There's nothing odd about this, in very large part this is just the usual nasty attempt at the disingenuous myth creation & laughable
exaggeration.
The whole point of all these supposedly 'positive discrimination' schemes is that where one has a spread of candidates of equal merit, then in a
situation where certain groups are clearly under-represented, one can then move to select from the under-represented group to try to help redress the
imbalance.
I have never seen anyone ever endorse the placing of unqualified candidates simply on the grounds of sex, race or creed, unfortunately where this
sometimes gets (deliberately, IMO) blurred is when the candidate not selected is perhaps even more highly qualified than the candidate from a
particular group that was selected.
The fact that they were all qualified for the job is often (conveniently) ignored.
But there are no dark conspiracies and there is no plot for attacking 'the white man' etc etc
(good God, I can't believe how fast some people want to rush to claim that able-bodied white males are a group terribly suffering from wicked
discrimination

).
This is not about forcing gangs of one-legged black lesbian single parents (or whatever other ludicrous Jeremy Clarkson-like pantomime exaggeration
one prefers) with barely one poor GCSE, if that, into Professorships at Cambridge, running the UK's nuclear power industry or anything remotely
similar.
BTW I wouldn't hold out any hope on a tory party riding to the rescue stu.
To Cameron's credit he has forced them to face up to the truth (and they have recently agree this) that the only way to effect practical change in
anything like an acceptable timetable where the imbalance is outrageous & wholly unjustifiable is to engage in active measures (ie positive
discrimination.
As Exoploitician said, here in Northern Ireland we have had similar moans.....set against a background of obvious and very clear under-representation
for certain groups (mostly members of the Roman Catholic faith).
We even have politicians coming on TV to whine that in certain areas Roman Catholics are getting an gross advatage over their Protestant neighbours
because in a handful of places in the world of work RC people are in a majority - as they willfully ignore the fact that in the workplace as a whole
RC people still are under-represented in many areas and more likely to be unemployed etc etc.
I remember similar in certain London boroughs where it was claimed that because say, Hackney or Towner Hamlets had a fair number of black people
working for them (and in a few depts even a majority) that this proved things were now completely fine & OK to the point of (usually whispered under
breath) perhaps going 'a bit to far the other way'.
It's ridiculous.
IMO it's often spread by those intent on ignoring the wider facts of the situation & in whipping up ill-informed and sometimes plain nasty
trouble.
[edit on 18-3-2008 by sminkeypinkey]