Gender studies

The “gender-balance” discrimination against men advocated 
by Susan Dalgety and Kate 
Higgins for the Dunfermline by-election (your report, 12 September) is a baffling concept in any democracy.

It amounts to women tacitly agreeing that men somehow have an unfair advantage over them, which they most emphatically do not. As for “forging a political system that resembles real life”, only the exact opposite 
approach will ever do this.

Of the many able women I know, not one of them would support such a demeaning system which, of course, discriminates against women in the most insulting way.

Peter Laidlaw

Bramdean Rise

Edinburgh

Surely calling for all-women shortlists does not go far enough in the quest to sweep aside discrimination and inequality; those shortlisted should not only be women, but also black, gay, and from ethnic minorities.

Er, on second thoughts, the Oxford English Dictionary 
definitions of “inequality” and “discrimination” suggest a flaw in that argument.

DJ Hollingdale

Easter Park Drive

Edinburgh