The next battleground-'Cancel Culture & Identity Politics' - Page 21 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#15158934
wat0n wrote:No, I already fulfilled the reasonable burden of proof: I showed there is a lot of journal discussion on these matters (not possible if editors reject those articles), that there is official advocacy at the association level and that university provosts generally agree with these efforts. That is, there is indeed an institutional effort to that effect.

Your analysis made claims about what most professors think about these matters without providing any evidence to that effect.

Field associations have a fair amount of power over their fields. They often have roles in the academic job market and they also run journals (often top ones in their professions, which can easily make a tenure case).

I don't see how the webpage discussing provosts contradicts my claim. On the contrary, they seem to value efforts to diversify their universities, even if they believe it's not an easy task.

It's not discrimination when there is no intent and a business justification for whatever you consider to be discriminatory (this is a disproportionate impact test in American anti-discrimination law) and even more so when there are alternatives being offered that fulfill the same needs in a more rational way.

The example you cited was an ignorant 20-year old snowflake who was sad that he couldn't learn what he wanted to learn as part of his undergrad degree. As any rational person does, I don't care if snowflakes melt.


I think we can agree to disagree.

The evidence has been presented and people can see for themselves how much (or little) has been done to get rid of institutional and systemic racism and sexism in academia.
#15159066
A lot of evidence has been presented by myself and wat0n of an outrageous movement that seeks to "decolonise" or "cancel" several academic disciplines that this movement is accusing of "white supremacism" and "racism". No evidence however has been presented that these academic disciplines are "white supremacist" or "racist" or that these academic disciplines are "deliberately suppressing people of colour" as repeatedly claimed.

Dr Padilla is honest enough to talk about his racism out loud:

He called for “reparative epistemic justice,” and asked for holders of “white privilege” to “surrender their privilege”:

Padilla: "In practical terms, this means that in an economy of academic prestige defined and governed by scarcity, white men will have to surrender the privilege they have of seeing their words printed and disseminated. They will have to take a back seat, so that people of colour, and women, and gender-non-conforming scholars of colour benefit from the privileges, career and otherwise, of seeing their words on the page."

Was he explicitly calling for Classics journals to stop publishing the scholarly work of white men? Apparently, he was:

Padilla: "…this is an economy of scarcity that, at the level of journal publication, will remain to a degree zero-sum. Until and unless this system of publication is dismantled—which will be fine by me—every person of colour who is to be published will take the place of a white man whose words could have or had already appeared in the pages of that journal. And that would be a future worth striving for."

Padilla said nothing about merit, the content of the article in question, or how it was reasoned. He said that articles by white men should be excluded from consideration, regardless of their merit, if members of other ethnic or racial groups submitted work for publication at the same time.
#15159071
@Pants-of-dog we shall continue to disagree on much, but I'm always interested in practical areas of agreement. We are both I believe republican subjects of Elizabeth II and both citizens of NATO countries. So I hope you will support:

1 (Assuming the monarchy can not be abolished in the immediate future) passing the succession to Harry and Meghan and making them joint monarchs. This would be very much in keeping with conservative tradition as when James's son was passed over in favour of William and Mary.

2 Opposing the racist treatment of Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Shamima Begum and withdrawing from NATO. In the case of the latter, I would not be adverse to the removal of citizenship for Muslim criminals, after due process has taken place, but i must apply equally to all citizens regardless of whether they have parents who were not natural born citizens. Sadly I feel the time for polite objection has passed and its time to call out the racist filth who support the discriminatory treatment against KSM and Shamima for what they are.
Last edited by Rich on 02 Mar 2021 14:41, edited 1 time in total.
#15159081
(Assuming the monarchy can not be abolished in the immediate future) passing the succession to Harry and Meghan and making them joint monarchs. This would be very much in keeping with conservative tradition as when Jame's son was passed over in favour of William and Mary.

:lol:

I like the way you think, Comrade @Rich.... :up:

Image
#15159110
Potemkin wrote:I like the way you think, Comrade @Rich.... :up:

Why thank-you. Not that one but, I do sometimes write my posts with you in mind. Sadly I fear sometimes only you have the intelligence and breadth and depth of historical and cross cultural learning to fully appreciate them.
Image

Of course when I look at a picture of Stalin I see a disabled man from an ethnic minority, ACAA (Adult children of Alcoholics Anonymous) and then single parent family. Although on the other hand he was a Grammar School boy, which where I came from fatally destroyed your "Working Class" cred for good.

Not all of us English have forgotten Hugh Mackay and the Scots Brigade role in liberating us from Papist tyranny. Progressive reform not revolution is the British way, The Scots having never supported South East England's republican "excesses". Is anyone enthusiastic about Charles III taking the throne, (except Charles)? The monarchy seems one area where so called non- White people are genuinely discriminated against. If we don't take this opportunity now, we could consign ourselves to another century of all "White" monarchy. I remember even back in the 80's White Dockers and White car workers were not just allowed to pass on their jobs to their White children. Why should the same rules not apply to Royalty.

Its said that Meghan is narcissistic, greedy, bossy, arrogant, conceited, self entitled with delusions of grandeur. Well that's exactly my point. She's clearly the best qualified candidate for the job. She should get it regardless of her heritage.
#15159115
Rich wrote:Why thank-you. Not that one but, I do sometimes write my posts with you in mind. Sadly I fear sometimes only you have the intelligence and breadth and depth of historical and cross cultural learning to fully appreciate them.

I think the same, @Rich. Not just about myself (though I do of course) but about you too. I don't always - okay, I don't ever - agree with your posts, but at least you are likely to understand any historical or cultural hints I drop. I don't often have to explain myself to you. :)

Of course when I look at a picture of Stalin I see a disabled man from an ethnic minority, ACAA (Adult children of Alcoholics Anonymous) and then single parent family. Although on the other hand he was a Grammar School boy, which where I came from fatally destroyed your "Working Class" cred for good.

Grammar school boy here too. And not the only similarity to Comrade Stalin which I share. Maybe that's why I've always found it easy to understand where Iosif Vissarionovich was coming from....

Not all of us English have forgotten Hugh Mackay and the Scots Brigade role in liberating us from Papist tyranny. Progressive reform not revolution is the British way, The Scots having never supported South East England's republican "excesses". Is anyone enthusiastic about Charles III taking the throne, (except Charles)? The monarchy seems one area where so called non- White people are genuinely discriminated against. If we don't take this opportunity now, we could consign ourselves to another century of all "White" monarchy. I remember even back in the 80's White Dockers and White car workers were not just allowed to pass on their jobs to their White children. Why should the same rules not apply to Royalty.

Its said that Meghan is narcissistic, greedy, bossy, arrogant, conceited, self entitled with delusions of grandeur. Well that's exactly my point. She's clearly the best qualified candidate for the job. She should get it regardless of her heritage.

:lol:

Again, I like the way you think @Rich. As usual, you have a good point. The qualities possessed by Meghan Markle, which would be completely unacceptable in a commoner, are precisely the qualities required - indeed, demanded - from a monarch. Unfortunately for her (and for everyone else) she was born into the wrong time and the wrong class.
#15159119
Pants-of-dog wrote:I think we can agree to disagree.

The evidence has been presented and people can see for themselves how much (or little) has been done to get rid of institutional and systemic racism and sexism in academia.


Sure. I have one last question though: Would you please explain why would the race or gender of a researcher be a factor to consider for generating quality knowledge in hard sciences like physics or math? Do you believe in the idea that science can or even should be deconstructed?

noemon wrote:A lot of evidence has been presented by myself and wat0n of an outrageous movement that seeks to "decolonise" or "cancel" several academic disciplines that this movement is accusing of "white supremacism" and "racism". No evidence however has been presented that these academic disciplines are "white supremacist" or "racist" or that these academic disciplines are "deliberately suppressing people of colour" as repeatedly claimed.


And that's an important point, too. Often the argument goes along those lines, which I also agree hasn't been really proven.

Another different argument is that diversity adds value to the research itself. However, this would likely be very dependent on the subject at hand, and one would need to understand why does it add value. If I had to guess, it's because some academics from "alternative" cultural or other sort of backgrounds may know different facts or literature about the topic at hand. For instance, if the field at hand is "international development" I can imagine academics from developing countries will have deeper knowledge about the status quo in their countries of origin than those from first world countries and so their input would in fact be valuable (I'm mentioning a social science example to illustrate the idea that it's not useful in the humanities only). But then, this is not because of diversity per se, but because one can objectively deduce that the guy from the developing country has some relevant information about the topic at hand. I don't think this would apply to the hard sciences, and also even in this case the term "decolonize" is very misleading at least.
#15159122
Potemkin wrote:I don't ever - agree with your posts

;) i hate to disappoint you, but you do agree with my posts quite frequently. However I would suggest that maybe you don't need to be too alarmed by that, as I think that we share important beliefs. I think I'm right in saying that neither of us believes in the sanctity of individual property or the nation state. The latter assumption seems to go unchallenged by some surprisingly progressive people. I think we also share a belief in a non-deterministic, but still highly constraining, historical materialism. Of course that still leaves plenty to disagree over, but still I would suggest that these are not unimportant beliefs.

On the historical materialism, just look at the incredible transformation of the position of women over the last two centuries or so. To me this seems so overwhelmingly likely to be due to the changes in the economic base of society, rather than to the actions or ideas of brave or imaginative individuals. Personally I find it fascinating to see how the clash between this juggernaut of change in the social base of society across the world and the ideological superstructures of Catholicism, Islam, Orthodox Judaism and conservative Hinduism will play out.
#15159123
wat0n wrote:Sure. I have one last question though: Would you please explain why would the race or gender of a researcher be a factor to consider for generating quality knowledge in hard sciences like physics or math?


I am not sure why you are asking me this, since it would make more sense to ask this from someone who champions the status quo.

It is, after all, the status quo that has created the situation where almost all faculty members in physics are white men. Female scientists and BIPOC scientists are woefully underrepresented.

Since this is the situation being defended and being portrayed as normal, it would be a good idea to ask why the existing racial demographics are the ones we should defend.

Do you believe in the idea that science can or even should be deconstructed?


Do you mean “decolonised”?

If so, why not? Why not get rid of racism?
#15159127
Pants-of-dog wrote:I am not sure why you are asking me this, since it would make more sense to ask this from someone who champions the status quo.

It is, after all, the status quo that has created the situation where almost all faculty members in physics are white men. Female scientists and BIPOC scientists are woefully underrepresented.

Since this is the situation being defended and being portrayed as normal, it would be a good idea to ask why the existing racial demographics are the ones we should defend.


You are the one who is proposing those changes, based at least in part on the idea that some undefined notion of diversity or decolonization would lead to science. So of course I'm naturally asking how does that work in some fields.

Pants-of-dog wrote:Do you mean “decolonised”?

If so, why not? Why not get rid of racism?


No, I mean deconstructed.
#15159131
wat0n wrote:You are the one who is proposing those changes, based at least in part on the idea that some undefined notion of diversity or decolonization would lead to science. So of course I'm naturally asking how does that work in some fields.


No, I never made the argument that race and gender matter.

If you think that race and gender should not matter, then you should worry about actual ongoing occurrences of people deciding they do, instead of worrying about an imaginary problem that might arise if your interpretation of some out of context words is true.

No, I mean deconstructed.


Then please specify what you mean. Deconstruction means something different for me.
#15159132
Rich wrote:;) i hate to disappoint you, but you do agree with my posts quite frequently. However I would suggest that maybe you don't need to be too alarmed by that, as I think that we share important beliefs. I think I'm right in saying that neither of us believes in the sanctity of individual property or the nation state. The latter assumption seems to go unchallenged by some surprisingly progressive people. I think we also share a belief in a non-deterministic, but still highly constraining, historical materialism. Of course that still leaves plenty to disagree over, but still I would suggest that these are not unimportant beliefs.

Granted. It's just that I have a tendency towards orthodoxy in my beliefs (no matter how revolutionary those beliefs may be), while you seem to have a contrarian tendency - like Yevgeny Zamyatin, you are an eternal heretic. ;)

On the historical materialism, just look at the incredible transformation of the position of women over the last two centuries or so. To me this seems so overwhelmingly likely to be due to the changes in the economic base of society, rather than to the actions or ideas of brave or imaginative individuals. Personally I find it fascinating to see how the clash between this juggernaut of change in the social base of society across the world and the ideological superstructures of Catholicism, Islam, Orthodox Judaism and conservative Hinduism will play out.

Indeed, and that will be the real historical conflict of the immediate future - not so much a "clash of cultures" as the clash of the material basis of a globalised human society with the traditional cultures which have heretofore given meaning and structure to most people's lives. I think we both know how that it likely to end, eh @Rich? ;)
#15159137
Pants-of-dog wrote:No, I never made the argument that race and gender matter.

If you think that race and gender should not matter, then you should worry about actual ongoing occurrences of people deciding they do, instead of worrying about an imaginary problem that might arise if your interpretation of some out of context words is true.


How would have the decolonization of physics have led or lead in the future to greater knowledge about physical phenomena?

Pants-of-dog wrote:Then please specify what you mean. Deconstruction means something different for me.


In the simplest sense of saying science has no essence and its meaning is derived from context.
#15159142
wat0n wrote:How would have the decolonization of physics have led or lead in the future to greater knowledge about physical phenomena?


Admin Edit: Rules 2 & 3 Violation

In the simplest sense of saying science has no essence and its meaning is derived from context.


This seems to have nothing to do with the topic.
#15159150
Pants-of-dog wrote:This seems to have nothing to do with the topic.


noemon wrote:Not to anyone else discussing the topic.


It does, because that's one (perhaps the only) way to be able to defend the decolonization project in terms of "improving science". After all, if science is just a construct with no bearing to reality (or if reality itself doesn't have any essence and is only constructed), then of course one may argue that Newtonian gravity was influenced by the fact Newton was an European male. It also means the whole "science" thing may as well be a scheme to have White males having secure-ish tenured positions, and that "improving science" should be about achieving representation of some sort.

But if it's not, if science does capture some essence of the real world - it does provide explanations for the reality we perceive - then it becomes a lot harder to make such blanket statements. In particular, it means that a concept like Newtonian gravity has some intrinsic value (in terms of how useful it is to explain our material world), regardless of who Newton was.

This is also something that seems to help fuel our current identity politics right now.
#15159153
I agree with you mate, any sane individual can see the danger of inserting identity(race, gender, nationality, religion, whatever) as a measure of something especially into the hard sciences.

Your Nazi example about the Physik movement is very apt and clearly demonstrates this very danger.

Stuff like that must be outright rejected not openly argued regardless the where they 're coming from!! :eek:

Demanding that "white people" simply get bypassed on the publication of academic journals on the basis of being "white", itself something arbitrary and totally in the eye of the beholder is a racist thing to say and especially when one is demanding from another to censor oneself or else be registered "racist". Padilla's Black identity cannot shield him from his racism. He would claim his racism is justified(dubious I would argue because he has the intellect and opportunity), either way it's overt racism.

If I were a Black intellectual I would not want the Black element to be a force instituted by the self-censorship of white people but by the organic and self-realised elevation of Black intellectuals into academic fields.

Even as a Black nationalist he is shallow and a dud.
#15159161
The thing that annoys me most about so called cancel culture, is how it's forcing people to apologize for shit they shouldn't really apologize for. People are even pre-apologizing for shit before anyone actually even calls them on stuff. It's creating a culture of fear to say/do/express any opinion/thought. It's stressful and likely psychologically damaging to people.

That said, I have hope that we will cool off with call out stuff.

This is connected to that thread I started some months ago, where I was asking if it's ok for an employer to fire you for stuff you do outside of work. All of this, of course, is case by case.
#15159219
noemon wrote:A lot of evidence has been presented by myself and wat0n of an outrageous movement that seeks to "decolonise" or "cancel" several academic disciplines that this movement is accusing of "white supremacism" and "racism". No evidence however has been presented that these academic disciplines are "white supremacist" or "racist" or that these academic disciplines are "deliberately suppressing people of colour" as repeatedly claimed.

I have to agree with you here that "white supremacism" is NOT a valid reason to "cancel" the use of the Greek classics.

If there is ONE weakness to relying exclusively on the Greek classics (and British classics, and USA classics), it is that this excludes other writers and philosophers from other countries (like Ibn Khaldun, or the Buddha, or French socialists, or the Oral traditions of most of the earth's cultures). But this isn't a criticism of Greek philosophy at all. It's a criticism of European curriculum creators and the racist masters they serve.

But to propose "white supremacy" as a reason to invalidate Plato or Aristotle... doesn't make sense since a lot of their work helped us to arrive at the idea that "supremacy" of one particular gent might be inauspicious in the first place.

Pants-of-dog, how do you feel about the "supremacy" that Hollywood presents in its products? Are you maybe attacking "the Greeks" simply because they're a much easier target?
#15161508
"political correctness" is one of the worst communication strategies the left has ever undertaken. It's been well intentioned, but I'm sorry - it's failed.

It's been taken to an extreme that serves only one purpose, to help fuel the culture war that defines the right. It's reflected in the way the two US political groups respond to scandals involving politicians. The Right had a man credibly accused of rape and adultery in the white house and frankly didn't care.

The left, we have a Gov accused of sexual harassment and the media is going nuts. It kills us in the Comm wars. Rest assured, the right's agenda is simply to exploit the issue but the Dem's don't' help themselves at all on this one. Here's an interesting piece on the 2021 CPAC convention. The whole friggin' theme was american "uncanceled".

They eat this crap up.
https://www.gopjail.com/history-of-america-uncanceled/

I'm new btw - so howdy.
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