A 24 year-old man named Jack Zanelli believes he was a victim of so-called ’positive discrimination’ in the RAF after he scored highly in aptitude tests but failed to make the cut, according to the Telegraph. He may be among the 160 white men whom the RAF has been accused of discriminating against in its efforts to meet “aspirational diversity targets”.
Now, as someone who made a very similar point about the comedy industry and got viciously attacked for it, I have learnt my lesson and just want to say that white men are systemically evil patriarchs, or whatever, and the only way to improve society is to be racist and sexist against them. Phew, glad we’ve cleared that up.
Mr Zanelli, however, is not as re-educated as me, and told his story to the Telegraph:
Mr Zanelli, who lives in Stirling, said that in March 2021 he was taken to RAF Cranwell where he scored highly in the aptitude tests for both the Pilot, and the Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Pilot tests.
However, in a subsequent interview, which was conducted over Skype, a recruiter told him that while he had done “very well”, he was not going to go forward in the recruitment process due to a “lack of leadership” experience.
“Considering the initial phase of RAF training, the ‘initial officer training’, is pretty much dedicated to building these skills I thought this was a pretty weak argument for them to defer me,” Mr Zanelli, who is now training to become a mortgage broker, said.
“They deferred me for a further six months for another interview, but I was 22 at the time and I felt I couldn’t postpone getting into a career any longer so I decided not to pursue the career, despite having wanted to be a pilot my whole life.”
Mr Zanelli said being told that he would not be progressing through the scheme “felt a bit odd”, given his academic qualifications and how well he had scored in the aptitude tests.
He added: “I’m not sure if I qualify as one of the 160 but it infuriates me that this is a potential reason as to why I wasn’t considered. It has made me doubt things.”
The RAF, of course, see it differently:
RAF sources insisted that if Mr. Zanelli was not selected for a role in the RAF then this was because “other candidates had better scores”.
They added that the discrimination issue was that the RAF “accelerated women and BAME people that had already been selected to the front of the queue for training”. They added that these candidates were not prioritised in selection.
An RAF spokesman said: “At no point did the RAF recruitment process select ethnic minority and female pilots over better qualified white male pilots. Over 80 per cent of our recruits during the period in question were white men.
“The error, which we have corrected and apologise for, was fast-tracking approximately 150 women and ethnic minority recruits, who had already passed all selection standards, on to earlier initial training courses.”
I remain sceptical of the RAF’s explanation, having received several private messages on the subject indicating that all is not well. Furthermore, even the RAF’s own Air Chief Marshal Sir Mike Wigston said the diversity targets were “stretching aspirational levels of ambition” (translation: we can’t even keep up with our own ‘equity and inclusion’ nonsense).
Worth reading in full.
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