MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me • Hacker News Board

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#21

Post by raxxorrax » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

acdha wrote: post #8

mc32 wrote: post #3

This is a sad state of affairs where one can't even have a meta discussion about a topic without having to tip toe around ill-defined lines. In the long run, this has the potential to turn people how want to stay out of politics and draw them in out of necessity, or they may also be cowed into something they disagree with to protect their livelihood. In either case, it's not a good thing that one may not seek science…

[flagged]

> He directly equates DEI efforts to Nazi Germany

He doesn't, he compared it to the state of German universities shortly before the Nazis came to power and there are certain parallels. I think it is worth listening to him.

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#22

Post by Jacqued » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:45 PM UTC

DeWilde wrote: post #10

acdha wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

>facing mild criticism from your peers Demanding that someone loses their job seems a bit more than mild and quite mobbish. Would you not agree?

I mean the guy lost "a major honor" in his field, not his job.

A lot of people deserve honors for their good work, and don't write trash articles comparing enrolling a few more Black students in college with literally nazi germany. For all his veneer of rationality the guy is wandering into nut-job territory here.

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#23

Post by prohobo » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:47 PM UTC

I'm starting to think that all of this is a weaponization of culture by elites to undermine political movements and stifle opposition to certain business interests.

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#24

Post by nootropicat » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:48 PM UTC

This isn't going to end until enough competent people are pushed away from existing institutions to form their own structures. Which is likely to take at least a generation, and quite likely is going to happen in a different country (don't ask me which). Existing institutions can't be saved because with each successful cancellation, cancellers gain power and remaining opposition loses it.

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#25

Post by blagie » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

I have insider information on MIT, but not on this specific situation.

In general, I would describe much of cancel culture not as a grassroots movement, so much as an astroturf movement. It gives entrenched powers an extrajudicial process to target people.

Abbot spoke out against legacy / alumni / etc. admissions. I suspect that, or something similar, was the real crime. MIT isn't huge into legacy / alumni admissions, so I suspect the mob got kicked off by somebody else (Harvard, just up the river, is big into legacy / alumni, would find this threatening, and leaderships are joined at the hip).

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#26

Post by acdha » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

DeWilde wrote: post #10

acdha wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

>facing mild criticism from your peers Demanding that someone loses their job seems a bit more than mild and quite mobbish. Would you not agree?

Did he actually lose his job? There's a big difference between your boss or, since he's an academic, someone on the promotion panel saying that and some internet stranger who has no impact on his career.

Contrast that with the Germans in question where “cancellation” had best case outcomes like economic ruin and fleeing the country. I'm not saying I support calls to have him fired — although I don't see people getting this lathered about about, say, all of the retail workers or service reps who get worse for even pettier reasons — but these are simply not remotely comparable situations.

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#27

Post by raxxorrax » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:52 PM UTC

tedivm wrote: post #19

If you look at the people who have been "cancelled" the vast majority of them are still employed, still selling their books, and often have even more prestige as a result (just amongst a specific group). Most of the internet has never heard of Dorian Abbot, yet not only does he still have a job, and not only is he still being invited to MIT to speak (just at a delayed date apparently), but now he has a bunch of advoc…

All the more reason to offer counter arguments instead to advocating to silence people.

edit: which was precisely the core of the argument from the beginning...

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#28

Post by acdha » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:53 PM UTC

raxxorrax wrote: post #21

acdha wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> He directly equates DEI efforts to Nazi Germany He doesn't, he compared it to the state of German universities shortly before the Nazis came to power and there are certain parallels. I think it is worth listening to him.

He didn't get to give a talk. Can you summarize in your own words what happened to the German academics he drew a direct comparison to?

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#29

Post by 57844743385 » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:54 PM UTC

57844743385 wrote: post #9

The only solution to this sort of thing is if institutions only accept formal, in person complaints from members of that institution. To do this they’d have to specifically recognize the problem of mob cancellation and decide to listen only to their own members.

A social movement has to form, one that rejects the faceless internet mob, and recognizes only people who exist here and now, physically in the present.

It needs a name. Movements only catch on when they have the right name that instantly conveys the message.

Re: MIT Abandons Its Mission. and Me

#30

Post by dragonwriter » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 1:54 PM UTC

acdha wrote: post #8

mc32 wrote: post #3

This is a sad state of affairs where one can't even have a meta discussion about a topic without having to tip toe around ill-defined lines. In the long run, this has the potential to turn people how want to stay out of politics and draw them in out of necessity, or they may also be cowed into something they disagree with to protect their livelihood. In either case, it's not a good thing that one may not seek science…

[flagged]

> He directly equates DEI efforts to Nazi Germany:

Specifically, he equated active racial, gender, etc. inclusion with active racial exclusion. Like the rest of his piece, it is part of a pile of nonobvious (but with a very high affinity for a particular political tribe, despite the author’s claim to be apolitical) conclusions offered without significant justification; the one place this seems to be noted at all os an invitation to the reader to do research and disprove the conclusion that the author has declined to support.