The Fora: A Higher Education Community

Yesterday on twitter there was an announcement made by an academic of the death of a scholar who went by @sciencing_bi. She was native American, worked at ASU, and had died of Covid-19.
Within a few hours, it was revealed that sciencing_bi seemed to be a fake persona (everyone who had claimed to know her it turned out had only interacted online, all the photos on her account were in fact stock pictures, ASU couldn't find any employee who had died).
She had been somewhat visible in #metoostem discussions and the nature of the scam is unclear (she seems to have been a creation of another scholar, as far as anyone can tell). Fake identity, appropriating indigenous identity (to the point of apparently sending people Hopi handcraft items...).
I'm not in the sciences but watching this unfolding was fascinating.

I know none of the players in this story, but I do think that this sort of online performance to be interesting.

Wasn't there another issue of an ASU professor being falsely accused of sexual misconduct in order to destroy her chances at a promotion or job offer? I believe that the allegations came from another faculty member who had created fake student accounts (as in, they created social media pages across different platforms of a single fake student)? I can't imagine having the energy maintain these sorts of facades -- in the case of Science_Bi, I'd imagine I'd be exhausted by it all quite quickly.

Here's an article that goes into some of the detail about Dolezal 2.0
https://heavy.com/news/2020/08/sciencing_bi-bethann-mclaughlin-asu/

The alleged perpetrator: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BethAnn_McLaughlin

I've been following this too in the wake of the c. elegans Twitter storm.  The suspicion does seem to be that the individual jimbogumbo posted about was behind this potentially fake account.  I have followed some of what this individual has been doing for a couple years because she has put herself in the spotlight a good bit, and there has been a lot of controversy about her handling of the #metoo work.  Initially, it seemed that she was bringing to light a lot of stories that some universities would prefer to keep buried, that she was an advocate, and so forth, but I guess some of those who started working with her on her efforts ended up abandoning that ship due to allegations of mismanagement, bullying, etc.  It is definitely an interesting story, even more so in light of the background.  It's terrible that so many people who "knew" the allegedly deceased scholar had to deal with that "loss" if it was all just a fake and a way of garnering more attention (since the alleged perpetrator also broke the news of the death).  And the characteristics of the fake scholar seem very skeevy (e.g., cultural appropriation mentioned here).

ETA: I just checked, and it looks as though the alleged perp's Twitter account has been suspended.

yes both accounts were suspended VERY quickly, which was odd (seems to take forever to get porn spammers kicked off)

When I first saw the commotion sometime earlyish yesterday (?), the fake account had been locked but not suspended, and the alleged perp's was still active, with her posting about having a Zoom wake of some sort for the fake person.  Now they are both suspended.  So I guess this has been evolving, but it is certainly moving pretty quickly, considering! There is an interesting synopsis of some of the happenings on @endlesswario account.  This is such a strange story.  I guess the alleged perp needed some attention.

Quote from: ab_grp on August 03, 2020, 10:54:46 AM
I guess the alleged perp needed some attention.

Or some cash. The online "wake" involved a venmo....

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 03, 2020, 12:49:00 PM

Quote from: ab_grp on August 03, 2020, 10:54:46 AM
I guess the alleged perp needed some attention.

Or some cash. The online "wake" involved a venmo....

True enough.  I also saw some mention that the fake account requested other venmo (coffee?) routed through the alleged perp with implication that this would be fraudulent (in the illegal sense). I'm not sure if that would be the case, but it's certainly sketchy and reeks.

The story is more fleshed out here: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/apparent-death-hoax-rocks-science-twitter

Quote from: jimbogumbo on August 04, 2020, 08:38:59 AM
The story is more fleshed out here: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/apparent-death-hoax-rocks-science-twitter

It's incredibly ironic that someone who founded an organization dedicated to believing peoples' claims would have falsified the entire existence of a person.

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 04, 2020, 08:59:33 AM

Quote from: jimbogumbo on August 04, 2020, 08:38:59 AM
The story is more fleshed out here: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/apparent-death-hoax-rocks-science-twitter

It's incredibly ironic that someone who founded an organization dedicated to believing peoples' claims would have falsified the entire existence of a person.

Agreed.  Kind of makes me wish IHE was still allowing comments on articles.  There is a lot to unpack here.

Quote from: ab_grp on August 04, 2020, 09:07:06 AM

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 04, 2020, 08:59:33 AM

Quote from: jimbogumbo on August 04, 2020, 08:38:59 AM
The story is more fleshed out here: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/04/apparent-death-hoax-rocks-science-twitter

It's incredibly ironic that someone who founded an organization dedicated to believing peoples' claims would have falsified the entire existence of a person.

Agreed.  Kind of makes me wish IHE was still allowing comments on articles.  There is a lot to unpack here.

It's been posted elsewhere (I think I heard first from polly_mer), but in case you've missed it:  Reddit now has a forum for commenting on Inside Higher Ed articles. Apparent death hoax rocks Science Twitter (https://www.reddit.com/r/InsideHigherEd/comments/i3jwsd/apparent_death_hoax_rocks_science_twitter/)

Thanks, Sprout.  I am guessing not as many folks will head over there as might have posted on IHE, but I had forgotten they had this alternative in place.

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 03, 2020, 05:22:16 AM
. . . appropriating indigenous identity (to the point of apparently sending people Hopi handcraft items) . . .

But did she contribute to Pow Wow Chow?

Today there are numerous additional stories in various media, including the NYT. The times article includes statement from McLaughlin acknowledging she made up @Sciencing_bi. What a horrific mess.

I hadn't seen the NYT article and was glad it provided a term for this: "Munchausen by internet."  I had been thinking along those lines but didn't realize that there was a specific term in place.  I'm actually surprised McLaughlin owned up to this so soon, although I think most would have done so sooner.

NYT link: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/04/style/college-coronavirus-hoax.html

She says she's realized she needs mental health help, but given that this was a long-running and self-serving fraud and  it sounds like there may also be significant financial fraud as well (no one knows where the gofundme money went), and less inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt on that. She also took careful steps to make it harder to discover the fraud. That all sounds more like con artist than mentally ill behavior (though of course it could be both).

I'm struck with similarities to people who have been caught blatantly fabricating large amounts of research data. The perpetrators act with great cunning to maintain the fraud, materially benefit from it, and then, when caught, plead mental illness e.g., this is an interesting read on an infamous case:
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/28/magazine/diederik-stapels-audacious-academic-fraud.html

Quote from: Puget on August 04, 2020, 01:36:21 PM
I'm struck with similarities to people who have been caught blatantly fabricating large amounts of research data. The perpetrators act with great cunning to maintain the fraud, materially benefit from it, and then, when caught, plead mental illness e.g., this is an interesting read on an infamous case:
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/28/magazine/diederik-stapels-audacious-academic-fraud.html

That is definitely a very interesting case.  The linked article provides a lot of detail and summarizes the evolution of events well, but I'd also highly recommend reading his book to get further insight from his perspective.  As noted, it has been translated and provided as a free PDF.  Here's a link to that: https://errorstatistics.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/fakingscience-20141214.pdf  I found it completely enthralling to follow the story of how things went so bad.  I also wonder how many researchers were negatively impacted by his fake data and guidance on what to study.

I also find it interesting wording given the particulars that she apologizes "without reservation" for what she's done.

Quote from: ab_grp on August 04, 2020, 02:05:50 PM
I also find it interesting wording given the particulars that she apologizes "without reservation" for what she's done.

Is that a Native American joke?  Talk about misreading your audience.

Also, the subhed on the Times's homepage is currently "A professor at Arizona State University does not exist."  I'm not sure that's quite right.

Quote from: writingprof on August 04, 2020, 03:25:15 PM

Quote from: ab_grp on August 04, 2020, 02:05:50 PM
I also find it interesting wording given the particulars that she apologizes "without reservation" for what she's done.

Is that a Native American joke?  Talk about misreading your audience.

Also, the subhed on the Times's homepage is currently "A professor at Arizona State University does not exist."  I'm not sure that's quite right.

Heh. They may be making a global statement.

Quote
I'm struck with similarities to people who have been caught blatantly fabricating large amounts of research data. The perpetrators act with great cunning to maintain the fraud, materially benefit from it, and then, when caught, plead mental illness e.g., this is an interesting read on an infamous case:
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/28/magazine/diederik-stapels-audacious-academic-fraud.html

What ever happened to our favorite research scammer (on the CHE fora), Mike LaCour?

Quote from: ab_grp on August 04, 2020, 02:05:50 PM

Quote from: Puget on August 04, 2020, 01:36:21 PM
I'm struck with similarities to people who have been caught blatantly fabricating large amounts of research data. The perpetrators act with great cunning to maintain the fraud, materially benefit from it, and then, when caught, plead mental illness e.g., this is an interesting read on an infamous case:
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/28/magazine/diederik-stapels-audacious-academic-fraud.html

That is definitely a very interesting case.  The linked article provides a lot of detail and summarizes the evolution of events well, but I'd also highly recommend reading his book to get further insight from his perspective.  As noted, it has been translated and provided as a free PDF.  Here's a link to that: https://errorstatistics.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/fakingscience-20141214.pdf  I found it completely enthralling to follow the story of how things went so bad.  I also wonder how many researchers were negatively impacted by his fake data and guidance on what to study.

I also find it interesting wording given the particulars that she apologizes "without reservation" for what she's done.

I forgot he wrote a book-- I can't say I'm all that interested in reading it since I hardly think he's a reliable narrator. He certainly ruined the careers of all of his grad students, who by all accounts were only guilty of a fair degree of failing to question well outside of field norm practices (usually, the grad students are the ones collected the data, not the PI). There was also considerable repetitional damage to the field.

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 04, 2020, 04:11:57 PM

What ever happened to our favorite research scammer (on the CHE fora), Mike LaCour?

Good question-- last I heard he had lost his job. I assume he is working far outside the field. Hard to believe anyone would trust him with anything data related ever again. That was a somewhat different case in that he was a grad student and it was, as far as we know, his first crime. Of course if he had gotten away with it it seems likely it wouldn't have been his last. Good story here on how he got caught by two other grad students looking to replicate his methods, and how they went on to do the study right: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-two-grad-students-uncovered-michael-lacour-fraud-and-a-way-to-change-opinions-on-transgender-rights/

Quote from: Puget on August 04, 2020, 06:29:58 PM
Good question-- last I heard he had lost his job. I assume he is working far outside the field. Hard to believe anyone would trust him with anything data related ever again. That was a somewhat different case in that he was a grad student and it was, as far as we know, his first crime.

Well, at the time he was busted he'd done more than one thing wrong (faking the study, lying on his cv, claiming awards he didn't have etc). I don't believe people start doing that kind of thing at 28. I bet he'd been faking stuff all the way along (in his applications to college, grad school, etc).

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 05, 2020, 03:00:11 AM

Quote from: Puget on August 04, 2020, 06:29:58 PM
Good question-- last I heard he had lost his job. I assume he is working far outside the field. Hard to believe anyone would trust him with anything data related ever again. That was a somewhat different case in that he was a grad student and it was, as far as we know, his first crime.

Well, at the time he was busted he'd done more than one thing wrong (faking the study, lying on his cv, claiming awards he didn't have etc). I don't believe people start doing that kind of thing at 28. I bet he'd been faking stuff all the way along (in his applications to college, grad school, etc).

Yes, fair enough, I just meant in terms of faking data, but that was likely just lack of prior opportunity if earlier projects had been more supervised by others. I agree usually people work their way up to big lies from small ones. Which, to bring it back around to the original topic, raises the question of what else McLaughlin has lied about in the past. It already sounds like the tenure denial may have also involved creating fake supporters on social media, but how much further back does it go, and was her research involved as well? It's looking like this is someone who we should be glad to have well out of science.

Quote from: Puget on August 05, 2020, 06:18:37 AM
Which, to bring it back around to the original topic, raises the question of what else McLaughlin has lied about in the past. It already sounds like the tenure denial may have also involved creating fake supporters on social media, but how much further back does it go, and was her research involved as well? It's looking like this is someone who we should be glad to have well out of science.

She has totally destroyed the point of her #metooSTEM venture, since she herself is the poster child for why people's claims cannot be taken at face value.

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 05, 2020, 06:59:48 AM
She has totally destroyed the point of her #metooSTEM venture, since she herself is the poster child for why people's claims cannot be taken at face value.

Exactly. And this was why the whole "believe all women" thing was going to turn ugly. Of course there are bad faith actors and nut jobs who are also women.
There are also paranoid grievance mongers with delusions of persecution ("nefarious forces ruining my career" is a narrative I've heard from academics of both sexes). For some of these people #metoo is just another way to say the world is out to get them (and get some online sympathy if they play it right).

This thread. This story. Good grief. I'm just going to assume henceforth that all accusations of bias are made up unless I saw it with my own eyes.

I still wonder how people could have been taken in.  The anthropology department at ASU is only 30 people.  While faculty photos may not be conclusive for an ethnic or gender identity, the department is just not that big in terms of circumstantial evidence for observed interests and writing style.

Quote from: polly_mer on August 05, 2020, 06:02:01 PM
I still wonder how people could have been taken in.  The anthropology department at ASU is only 30 people.  While faculty photos may not be conclusive for an ethnic or gender identity, the department is just not that big in terms of circumstantial evidence for observed interests and writing style.

I think the point was made in one of the Twitter threads that anthro teaches in several different departments, so it may not specifically have been the anthro department.  But, a lot of people seemed to blindly accept that this person was real.  There are a lot of marginalized (and non) individuals who use pseudonymous accounts, but I think (or at least hope) this might make individuals question some of what they read.  It's tough, because I was going to say especially if it seems controversial, but I guess there are plenty of real life people who use those accounts to post things they can't post under their own names, especially if they are marginalized, ECR, etc.

As for whether Stapel is a reliable narrator (sorry I can't seem to include that quote as well right now), I don't think he painted himself in a sympathetic light, let alone a favorable one.  His book really is an interesting read about his downward spiral.  My own opinion, of course.  He definitely did damage to the field and to individuals he mentored.

The weird part is such specific detail while claiming a need for anonymity.  "Indigenous lesbian scientist at a big state U" is much more preserving of a protective pseudonym than naming the department and school and specifying member of the Hopi tribe.  Hopi alone plus anthropologist with faculty rank is only a handful of people in the US.

I follow many scientists who use protective cover as a pseudonym, particularly when they have a steady stream of grievances about the field in general and their institution in particular.  They generally admit to being a chemist or physicist with possibly a geographic region, but that's it as far as identifying detail.

Is anyone really surprised that this was so easy? Not only is it unacceptable to even remotely imply that something about a Me Too claim is questionable, you're not even supposed to bring up instances (Bryan Banks, Duke LaCross, etc.) that have been proven false.

When third-rate director Emily Lindin stated that any amount is "microscopic" and bringing it up is simply a "derailment tactic" she then followed it with her viral statement which mistakenly said the quiet part out loud:

"Sorry. If some innocent men's reputations have to take a hit in the process of undoing the patriarchy, that is a price I am absolutely willing to pay."

This is just one of the many more transparent versions of "believe all women" which either exclude the extremity of the above statement or fail to conclude the phrase following "all women" with "who make accusations against those I politically oppose and ignore or threaten those whose allegations are against my allies."

Who in the world would put their career on the line for something that could have no possible benefit to them but involves a radioactive topic that is guaranteed to cause backlash? I'm sure every white male on the planet is just itching to jump into that discussion!

By the way, I love how the fictional character doesn't become Native American until after someone whines about issues related to race, thus necessitating a feature to render the person "immune" by virtue of race.

After the 180 all of the original #metoo crowd had to take after Biden's accusers came out, this type of story really is just beating a horse that's been dead for some time. Everyone knows the entire me too movement was a fraud by people with other objectives. Most people just won't say so in public.

Quote from: financeguy on August 05, 2020, 09:31:59 PM
By the way, I love how the fictional character doesn't become Native American until after someone whines about issues related to race, thus necessitating a feature to render the person "immune" by virtue of race.

The white-person pretending to be native is such a well-known trope in academia (and in some cases this really pays off, career-wise. Ward Churchill, Andrea Smith, Gwen Benaway, etc).
As you say it's a convenient way to identify out of the "oppressor" class (or in this case, to give a white woman a non-white ally).

Well, we're forgetting an even more well known academic who left for the Senate, but I digress...

I had a Native American roommate in grad school and the subject of living near the trail of tears at one point in my life came up. He asked if I had any background and I said my great grandmother was either full or 1/2 Cherokee, the most common affiliation in that region, but that "I don't know the specifics and that wouldn't make me native either way, so it isn't something I've looked into beyond hearing it mentioned by my grandmother a few times in passing." He joked that I had just given the long-winded white version of "Yes, I'm native also."

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 06, 2020, 02:35:56 AM

The white-person pretending to be native is such a well-known trope in academia (and in some cases this really pays off, career-wise. Ward Churchill, Andrea Smith, Gwen Benaway, etc).
As you say it's a convenient way to identify out of the "oppressor" class (or in this case, to give a white woman a non-white ally).

Just for fun, let's add Asa Earl Carter ("Little Tree") and Emily Carr ("Klee Wyck") to the list. (And Elizabeth Warren and Sarah Vowell, but I digress.)

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 06, 2020, 12:22:55 PM

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 06, 2020, 02:35:56 AM

The white-person pretending to be native is such a well-known trope in academia (and in some cases this really pays off, career-wise. Ward Churchill, Andrea Smith, Gwen Benaway, etc).
As you say it's a convenient way to identify out of the "oppressor" class (or in this case, to give a white woman a non-white ally).

Just for fun, let's add Asa Earl Carter ("Little Tree") and Emily Carr ("Klee Wyck") to the list. (And Elizabeth Warren and Sarah Vowell, but I digress.)

Yes.  Bacardi's failure to include Elizabeth Warren on the list is either criminal negligence or gross political hackery.

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 06, 2020, 12:22:55 PM
Just for fun, let's add Asa Earl Carter ("Little Tree") and Emily Carr ("Klee Wyck") to the list.

They weren't academics. Artists and writers faking an ethnicity is much longer list.

Quote
(And Elizabeth Warren and Sarah Vowell, but I digress.)

I wasn't aware of Sarah Vowell's Indian ancestry being fake - do you have any links?

Quote from: writingprof on August 06, 2020, 12:27:43 PM

Yes.  Bacardi's failure to include Elizabeth Warren on the list is either criminal negligence or gross political hackery.

Nah, we're (I'm) just having fun naming famous names.

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 06, 2020, 02:53:00 PM

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 06, 2020, 12:22:55 PM
Just for fun, let's add Asa Earl Carter ("Little Tree") and Emily Carr ("Klee Wyck") to the list.

They weren't academics. Artists and writers faking an ethnicity is much longer list.

Right, academics. My apologies. Joseph Boyden, then!

Quote

I wasn't aware of Sarah Vowell's Indian ancestry being fake - do you have any links?

It's not that it's fake, it's that it's very distant (Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Vowell#Personal_life) says "1/8 on her mother's side" and "1/16 on her father's side"), she's not tied to the Cherokee community, and yet she frequently presents herself as having a special affinity for the Cherokee, or talks about "her ancestors" on the Trail of Tears, that sort of thing. It's especially bad in her book Unfamiliar Fishes, which is supposed to be about the history of Hawai'i but features almost as much of "her ancestors" as it does Native Hawaiians (and a whole lot more about east coast missionaries than either). (Don't get me started about what's on display in that book. I hated it.) So: basically the same sort of case as Warren, although not nearly as bad because she doesn't actually characterize herself as Indigenous (she just takes on the ancestral mantle and appeals to familial affinity).

Looks like it's time to get Heini Himmler back and reinstitute skull measurements and such, so that we can have a scientific answer to these questions. :-(

People, this is a long road, and at the end there is another abyss.

Problem is, Elizabeth Warren does actually have native American ancestry.   Even the DNA test showed this, though the level was probably not as high a percentage as she thought.  Heck, most Oklahomans do.

Around here (SE Mass./ RI) lots of white folks do, too.  Another thing I learned in college anthro class was that the number of whites who would claim some native American ancestry on the decennial census forms generally has waxed and waned over the decades, based on how popular it was to admit one's NA ancestry, vs. how much of an incentive there was to hide it, pass as white, etc.  (remember, at many times and places here in the US, states, ahem, well, er, did not exactly let the NA folks in their midst just, well, be NA-- sometimes children were taken, etc., things like this).  I was probably 26 or 27 years old when I learned something my mom apparently forgot to tell me, but  had assumed I knew, someone else had said, etc., namely that her maternal grandmother, thus one of my great-grandmothers (who was still alive, albeit suffering from bad dementia, when I was young), had a mother who was NA, or half-NA (we're not exactly sure, nor does anyone seem to recall the tribe).   Why do I believe this?  Because, when my great-grandmother was a kid, there would have been no incentive whatsoever for her mom to lie and invent such a heritage, and really when my mom was young, well, no such an incentive would have developed by then as well.  Closer to now, there is a woman in my own church around here, whom everyone who saw her would say 'she's white', who is nonetheless an enrolled member of the Wampanoag tribe, and damned proud of that.  Her heritage includes at least one other NA nation, plus some Italian... and WASP Puritan ancestors as well.   Her outward Caucasian appearance is what it is, but it does not detract from reality.   My point should be clear enough-- before one assaults someone claiming to be NA, best one be real sure one is sure of one's facts.

I just don't get why this matters to the woke crowd if they've suddenly said you can identify with your race of preference. Or is this not true? I though the twitter crowd determined that you are what you say you are and that it's racist to believe facts/science get in the way of one's self professed identity in a similar way that this is perceived in the trans debate regarding gender. No DNA test needed since the science not relevant. What am I missing here? I mean this person is a fictional character so the whole premise is able to be debunked, but how are we debunking NA ancestry when the entire concept of race is open to "whatever you personally feel like" as is the trans position regarding gender? I'm not trying to flame this, it really is confusing. What is the current  HR compliant/woke approved "I won't get fired for this" stance on someone identifying as a member of a racial group vs this being an objectively determined issue and if it's the former, why is the concept of "outing" someone even possible?

I'm not aware that anyone claims that people can qualify as members of a certain race by self-identifying as such without any actual genetic link. As far as I'm aware, it's just a straw man that the opposition sets up in order to try to show the ridiculousness of other kinds of self-identification.

I too have a tiny bit of Native American ancestry (Iroquois). The memory of it had been passed down in my family, and when I met some long-lost relatives of the same ancestry, they had exactly the same story as had been passed down to me. And I took one of those DNA tests — not for this reason, but for others — and it showed up there as well. I certainly don't claim to be Native American, and it gives me no particular authority on anything. But I think it's useful to remember those things, because it says something about the conditions of early America and the frontier, and because the truth is what it is — it's no more virtuous to paper over it than it is to overemphasize it. 

That said, whatever is fashionable will get lots of emphasis and some fakery. In the days when it was considered disgraceful to have some Native American ancestry, people kept very quiet about it. When it suddenly seems to give white folks street cred, all of a sudden many people are, in the words of one article, members of the "tribe called Wannabe."

Quote from: kaysixteen on August 06, 2020, 06:50:45 PM
Problem is, Elizabeth Warren does actually have native American ancestry.   Even the DNA test showed this, though the level was probably not as high a percentage as she thought. 

The level was so low I'd read it as margin of error. Because Native Americans were such a tiny reference pool compared to other groups, there were a lot of false positives when 23andMe and other DNA-heritage products started. They were identifying people from Pakistan as Native American.

 

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 02:25:35 AM
I'm not aware that anyone claims that people can qualify as members of a certain race by self-identifying as such without any actual genetic link.

"In Defense of Transracial Identity" written by Rachel Tuvel published in Hypatia and then the resulting public discussion fades so quickly from mind.

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/05/transracialism-article-controversy.html
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/05/19/journals-board-directors-offers-its-support-editors-decision-publish-article

Quote from: kaysixteen on August 06, 2020, 06:50:45 PM
Problem is, Elizabeth Warren does actually have native American ancestry.   Even the DNA test showed this, though the level was probably not as high a percentage as she thought.  Heck, most Oklahomans do.

The results of that test can be found all over the Web, but I like the way FactCheck.org puts it:  "The report concluded there is 'strong evidence' she had a Native American ancestor approximately six to 10 generations ago."  In other words, it is likely that Warren's great-great-great-great-grandparent or great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandparent was a Native American.  Yeah, she should definitely get a leg up in the Harvard hiring process, contribute to tribal cookbooks, and allow herself to be called a woman "of color." 

Warren is basically Rachel Dolezal, except she's too big to fail, so the media can't properly condemn her.  She's a ridiculous fraud, and Harvard counting her toward its "diversity" is a synecdoche for everything that's wrong with this country.

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 02:25:35 AM
I'm not aware that anyone claims that people can qualify as members of a certain race by self-identifying as such without any actual genetic link. As far as I'm aware, it's just a straw man that the opposition sets up in order to try to show the ridiculousness of other kinds of self-identification.

The UCU (major faculty union in the UK) has said they support "self identification" of race, gender ID, disability status, etc.

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 07, 2020, 05:58:19 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 02:25:35 AM
I'm not aware that anyone claims that people can qualify as members of a certain race by self-identifying as such without any actual genetic link. As far as I'm aware, it's just a straw man that the opposition sets up in order to try to show the ridiculousness of other kinds of self-identification.

The UCU (major faculty union in the UK) has said they support "self identification" of race, gender ID, disability status, etc.

I think this is brilliant. It should totally blow up the victimhood Olympics.

To quote:

"When everyone is special, no-one is special" -Syndrome, The Incredibles

My understanding of the kind of self-identification the UCU is talking about is not a philosophy that anybody can say they belong to any race. It's that if you have, say, a white mother and a Hispanic father, and when forms ask for race and you write "Hispanic," they're not going to do a DNA check or demand a genealogy with an affadavit to see whether your Hispanic father actually had two white grandmothers and so he was only half Hispanic and therefore you're only one-quarter Hispanic and therefore, even though your name is Juanita Gonzalez and you grew up bilingual in Spanish and English, you're not really "Hispanic enough" by blood and therefore and you are fraudulent and breaking the rules. Or take the example of people who grew up on the Hopi reservation raised by their Hopi grandmother speaking Hopi, but actually they have three-quarters white parents, so are they really Hopi? 

This gets round all that by taking people's word for it. It also acknowledges that race is to a great extent culturally determined. If a person looks Black, he'll face the discrimination that Black people encounter, even if genetically he's only 3/8 Black.

Sure, this does open the door to people declaring they're some race that they have no claim to either genetically or culturally. I, a white-bread European-American, could declare that I'm 100% Pacific Islander. The ways of preventing this are problematic, though, aren't they? What kind of proof would be necessary?  I think it's reasonable just to go ahead and take people's word for it (as we do on the U.S. census, right?), unless the stakes are high for some reason. In this situation I don't think the stakes are often very high.

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 09:22:32 AM
I think it's reasonable just to go ahead and take people's word for it (as we do on the U.S. census, right?), unless the stakes are high for some reason.

If I were "B"lack, my professional life would be better in every conceivable way.  I'd say those stakes are pretty high.

I think it's because you are not Black that you don't know the many ways in which your professional life would be harder. To cite a minor one, you'd encounter people like yourself, people are oblivious to the bigotry and bias that Black people encounter at every level of professional life, and think that Blackness is an advantage.

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 10:29:32 AM
I think it's because you are not Black that you don't know the many ways in which your professional life would be harder. To cite a minor one, you'd encounter people like yourself, people are oblivious to the bigotry and bias that Black people encounter at every level of professional life, and think that Blackness is an advantage.

Tell that to Rachel Dolezal. If there really is an immutable, one-way direction of discrimination, then no-one with "privilege" should ever WANT to "incorrectly" self-identify as belonging to some "oppressed" group. So there would be no reason to disallow it.

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 09:22:32 AM
My understanding of the kind of self-identification the UCU is talking about is not a philosophy that anybody can say they belong to any race. It's that if you have, say, a white mother and a Hispanic father, and when forms ask for race and you write "Hispanic," they're not going to do a DNA check or demand a genealogy with an affadavit...

Err... define "Hispanic." There are Spanish-speaking Latin Americans, who are culturally Latino and whose families have been in Latin America for generations, who are blue-eyed blonds, others who are Amerindian, others who are black, and plenty that are of mixed ancestry. Add in Latin Americans of Lebanese, Chinese, Japanese, etc ancestry, and that many of the European immigrants to the region had Arab or Jewish ancestry, and "Hispanic" makes absolutely no sense as a "racial" category. It does make sense as a cultural category but in that case it has no link to DNA or genealogy. Or do only "mestizo/ladino" Latinos count as "Hispanic"?

Quote from: writingprof on August 07, 2020, 09:49:31 AM

If I were "B"lack, my professional life would be better in every conceivable way.  I'd say those stakes are pretty high.

I have one close Black friend in the profession. She transferred out of her first PhD program because her advisors left. She was the first Black person admitted into her new PhD program (and only, until recently--seven years after she first transferred). When the language requirements were changed in her second year, she was the only student not grandfathered into the new requirement (there's no reason why she should have been a special case, given the work she does). In fact, the new language requirement was easier than before (one language instead of two), but she was required to learn a third language. Again, her work only actually requires competence in English. There's no good reason to require more from her than anyone else.

She spent two years writing her comps, all because of a single comp entirely outside her areas of specialization or competence. The prof in charge of that comp routinely insulted her writing ability, and required her to do her own translations (in a dead language entirely outside the three extra ones she had to learn for the language requirement), and regularly criticized her reliance on standard translations of the source materials. The ordeal ended when this professor died suddenly, and the department's other expert in the area took over the comp. He took one look at it, and said it was perfectly fine and that he didn't understand why she'd been kept working on it for so long.

She had to defend her prospectus three times. After the first time, a member of the committee who had just started working in her area (from a completely different area) made a big fuss of the fact that she wasn't engaging with material that's not at all relevant to the project (but which he's interested in), and demanded that she do so. They also indicated that she should revise the project in a completely different direction because it wasn't suitable. So she did. The second time she defended her prospectus, the whole thing happened in reverse: the committee tore into the project they had set her, telling her it wasn't suitable. Then her supervisor, acting like he'd had a bright new revelation, picked up on a tiny thread in the new project asked her why she didn't work on that instead. That something else was her original project. The third time, with many comments about her abilities and aptitudes, they passed her prospectus.

Then her supervisor spent a year negging her writing and preparation for graduate work before taking a job somewhere else. She's since transferred out of that program, is in a much better place, and is on track to finish in a year.

That whole ten-ish year odyssey doesn't even get into the shit she's had to take from her fellow graduate students, people at conferences, the names she's been called by professors and colleagues, the social exclusion, etc. It's a wonder she's still in the profession, and I, for one, wouldn't trade my experiences for hers for anything in the world.

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 07, 2020, 11:12:57 AM

Tell that to Rachel Dolezal. If there really is an immutable, one-way direction of discrimination, then no-one with "privilege" should ever WANT to "incorrectly" self-identify as belonging to some "oppressed" group. So there would be no reason to disallow it.

I don't think anyone thinks it's immutable or one-way. We've been talking about intersectionality since 1989, and we've been aware that social attitudes change diachronically and synchronically for... well, a lot longer. Armchair speculation about people's behaviour doesn't really come into it, nor is it helpful. People act against their rational interests all the time. Just look at the failed-state to the south of us.

Quote from: Stockmann on August 07, 2020, 11:18:44 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 09:22:32 AM
My understanding of the kind of self-identification the UCU is talking about is not a philosophy that anybody can say they belong to any race. It's that if you have, say, a white mother and a Hispanic father, and when forms ask for race and you write "Hispanic," they're not going to do a DNA check or demand a genealogy with an affadavit...

Err... define "Hispanic." There are Spanish-speaking Latin Americans, who are culturally Latino and whose families have been in Latin America for generations, who are blue-eyed blonds, others who are Amerindian, others who are black, and plenty that are of mixed ancestry. Add in Latin Americans of Lebanese, Chinese, Japanese, etc ancestry, and that many of the European immigrants to the region had Arab or Jewish ancestry, and "Hispanic" makes absolutely no sense as a "racial" category. It does make sense as a cultural category but in that case it has no link to DNA or genealogy. Or do only "mestizo/ladino" Latinos count as "Hispanic"?

I think you're making Hegemony's point for her, and also highlighting the fact that none of our racial categories actually make much sense (this was the whole point of the 'social kind' talk pages and pages and pages ago).

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 07, 2020, 11:51:07 AM

Quote from: writingprof on August 07, 2020, 09:49:31 AM

If I were "B"lack, my professional life would be better in every conceivable way.  I'd say those stakes are pretty high.

I have one close Black friend in the profession. She transferred out of her first PhD program because her advisors left. She was the first Black person admitted into her new PhD program (and only, until recently--seven years after she first transferred). When the language requirements were changed in her second year, she was the only student not grandfathered into the new requirement (there's no reason why she should have been a special case, given the work she does). In fact, the new language requirement was easier than before (one language instead of two), but she was required to learn a third language. Again, her work only actually requires competence in English. There's no good reason to require more from her than anyone else.

She spent two years writing her comps, all because of a single comp entirely outside her areas of specialization or competence. The prof in charge of that comp routinely insulted her writing ability, and required her to do her own translations (in a dead language entirely outside the three extra ones she had to learn for the language requirement), and regularly criticized her reliance on standard translations of the source materials. The ordeal ended when this professor died suddenly, and the department's other expert in the area took over the comp. He took one look at it, and said it was perfectly fine and that he didn't understand why she'd been kept working on it for so long.

She had to defend her prospectus three times. After the first time, a member of the committee who had just started working in her area (from a completely different area) made a big fuss of the fact that she wasn't engaging with material that's not at all relevant to the project (but which he's interested in), and demanded that she do so. They also indicated that she should revise the project in a completely different direction because it wasn't suitable. So she did. The second time she defended her prospectus, the whole thing happened in reverse: the committee tore into the project they had set her, telling her it wasn't suitable. Then her supervisor, acting like he'd had a bright new revelation, picked up on a tiny thread in the new project asked her why she didn't work on that instead. That something else was her original project. The third time, with many comments about her abilities and aptitudes, they passed her prospectus.

Then her supervisor spent a year negging her writing and preparation for graduate work before taking a job somewhere else. She's since transferred out of that program, is in a much better place, and is on track to finish in a year.

That whole ten-ish year odyssey doesn't even get into the shit she's had to take from her fellow graduate students, people at conferences, the names she's been called by professors and colleagues, the social exclusion, etc. It's a wonder she's still in the profession, and I, for one, wouldn't trade my experiences for hers for anything in the world.

Sorry, I missed the part where you proved or even provided suggestive evidence that your friend's race was the cause of this treatment.  As you may recall from the old fora, many white Ph.D. candidates can tell similar stories of arbitrary rule in doctoral programs.  Not every bad thing that happens to a "B"lack person is due to anti-"B"lackness.  Assuming a causal relationship where non exists is sloppy thinking.  Try to knock it off. 

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 07, 2020, 11:12:57 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 10:29:32 AM
I think it's because you are not Black that you don't know the many ways in which your professional life would be harder. To cite a minor one, you'd encounter people like yourself, people are oblivious to the bigotry and bias that Black people encounter at every level of professional life, and think that Blackness is an advantage.

Tell that to Rachel Dolezal. If there really is an immutable, one-way direction of discrimination, then no-one with "privilege" should ever WANT to "incorrectly" self-identify as belonging to some "oppressed" group. So there would be no reason to disallow it.

This is exactly right.  In the past, when there was actual racism, "B"lack people who could do so sometimes "passed" as white.  Now, white people who can do so occasionally try to "pass" as "B"lack.  As far as I'm concerned, that's the end of the story.

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 07, 2020, 11:12:57 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 10:29:32 AM
I think it's because you are not Black that you don't know the many ways in which your professional life would be harder. To cite a minor one, you'd encounter people like yourself, people are oblivious to the bigotry and bias that Black people encounter at every level of professional life, and think that Blackness is an advantage.

Tell that to Rachel Dolezal. If there really is an immutable, one-way direction of discrimination, then no-one with "privilege" should ever WANT to "incorrectly" self-identify as belonging to some "oppressed" group. So there would be no reason to disallow it.

That's one rare example. If you put that much weight on a single case in other parts of your life, then I've got all sorts of snake oil I'd love to sell you!

Quote from: Diogenes on August 07, 2020, 12:22:43 PM

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 07, 2020, 11:12:57 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 10:29:32 AM
I think it's because you are not Black that you don't know the many ways in which your professional life would be harder. To cite a minor one, you'd encounter people like yourself, people are oblivious to the bigotry and bias that Black people encounter at every level of professional life, and think that Blackness is an advantage.

Tell that to Rachel Dolezal. If there really is an immutable, one-way direction of discrimination, then no-one with "privilege" should ever WANT to "incorrectly" self-identify as belonging to some "oppressed" group. So there would be no reason to disallow it.

That's one rare example. If you put that much weight on a single case in other parts of your life, then I've got all sorts of snake oil I'd love to sell you!

That's a counterexample to the hypothesis of one-way discrimination. A single counterexample is sufficient to disprove a hypothesis. [One bridge falling down is sufficient to question the design; a second or third of the same design is not necessary.]

I don't think it's unreasonable to ask as a white person that if you are going to say identity is the most important aspect of all of us, the reason a VP pick should be chosen, the reason someone should get a job or get admitted to a school, the reason you're allowed to be outside during covid 19 or not, the reason why certain people should be asked to be silent on certain issues and the reason why others should be heard no matter what they say, you should at least have an easily understandable standard of what that thing is. As a white oppressor simply eating my popcorn on the sidelines wondering what the hell is going on, I find it genuinely confusing and arbitrary.

Apparently the actress playing Harriet Tubman was unacceptable in the recent film since she wasn't the right kind of black. (Not "ADOS" or American Decedents of Slavery but a ((!)) British actress). Apparently the fact that she was a good actress who physically resembled the historical figure in question isn't really relevant. White people see this level of slicing and dicing and think "It they can't keep from getting pissed off at each other for this level of nonsense, I'm getting fired for some comment in T minus..." 

Quote from: financeguy on August 07, 2020, 01:05:40 PM
Apparently the actress playing Harriet Tubman was unacceptable in the recent film since she wasn't the right kind of black. (Not "ADOS" or American Decedents of Slavery but a ((!)) British actress).

"British people taking our roles" is the Hollywood version of "immigrants taking our jobs".

Quote from: dismalist on August 07, 2020, 12:37:54 PM

Quote from: Diogenes on August 07, 2020, 12:22:43 PM

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 07, 2020, 11:12:57 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 10:29:32 AM
I think it's because you are not Black that you don't know the many ways in which your professional life would be harder. To cite a minor one, you'd encounter people like yourself, people are oblivious to the bigotry and bias that Black people encounter at every level of professional life, and think that Blackness is an advantage.

Tell that to Rachel Dolezal. If there really is an immutable, one-way direction of discrimination, then no-one with "privilege" should ever WANT to "incorrectly" self-identify as belonging to some "oppressed" group. So there would be no reason to disallow it.

That's one rare example. If you put that much weight on a single case in other parts of your life, then I've got all sorts of snake oil I'd love to sell you!

That's a counterexample to the hypothesis of one-way discrimination. A single counterexample is sufficient to disprove a hypothesis. [One bridge falling down is sufficient to question the design; a second or third of the same design is not necessary.]

No it doesn't. To use the classic example, if I make a claim all swans are white and you find a black swan, my initial claim has been disproven, slightly. But the fact remains that 99.9999999% of swans are still white. The evidence then is most swans are white, not that all white swans are false, as you are claiming.

To give a more extreme example like Dolezal, there is the case in Germany of the guy who paid another guy to eat his genitals. It would be absurd for me to take that case and proclaim that genitals are clearly good to eat. Apparently it is for one case, but that fact still remains it would be bad for most people.

And, you are then taking one white person's experience and weighing against all Black voices, saying that her kookyness outweighs all of the experiences by Black people.

Quote from: writingprof on August 07, 2020, 12:16:27 PM

Sorry, I missed the part where you proved or even provided suggestive evidence that your friend's race was the cause of this treatment.  As you may recall from the old fora, many white Ph.D. candidates can tell similar stories of arbitrary rule in doctoral programs.  Not every bad thing that happens to a "B"lack person is due to anti-"B"lackness.  Assuming a causal relationship where non exists is sloppy thinking.  Try to knock it off. 

Give me a break, buddy. You shouldn't go around discussions applying stronger standards of evidence to your interlocutors than you're willing to apply to yourself.

It's entirely possible my friend is an illiterate moron whose work just isn't up to snuff. I know that's not the case, however, so I can easily dismiss that explanation. Since I'm acquainted with people in that department, and know some of the (explicitly racist) things that were said to and about her, I can start to form my own conclusions. Since her experiences in other departments have been different, and her experiences in that department were so consistent and limited to her, because her experiences are so similar to the experiences other Black people and people of colour report about their own graduate educations, and because I've had similar experiences of my own when I've been mis-raced (which happens a lot even though I'm white), I'm pretty satisfied that my read of the situation is accurate. In fact, when these things started happening to her I dismissed them for a while, figuring that it was probably something else at work. As more and more incidents accumulated, however, and as I came to know some of the people in that department, that explanation became less and less plausible. I take it as a pretty strong indication that these problems have disappeared now that she's transferred again.

But this isn't a legal proceeding. I'm just reporting on a friend's experience trying to make it through the professional meat-grinder, which hasn't been especially easy (contrary to your own entirely unsubstantiated claims, I might add), and expressing the opinion that I wouldn't trade my (easy!) experience for hers.

It's entirely possible--even likely--that when you look at individual instances, other factors are involved. Misogyny, for instance, was probably involved in some of the cases. Some of those factors might even seem entirely benign. There's nothing wrong with holding students to high standards, for example. But when you're only holding some students who share a particular characteristic in common to those higher standards, a problem starts to emerge. When you put all the incidents together a pattern emerges, and it's not a pattern that reflects well on that department, even if they don't all go around wearing white hoods. 'Systemic racism' doesn't mean the system is full of racists.

For comparison's sake, I know a few female professors who are much harder on their female students than their male students. They're even explicit about doing this, and about holding them to much higher standards. The rationale is that it's hard to be a woman in this profession (true!), and you need to develop a thick skin and indefatigable attitude (true true!), so they're doing them a favour by helping them learn these lessons early. They mean well. But it's clear for all to see that their male advisees sail through the process without any trouble, while almost none of their female advisees graduate. In departments where it's already hard to be a woman (e.g. because there are almost no female faculty or graduate students), this kind of "advising" is not actually all that helpful. In fact, it's paradigmatically bad advising. It makes a bad situation much worse. And yes, it's discriminatory, even if their hearts are in the right place.

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 07, 2020, 01:46:45 PM

Quote from: financeguy on August 07, 2020, 01:05:40 PM
Apparently the actress playing Harriet Tubman was unacceptable in the recent film since she wasn't the right kind of black. (Not "ADOS" or American Decedents of Slavery but a ((!)) British actress).

"British people taking our roles" is the Hollywood version of "immigrants taking our jobs".

FWIW, this is a real issue in British cinema. There are very few opportunities for Black British actors at home, especially in leading and key supporting roles, but comparatively many in the US. So there's this whole acting drain going on. Things have gotten better in Britain in recent years, but it's still especially hard, and so the pipeline is still there.

But as far as Zoë Saldaña is concerned, the problem wasn't that she's British, because she's not. She's American. Her mother was Puerto Rican, and her father was a Haitian Dominican. Nor, as I understand the controversy, is the problem that she's not Black--she is, unquestionably. Rather, the problem is that the filmmakers darkened her skin and gave her facial prosthetics so that she could better approximate Nina Simone's look. And that cleaves a little too close to blackface, especially when the people in charge of making these decisions are white men.

Quote from: Diogenes on August 07, 2020, 02:09:09 PM

Quote from: dismalist on August 07, 2020, 12:37:54 PM

Quote from: Diogenes on August 07, 2020, 12:22:43 PM

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 07, 2020, 11:12:57 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 10:29:32 AM
I think it's because you are not Black that you don't know the many ways in which your professional life would be harder. To cite a minor one, you'd encounter people like yourself, people are oblivious to the bigotry and bias that Black people encounter at every level of professional life, and think that Blackness is an advantage.

Tell that to Rachel Dolezal. If there really is an immutable, one-way direction of discrimination, then no-one with "privilege" should ever WANT to "incorrectly" self-identify as belonging to some "oppressed" group. So there would be no reason to disallow it.

That's one rare example. If you put that much weight on a single case in other parts of your life, then I've got all sorts of snake oil I'd love to sell you!

That's a counterexample to the hypothesis of one-way discrimination. A single counterexample is sufficient to disprove a hypothesis. [One bridge falling down is sufficient to question the design; a second or third of the same design is not necessary.]

No it doesn't. To use the classic example, if I make a claim all swans are white and you find a black swan, my initial claim has been disproven, slightly. But the fact remains that 99.9999999% of swans are still white. The evidence then is most swans are white, not that all white swans are false, as you are claiming.

...

One black swan shows that the hypothesis "All swans are white" is incorrect. Need a better hypothesis: No swans are white, some swans are white, many swans are white, most swans are white could each be true. To figure out which, we gotta start counting. All that work required because of one black swan!

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 07, 2020, 11:51:07 AM

Quote from: Stockmann on August 07, 2020, 11:18:44 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 09:22:32 AM
My understanding of the kind of self-identification the UCU is talking about is not a philosophy that anybody can say they belong to any race. It's that if you have, say, a white mother and a Hispanic father, and when forms ask for race and you write "Hispanic," they're not going to do a DNA check or demand a genealogy with an affadavit...

Err... define "Hispanic." There are Spanish-speaking Latin Americans, who are culturally Latino and whose families have been in Latin America for generations, who are blue-eyed blonds, others who are Amerindian, others who are black, and plenty that are of mixed ancestry. Add in Latin Americans of Lebanese, Chinese, Japanese, etc ancestry, and that many of the European immigrants to the region had Arab or Jewish ancestry, and "Hispanic" makes absolutely no sense as a "racial" category. It does make sense as a cultural category but in that case it has no link to DNA or genealogy. Or do only "mestizo/ladino" Latinos count as "Hispanic"?

I think you're making Hegemony's point for her, and also highlighting the fact that none of our racial categories actually make much sense (this was the whole point of the 'social kind' talk pages and pages and pages ago).

My point is that her example makes no sense - the white mother could also be Hispanic, and in any case if it's a cultural classification a person could be Hispanic without Hispanic ancestry. Whereas if it was a white mother and a black father, then according to the one drop rule the person would be black regardless of cultural background. Black is an ancestry-based category in a way that Hispanic (if it even makes sense as a category) is not, even if of course the one drop rule is biologically ridiculous.
If a category is ancestry-based, and belonging to it, or not belonging to it, confers advantages (whether official or not), including related to employment, then of course people will try to game the system, from using the most tenuous connections to outright making stuff up. The census, which doesn't confer any advantages, has surely far more honest answers than college applications (and by "honest" I mean "not deliberate fabrications or exaggerations").

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 07, 2020, 02:18:13 PM
But as far as Zoë Saldaña is concerned, the problem wasn't that she's British, because she's not. She's American. Her mother was Puerto Rican, and her father was a Haitian Dominican. Nor, as I understand the controversy, is the problem that she's not Black--she is, unquestionably. Rather, the problem is that the filmmakers darkened her skin and gave her facial prosthetics so that she could better approximate Nina Simone's look. And that cleaves a little too close to blackface, especially when the people in charge of making these decisions are white men.

Huh? Nobody mentioned Zoe Saldana. The original comment was about the Harriet Tubman film, which starred Cynthia Erivo (who is British). Your mixing up Black women isn't helping here.

Quote from: bacardiandlime on August 07, 2020, 04:55:32 PM


Huh? Nobody mentioned Zoe Saldana. The original comment was about the Harriet Tubman film, which starred Cynthia Erivo (who is British). Your mixing up Black women isn't helping here.

My apologies, you're right. I had the Nina Simone film on my mind because I read about the controversy, and Saldaña's apologetic response, yesterday.

Quote from: Diogenes on August 07, 2020, 12:22:43 PM

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 07, 2020, 11:12:57 AM

Quote from: Hegemony on August 07, 2020, 10:29:32 AM
I think it's because you are not Black that you don't know the many ways in which your professional life would be harder. To cite a minor one, you'd encounter people like yourself, people are oblivious to the bigotry and bias that Black people encounter at every level of professional life, and think that Blackness is an advantage.

Tell that to Rachel Dolezal. If there really is an immutable, one-way direction of discrimination, then no-one with "privilege" should ever WANT to "incorrectly" self-identify as belonging to some "oppressed" group. So there would be no reason to disallow it.

That's one rare example. If you put that much weight on a single case in other parts of your life, then I've got all sorts of snake oil I'd love to sell you!

How about Elizabeth Warren?

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 07, 2020, 02:18:13 PM

Quote from: writingprof on August 07, 2020, 12:16:27 PM

Sorry, I missed the part where you proved or even provided suggestive evidence that your friend's race was the cause of this treatment.  As you may recall from the old fora, many white Ph.D. candidates can tell similar stories of arbitrary rule in doctoral programs.  Not every bad thing that happens to a "B"lack person is due to anti-"B"lackness.  Assuming a causal relationship where non exists is sloppy thinking.  Try to knock it off. 

Give me a break, buddy. You shouldn't go around discussions applying stronger standards of evidence to your interlocutors than you're willing to apply to yourself.

It's entirely possible my friend is an illiterate moron whose work just isn't up to snuff. I know that's not the case, however, so I can easily dismiss that explanation. Since I'm acquainted with people in that department, and know some of the (explicitly racist) things that were said to and about her, I can start to form my own conclusions.

Ah. Congratulations. Your argument that "B"lack people are persecuted in graduate school has now risen to the level of anecdote. That's certainly a step in the right direction.

Quote from: financeguy on August 07, 2020, 01:05:40 PM
I don't think it's unreasonable to ask as a white person that if you are going to say identity is the most important aspect of all of us, the reason a VP pick should be chosen, the reason someone should get a job or get admitted to a school, the reason you're allowed to be outside during covid 19 or not, the reason why certain people should be asked to be silent on certain issues and the reason why others should be heard no matter what they say, you should at least have an easily understandable standard of what that thing is.

So, so true.

Quote from: Stockmann on August 07, 2020, 04:04:51 PM
[
If a category is ancestry-based, and belonging to it, or not belonging to it, confers advantages (whether official or not), including related to employment, then of course people will try to game the system, from using the most tenuous connections to outright making stuff up. The census, which doesn't confer any advantages, has surely far more honest answers than college applications (and by "honest" I mean "not deliberate fabrications or exaggerations").

This is a good description of the tension between inclusiveness and gaming that any organization needs to address.

To my mind, Twitter avatars may identify as any category they care to be. They are their own imagined thing, so they may or may not be similar to the person writing the posts. The organization, whether Twitter Inc. or the twitterverse can't exactly police that. As a result readers need to take potential inauthenticity into account.

College applicants need to be candid, since the organization asking has specific intentions in regard to the category and need relevant information.

On another thread, we discussed some open-membership group allowing people to identify as they chose. They have the authority to make that decision, and get to accept the consequences of accepting the various judgements members make. I don't think there is a huge risk to the organization from this choice.

(BTW, on this forum, I identify as a blueberry bush. Nobody has challenged the authenticity of my ancestry.)

Quote from: writingprof on August 08, 2020, 05:45:54 AM


Ah. Congratulations. Your argument that "B"lack people are persecuted in graduate school has now risen to the level of anecdote. That's certainly a step in the right direction.

Thank you. I'm still waiting for the evidence that

Quote from: writingprof on August 07, 2020, 09:49:31 AM
If I were "B"lack, my professional life would be better in every conceivable way.

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 08, 2020, 08:00:35 AM

Quote from: writingprof on August 08, 2020, 05:45:54 AM


Ah. Congratulations. Your argument that "B"lack people are persecuted in graduate school has now risen to the level of anecdote. That's certainly a step in the right direction.

Thank you. I'm still waiting for the evidence that

Quote from: writingprof on August 07, 2020, 09:49:31 AM
If I were "B"lack, my professional life would be better in every conceivable way.

Gladly. Every job ad in my field implores people "of color" to apply. (Perhaps by next year, search committees will have learned the new shibboleths "B"lack and BIPOC.) My current university offers special perks/funding/opportunities to "B"lack and "B"rown faculty. (Or is it "B"lack and brown? One forgets.) Broadly speaking, there's a movement afoot in my field to end the blind review of manuscripts, as blind review makes it more difficult to discriminate against white people.

Perhaps these steps are necessary. I am agnostic on the matter. But let's not pretend that they don't affect me negatively, or that my professional life wouldn't be better if I could take advantage of them.

Encouragement to apply is not evidence of superior job outcomes. (Nor are designated funding opportunities, for that matter). It would be "sloppy thinking" to conflate the two.

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 08, 2020, 10:46:41 AM
Encouragement to apply is not evidence of superior job outcomes. (Nor are designated funding opportunities, for that matter). It would be "sloppy thinking" to conflate the two.

Please help me understand your parenthetical sentence, which seems to state that "designated funding opportunities" are not evidence of "superior job outcomes."  What are "superior job outcomes"?  The phrase's connection to the application process in your first sentence indicates that it refers to one's chances of getting a job.  That makes sense.  But to say that "designated funding opportunities" don't contribute to one's chances of getting a job is nonsensical.  By definition, the people who get that designated funding already have the job.

Quote from: writingprof on August 08, 2020, 12:55:16 PM


Please help me understand your parenthetical sentence, which seems to state that "designated funding opportunities" are not evidence of "superior job outcomes."  What are "superior job outcomes"?  The phrase's connection to the application process in your first sentence indicates that it refers to one's chances of getting a job.  That makes sense.  But to say that "designated funding opportunities" don't contribute to one's chances of getting a job is nonsensical.  By definition, the people who get that designated funding already have the job.

Your original claim was that your professional life would have been much easier if you'd been Black. It's not clear to me that the mere existence of specially-designated funding opportunities would make this true, especially if it's not the case that all or the majority or a significant chunk of funding opportunities are reserved for people who aren't like you.

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 08, 2020, 01:14:57 PM

Quote from: writingprof on August 08, 2020, 12:55:16 PM


Please help me understand your parenthetical sentence, which seems to state that "designated funding opportunities" are not evidence of "superior job outcomes."  What are "superior job outcomes"?  The phrase's connection to the application process in your first sentence indicates that it refers to one's chances of getting a job.  That makes sense.  But to say that "designated funding opportunities" don't contribute to one's chances of getting a job is nonsensical.  By definition, the people who get that designated funding already have the job.

Your original claim was that your professional life would have been much easier if you'd been Black. It's not clear to me that the mere existence of specially-designated funding opportunities would make this true, especially if it's not the case that all or the majority or a significant chunk of funding opportunities are reserved for people who aren't like you.

If there are lots of qualified candidates from a group for whom there are "specially-designated funding opportunities", then they're not neccesary. If there aren't lots of qualified candidates from a group for whom there are "specially-designated funding opportunities", then it's basically a shoe-in.

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 08, 2020, 01:14:57 PM

Quote from: writingprof on August 08, 2020, 12:55:16 PM


Please help me understand your parenthetical sentence, which seems to state that "designated funding opportunities" are not evidence of "superior job outcomes."  What are "superior job outcomes"?  The phrase's connection to the application process in your first sentence indicates that it refers to one's chances of getting a job.  That makes sense.  But to say that "designated funding opportunities" don't contribute to one's chances of getting a job is nonsensical.  By definition, the people who get that designated funding already have the job.

Your original claim was that your professional life would have been much easier if you'd been Black. It's not clear to me that the mere existence of specially-designated funding opportunities would make this true, especially if it's not the case that all or the majority or a significant chunk of funding opportunities are reserved for people who aren't like you.

As a white person, I have access to the main pot of money.  As a black person, I would have access to the main pot of money (and, let's face it, the informal boosterism of the people who give it out) and a separate pot of money.  I will let others decide which is the preferable situation.

I remember in the years after 9/11 there was one state university system that told me they did not have "regular" Ph.D. fellowships due to budget cutting, only the "named" variety, which were invariably for a specific group or to "enhance diversity" in general. There was no "general" or "main" pool of money.

Quote

Your original claim was that your professional life would have been much easier if you'd been Black. It's not clear to me that the mere existence of specially-designated funding opportunities would make this true, especially if it's not the case that all or the majority or a significant chunk of funding opportunities are reserved for people who aren't like you.

Quote
As a white person, I have access to the main pot of money.  As a black person, I would have access to the main pot of money (and, let's face it, the informal boosterism of the people who give it out) and a separate pot of money.  I will let others decide which is the preferable situation.

I'm surprised that the statement that someone's career would be better if they were black isn't being challenged here by more than one person or two.  There are sizeable numbers of studies that suggest ways in which race plays a role in educational attainment.  Starting in prek, Black boys are more likely to be expelled for behaviors that don't lead to expulsion for whites, Black kids are less likely to be tracked into advanced math in k-12, realtors are less likely to show Black families certain more desirable properties (that might be located near better schools.)  To say that someone's career would be more successful if they were Black seems to be ignoring a lot of accumulated evidence on the determinants of educational success.

I think the issue is that people who think their careers would be better if they were Black generally think they would be exactly the same person they are now, only Black, with no internalization of the fact the institutionalized inequities mean that their life experiences up to this point might be very different. I've consider weighing in several times, but have been dissuaded by the suspicion that people who insist on using the construct "B"lack are unlikely to be arguing in good faith.

Quote from: Hibush on August 08, 2020, 07:12:06 AM

Quote from: Stockmann on August 07, 2020, 04:04:51 PM
[
If a category is ancestry-based, and belonging to it, or not belonging to it, confers advantages (whether official or not), including related to employment, then of course people will try to game the system, from using the most tenuous connections to outright making stuff up. The census, which doesn't confer any advantages, has surely far more honest answers than college applications (and by "honest" I mean "not deliberate fabrications or exaggerations").

...College applicants need to be candid, since the organization asking has specific intentions in regard to the category and need relevant information.

In comparison, when it comes to grades colleges rely on transcripts, not candor.

QuoteOn another thread, we discussed some open-membership group allowing people to identify as they chose. They have the authority to make that decision, and get to accept the consequences of accepting the various judgements members make. I don't think there is a huge risk to the organization from this choice.

The risk is not to the organization, and in the case of an open-membership thing no-harm-no-foul probably applies. But in other instances, matters are competitive - admitting someone to college means a place that can't be offered to someone else, hiring someone means a job that can't be offered to someone else. 

Quote from: writingprof on August 08, 2020, 05:25:38 PM

As a white person, I have access to the main pot of money.  As a black person, I would have access to the main pot of money (and, let's face it, the informal boosterism of the people who give it out) and a separate pot of money.  I will let others decide which is the preferable situation.

Yes, one and one pot of money make two pots of money, and two pots are more than one pot. But the question is whether having access to two pots of money at that point in the system makes up for the disadvantages you face elsewhere in the system (perhaps even with respect to accessing the main pot of money).

By way of analogy: Canadians have access to postdoctoral funding from the federal government, and at least in theory Canadian schools are supposed to preferentially hire Canadian candidates. If you're an American looking for a job, then it might seem like you'd be better off as a Canadian, since you'd then have access to the American market plus the Canadian perks. But when you look more closely, what you'll find is that (1) American institutions are also supposed to preferentially hire Americans, and as a preference it's as real in the US as it is in Canada (i.e. basically irrelevant for research institutions and elite SLACs, basically real for CCs, etc.), (2) Americans also have some access to government postdoctoral funding, (3) "foreign" applicants are systematically disadvantaged at a number of American institutions which can't be bothered with the VISA complications (many of these aren't even aware of TN visas!), and (4) the Canadian academic market is tiny, even for sessional work. So it's not clear you'd actually come out ahead by being Canadian, when all is said and done. You'd be better off as a dual citizen, or an American with Canadian permanent residency. But as just one or the other? The newly-minted American academic is almost certainly better off.

As Dismal and onthefringe rightly point out, you haven't properly balanced your considerations and considered all the appropriate factors:

Quote from: Dismal on August 09, 2020, 10:38:58 AM

I'm surprised that the statement that someone's career would be better if they were black isn't being challenged here by more than one person or two.  There are sizeable numbers of studies that suggest ways in which race plays a role in educational attainment.  Starting in prek, Black boys are more likely to be expelled for behaviors that don't lead to expulsion for whites, Black kids are less likely to be tracked into advanced math in k-12, realtors are less likely to show Black families certain more desirable properties (that might be located near better schools.)  To say that someone's career would be more successful if they were Black seems to be ignoring a lot of accumulated evidence on the determinants of educational success.

Quote from: onthefringe on August 09, 2020, 10:56:12 AM
I think the issue is that people who think their careers would be better if they were Black generally think they would be exactly the same person they are now, only Black, with no internalization of the fact the institutionalized inequities mean that their life experiences up to this point might be very different. I've consider weighing in several times, but have been dissuaded by the suspicion that people who insist on using the construct "B"lack are unlikely to be arguing in good faith.

Quote from: Parasaurolophus on August 09, 2020, 11:37:52 AM
.

By way of analogy: Canadians have access to postdoctoral funding from the federal government, and at least in theory Canadian schools are supposed to preferentially hire Canadian candidates. If you're an American looking for a job, then it might seem like you'd be better off as a Canadian, since you'd then have access to the American market plus the Canadian perks. But when you look more closely, what you'll find is that (1) American institutions are also supposed to preferentially hire Americans, and as a preference it's as real in the US as it is in Canada (i.e. basically irrelevant for research institutions and elite SLACs, basically real for CCs, etc.),

This is a good illustration of the idea that "privilege" is context-specific.

Back in the day, the Chronicle fora used to have an ongoing thread on 'Anti-Affirmative Action', or something like that, but it did not really survive the change to the newer tech in 2006, largely because, ahem, the reaction to those criticizing AA was, ahem, consistently, ah, er, well.... let's just say 'unedifying'.   Heck, it was only somewhat less unedifying when people like me said that we ought to junk all existing AA formulae and replace them with a strictly class-based AA instead.   Like it or not, AA exists, and it is not based on class, but rather on inborn characteristics, one of which is not 'white male'.   As long as this remains the case, well, it remains unambiguously true that white males in academia face a hurdle that, well, no one else has to cross.   I do not like this, especially because, well, I would largely have qualified for a class-based AA as a younger man/ grad student, etc., and certainly would now, but whether I like it or not, it is the case nonetheless.  And it will not do to criticize those who point this out, even if, as occasionally has been the case here, those doing so do it inartfully, or even obnoxiously.

Quote from: marshwiggle on August 09, 2020, 12:54:48 PM


This is a good illustration of the idea that "privilege" is context-specific.

I think you'll find that explitily acknowledged in the literature on social privilege. Peggy McIntosh, for one, was pretty clear about it in her touchstone essay. The discussion grew up closely intertwined with the discussion on intersectionality.

Taking intersectionality seriously leads inexorably to individualism! :-)

kaysixteen, I have no problem with white males being as obnoxious as possible in pointing out that this is AA is an inherently racist policy. The only way to get it to go away is to impose such reputational cost on the policy that no one would want to be perceived as even potentially benefiting from it. You're not even allowed to point out factual aspects of AA affecting admissions decisions in many venues. At least a couple forums (many college related on reddit and at top-law-schools.com) have policies that automatically block someone if critiquing AA.

Quote from: onthefringe on August 09, 2020, 10:56:12 AM
I think the issue is that people who think their careers would be better if they were Black generally think they would be exactly the same person they are now, only Black, with no internalization of the fact the institutionalized inequities mean that their life experiences up to this point might be very different.

I openly admit this.  Many "B"lack people in academe traveled a harder road to get here.  I grant it.  However, those who made it are now granted opportunities that I am denied, at my expense, at every step.  Furthermore, "B"lack people whose upbringing was similar to mine (two-parent home, upper-middle class) are among the luckiest people in the history of the world, receiving, as they do, all the benefits of reverse-racism and none of the disadvantages it's meant to counter.

Quote from: writingprof on August 10, 2020, 06:07:37 AM

Quote from: onthefringe on August 09, 2020, 10:56:12 AM
I think the issue is that people who think their careers would be better if they were Black generally think they would be exactly the same person they are now, only Black, with no internalization of the fact the institutionalized inequities mean that their life experiences up to this point might be very different.

I openly admit this.  Many "B"lack people in academe traveled a harder road to get here.  I grant it.  However, those who made it are now granted opportunities that I am denied, at my expense, at every step.  Furthermore, "B"lack people whose upbringing was similar to mine (two-parent home, upper-middle class) are among the luckiest people in the history of the world, receiving, as they do, all the benefits of reverse-racism and none of the disadvantages it's meant to counter.

It's interesting that many of the people who argue strongly against research on characteristics like IQ , crime rate, etc. when the results are broken down by identity groups on the grounds that group averages don't indicate individual characteristics, (which is of course absolutely correct), are the same people advocating for things like AA on the grounds that the suffering experienced by members of groups is universal enough that individual variations are irrelevant (which, as pointed out above, is ridiculous).

We want everyone to be treated as an individual, until it comes time to judge a double murderer or pick a VP, then identity goes into overdrive.

Quote from: financeguy on August 10, 2020, 12:28:28 PM
We want everyone to be treated as an individual, until it comes time to judge a double murderer or pick a VP, then identity goes into overdrive.

If affirmative action were limited to those categories, I would happily accept it.