This is a no-brainer considering only 2.3% of their faculty identifies as conservative.
https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2023/5/22/faculty-survey-...
And that is what I'm commenting on. I'm not a fan of Trump's "war on DEI" but if it was applied with some consistency I could take it as a genuine difference in viewpoints. That would be okay. But the movement is railing hard and vitriolic against anything with even a whiff of "DEI" while applying wildly different standards to themselves. This is hard to take as a genuine difference in viewpoints.
If they are not applying at a rate of over 3% then there is no discrimination.
It's possible that you can identify right-wing high schoolers based on their writing, but I don't really see a problem with rejecting students if they are touting unpopular and/or discriminatory ideas. Universities have the right to maintain a culture of openness and learning, and conservatism is often antithetical to that.
Also, if you're an academic seeking employment, your work and professional connections will make it clear.
There are real people, even smart people, on the other team. They have thoughts, kids, impressive degrees, goals unrelated to politics. They enjoy sunshine and hiking. They think they're doing what they're doing for good reasons. They believe themselves to be good people. They might even believe you to be a good person.
As should be more widely known, this is a bad start to actually being good people.
So, as I alluded to before, the issue here isn't the education - you are delusional. I don't know how to help you because what you're saying is just not aligned with reality and that's not something I can fix.
For the record, you can analyze the text of various scholars even if you don't agree with them, and that's a huge part of critical thinking and higher education. Understand the historical, social, and economic context that lead someone like Marx to his ideology is important. We do this for Hitler and Mussolini all the time, but I don't see anyone claiming that educators are fascists.
Meaning, you, and others, have a severe bias here. You're missing, looking past, the instances that disagree with your perception. So then all that's left is the stuff that aligns with your perception, and such you've constructed a perfect delusion.
This idea that conservative socioeconomics and the "invisible hand" is the One True theory of everything and nothing else should even so much as uttered, lest you be a communist, is, in it of itself, as you say, "fashionable nonsense". In fact, you cannot truly understand the context for 20th century fiscal policy without understanding the impact of Marx and other ideologues that came after him.
Many Americans would be seriously surprised by the balance of left and right at continental European universities. It is nowhere near as one-sided. And Asian universities are a completely different world.
Generalizing from the extremely lopsided ratios in academia of the Anglosphere to the global educated class is somewhat unreliable.
Sure, in Europe left and right may be more closely matched in academia, but most "right"-leaning Europeans would not be anywhere near the "right" in US-terms, so your argument is comparing very different things
I agree generally, however you should be aware that American republicans are not referring to these people because they don't know anything about them. While the American left is typically extremely US-centric, the American right is even more so. So, while you have a point, you are giving them far too much credit. Their view of American education IS their view of education in general, because that's all they know. If they wanted to know more they would have to educate themselves, but they're ideologically opposed to education, so...
And, to be clear, it only takes a small look through Republican policy making to deduce they are ideologically opposed to education. They outright say it, usually.
And it makes complete sense when you think about conservatism as an ideology and education as a concept. Education is the processes of breaking down thought processes, destroying preconceived notions, and seeking truth through evidence. It denounces the idea that what is correct is what is common. It denounces the idea that wisdom is just a given, and not something to be worked towards. This is directly antithetical to conservatism. Conservatism values maintenance and blind belief, keeping stability for the sake of stability. It values faith in things working, and not evidence of why it's working. It denounces the notions of explanations and reasoning being required. It upholds the status quo because it is the status quo. It's naturally risk-averse, anti-creative, and small-minded.
This is the reason progressiveness, whether it be in Europe or anywhere else, thrives in education whereas conservatism struggles. It is, however, important to note that this does not perfectly line up with American politics. But, the American political system is associated with these underlying ideologies and thought patterns.
>Many Americans would be seriously surprised by the balance of left and right at continental European universities.
Yes, because EU "left" would be accused of socialism, whereas the EU "right" would mostly be the US's existing left wing. the US right wing was always on a far side and these days fell straight to the AfD levels of extremism.
It's not one sided, but the spectrum is completely different.
>And Asian universities are a completely different world.
I'm sure they are. a history fighting within the eastern continent and a rule of emporers will shape differently than from a land of conquerers puahing for conformity who eventually tried to make nice as their regimes fell and created this hybrid of individualism and trade amongst one another.
That's true now. It wasn't always true. From: https://www.aei.org/articles/are-colleges-and-universities-t...
- In 1989-1990, when HERI first fielded this survey, 42% of faculty identified as being on the left, 40% were moderate, and another 18% were on the right.
- in 2016-2017, HERI found that 60% of the faculty identified as either far left or liberal compared to just 12% being conservative or far right
Now you say it's 2.3% conservative.
The universities argue they haven't changed, it's the politics of the right. I'd say they are correct as the right now to disavows and ridicules the output of universities on things like climate change, tariffs, vaccines, health, voter fraud in US elections ... well it's a long list. It wasn't like that 30 years ago.
The universities are supposed to be intellectual power houses fearlessly seeking out fundamental truths and relationships, regardless of what the people in power might think of their discoveries. Both sides of politics once celebrated that. Now one side wants to control what types of thought the universities allow, demanding they monitor, snitch, report, and police the on ideas the conservative base don't like. That's directly opposed to how Universities operate. They allow and encourage all types of thought, but insist they be exposed to a torrent of opposing thoughts so only the soundest survive.
Frankly, I'm amazed 2.3% still identify with a mob that clearly wants to undermine that. I'm guessing it will drop to near 0% now.
Seriously?
That's what the term originally meant, before it was turned into a strawman for "anything I don't like" by the conservative media machine and weaponized to divide people.
It sounds like you're aware of the present reality of race and how it impacts how one is treated in America just for being who they are.
> I have never been a "woke" person
I have news for you...
If Trump were a black woman (or man), he would have never survived the release of the Hollywood Access tape and therefore would have never gotten elected.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/local/fbi-video-of-unde...
You also can't compare a mayoral election with a presidential one.
Nope. Though you also missed the part where the manufacturing of "felony" charges was so novel they had never been attempted before. The closest parallel is probably the case of John Edwards who was acquitted: https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/us/edwards-jury-returns-n... But you probably think it's because he was also a white man and not because there was no criminal act.
I'm curious if you can even sum up what exactly was the felony that Trump was convicted, or even better, who's the victim? Because all I saw was an overzealous DA in NY with utter disregard for the actual law.
> You also can't compare a mayoral election with a presidential one.
Yes. And clearly people of DC would rather elect a Democrat crackhead over any Republican.
My point was about surviving scandals as a candidate. Trump survived the Hollywood Access tape, where it would have buried most candidates. Your example was "whatabout Barry" -- but they're not comparable (and Barry did not survive his scandal, but went to jail).
Pretty sure sedition was around since Shay's rebellion.
And yes, welcome to privileged. They made up new laws to arrest black men without saying it's targeting black men. Hence the metaphor in this chain.
Anyway, that's all to say I find it sad and funny that people are all up in arms about being "woke" these days. It's like stating "I'd prefer to be ignorant".
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrXfkPViFIE&t=249s
[2] whole song is great, but I forgot about this second section of the song: https://youtu.be/Dieo6bp4zQw?si=fCPJpWIbQV_g5yx3&t=203
Yes, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is a democracy that serves the people of Korea.
Sometimes expressions have meaning beyond what advocates for the related concepts claim. For example, as I’m sure you are aware, ‘woke’ viewpoints repeatedly advocate for racial discrimination in American universities.
What a waste of an otherwise useful term.
The meaning of "woke" changes depending on the person saying it, and the one listening, which makes it hard to tell what the person is _really_ trying to say.
Edit: Apparently it was recently popularized by BLM activists, but then took on a different meaning [1]. So it seems ambiguous, which to me makes it not that useful.
Still not sure it was a fair trade though.
It's never a fair trade. But at least one is a singular word you never have to use in a discussion. The other was a term that de-humanized people.
If you're aware that structural discrimination and social injustice exists, then you already are woke. The expression of it might be different for you -- more MLK than Malcolm X, say -- but that doesn't mean you're not woke. We shouldn't let them muddy things when the goal is helping all beings be awake to reality.
This is a useless term if we can't agree on what "woke" is to begin with. Hence, the GP comment. If we can't agree on meanings of words, we talk past each other instead of to each other.
You see your two meanings and you realize how arguing about the term without aligning isn't a discussion, right?
----
as an aside:
>a sort of rhetoric and militant attitude about it that honestly I find grating.
I'll be "woke" here and note the discminination in when a demanding male tends to be thought of as "leadership material", whereas a demanding female in the same role is called "bossy". These kinds of internal disciminations is exactly what "woke" people try to address (and ironically enough, are dismissed as "militant" over. Because it talks about topics people want to shut down).
It is worth noting that it is a right-wing tactic to capture the meaning of words. "Woke" used to mean "being aware of social and political issues and injustices," but right-wing usage of the term has diluted it to the point where it can't be used for its original meaning anymore.
If you let Harvard do "merit-based hiring", they'll move a little in the direction of actually complying with employment law, but not much. If you institute a regime such as the one that existed for race and sex for decades (i.e., if you don't have "enough" black people, you need to show how your recruitment pipeline means that's necessarily the case, like not enough get the required type of degree), you'll get much better compliance.
Do you really think this administration is doing anything close to that?
Phenotype diversity != Viewpoint diversity
The former is what current academia and DEI focus on, the latter is what the administration demands.
Does this simple logic need to be expressed in Rust for HN folks to wrap their mind around it?
I think you should give better faith to the community instead of breaking the guidelines here trying to prove a point.
I can't even engage with these levels of cognitive dissonance. Or bad faith. Or whatever it is.