No. NO! There is no such thing as “positive discrimination”; there is discrimination on the basis of merit or on the basis of group membership – the first is fair, the second unfair. Anything which loads the dice of a competition is unfair and no, this does not include the whole of life experience. Competitions are discreet and detachable processes which create their own distinct criteria of justice. If you don’t have a chance, don’t enter the competition. If, because of single parenthood, addiction to crack, experience of abuse and a bang on the head you find it difficult to add or subtract, then offering you a place at Harvard to study mathematics is useless; it won’t help you, it won’t help the university. Pretending otherwise is a lie. And what then? To justify your place at university, do we go on systematically cooking the books until you become a professor or a chief scientist at NASA? When, at last, do we tell the truth? And this is where we hit the dark heart of the whole neo-communist movement – the idiot belief that there is no truth – or, “truth”; that the whole of society can be turned into Utopia by a gigantic game of “Let’s Pretend” enforced by continual tantrums. This also shows that competitive exams are in part measures of truth to start with. We can only know that this or that group is disadvantaged if we are honest about their academic performance. Then we can intervene, constructively and NOT in the vile, vengeful, counterproductive, inverted-fascist way of the modern left.
the idiot belief that there is no truth – or, “truth”; that the whole of society can be turned into Utopia by a gigantic game of “Let’s Pretend”
Presumably, that idiot belief includes itself in its own claim. That is, if nothing is objectively true, then the assertion that nothing is objectively true is untrue.
True (ha!). But the illogic of Post Modernist-derived stances have been pointed out for decades without resulting in any rethinking. Logic is, apparently, a sly trick of white, heteronormative patriarchy, don’t you know!
True. The revenge of reason is decline. In the short term, it can be rendered powerless. Rather as an alcoholic can damage his liver without pain, until massive cirrhosis has set in, the mediocrities in charge of the west are drunk on a form of revivalist fervour immune to challenge or advice.
Just as there is no matter without anti-matter, so there is no discrimination in favour of one group without discrimination against others.
Lesley van Reenen
2 years ago
It is depressing indeed to constantly be reminded that logic and intrinsic goodness has been abandoned by ‘progressives’.
Galeti Tavas
2 years ago
“It is a powerful dogma — but it could soon meet its match in the Supreme Court.”
It is not 2024 yet, and Biden’s handlers may yet decide to stack the Supreme Court with a couple dozen judges who make AOC seem centrist. Nothing is ever off the table with that strange puppet led organization.
Paula Williams
2 years ago
Affirmative action (aka positive or woke discrimination) just means enforced discrimination to privilege a favoured group (typically anyone non-white/male).
Perhaps needs renaming to Diversity Before Merit.
Last edited 2 years ago by Paula Williams
John Barclay
2 years ago
Kendi’s logic is summed up as: give unsuccessful minorities (regardless of the reason) a free ride until the outcomes match. Any disparity is 100% attributed to racism, with all personal agency given a zero weight.
It’s actually horrifically patronising and condescending and essentially communist.
It takes about 5 seconds to see through this reasoning and immediately see the problems and perverse incentives it generates, yet here we are. Discussing this lunacy.
Last edited 2 years ago by John Barclay
Sheryl Rhodes
2 years ago
Mr. Wiseman You wrote: To Kendi, equity is measured in terms of outcome, and has only been achieved “when two or more racial groups are not standing on approximately equal footing”. I’m not following this—it only makes sense to me if you change it to say that INequity is “when two or more racial groups are not standing on approximately equal footing.” IOW, that equity means that racial groups are all on approximately equal footing. His view is that any negative disparity between racial groups is due solely to racism and thus the only moral response is to forcefully (and endlessly) make these groups equal in all ways, by any means necessary.
Kendi’s views and proposals are made even more of a nightmare because he believes that all PAST discrimination must also be recompensed. Past discrimination must be counter-balanced by extra, super-duper discrimination today. For instance, if every graduating class in US medical schools were to consist of 12.5 % black Americans (the approximate percentage of black Americans today) that would still not satisfy Kendi. Instead, his proposed new, all-powerful Federal agency would force medical schools to admit many more black students to make up for the fact that they were “under-admitting” black students for the past hundred+ years. I wonder how many years of medical schools admitting 100% black students would satisfy these requirements?
I caught that too, but assumed the opposite way to correct it. That is, the writer meant to say that equity was achieved “when two or more groups were standing on approximately equal footing”, but put a “not” in there that invalidated the statement.
“Anti-racism has become a form of discrimination.” Congratulations. You finally figured that out. The ultimate aim of the Kendis is to establish a James Raven system. What’s that? It’s Jim Crow for whites. Guess who is going to the back of the bus now.
It should probably be James Dove or some other white bird than a raven, shouldn’t it?
Last edited 2 years ago by Tom Krehbiel
Brendan Newport
2 years ago
What we are seeing is the abandonment of class analysis in favour of racialist thinking. The bedrock of socialist thought is being cut-away – well being dynamited away, by this new breed of social engineers.
And it interprets class as being…worthless. Rather it is the color of your skin that determines what success will be dealt to you in life by the authorities, what help you will get in the event that circumstances see you laid-low. Racialist thinking has never been explicitly stated, but it’s a key aspect of US politics.
President Roosevelt’s New Deal excluded blacks from Social Security and the provisions afforded by the National Labour relations Act. So the Democrat Party can perhaps say it is following Roosevelt’s racialist thinking even now, as it favours some people for support, based on the color of their skin, rather than their circumstances. The desire to avoid distinction by class remains as strong now, as expressed by Democrats, as it did in the 1930s.
Christopher Chantrill
2 years ago
Ever since Marx, western ruling classes have used an “over/under” political formula to justify their power. This is most nakedly offered in the allyship narrative, of Oppressed Peoples and their Allies fighting against the White Oppressors.
For the Next Regime I propose a middle-against-the-rest political formula, of We All-American Patriots against wokey NPCs and their vote-bank Little Darlings.
And when the Next Regime steps in, I’m sure the Supreme Court will be happy to rubber-stamp the new narrative.
Alan Hawkes
2 years ago
In the case of Bostock much of the discussion focusses on the word, “sex”, when it might appear simpler to assert that the drafters of the original Title 7 legislation meant, “gender” i.e. male, or female, at birth. The Supreme Court seem to have decided that sexual orientation, as claimed in post-birth life should be brought in – as gender-choice.
It remains to be seen what happens when a non-black applicant to an Ivy League university asks the court to rule that setting him/her a higher pass-mark than a black candidate breaches Bostock.
Richard Turpin
2 years ago
Equality of opportunity will never ever produce equality of outcome. The progressives therefore believe equality of outcome is justified by not providing equality of opportunity. They do this believing they are going to make society fairer, more equal and more harmonious. It’s idiocy of the highest order. People ill equipped for jobs they have been chosen for on the basis of an identity group will ultimately resent being given the job never knowing if they were the best candidate and people outside that identity group ,never presented with the opportunity, will always assume they weren’t. Universities need to select the best candidates based upon the applicants intellect and not the colour of their skin.
The fact educated people believe this is sustainable is shocking to me, the pitfalls and fallout are obvious to most of us. How can the courts defend it? How can a judge favour any form of racism in the name of equality of outcome? Society evolves by having the best qualified candidates in all jobs, in all walks of life, at all levels, including university placements. The moment we think otherwise we’re in deep trouble, if not already.
No. NO! There is no such thing as “positive discrimination”; there is discrimination on the basis of merit or on the basis of group membership – the first is fair, the second unfair. Anything which loads the dice of a competition is unfair and no, this does not include the whole of life experience. Competitions are discreet and detachable processes which create their own distinct criteria of justice. If you don’t have a chance, don’t enter the competition. If, because of single parenthood, addiction to crack, experience of abuse and a bang on the head you find it difficult to add or subtract, then offering you a place at Harvard to study mathematics is useless; it won’t help you, it won’t help the university. Pretending otherwise is a lie. And what then? To justify your place at university, do we go on systematically cooking the books until you become a professor or a chief scientist at NASA? When, at last, do we tell the truth? And this is where we hit the dark heart of the whole neo-communist movement – the idiot belief that there is no truth – or, “truth”; that the whole of society can be turned into Utopia by a gigantic game of “Let’s Pretend” enforced by continual tantrums. This also shows that competitive exams are in part measures of truth to start with. We can only know that this or that group is disadvantaged if we are honest about their academic performance. Then we can intervene, constructively and NOT in the vile, vengeful, counterproductive, inverted-fascist way of the modern left.
Presumably, that idiot belief includes itself in its own claim. That is, if nothing is objectively true, then the assertion that nothing is objectively true is untrue.
True (ha!). But the illogic of Post Modernist-derived stances have been pointed out for decades without resulting in any rethinking. Logic is, apparently, a sly trick of white, heteronormative patriarchy, don’t you know!
True. The revenge of reason is decline. In the short term, it can be rendered powerless. Rather as an alcoholic can damage his liver without pain, until massive cirrhosis has set in, the mediocrities in charge of the west are drunk on a form of revivalist fervour immune to challenge or advice.
Indeed so, I first encountered this rebuttal in Russell’s History of Western Philosophy, first published in 1946.
This statement is false
Just as there is no matter without anti-matter, so there is no discrimination in favour of one group without discrimination against others.
It is depressing indeed to constantly be reminded that logic and intrinsic goodness has been abandoned by ‘progressives’.
“It is a powerful dogma — but it could soon meet its match in the Supreme Court.”
It is not 2024 yet, and Biden’s handlers may yet decide to stack the Supreme Court with a couple dozen judges who make AOC seem centrist. Nothing is ever off the table with that strange puppet led organization.
Affirmative action (aka positive or woke discrimination) just means enforced discrimination to privilege a favoured group (typically anyone non-white/male).
Perhaps needs renaming to Diversity Before Merit.
Kendi’s logic is summed up as: give unsuccessful minorities (regardless of the reason) a free ride until the outcomes match. Any disparity is 100% attributed to racism, with all personal agency given a zero weight.
It’s actually horrifically patronising and condescending and essentially communist.
It takes about 5 seconds to see through this reasoning and immediately see the problems and perverse incentives it generates, yet here we are. Discussing this lunacy.
Mr. Wiseman You wrote:
To Kendi, equity is measured in terms of outcome, and has only been achieved “when two or more racial groups are not standing on approximately equal footing”.
I’m not following this—it only makes sense to me if you change it to say that INequity is “when two or more racial groups are not standing on approximately equal footing.” IOW, that equity means that racial groups are all on approximately equal footing.
His view is that any negative disparity between racial groups is due solely to racism and thus the only moral response is to forcefully (and endlessly) make these groups equal in all ways, by any means necessary.
Kendi’s views and proposals are made even more of a nightmare because he believes that all PAST discrimination must also be recompensed. Past discrimination must be counter-balanced by extra, super-duper discrimination today. For instance, if every graduating class in US medical schools were to consist of 12.5 % black Americans (the approximate percentage of black Americans today) that would still not satisfy Kendi. Instead, his proposed new, all-powerful Federal agency would force medical schools to admit many more black students to make up for the fact that they were “under-admitting” black students for the past hundred+ years. I wonder how many years of medical schools admitting 100% black students would satisfy these requirements?
I caught that too, but assumed the opposite way to correct it. That is, the writer meant to say that equity was achieved “when two or more groups were standing on approximately equal footing”, but put a “not” in there that invalidated the statement.
I think it’s probably just a typo.
“Anti-racism has become a form of discrimination.” Congratulations. You finally figured that out. The ultimate aim of the Kendis is to establish a James Raven system. What’s that? It’s Jim Crow for whites. Guess who is going to the back of the bus now.
It should probably be James Dove or some other white bird than a raven, shouldn’t it?
What we are seeing is the abandonment of class analysis in favour of racialist thinking. The bedrock of socialist thought is being cut-away – well being dynamited away, by this new breed of social engineers.
And it interprets class as being…worthless. Rather it is the color of your skin that determines what success will be dealt to you in life by the authorities, what help you will get in the event that circumstances see you laid-low. Racialist thinking has never been explicitly stated, but it’s a key aspect of US politics.
President Roosevelt’s New Deal excluded blacks from Social Security and the provisions afforded by the National Labour relations Act. So the Democrat Party can perhaps say it is following Roosevelt’s racialist thinking even now, as it favours some people for support, based on the color of their skin, rather than their circumstances. The desire to avoid distinction by class remains as strong now, as expressed by Democrats, as it did in the 1930s.
Ever since Marx, western ruling classes have used an “over/under” political formula to justify their power. This is most nakedly offered in the allyship narrative, of Oppressed Peoples and their Allies fighting against the White Oppressors.
For the Next Regime I propose a middle-against-the-rest political formula, of We All-American Patriots against wokey NPCs and their vote-bank Little Darlings.
And when the Next Regime steps in, I’m sure the Supreme Court will be happy to rubber-stamp the new narrative.
In the case of Bostock much of the discussion focusses on the word, “sex”, when it might appear simpler to assert that the drafters of the original Title 7 legislation meant, “gender” i.e. male, or female, at birth. The Supreme Court seem to have decided that sexual orientation, as claimed in post-birth life should be brought in – as gender-choice.
It remains to be seen what happens when a non-black applicant to an Ivy League university asks the court to rule that setting him/her a higher pass-mark than a black candidate breaches Bostock.
Equality of opportunity will never ever produce equality of outcome. The progressives therefore believe equality of outcome is justified by not providing equality of opportunity. They do this believing they are going to make society fairer, more equal and more harmonious. It’s idiocy of the highest order. People ill equipped for jobs they have been chosen for on the basis of an identity group will ultimately resent being given the job never knowing if they were the best candidate and people outside that identity group ,never presented with the opportunity, will always assume they weren’t. Universities need to select the best candidates based upon the applicants intellect and not the colour of their skin.
The fact educated people believe this is sustainable is shocking to me, the pitfalls and fallout are obvious to most of us. How can the courts defend it? How can a judge favour any form of racism in the name of equality of outcome? Society evolves by having the best qualified candidates in all jobs, in all walks of life, at all levels, including university placements. The moment we think otherwise we’re in deep trouble, if not already.