Somehow the word has been twisted to be almost exclusively negative.
But show me an organization that doesn't discriminate, and I'll show you an organization of utter incompetence.
"President" was chosen as the title of the head of the US Executive Branch because it was a title with nearly no prestige; it was the sort of name you'd give to the Robert's Rules enforcer for community meetings. Words take on a connotation history provides them.
"Differentiation" is the word I have to use now.
Webster gives pride of place to both the transitive and intransitive definitions that could fit your "once upon a time" definition.[1]
Furthermore, of the six definitions given, five are what I'd consider a trait or ability that is wholly positive to possess. Only the 2nd definition for the intransitive form has a negative connotation.
> But show me an organization that doesn't discriminate, and I'll show you an organization of utter incompetence.
Any organization that isn't utterly incompetent would avoid using the ambiguous word "discriminate" in place of the unambiguous phrase "use good judgment."
Also, HR is just one tiny and narrow domain of human affairs. Music, writing, even dating see way more use of the positive definitions of "discriminate."
In practice, discrimination has largely negative connotations https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/183093/is-there-...
> "use good judgment."
"The screening exercise _____ aggressively."
* "The screening exercise uses good judgement aggressively." Awkward.
* "The screening exercise filters aggressively." No implication that choice is based on the candidate's characteristics instead of random chance.
* "The screening exercise distinguishes aggressively". Sounds odd, plus has positive rather than neutral connotations.
* "The screening exercise differentiates aggressively " Best one, though it doesn't hint at the pass/fail nature of the distinction.
Everything is discrimination - if you're seeking to hire a software engineer you're probably going to discriminate against people who don't know how to code, people with low IQs, people who can't get along with the team, etc.
The question becomes, is the discrimination legal and/or ethical and based on actual business needs? If the GP noticed they can get a seasoned developer for only slightly above the price of a jr developer (who sees themselves as "senior") , that doesn't really seem like immoral discrimination to me, especially if they are more than willing to also hire jr engineers at jr engineer prices. Most places cant, for business reasons, survive alone solely on senior engineers.
(Interestingly enough, in the US, discrimination based on age because "old people are stupid" is illegal whereas discrimination on age based on "young people are stupid" is not.)