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ZorbaTHut  2yr ago (text post)   35549 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 19, 2022

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Probably (and I'm pretty sure universities are doing exactly that), but I wouldn't say that this satisfies the stated goal of having a less racist society. It's probably the optimal thing to do from an employment compliance perspective, but it doesn't seem to improve life for any of my countrymates of any race. I guess maybe it furthers some global anti-racist goal, but this is not a goal of mine.

I largely agree, but the normative framework of contemporary corporate anti-racism is that of equality, diversity, and inclusion, and I think suggestions like mine can be framed as satisfying that. What they don't satisfy is a murkier (but probably more important) set of anti-racist principles concerning something like restorative justice and fairness; I can imagine an ADOS looking at these diversity efforts and not unreasonably saying something like -

My ancestors were sold into slavery and we have been subjected to generations of mistreatment, exclusion, and abuse, resulting in us being a damaged and vulnerable community to this day. Puritanical whites then looked at our suffering and decide to repent by implementing a system in which people who superficially look like me but don't come from my community and haven't been subject to our suffering are brought in to assuage their consciences! What outrage, what insult. It's like trying to assuage your guilt about the suffering of the meat you just ate by letting your dog chew on the bones!

And they would have a damn good point. This is NOT restorative justice by any measure. On the other hand, I have some mild-Bryan Kaplanesque sympathy for systems that can attract the best of global talent from around the world and provide opportunity to bright and ambitious people in the developing world, so I do like this aspect of the policy on those grounds.

That may conflate cause and effect. It could be the ancestors were sold into slavery because they were damaged. Arguably at the time they were economically less valuable than the trade goods for which many were exchanged.

equality, diversity, and inclusion

The E in DEI is actually 'equity', which is an altogether different concept that equality. It focuses on outcomes and historical redress, instead of opportunity.

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