness and equality.

Value Conflict Theory

It should be noted that conflict theories are present to emphasize some the inequality that results in some social group. These theories go on to either critique the socio political structure of a society and they also draw attention to any sort of inequality in the society. The main basis of this theory rests in the idea that every society is build up of individuals who will have varying and conflicting values and interest. The value conflict theory states that social problems like discrimination in the work place would occur when groups with different values and morals would meet and compete. In this entire scenario, it is very crucial to understand the values of both these groups. After doing so, it is important to see which group has more power to enforce their own wishes against the other group.

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It should be noted that conflict has risen in our society because the dominant thought is that marriage is a union between man and woman. Either it is marriage or any sort of intimate relationship, it should occur between women and men. The norm that has been established is that the men and men cannot be together and women cannot be together. Due to this reason, there are people who do not agree to the entire idea of being gay, bisexual, or lesbian. It is quite visible that our society is more biased towards straight sexual orientation. Patterson & Redding stated many sodomy statutes have gone to declare private consensual sexual acts between the same sex illegal.

This shows that discrimination is present in the legal system of the country. If one really thinks about it then the conflict of values has been present from the top most level. If a country's legal system goes on to declare something unlawful, the society is bound to follow. An example of that is that gay or lesbian couples or even individuals are not allowed to legally adopt a child.

One of the prepositions of the conflict theory is that people are not accepting of those with differences is because they feel that that this group would take over. If an analogy could be drawn, it should be noted that about fifty years ago, people were quite against the idea of interracial dating and marriage. People were so against it that it was outlawed at one point and time. However, today we see that people are dating and getting married and no harm came from interracial relationships as such.

Conflict theory is one of the many theories that can be used to explain why things like discrimination, manipulation of individuals and pressured behaviors take place in the society. It can be used to shown that there are internal problems in the society that make way for such unjust behavior to take place. It has been studied through the conflict theory that dominant groups would always attempt to have political, social and economical power over the groups that are subordinate. They enjoy it and use it to manipulate individuals in their environment.

A conflict theorist believes that every person is equal regarding of his race, gender or sexual orientated. However, it is the dominant groups that decide that what is right or wrong. Consequently, the laws that are made also work to favor the dominant groups more.

Deviant Behavior Theory

Any kind of behavior that results in the violation of social norms is termed as the deviant behavior. This kind of behavior is normally of the severity that it can cause disapproval from most of the people of the society. It should be noted here that deviance can be non-criminal or criminal in nature. The sociological discipline that is associated with crime is termed as criminology, meanwhile activities like excessive gambling, alcohol, being naked in public, stealing, playing with fire, lying, denying to bathe, cross-dressing and buying the services of prostitutes are some of the actions and behaviors that are considered to be deviant by most of the society (Anderson and Taylor).

The concept behind deviance is not a simple ne because norms tend to vary considerably in different groups, at different times and at different places. It will not be wrong to say that an action that is considered as being deviant by one group may be totally acceptable in the other group. For instance, in some regions of Muslim Africa, Malaysia and Indonesia, women are circumcised. This procedure is termed as infibulations and clitoridectomy and involves the dissection of the clitoris or the suturing of labia and is usually done without giving anesthesia to the women. When we talk about America, the idea of female circumcision that is also known as female genital mutilation is considered to be totally out of question. The reason behind this is that female genital mutilation is performed under unsterile conditions and therefore mostly leads to infections. It is performed in some parts of the world to oppress the women and to prevent them from having sexual pleasure.

There are many theories in sociology that relate to criminal and non-criminal deviance. One of the theories that need to be brought into limelight while discrimination over sexual orientation is being discussed is the Social control theory. This theory was developed by Travis Hirschi and is a kind of functionalist theory. According to….....

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