[systemstops]

"If these are the conditions under which passionate creative problem solving thrives, then of course we must recover them to make software great again. But they are not."

This doesn't make any sense. Obviously those conditions lead to incredible thriving in the past. This guy is basically arguing that because it doesn't work now (in a super diverse globalized world) that it never actually worked.

These are the same kind of "they just got lucky" arguments I see constantly to downplay the achievements of any specific group of people.

[munificent]

There is an infinitely long list of things that were part of the environment when that kind of passionate creative problem solving in software was thriving.

What the author is saying is that not all of those properties were causative to make software great again.

Do we need people to have enough of a safety net to take risks with entrepreneurship? Yes. Do we need enough regulation to prevent entrenched companies from using regulatory capture to stifle competition while having little enough regulation that small companies can spin up and be nimble? Yes.

Do we need to be listening to N'Sync, wearing JNCOs, watching Beavis and Butthead, and drinking Crystal Pepsi? Probably not. Those were in the air, but not causative.

And, certainly, I see little evidence to support the implicit claim in "anti-woke" that somehow sexism, homophobia, and racism were causative factors that enabled entrepreneurialism to thrive a few decades ago.

[systemstops]

People still argue what things made a small city state (Athens) suddenly become the cornerstone of western civilization. That fact is that we have these explosions of human potential where certain groups of people in certain environments make massive leaps, and we don't what the magic sauce is. It's great when it happens, but It's foolish to think that we can somehow socially engineer the same results through brute force, which is the problem with DEI thinking. That is also why so many companies are silently ditching those policies.

[munificent]

DEI is not about brute forcing an environment for success, at all. That's not the goal even a little bit.

DEI is about recognizing that our culture has placed some people at a disadvantage by virtue of properties they have no control over and attempting to remedy that imbalance.

[systemstops]

Based on the theory that gaps between groups are caused by systemic factors. The gaps exist, so an explanation and fix is needed, which is morally commendable. The problem is that the theory is far too overconfident and completely ignores the fact that the gaps also show up in cognitive testing.

[munificent]

The foundational document of our nation's government literally treats Native Americans as non-people and slaves (who were overwhelmingly of African descent) as 3/5 of a person.

The majority of Black people in the US are literally descended from people who were brought here as slaves. Half of the country was so attached to the idea of being able to own Black people and treat them as property that they started a civil war to hold onto it.

This is the country that was founded on enslaved Black people, created the Trail of Tears, and placed Japanese-Americans in concentration camps.

It shouldn't be very hard to figure out an explanation for why certain races in the US have historically been at a disadvantage.

[systemstops]

Both things can be true. That fact is that some groups that were discriminated against now thrive, and some don't (even after trillions of dollars in public spending). That is why cognitive testing is helpful at figuring out what is going on.

New ideas, such as the US was "founded on enslaved Black people" really only gained attention the last few years because of our inability to solve the gaps. People wanted an explanation, so the past had to be retconned. The other Anglo colonies - Canada, Australia, New Zealand - never had slavery and ended up about as well off as the US.

[Jensson]

If the remedy is to force environments then both are true at once.