Like you said: By referring to "all invididuals" (or, better, "persons" or "citizens.") - Edit 1
Before modification by Joel at 24/10/2012 04:39:11 PM
That covers a lot of ground, and I tried to avoid going there after getting into it a while back over equal opportunity housing and related laws. The bottom line is that we cannot, or should not, ban bigotry itself. Free democratic societies tend to gradually reduce bigotry by ostracizing bigots (which is not "bigotry against bigots" because it rejects behavior, not people.) What we cannot do is let the majority dictate what everyone believes or how they choose to dispose of their own property. Unfortunately, that means businesses ought to be able to post "Irish need not apply" signs if willing to deal with the loss of trade such practices provoke.
I'll bite. How should the Civil Rights Act have been written in order to reverse stagnant attitudes about racial employment when it came to African-Americans such that the law read in a way that could still be universalized -- without referring to a grouping phrase like "on the basis of race"? If you referred instead to "all individuals" or "no individuals," it seems to me you'd be invariably crossing the line where employers can't hire or fire anyone at all for reasons other than direct qualifications. That might work for a very generic business, but any business going for a certain image or flavor would have a tough time of it. Law firms would have to hire people who refuse to wear suits, for instance, just because those people may be well qualified at law.
(Of course, maybe I am just an old fuddy-duddy in my own way.)
Everyone is an old fuddy-duddy in their own way; that is the REAL crux of all discrimination. So, yes, the employment standard should be ability to best do the job: What other standard is non-discriminatory? How many people resent what we did instead, not because they are bigots, but because they do not want to lose their livelihood to someone with no qualifications but the "right" color, gender, etc? Professional attire for professional duties falls within job qualifications, but basing employment on anything that does not is discrimination on its face.
Also, and once again, I am not sure any of that should have the force of law for private businesses, whose owners should be free to be as bigoted as they like as long as they commit/incite no violence. That will have inevitably dire commercial consequences, but should not have legal ones.