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How ‘Diversity’ Policing Fails Science
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- SamoyedFurFluff 4y agoThis is an opinion piece, not actual journalism, for context.
- swader999 4y agoAs a parent there's no way I'm encouraging my kids to take on mega debt to fund this nonsense.
- archagon 4y agoAs a parent, you have little say in what your kids will end up finding valuable. Prepare to be disappointed.
- cm2187 4y agoAs a parent, you are exposed to your kids making a non DEI-compliant joke on a social media and as a result be barred from university admission years later.
- swader999 4y agoRight, problem solved.
- boringg 4y agoAs a parent I would hope you wouldn't take on mega debt to go to texas tech and would be able to discern the quality of taking a lesson from a sample size from one.
- fidgewidge 4y agoThe problems sadly aren't limited to Texas Tech Biology, Texas Tech, Texas or the USA. Even if you ignore DEI ideology entirely, the amount of low quality pseudo-science coming out of universities is a crisis all by itself. The biology world seems especially hard hit but social sciences, humanities and economics also have major reputational issues due to a proliferation of shoddy papers. The questions are really, are universities as valuable as people currently assume? And if so, should they be?
- goatlover 4y agoTexas Tech is hardly the only example.
- red-iron-pine 4y agoPretty much every in person campus in the US at this point. Political and academic suicide not to.
- 4RealFreedom 4y agohttps://archive.ph/I0SKS https://archive.ph/I0SKS
- cm2187 4y agoGiven that the example is a biology department, it is inevitable to evoke Lysenkoism. But unfortunately it is not limited to biology nor education. Large corporations are pulling slides from the US democratic party manifest in mandatory trainings. I have no idea how they think it is appropriate.
- fidgewidge 4y ago"I have no idea how they think it is appropriate." They don't see politics as a series of intellectual debates between sides with opposing experiences and views, resolved via votes. They think they're perfect angels and their opponents are an evil that should not exist at all. If they thought they could force you to vote Democrat as part of your job contract they'd do it in a heartbeat. If they thought they had a way to eliminate the Republicans forever and then ban it from ever re-emerging, they wouldn't even hesitate. If you think that's extreme or flamebait, well, it's what US academia is now actually doing via these loyalty pledges and openly politically biased hiring practices: systematically erase the non-left from academic existence. It's what happened to James Damore, it's what your HR department would do to you in an instant if you complained about the inappropriateness of forcing employees to sit through left wing political material. They would love you to complain so they can identify you and eliminate you because that's just how they roll. At some point, our society is going to have to face the fact that this is how it always goes with the left. It has happened throughout history, going back to the French Revolution. Having a left that doesn't try and take over to impose a dictatorship the moment it spies an opportunity to do so is very difficult. In Europe there is a similar problem except it's being done via encoding leftist worldviews into the European Union, instead of by trying to take over universities and corporations, and is arguably more advanced. It's a really big problem and it's very unclear what to do about it. Society needs to (re)develop norms and taboos about allowing anything to do with politics into the workplace. Or it needs to radically shift towards the libertarian right, as a way to mitigate the risk of a left wing violent uprising. NB for any lefties who never got the memo at the end of the 20th century, "the left" doesn't refer to anti-war anti-capitalists anymore. It refers to middle class culture and eco warriors - the sort of people the WSJ article is about.
- sfpotter 4y ago
- nhchris 4y agoScience is incidental. The purpose is to select candidates that will produce ammunition in the form of research (e.g. various marginalization studies) for your side, and exclude candidates that might produce research useful to your opponents. This has been the case for a while in social sciences [1], now it's taking over all fields, and being made explicit and open [2,3,4]. The result of "just stick to your research, they won't bother STEM" attitudes. [1] The authors also submitted different test studies to different peer-review boards. The methodology was identical, and the variable was that the purported findings either went for, or against, the liberal worldview (for example, one found evidence of discrimination against minority groups, and another found evidence of "reverse discrimination" against straight white males). Despite equal methodological strengths, the studies that went against the liberal worldview were criticized and rejected, and those that went with it were not. - https://theweek.com/articles/441474/how-academias-liberal-bias-killing-social-science https://theweek.com/articles/441474/how-academias-liberal-bi... [2] Advancing knowledge and understanding is a fundamental public good. In some cases, however, potential harms to the populations studied may outweigh the benefit of publication. - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-022-01443-2 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-022-01443-2 [3] Science Must Not Be Used to Foster White Supremacy - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/science-must-not-be-used-to-foster-white-supremacy/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/science-must-not-... [4] Study: Diversity Statements Required for One-Fifth of Academic Jobs - https://freebeacon.com/campus/study-diversity-statements-required-for-one-fifth-of-academic-jobs/ https://freebeacon.com/campus/study-diversity-statements-req...
- bayesian_horse 4y agoYou're accusing mild opinionism by being even more opionated.
- DiggyJohnson 4y agoWhat? Can you break your perspective down more into the context of the comment you're replying to?
- evancox100 4y agoIt’s the biology department!
- 4RealFreedom 4y agoI'd really like to know what the endgame is for DEI. Can anyone explain that?
- anoxor 4y agoIt functions as a religious cult, and the goal is power and control. See justification for use of power because they project that their opponents goal was power first.
- Georgelemental 4y agoThere is no endgame, that would mean that they would lose their jobs and relevance. > Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever! —George Wallace, 1963 > The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination. —Ibram X. Kendi, 2019
- causi 4y agoThe destruction of meritocracy. Meritocracy forces people to confront things about themselves they don't like and influences them to change. Change is hard and painful. Especially now, when the things people need to change about themselves are also things they hold as being very important to their identity. People with a cultural background that fosters academic achievement will on average achieve more than people who don't. In the Western world, those cultural differences often also line up with ethnic differences. That's what we refuse to confront: that, by ourselves or in response to circumstances imposed on us by others, some of us have developed cultures that put us at a disadvantage. Did my Korean friend growing up who spent his every afternoon and weekend studying while I was playing videogames deserve to get into a better university than me and make more money than me? I say he did. DEI says he didn't.
- ramesh31 4y ago>Did my Korean friend growing up who spent his every afternoon and weekend studying while I was playing videogames deserve to get into a better university than me and make more money than me? I say he did. DEI says he didn't. But why was your friend able to spend his every afternoon and weekend studying? Because he was raised in a supportive, nurturing environment. Probably with grandparents and aunts/uncles to help take care of him. He probably had older relatives in professional careers to aspire to and mentor him. He probably never had to work a job in high school to help support his family, or raise his younger siblings while mom worked night shift. His parents were probably married and able to hold decent jobs to provide a stable home, good nutrition, and a lack of stress. They probably were able to make sure he went to preschool, and had reliable transportation to get him to/from there and kindergarten, and drilled into him the importance of education from a young age. All of these things are what DEI tries to correct for. The people who had none of that never get a shot at redemption otherwise. The cards are stacked from birth.
- boringg 4y agoNot defending anything here - but is this a case where a low-middle quality school is trying to protect itself from downside risk of one of their staff creating an uproar? They probably already have an enrollment and funding problem so any further debacle will only hurt further. This article is creating that same debacle I would imagine.
- bunbunbun 4y agoDon’t be fooled into outrage, there are at least two issues with this op Ed. First, even with negative remarks some candidates will proceed in the process and maybe become the hired person. Second, the author is relying on your ignorance of academic hiring procedures, which has its own reasoning grown out of years of faculty politics.
- Flatcircle 4y agoReading this type of stuff makes me so sad. It’s Very Soviet.
- goatlover 4y agoYou would think South Park spending a season lampooning it would register, but I guess it can be dismissed as just being edgy instead of apt social satire.
- saul_goodman 4y agoAmerican exceptionalism is dead. Persia was once known for their strong pursuit of knowledge and science, it's why the majority of the visible stars in the sky have Arabic names even to this day. Then the region transitioned heavily into religion. That's not an indictment of religion, just that we are watching our own downfall by valuing political beliefs above the actual requirements of any given job. It's probably too late to correct at this point as there will always be people willing to do what is asked of them, to proselytize the desired belief system to the next generation. Our union will just fracture as so many before have been fractured.
- blibble 4y agoindeed, if you extrapolate this out several decades then you end up with companies far less competitive on the global scale and the same applies to societies too
- snek_case 4y ago> if you extrapolate this out several decades then you end up with companies far less competitive on the global scale Just look at how Google is doing lately...
- catapart 4y agoWait a minute... a conservative author from a conservative organization writing in a paper with a majority-convervative base...THAT article's source study found that there was a liberal bias in COLLEGES?!!? Sorry; I know HN isn't kind to sass. But, sass aside, look at the details and it's obvious this is propaganda. Yes colleges (and life) have a liberal bias. That doesn't mean asking people to promise not to be racist (with a signature) is a fascist plot to indoctrinate orthodoxy. It just means that if you can't even promise to not be racist, there's a high likelihood there will be problems in your tenure, vis a vis how you respond to reasonable assurances of common ground.
- goatlover 4y agoMaybe they can also promise not to vote for a certain political party, just to be on the safe side. And maybe throw in a statement against capitalism and neoliberalism while they're at it, just to emphasize how they're not holding up the status quo.
- kenjackson 4y agoIs not being racist now a liberal ideology? This seems more akin to signing a document that you won’t have relations with your students or that you won’t fabricate research.
- catapart 4y agoIf they did that, then even neutral organizations, like the ACLU and the National Academy of Sciences, would call out their poor practices. There are plenty of examples of that. Turns out, well-written articles get input from all interested parties and include any opposition research so that readers can look at the information presented and decide what the report means. Please note that Mr. Sailer elided all of that and, instead, used a singular study (which he plainly admits) to attack a philosophy that he and his funders are on record trying to dismantle. This isn't complicated, it's just barely disguised.
- dbsmith83 4y ago
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- wonderwonder 4y agoThe most interesting twist to come out of the rise of DEI is the now open discrimination against Asians, and the rising open casting of Jews as the real enemy of African Americans. Although Jews get blamed for everything else so maybe it's not so much of a surprise. A year or so ago when there was a large number of cases of Asians being attacked in the streets by African Americans; the DEI director where I worked posted on slack in response to posts by concerned Asian coworkers that it was because of white supremacy and we mustn't let white supremacists drive us apart. It was very much whites are the bad guys and just ignore whatever is really happening. What makes it worse is DEI leaders are essentially given unlimited power. They can say anything and if you say anything to contradict them you are a racist and your career is destroyed. Article reminds me of this: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1608188826291167242/photo/1 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1608188826291167242/phot...
- andrepd 4y agoThat meme is kind of stupid, to be fair. Scientific skepticism means question and probe and doubt in a measure appropriate to the evidence presented, not that we suddenly have to doubt that the earth is round or that gravity exists.
- wonderwonder 4y agoSure in those specific cases but not in the context of journals like Nature announcing that they will refuse to publish any scientific studies that conflict with their DEI policies. Also I'm a sucker for anything involving Lego people
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- bunbunbun 4y agoWashington post had a nice economic and historical analysis of what you are talking about a few years ago: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/11/29/the-real-reason-americans-stopped-spitting-on-asian-americans-and-started-praising-them/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/11/29/the-r... It’s not exhaustive but gives some touchstones for further reading
- bannedbybros 4y ago[dead]
- syzarian 4y agoThe land acknowledgement statements really irk me. Pretty much all land has been conquered, reconquered, or otherwise changed hands many times over the last several thousand years. What is the point of saying this land once belonged to group A? How does that help marginalized people? It reminds me of people saying, “Thank you for your service” and then voting against politicians that want to increase funding for veterans. I suppose this sort of meaningless act lets some people feel like they are “allies” of native people without having to actually help native people. It’s like, “thoughts and prayers”. There will be a backlash and these dumb requirements are an obstacle to progress toward racial equality.
- beej71 4y agoI think the two options people generally go with are: 1. Forget about it and do nothing. 2. Remember it and do nothing. While both of these are pretty poor, the second, I'd argue, is marginally better. Forgetting history isn't usually the best plan.
- syzarian 4y agoAll else being equal I would agree with you. I do think though that enforcing things like land acknowledgment statements in syllabi creates resentment amongst those in the middle. There is also harm, I think, in letting those who advocate for such policies feel good about themselves without them doing anything to feel good about.