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Who cares about diversity?

fakenous.substack.com

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Re: Who cares about diversity?

#341

Post by selwynii »

vlod wrote: post #327
opmelogy wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see a problem with this, especially if part of the mission of the folks giving the grant is to create opportunities for under-represented people. "If I want to focus on merit, fairness and equality, then you get called out as racist or sexist." I'm still waiting for an example where someone can actually vet people based on merit, fairness and equality without any of their own unconscious biases being a factor…

>I'm still waiting for an example where someone can actually vet people based on merit, fairness and equality without any of their own unconscious biases being a factor Blind auditions for orchestras.

And the pendulum has swung so far back I can recall reading "diversity" advocates trying to remove them in the last few years for being insufficiently equitable.

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#342

Post by rcoveson »

tptacek wrote: post #305
rcoveson wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bit by bit, we've got: > it's all sort of comically smug Tonal critique, valid but not worth much. > everybody else in the entire world is wrong, and here is a 7-point axiomatic derivation proving it What argument doesn't take this form? If you're making an argument you yourself agree with, then yeah, the implication is that you disagree with people who disagree with it. Axiomatic derivations will be involved, becaus…

It sounds like your problem with my argument about the poor reasoning here is that I made it in too few words? I'll say it again: he hasn't actually managed to engage with the argument for DEI, even institutionalized DEI; he thinks instead that he's checkmated it by attempting to reconcile a dictionary definition with the rationale the Supreme Court used in the 1970s to defend Affirmative Action.

> I'll say it again: he hasn't actually managed to engage with the argument for DEI, even institutionalized DEI

The use of the definite article here is surprising. I get the impression you have an argument for DEI in mind that you think everybody has in mind. Which one is it?

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#343

Post by tootie »

tptacek wrote: post #89

The whole blog is like this; it's all sort of comically smug "everybody else in the entire world is wrong, and here is a 7-point axiomatic derivation proving it"†, much of it depending on specific definitions of specific words. Check-mate, atheists! There are lots of good, sharp, critical things to say about the DEI movement, most especially "institutional" DEI, but you can't meaningfully say them when you write with…

I think the post boils down to him not wanting to spend any effort accommodating diversity. It's a valid opinion but I don't see how anything he wrote would sway anyone one way or the other.

I think he's also wrong in the factual sense about what diversity initiatives are for. It's not actually that diversity is an automatic net win for companies because diverse workers are better. It exists specifically to combat bias and discrimination. Both conscious and unconscious. It's literally anti racism (or anti misogyny or anti homophobia etc). I support DEI programs because that's a laudable goal unto itself. Even if it makes a company less profitable. I think the goal of any human endeavor should be to make the world a marginally better place. Not just to maximize profit.

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#344

Post by vlod »

selwynii wrote: post #341
vlod wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm still waiting for an example where someone can actually vet people based on merit, fairness and equality without any of their own unconscious biases being a factor Blind auditions for orchestras.

And the pendulum has swung so far back I can recall reading "diversity" advocates trying to remove them in the last few years for being insufficiently equitable.

I didn't realize this was a thing till I read it.

nytimes [0]: "To Make Orchestras More Diverse, End Blind Auditions"

[0]: https://archive.ph/kCb9N

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#345

Post by crackercrews »

koonsolo wrote: post #339

I do a lot of hiring, and co-hired a lot of my colleagues. I would never hire for diversity, and would explicitly refuse to do so. Why? Everyone in my team is hired for 1 thing: excellent developers. Nobody is questioning why they are there, and I would never put those people in a position where project managers have to question why anyone in my team is there, because of being a good developer or to fill up some stat…

> But hey, once the world starts doing that bullshit, it's excellent for me. I'm a hetro white male, so there can be ony 1 reason why I was hired.

This logic only makes sense looking backward, assuming you got hired.

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#346

Post by revlolz »

registeredcorn wrote: post #279
revlolz wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DEI measures from companies I have been with have been unironically fighting the woes of systemic racism with a new form of systemic racism. IMO it leads to resentment even from minority employees and is poison to morale in a meritocratic performance based organizations.

Yep. The worries over "Am I just a diversity hire?" are a real concern. :( I really wish that applicants were required to give less information, not more. I don't want to know your name, or how old you are, or where you're from. I just want to know what your credentials are. Personally, I feel like criminal records, outside of specific work like working with weapons, children/elderly, or law enforcement, should not b…

I've found that the only controllable practices are to force our hr to send anonimized resumes to my interview team and to zealously challenge bias through panel review questions to interviewers. Our reviews can't detail things like "not a culture fit" or "is unqualified." there has to be a specific quantifiable reason for decline or hire. We've never had anyone openly discriminate because I don't sincerely believe people do (intentionally) , but I'm willing to put faith into the concept of unconscious bias and take action to challenge it with methods that do not hypocritcally embrace discrimation of protected class/features/etc. However, I strongly believe dei equity creates more racism rather than remove it.

All opinions here subjective, maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like it's best for both candidate and company.

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#347

Post by philwelch »

jiveturkey wrote: post #238

> Most fundamentally, in this context, diversity would be variety of ideas, experiences, and attitudes, especially those relevant to the things that people are learning about in school. In the context the author wants us to assume, sure. But that is not what big-D Diversity is. "When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less." - Humpty Dumpty In this case, of course, this is very in…

I would posit that the advocates of "big-D Diversity" are the ones intentionally setting up a provocative and tendentious definition of "diversity".

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#348

Post by HideousKojima »

_312m wrote: post #314
HideousKojima wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Without the added context of the original book's description, since it seems no one was aware of it, do you think the uproar was justified? No, I don't think willful ignorance justifies cancel culture.

> willful ignorance I think it's just plain old fashioned ignorance, right? Dunno, to me this just looks like kids who were excited to see a musical starring someone who looked like them for once, and were understandably upset when that didn't happen. Looks like the students were targeted by alt-right publications for that, too: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/08/theater/hunchback-of-notr...

>I think it's just plain old fashioned ignorance, right?

Pushing to get a play cancelled (and succeeding!) over a misunderstanding that can be resolved by a 30 second googling is in fact willful ignorance.

>Dunno, to me this just looks like kids who were excited to see a musical starring someone who looked like them, and were understandably upset when that didn't happen.

They started a months-long letter writing and protesting campaign, according to your own NYT link. And the person who started the campaign was African American, not Gypsy. And while most of the Gypsies I met while living in Eastern Europe looked vaguely Middle Eastern or Indian (I realize their actual ancestry is more complicated), there are white Gypsies as well. I have never, however, heard of black Gypsies. I'm sure with immigration to Europe combined with intermarriage there are some now, but the typical Gypsy in France a few centuries ago is not going to be black. So I have no idea what your "someone who looked like them" comment is supposed to mean.

>Looks like the students were targeted by alt-right publications for that, too

Oh no, shitheads on the internet said mean things and a tiny number even made threats! I'm sure you can find examples of that for any controversial news story that makes national headlines, I don't see your point here.

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#349

Post by gnull »

jedberg wrote: post #180

So here's where I'm stuck: On the one hand I totally understand the objections to categorizing people based on things that won't affect their job performance per se -- skin color, gender, who they are attracted to, etc. But on the other hand, those people have been systematically discriminated against, well, forever. So the question is, where should the fix be applied? If the only people who have the skills to do the…

> But that will take decades. What do we do until then?

We wait.

I don't understand why people want these issues to be resolved here and now. Society and culture take decades to change, that's natural, and shortcuts—however tempting they might be—often come at a cost of something else.

The conditions of these oppressed groups are not terribly bad, compared to what was going on with people in general throughout history. An average man who lived in Europe 100 years ago would gladly change places with an average black woman living in Europe nowadays. And even lots of white people from poorer countries nowadays have a lower standard of living than black people in developed countries. I speak from my own experience, as a person who grew up in a countryside where people don't have running water in their homes and toilet is just a hole in the ground; then I come to Northern Europe for work and hear how hard it is to be a black person here and that I'm apparently privileged because I'm white.

My point is, current conditions of people in developed countries are not so bad that it requires urgent measures to improve. If solving it takes 2-4 generations of people living in these conditions, it's not that much of a tragedy, and I don't think we must urgently start dumping resources to speed it up.

Re: Who cares about diversity?

#350

Post by eweise »

petilon wrote: post #311
EarlKing wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Diversity doesn't only mean race. Yes it does. It's an imperialist code-word for state sanctioned racism against the majority population of the proletariat in order to pit the proletariat against itself. Absolutely no one is fooled.

I don't think that's the case. Name a university where they ask for diversity essays in order to reduce the percentage of whites. The reverse is often true. For example, many universities use it to control asian population.

Well, same thing really. They are asking a general diversity question in order to get more info about your cultural background.
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