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PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

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Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#21

Post by mc32 »

bilekas wrote: post #8
dang wrote: post #310

[stub for offtopicness / flamewarness / guideline-breakingness] (this is a rough cut - I know there are other posts left in the thread that arguably belong here, but this time I'm in a bit of a rush) (please, everyone, you can make substantive points thoughtfully but do so within the guardrails at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - avoid the generic-indignant-flamey-snarky-namecalley-hardcore-battley…

This seems very un-American. The government dictating how you run your business ? > “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” Is that even legal to add such an arbitrary and opinionated reason to a government grant? I applaud them for taking a stand, it…

I think people defend anti discrimination or are against it depending on how the anti discrimination policy discriminates discrimination.

We always discriminate. We have to. But only some discrimination is allowed and some are not allowed. The difference is what kind of discrimination people feel is fair and unfair.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#22

Post by mlinhares »

skrebbel wrote: post #20
bakugo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws. So basically, the PSF wants to discriminate, the government doesn't want them to do so, and that's a problem? Am I reading this correctly?

Oh come on. The language means that if PSF at any point, maybe years from now, at some conference or wherever maybe somehow supports or hosts a panel about diversity and inclusion, the NSF can force them to pay the money back, even though it's already spent. That's not "wanting to discriminate", it's a free ticket for a rogue government to bully the PSF without a good argument, if it ever sees fit. Even if I were an…

Anyone that signs something like this either can't read or hired lawyers that can't read.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#23

Post by add-sub-mul-div »

dang wrote: post #310

[stub for offtopicness / flamewarness / guideline-breakingness] (this is a rough cut - I know there are other posts left in the thread that arguably belong here, but this time I'm in a bit of a rush) (please, everyone, you can make substantive points thoughtfully but do so within the guardrails at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - avoid the generic-indignant-flamey-snarky-namecalley-hardcore-battley…

You either think DEI is about taking jobs from white people and giving them to undeserving others, or that the deserving are spread across different races and genders etc. and we should capture that better.

If you're in the former group just man up and say it, don't waste our time with the equivocating, "so the government just doesn't want people to discriminate and that's a problem???"

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#25

Post by justin66 »

bilekas wrote: post #8
dang wrote: post #310

[stub for offtopicness / flamewarness / guideline-breakingness] (this is a rough cut - I know there are other posts left in the thread that arguably belong here, but this time I'm in a bit of a rush) (please, everyone, you can make substantive points thoughtfully but do so within the guardrails at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - avoid the generic-indignant-flamey-snarky-namecalley-hardcore-battley…

This seems very un-American. The government dictating how you run your business ? > “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” Is that even legal to add such an arbitrary and opinionated reason to a government grant? I applaud them for taking a stand, it…

I understand what you're driving at but at this stage of the game it's quite American.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#26

Post by djoldman »

> These terms included affirming the statement that we “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.”

(Emphasis mine)

I'm curious if any lawyer folks could weigh in as to whether this language means that the entire sentence requires the mentioned programs to be "in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws." If so, one might argue that a "DEI program" was not in violation of a Federal anti-discrimination law.

Obviously no one would want to have to go to court and this likely would be an unacceptable risk.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#27

Post by ponow »

bilekas wrote: post #8
dang wrote: post #310

[stub for offtopicness / flamewarness / guideline-breakingness] (this is a rough cut - I know there are other posts left in the thread that arguably belong here, but this time I'm in a bit of a rush) (please, everyone, you can make substantive points thoughtfully but do so within the guardrails at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - avoid the generic-indignant-flamey-snarky-namecalley-hardcore-battley…

This seems very un-American. The government dictating how you run your business ? > “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” Is that even legal to add such an arbitrary and opinionated reason to a government grant? I applaud them for taking a stand, it…

Federal funding of research is un-American.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#28

Post by rectang »

bilekas wrote: post #8
dang wrote: post #310

[stub for offtopicness / flamewarness / guideline-breakingness] (this is a rough cut - I know there are other posts left in the thread that arguably belong here, but this time I'm in a bit of a rush) (please, everyone, you can make substantive points thoughtfully but do so within the guardrails at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - avoid the generic-indignant-flamey-snarky-namecalley-hardcore-battley…

This seems very un-American. The government dictating how you run your business ? > “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” Is that even legal to add such an arbitrary and opinionated reason to a government grant? I applaud them for taking a stand, it…

Anti-DEI forces, once in power, turn out not to favor putative “diversity of opinion” after all.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#29

Post by aspir »

This isn't good for the PSF, but if these "poison pill" terms are a pattern that applies to all NSF and (presumably) other government research funding, the entire state of modern scientific research is at risk.

Regardless of how you, as an individual, might feel about "DEI," imposing onerous political terms on scientific grants harms everyone in the long term.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#30

Post by paloblanco »

arusahni wrote: post #14
paloblanco wrote: post #5

1.5M is a laughably small number compared to the value that financial institutions extract from just having PyPi available. I know my company, not financial but still large, has containers hitting it every day. How do we get these groups to fork over even just a small amount?

The PSF and several other organizations that provide public package registries wrote an open letter [1] announcing a joint effort to make this situation more sustainable. I'll be interested to see where it goes. [1]: https://openssf.org/blog/2025/09/23/open-infrastructure-is-n...

Thanks! I want to bring this up as a discussion point when I get the chance at work.

I can't find a date on this letter - is it recent?

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