(no subject)

[rivendellrose]

Last night, I got completely sucked in by the latest issue of Bitch, read pretty much the whole damned thing, and then went downstairs with the express intention of writing my paper for the Death class before I did anything else. You can imagine how well that worked.

First, I checked my email. Then that reminded me that I needed to check the UW's job-search site. Where I found a job that I needed to apply for. Which reminded me that I needed to file my resume with the FBI so that I could start looking at their clerical/office vacancies. Having done that (which took much longer than it should have because their website was designed by tree frogs, and not particularly clever ones at that), of course I had to actually look at the vacancies. And then apply for the one vacancy I was qualified for that is in Seattle. Which also took much longer than it should have, because whoever designed their handy-dandy little questionnaire process is about as legible and user-friendly as a orangutan equipped with the OED and the biggest, most godawful legal thesaurus you ever will see. And don't forget that the tree frogs were still doing the coding for him.

When I finally got through the actual job-related part of the application questionnaire and thought I was home free, I got to the demographic survey. First question: Ethnicity. That's normal, right? But they set it up like this:

Ethnicity:
( ) Latino/Hispanic
( ) Non-Latino/Hispanic

And then the usual list of ethnic-background options, under a separate heading... with Latino/Hispanic as an option!!! Why? Does this make sense to anybody? Could someone please explain to me why this is necessary? I was so flabbergasted that I almost screencapped the page, just to prove that it really happened that way, but then realized that since it's the frigging FBI, the act of taking a screencap might very well somehow trigger a "security" process that would eat my whole application and cause me to have to start over again. Or possibly that it might be some kind of secret felony to copy images from their website, I don't know.

...Not that I'm really paranoid like that, but it's the government - they're crazy like that, sometimes.

Anyway, after all that was done I got even more distracted and ended up checking a few things on Craigslist, sending notices to myself... and then closing out the window and looking straight in the face of the two paragraphs that I'd written for my 3 page paper. Needless to say, I was up a bit late last night getting that finished. *Sigh*

Currently working on outlining my paper for expository writing (proofreading/editing exercise), and getting nervous about meeting Paul at around 6pm. Eep.

Comments

[tonsai.livejournal.com]

you know, i see that kind of thing on surveys a lot (and i see a lot of surveys, working in the market research field as i do), but i have to say i'm not totally sure what the rationale is. i'll ask some more experienced people in my office about it, but i have to say, on our own surveys, we pretty much never ask it that way. we strive for letting people select as many ethnicities as they might choose to self-apply, which sort of renders the second question moot.

also, as far as i know, it would be pretty complicated for a website to embed something that would record your keystrokes like that, and you'd probably know about it. image protection can only go so far.

also, there is a new issue of bitch? cool!

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

I figured it would be fairly impossible for a website to recognize something like that. Ah well.

I'd really like to hear about it! Maybe it's because Latino is the... non-minority minority, now? I don't know. That's as far as I'd gotten in trying to figure it out. Mostly I was struck by how nervous and singled-out that would make me feel if I was a Latina filling out that form.

[narsilion.livejournal.com]

Wow, it sounds like if we looked up self-distracting in the dictionary, there would have been a picture of you there last night. How was the date?
I wonder if the FBI site would allow you to take a screencap, or if they can block that somehow. Interesting.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Self-distracting, yup, that's me. I'll deal with the date in a separate entry, but it went fairly well.

Sounds like they probably wouldn't have a way of blocking it, which wouldn't be a big deal since it was just a job questionnaire. The only sensitive information on the screen was mine, I suppose, so what would they care?

[ursula]

Because some people consider being Hispanic a race, and some consider it an ethnicity. If you think of a Hispanic person, you probably think of someone whose ancestors were mostly Spanish/Portuguese and Native American, but of course there are people who identify as black or white or First Nations and also come from Cuba, Mexico, Brazil, etc., etc.

Surveys that have separate ethnicity and race questions are pretty common, actually, though most of them don't repeat the way you're complaining about.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Huh. That's an interesting distinction to make - I kind of get it, but I'll have to think about that for a while to see if I can absorb it a little better. Thanks!

[reve-lucide.livejournal.com]

When we signed all the papers to close on our house, there was a form specifically asking you to declare whether you were Hispanic or non-Hispanic. Nothing else, no other ethnicity or race questions in the whole 40 pages -- you just had to specify whether you were Hispanic or not. And it was not optional.

I'm still not quite sure why, and neither was my loan officer (a friend of mine), but she said it's something that has been added in the last few years and she can't see any other logical reason for it except to keep track of whether you are Hispanic or not if you ever foreclose on the property. Which seems pretty damn racist if you ask me.

[reve-lucide.livejournal.com]

Not that what I just said has anything to do with your post, but I was just reminded of it, and I haven't been on LJ for a day or two, and I just wanted to say stuff to people that's only semi- to non-relevant to what they posted. :p

[narsilion.livejournal.com]

Heee. I love your icon!

[reve-lucide.livejournal.com]

Haha. Thank you. I'm kinda proud of that one, so I'm glad it looks all right to other people too. ^_^

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

I thought it had plenty to do with it, considering what I was asking about.

And welcome back. ;)

[reve-lucide.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Nice to be back, although it was nice to be gone as well. ^_^

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Oh, for... well, that's a lovely little bit, isn't it? I'd have to guess it has something to do with the assumption that Latinos tend to live with a lot of people in the same house/apartment/whatever, and there's probably an assumption going on that they'd be more likely to foreclose. *Headdesk*

I really do wonder about the world, sometimes. It's such a crazy damned place.

[reve-lucide.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm sure that's the only reason they ask. Ridiculous.

And I'm pretty sure it's an official government (state, maybe?) form that has to be included in the closing papers, rather than something that the specific title company just threw in there on their own.

[coralia13.livejournal.com]

Ooooh, FBI? You are going to be Scully!


That's actually the only semi-intelligent thing I have to say.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

That's okay, it's pretty much my only semi-intelligent reason for applying. ;)

Well, that and the job I applied for actually does bear some vague resemblance to what I do now (scary, isn't it?). But mostly it's just me thinking it'd be awesome to answer the "where do you work?" question with "oh, I work for the FBI." XD

[coralia13.livejournal.com]

Sweet! Is it just administrative work? Or can you not talk about it? ;)

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Mostly admin stuff, but it's also monitoring radios and that kind of thing. It would be pretty far in the future, as I understand, since they've got a fairly long process of uber-background-checks and stuff, but hey - it's an interesting shot. ;)