Posted on 01/15/2003 1:13:13 PM PST by Dog
President to speak shortly...
I don't see what this has to do with race. A Swede or Chinaman's culture is far more different from mine than an African American's is likely to be. We don't import opinionated foreigners so we can get their perspectives, even though it would be a far more efficient way of getting diversity.
If you introduce those different points of view into a college class, then the quality of classroom discussion can, and probably will, be better than if the class consisted of kids from the same racial and economic background.
Maybe. Or maybe the ideas will be trite recapitulations of what they've heard in the media.
In any case, it really depends on the field. I don't give a tinker's damn what my students' ideas are on the Second Law of Thermodynamics. They're either correct, or incorrect (or, most likely, they've never heard of the second law), but it really doesn't matter; they can either learn and learn to apply the second law, or they can fail the class. So can we dispense with 'diversity' in the sciences?(please!)
The idea that a group of immature youngsters, sitting around and expressing almost completely uninformed opinions on a subject of which they know next-to-nothing, amounts to education is a comical one, when you think about it. Sure, there are some pedagogical purposes to a Socratic method of teaching (IMNSHE, it's a good way of keeping 'em awake), but Socrates, AFAIK, never asked Phoenicians into his class to provide a 'non-Greek' perspective. I doubt Socrates would have believed ideas depend on origins.
Your comments offer very little, one way or the other. As for importing foreigners, I initially had that in there, too, but decided to leave it out: this is a discussion about American citizens.
Your second comment is useless. "It might, or it might not." Speaking from personal experience, it does offer a better discussion.
You're of course speaking as a technical guy -- which says a lot more about you than it does about the quality of, say, an ethics class.
He can't be everywhere at once, but WE certainly are!!
Thanks. I could have added that importing black kids into a class to provide a 'minority' perspective is patronizing and demeaning. They're there to learn, just like anyone else. Personally, I'd resent being categorized as having certain ideas or even a different 'perspective' because of my race.
You're of course speaking as a technical guy -- which says a lot more about you than it does about the quality of, say, an ethics class.
My philosopher friends tell me that ethics is a technical subject too. Students can sometimes help each other learn or understand, though that's better done outside a formal classroom setting; but I don't expect them to come up with valid ideas in ethics that Kant might have missed.
I was around in the eighties when the whole 'diversity' scam was being formulated. I literally watched it happen. It's a blatant attempt to get around race-blind, equal treatment policies based on merit, and a way to grab power for identity politicians who can then dole out preferences to their particular sub-groups, be they black, hispanic, women, homosexuals, or whatever.
If you introduce those different points of view into a college class, then the quality of classroom discussion can, and probably will, be better than if the class consisted of kids from the same racial and economic background.
I have extensive experience with all socioeconomic and racial strata, personally and professionally.
Your justification(s) of "diversity" are nonsense, and patronizing racist nonsense, at that.
Obviously, many people have different points of view than I do. My life and my intellect have ben immeasurably enhanced by exposure to many points of view.
I do not, however, subscribe to the notion that because someone is black that they are more likely to have a "different point of view" than a white person. This is a glaring example of stereotyping, ascribing an intellectual or political opinion to someone because their skin is different than yours.
How can you possibly know what is someone's point of view before you know them? For shame!
What -- you're saying that people from different racial, cultural, and socioeconomic backgrounds don't look at the world differently?
That's hopelessly out of step with what your own experience should have told you.
Your loud protestations and silly accusations are proof enough to me that you know you're wrong.
You're dodging the point again. Nobody said anything about "black kids" except you.
My comments made no such distinction. However, real life experience tells us that racial, cultural, and socioeconomic background does influence how people approach life. Such a diversity of views in a college setting can and often does provide a richer experience for all involved, which makes it something to be desired.
You, however, apparently do not want to admit this possibility, which explains the irrelevance of the rest of your post.
As we all agree, a desire for diversity does not justify quotas, nor does it justify wholesale discrimination. But it does give an admissions department something else to think about and strive for.
There are two major recipients of preferences in the US: blacks and hispanics. We were talking about race, not ethnicity, so that rules out hispanics. AHA! traps are not an honest way to argue.
However, real life experience tells us that racial, cultural, and socioeconomic background does influence how people approach life. Such a diversity of views in a college setting can and often does provide a richer experience for all involved, which makes it something to be desired.
I've disputed that. Repeating it over and over doesn't strengthen the point. My experience (and I've been in colleges of one sort or another for the last 30 years) tells me otherwise. I think it makes next to no difference. If it were really true, proponents of diversity would not have to spend so much time repeating it.
As I said already, I teach science classes. I've taught at every level from General Chemistry and 'Science for poets' courses to advanced graduate courses. There mare few enough 'underrepresented' groups in these courses to begin with. I've seen no evidence that the non-white, non-Anglo kids made any more of a conribution than the white, Anglo kids.
You, however, apparently do not want to admit this possibility, which explains the irrelevance of the rest of your post.
It's not that I don't want to admit the possibility; it's that I've looked at it and discarded it. As, for example, have several of the Conservative organizations involved in the Michigan case.
By the way, if the post is irrelevant, you need to show it's irrelevant. Just repeating the same claim does not add to the argument.
Now, this is the second time you have posted an argument about what my experience should have taught me.
This is an unanswerable argument-I can only discuss what my experience has actually taught me. I cannot accept that I should argue from the premise of your opinion about what my opinion should be.
My extensive experience has taught me to reject your premise that persons from minority backgrounds are different from me, so different that by virtue of their background, without reference to their actual human selves that they will provide me with experiences, insights, and "points of view" not otherwise obtainable.
This is racist garbage, and that's all it is. I am an educated man, and nothing human is alien to me. It is much more stimulating to interact with others, be they black, red, brown, yellow, or white, who have something to say rather than to pat myself on the back about how broad my social interactions are because I hang out with dark-skinned people.
Do you realize how inferior you must actually take black folks to be-that your projections have taken the place of their actuality?
For you, they are all Invisible Men, whose reality is submerged in your psychological projective system.
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