Live data from Hacker News

MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

whyevolutionistrue.com

231–240 of 807 posts

Re: MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

#231

In the spirit of trying to learn something from the community: while I can certainly understand the rationale and goals behind DEI programs (many of which I agree with, others not), I honestly can't understand these "DEI statements" at all. They always seemed very "1984" to me, and almost designed to engender resentment in a way that would ultimately backfire. So perhaps I'm in a like-minded echo chamber, but is ther…

[flagged]

[flagged]

Re: MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

#232

>DEI statements are important because they show individual awareness of historical inequities and current biases that form modern society. Only the currently approved ones. The perfect example: holocaust denial. Ask anyone in the US how many people died in the holocaust. The answer is 6 million and they are all Jews. The real number is 14 million with 8 million Slavs, 6 million Jews and 2 million misc of gays, Gypsie…

Wait so your definition of Holocaust denier is not the person that denies that 6 million Jews were systematically killed by the Nazi Germany machine, but the person who believes in the Holocaust of the Jews, but does not include other atrocities perpetrated by Nazis on the European population?

Can you clarify?

And in your opinion, did these DEI statements ever have Jews in mind?

Re: MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

#234
post #112
post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People might be surprised how dumb top universities can be. When everyone is biased to thinking they're the best, it pretty easily creates tunnel vision.

Tenure is also a blessing and a curse. It ensures academic freedom. But it also ensures someone has limited checks on their bullshit, until they retire.

This came more from administrators in universities and funding agencies than the professors themselves, who are mostly dragged along for the ride, or go through whatever motions it takes to get promoted or obtain an administrator position. Tenure would actually work more against administrative abuse than for it.

Re: MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

#235

>DEI statements are important because they show individual awareness of historical inequities and current biases that form modern society. Only the currently approved ones. The perfect example: holocaust denial. Ask anyone in the US how many people died in the holocaust. The answer is 6 million and they are all Jews. The real number is 14 million with 8 million Slavs, 6 million Jews and 2 million misc of gays, Gypsie…

Because the Holocaust can refer to either the Nazi's genocide of Jews or all the genocides carried out by Nazi Germany. Most often it is the former.

So to reframe this, if you ask people how many people died in the Jewish genocide they'll probably give you the figure of how many Jews died, yes. They aren't ignoring all of the other victims, they're giving you the statistic of what they thought you asked for.

This is no different than separating out the genocide of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire and the genocide of Greeks by the same regime.

Re: MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

#236
post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am almost certain that by 2100, the current worship of skin-deep diversity will be relegated to the cabinet of ancient curiosities, along with lobotomy, bell-bottom jeans and haruspicy [0], and people will worship something equally weird, but momentarily fashionable. Diversity is not really a value. If it were, it would have been recognized as such millennia ago, because already the Egyptians and the Babylonians kn…

I am unsure about most of those countries but Japan and Israel have a reputation for being extremely racist Prejudice of any form is unhelpful. Racism is particularly nasty

I think Japan is not racist, but xenofobe (they dislike and avoid other cultures, not races) and Israel is very non-racist as they are are united by the religion regardless the race. Also racism is not particularly worse than other similar forms of prejudice - if you look at the German concentration camps, race was one of the factors but not the top.

Re: MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

#237

>DEI statements are important because they show individual awareness of historical inequities and current biases that form modern society. Only the currently approved ones. The perfect example: holocaust denial. Ask anyone in the US how many people died in the holocaust. The answer is 6 million and they are all Jews. The real number is 14 million with 8 million Slavs, 6 million Jews and 2 million misc of gays, Gypsie…

I was taught in high school that it was 6 million Jews.

Standard American public high school. Teacher was left-wing. We read Diary of Anne Frank, Night by Elie Weisel, Number the Stars, etc.

No holocaust denial going on.

Yes, the Soviets were excluded. So were the Prussians, who were the victims of both Nazi and Soviet genocides.

Nobody calls this holocaust denial.

Re: MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

#239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I'm pretty sure that "cultural Marxism" is a conspiracy theory, so I'd probably downvote you for that still. Seriously, what is your definition of cultural Marxism? I'm not gonna respond by picking it apart or whatever, I'll just read it and write "thank you" as a response after you've posted it.

The culture of class revenge/justice that fuels Marxism.

"The tradition of Marxist cultural analysis has also been referred to as "cultural Marxism", and "Marxist cultural theory", in reference to Marxist ideas about culture."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxist_cultural_analysis

It is >also< a name used by people who believe in a conspiracy theory about egalitarian politics.

Re: MIT abandons requirement of DEI statements for hiring and promotions

#240

How would academics react to mandates requiring them to declare their support for: - Ensuring open access to research - Committing to long-term, foundational research - Prioritizing high-quality teaching and mentorship - Embracing diverse viewpoints - Questioning established academic orthodoxy - Focusing research on public rather than personal gain - Openly sharing data and methodologies - Upholding research neutrali…

Does "external influences" include the American Communist Party? How about the Chinese Communist Party?
Post reply on HN