Are you saying to me that if a 7 month pregnant woman applies for a job on a coal mine Im not allowed to refuse her employment? There are many hard labor jobs a woman cannot do while pregnant without risking injury.

@NeilMeyer How wonderfully 20th century of you. Pregnant woman are not invalids. Oh, and coal miners use machines, not shovels.

@NeilMeyer the point is that you don't know that until you get an individualized medical opinion that she can or cannot do the job. If you AssUMe that pregnant=incapable, that's discrimination. That's really the very definition of discrimination - assuming based on stereotypes rather than facts. It is of course perfectly legal to deny the job to someone who is incapable of doing it.

It wasn't that long ago that it was widely believed that women, even when not pregnant, were incapable of doing jobs like police officer, iron worker, or truck driver. In many cases, this was based on a genuine, but misguided, paternalism intended to "protect" women. Please don't stereotype.

Well to be fair it is still the case that it is a widely held believe that work with children is a womans job. I have been more stereotyped as a man working with children than any woman has been. Made me believe that sexism in the west is only considered wrong if a woman is suffering from it.

@RobertColumbia where was this "widely believed?" Women have held positions of power as far back as Cleopatra. They have served in the military in Israel and in the Red Army (certainly during WW2), including in the fighter pilot roles. They were also commonly employed as factory workers in the post-Industrial-Revolution Europe. An argument can be made that the places and periods where and when women were freed from hard labor were mostly unique to the times when governments tried to increase their availability for child bearing due to the perceived need to increase overall population.

@NeilMeyer effectively it maybe the case because it's illegal to discriminate against women and not illegal to discriminate against men. It's not unheard of for house sharing or (for example) tutoring arrangements to be advertised to openly request only female applicants. Similar advertisements for male-only applicants would not be accepted by publishers and would likely be illegal.

stackexchange itself readily accepts job advertisements which use placeholders for age as a roundabout way to discriminate based on age. "Graduating student" and such criteria are claimed to be about not requiring experience. But "no experience necessary" is a more common way to phrase the same concept and it is less likely to discourage 40+ applicants.

@grovkin, is there some location where it's actually only illegal to discriminate against women, and not illegal to discriminate against men? Or are you just making that up?

You can discriminate based on age, gender, religion, etc IF you can demonstrate a legitimate reason for doing so. That's why there are no female models for men's fashion.

Considering the state of congress right now, I expect improvement, should everyone follow your example. An empty congress would at least keep the salaries, remuneration and general graft to a minimum, while getting approximately as much done.

@J... just to clarify, are you suggesting that being a female is a bona fide occupational qualification for working with children?

@grovkin Hooters is not a place for children. It's a restaurant where men pay to see women serve them in small, tight clothes. You might arguably consider the men that frequent such establishments as "children", but I think that's beside the point...

@J... the commented to which you responded didn't mention Hooters. If you weren't responding Neil Meyer's comment alleging discrimination in education-related employment, can you, please, clarify which point, made by Neil Meyer, you were responding to when you mentioned acceptability of bona fide occupational qualification?

@grovkin Neil's point was about a 7-month pregnant woman working in a coal mine. Pregnant women have special constrains that limit what they can safely do. Certain industrial and laboratory chemicals, for example, have exposure limits for normal workers that are dangerous for a developing fetus and so pregnant women are disallowed from engaging in such work where they may be exposed to an environment harmful to the unborn child. I didn't say anything about working with children.

@ikkachu your comments is formulated as a question about law. You are welcome to ask a separate question about it if you are interested in quality answers.

@RonTrunk That's why there are no female models for men's fashion. Well, there is (or used to be) Van Heusen so that example isn't 100% correct. Male models for female fashion, not so much.