Some feminists would argue that the very notion of a “skills-based competitive test” is a device of the patriarchy. Given that patriarchal attitudes permeate our entire society, any such test would be biased toward privileging men over women—because such tests are constructed and scored by humans, and humans are subconsciously (and, in some cases, consciously) predisposed toward men, and against women. This predisposition includes both overt bias, as well as the more subtle bias of treating men as the “default gender”, and women as the exception (which would result in their tests being harder, and getting scored more poorly).
Therefore, given that the very notion of a neutral test perpetuates the patriarchy, we should at the very least decide randomly between Anne and Andrew—and possibly even between Anne, Andrew, and Barbara, given the strength of the patriarchal bias.
However, if our goal is not merely to increase the revenue of some random company, but to build a better world, we should strictly prefer Anne (and possibly Barbara) over Andrew, not just in this specific case but in all such cases. This will cause the proportion of women in the workforce to rise, until it reaches majority status at some point, which would help us to erode the notion that men are the default and women are the exception.
I do not personally endorse the above arguments, but I believe they are an accurate representation of at least some feminists’ views. They are not limited to feminism, either; you can replace “male/female” with “white/black” or “young/old” or any other such criterion.
Some feminists would argue that the very notion of a “skills-based competitive test” is a device of the patriarchy. Given that patriarchal attitudes permeate our entire society, any such test would be biased toward privileging men over women—because such tests are constructed and scored by humans, and humans are subconsciously (and, in some cases, consciously) predisposed toward men, and against women. This predisposition includes both overt bias, as well as the more subtle bias of treating men as the “default gender”, and women as the exception (which would result in their tests being harder, and getting scored more poorly).
Therefore, given that the very notion of a neutral test perpetuates the patriarchy, we should at the very least decide randomly between Anne and Andrew—and possibly even between Anne, Andrew, and Barbara, given the strength of the patriarchal bias.
However, if our goal is not merely to increase the revenue of some random company, but to build a better world, we should strictly prefer Anne (and possibly Barbara) over Andrew, not just in this specific case but in all such cases. This will cause the proportion of women in the workforce to rise, until it reaches majority status at some point, which would help us to erode the notion that men are the default and women are the exception.
I do not personally endorse the above arguments, but I believe they are an accurate representation of at least some feminists’ views. They are not limited to feminism, either; you can replace “male/female” with “white/black” or “young/old” or any other such criterion.