[floor2]

> I’ve never seen a proposal win or lose, or even change positions in a tie break, based on that content

This is an absolutely wild statement, because my experience has been the complete opposite. I've seen a zillion times where a straight white guy was passed over specifically to achieve DEI goals.

I don't think the pro-DEI crowd understands how discriminatory DEI initiatives became in many institutions and how that's the root of the anti-DEI backlash.

I've lost count of the number of times I've seen the best X (candidate, project, company, whatever) get rejected because they were unacceptably white and male, so that the job/grant/contract could go to a DEI candidate instead.

Heck, I was on an interview committee where the recruiters and hiring manager openly admitted they weren't interviewing male candidates, and we spent 3 months interviewing 100% of female candidates who applied while hundreds of male applicants got ghosted. That one was more explicit than most, but the same phenomenon has been happening for years at every layer of academia, business and government.

[advisedwang]

The post your are talking about is specifically about NSF proposals. Your experience with interviewing, project choice, contracting or whatever you are referring to is a different thing. It's not so wild to imagine that a different thing has different practices.

[maxlybbert]

I think you’re talking about something different.

Regardless of which ethnic group, sexual orientation, nationality, etc. I belong to, if I want to get an NSF grant, I have to fill out certain paperwork. And, apparently, it’s expected that I would write how my proposal will make the world a better place based on how it impacts DEI factors. The comment is that it doesn’t actually matter what I say there, since everybody says the same thing. There’s never a case where the NSF isn’t sure about whether to grant funds, and then decides that the way one project impacts DEI makes it better than another project.

[squigz]

I've never found this argument of the anti-DEI crowd to be very convincing, because it inherently implies that without DEI measures, such decisions would be entirely meritocratic.

[prepend]

I think the argument is that while there was suspicion and implicit lack of meritocratic procedures before the initiatives, after doubt was removed.

For example, I just started in the 90s and worked in tech but I never heard an HR person or hiring manager say “we’re only going to interview applicants of a majority race” but after initiatives, it became common to hear this toward an underrepresented race or gender.

I want a diverse workforce. But explicitly discriminating to attempt to fix the problem is a bad way that makes people angry. I think it’s better to work on systemic fixes (more graduates, more training programs, etc).

[ZeroGravitas]

You're making a case against racism happening in the 90s, but you also think that if racism was happening in the nineties then the people doing it would have announced in public "FYI everyone I'm doing the racism now" which makes you seem somewhat detached from reality.

[prepend]

That’s not what I’m saying. Racism happened in the 90s, but it wasn’t explicit discrimination. Explicitly discriminating against certain races now is something new.

Two things can be bad at the same time: implicit racism then and now; explicit racism just now.

[eli_gottlieb]

> But explicitly discriminating to attempt to fix the problem is a bad way that makes people angry.

It's also illegal under the Civil Rights Act.

[prepend]

I think so too. It surprised me how people could do things like this and not be sued under the CRA.

[squigz]

> after doubt was removed.

This really isn't quite the universal experience many in this crowd seem to make it out to be.

[floor2]

Perhaps it would help if you considered concepts like "more and less".

Without DEI measures (as implemented by many American institutions in recent years) such decisions would be more meritocratic.

There's still nepotism and rich parents and connections and luck and a whole bunch of random biases by the people making decisions. The point is that while in theory DEI was supposed to be a counter to those forces, in practice it has just become another source of unfairness and injustice.

[AnthonyMouse]

> There's still nepotism and rich parents and connections and luck and a whole bunch of random biases by the people making decisions. The point is that while in theory DEI was supposed to be a counter to those forces, in practice it has just become another source of unfairness and injustice.

And it tends to lead to a specific result: A number of slots are assigned for each group but then the set of people with rich parents are disproportionately from one group, so nepotism fills all of that group's slots. Then you get a 0% reduction in nepotism and instead the people without rich parents, but from the same demographic group, are the ones excluded. Which quite justifiably makes them mad.

[joshuamorton]

This doesn't follow.

Are you certain that "DEI programs" (which themselves are a wide range of things, from explicit preferences to hire veterans in US Government jobs to as described ineffective NSF rigamarole) are causing overall less meritocracy, or is it just a particularly visible form, some less qualified black people are getting in instead of equally unqualified white people, and that's notable, while the well qualified folks who get in but wouldn't be considered otherwise aren't noticed because they don't make the news.

[Manuel_D]

I'm not sure about th NSF, but at 3 of the 4 companies I worked at DEI initiatives were explicitly discriminatory. One prohibited white and Asian men from a segment of our headcount. Another set specific percentage quotas for women in OKRs (and those quotas were well above women's industry representation). And another prohibited offers being made until a certain number of women and URM were interviewed for a given role.

Not every form of discrimination involves lowering hiring standards. For instance, imagine I flip a coin whenever a Catholic candidate applies. Tails, their resume goes into the garbage bin, heads and their application process as normal. Does this lower lower hiring standards for non Catholics? No. Does this advantage non-Catholics over Catholic candidates? Yes. It would halve the hiring rate of Catholics, though it doesn't result in any "lowering the bar".

I'm not accusing you personally of doing this, but equating discrimination with lowered standards is a common tactic to try and stigmatize the acknowledgement of discriminatory DEI practices.