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It is amazing to me that a handful of people on twitter can get people cancelled, while thousands of people can march in the streets (such as in many parts of Europe, or in New York City) and be completely ignored.
I'm glad Princeton has decided to host this. It seems somehow worse that MIT cancelled a science talk since if one of the most respected engineering schools cannot resist calls for censorship by a twitter mob then who can? Thinking about why academia is especially susceptible to this, it seems like most faculty and staff there are in a position not unlike a high priest or clergy member in that they wield a lot of pow…
So we're past the point of looking for racism. Even political opposition, or a viewpoint you don't agree with merits cancellation?
It is amazing to me that a handful of people on twitter can get people cancelled, while thousands of people can march in the streets (such as in many parts of Europe, or in New York City) and be completely ignored.
> MIT told him it was canceling the lecture to “avoid controversy” after students and recent alumni demanded he be uninvited because he’d recently argued academic evaluations should be based on merit. Damn, I assumed he said something racist maybe, but this is what the issue was about, I just lost all respect for MIT.
> He and Stanford University professor Ivan Marinovic had argued in a Newsweek op-ed published in August that current diversity efforts — known as Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion — at universities violated equal treatment.
> Instead, they proposed a framework called Merit, Fairness, and Equality where "university applicants are treated as individuals and evaluated through a rigorous and unbiased process based on their merit and qualifications alone."
In my opinion, the current system is put in place to try to address inequalities that the applicants outside of the educational institution had faced.
It's not a perfect solution, but I think that not having it in place may result in a student roster that would be increasingly conformed by the children of those who have benefited the most from economic inequality.
This Twitter mob has also affected stand up comedy. In Dave Chapelles new special he talks about it a fair amount.
> MIT told him it was canceling the lecture to “avoid controversy” after students and recent alumni demanded he be uninvited because he’d recently argued academic evaluations should be based on merit. Damn, I assumed he said something racist maybe, but this is what the issue was about, I just lost all respect for MIT.
I think that may be an over-simplification; the following paragraphs from the article clarify they are talking about admissions: > He and Stanford University professor Ivan Marinovic had argued in a Newsweek op-ed published in August that current diversity efforts — known as Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion — at universities violated equal treatment. > Instead, they proposed a framework called Merit, Fairness, and Eq…
If you think that the issue is economic inequality impeding their development, this sort of fix is at best a hack that draws fire in other ways, especially from those with egalitarian values.
An enforced racial criteria is the definition of systemic racism. It's literally a system around judging people on their race and doling out advantages on that race.
> mounted a Twitter campaign to cancel a distinguished science lecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology because they disagreed with some of the political positions the speaker had taken So we're past the point of looking for racism. Even political opposition, or a viewpoint you don't agree with merits cancellation?
> MIT told him it was canceling the lecture to “avoid controversy” after students and recent alumni demanded he be uninvited because he’d recently argued academic evaluations should be based on merit. Damn, I assumed he said something racist maybe, but this is what the issue was about, I just lost all respect for MIT.
> MIT told him it was canceling the lecture to “avoid controversy” after students and recent alumni demanded he be uninvited because he’d recently argued academic evaluations should be based on merit. Damn, I assumed he said something racist maybe, but this is what the issue was about, I just lost all respect for MIT.
There is this weird notion floating around the "identity politics" crowd that says that relying on merit is racist and prejudicial.