Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: me@csri.toronto.edu (Daniel R. Simon)
Subject: Re: Hiring quotas and faculty positions
Organization: CSRI, University of Toronto
Date: 14 Sep 92 19:10:33 GMT

In article <13SEP199214042085@jetson.uh.edu> schieber@jetson.uh.edu (Schieber, Jay D.) writes:
>In article <1992Sep12.165734.11038@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu>, me@csri.toronto.edu (Daniel R. Simon) writes...
>>In article <10SEP199219073072@jetson.uh.edu> schieber@jetson.uh.edu (Schieber, Jay D.) writes:
>>>Finally, given the dubious criteria that are often used to 
>>>hire candidates, and the very large number of complicated
>>>criteria that are valid (filling "holes" in research area
>>>or "teaching", exciting new collaborations, etc), using the
>>>two above-mentioned criteria in addition to the others seems
>>>perfectly valid to me.  In fact, I would say if you wish to
>>>minimize criteria which you feel are "poor", I would 
>>>suggest looking at all of them first.  I suspect that by
>>>the time you do away with those which are worse, this last
>>>one will pretty much take care of itself.
>>>
>>>Note that I have not even referred to the help such a criterion
>>>has in reducing the power of the "old boys network".
>> 
>>Naturally.  After all, if the hiring process is such a messy, fuzzy
>>business, full of "poor" and "dubious criteria", then why should
>>favoritism towards members of the "old boys network" be of any
>>particular concern?  Perhaps some women and minorities might get
>>shortchanged--but, then, isn't it all, as one poster put it, just a
>>"crap shoot", anyway?  True, the "old boys network" might occasionally
>>prefer a well-connected white male or two--but if the alternative
>>selection process is so full of "complicated" and "dubious" criteria
>>that a bit of extra racism and sexism isn't even worth complaining
>>about, then it's hard to see why the criteria used by the Guardians of
>>the White Male Power Structure (ability to fraternize with "the boys",
>>and so on) are any less "valid".  So why not just let them *keep*
>>their "power", instead of going to such infernal trouble to "reduce"
>>it?
>> 
>> 
>>Thus does the logic of "remedial" preferential treatment defeat
>>itself.
>
>Frankly, I find the above argument to fall of its own weight without
>refutation.  The point is simple: the current system is flawed, and
>can be improved.  If you do not wish to work on it, do not.  I find
>AA to be a perfectly reasonable attempt to improve the situation.

....Except that when it is pointed out that this "perfectly reasonable
attempt to improve the situation" has the fatal flaw of exacerbating
the very problem it is intended to ameliorate, by perpetuating the
previous pattern of racial, ethnic and sex discrimination that it
purports to counteract, the most frequent rejoinder (repeated ad
nauseam during the debate in this newsgroup, for instance) is that it
worsens matters no more than many other "dubious" practices which are
equally commonly employed.  It is this defense of AA (the one most
frequently presented in this debate, by my count) that in fact argues 
*against* AA's very rationale, by suggesting that discrimination on 
the basis of sex and race is not particularly worse than many other 
"dubious" hiring practices.

Personally, I consider such discrimination to be an abomination, and I
am saddened at how many obviously thoughtful, high-minded people see
so little wrong with it.  Then again, such widespread tolerance among
the morally serious of flagrant discrimination by race and sex is
hardly without historical precedent.


>For the record, I am not referring to "remedial preferential treatment".

The practice to which *I* was referring was the practice of including
preference for candidates of a particular race, ethnicity or gender as
a criterion in university hiring, acceptance or promotion.  This
practice was endorsed by the poster to whom I responded.  I honestly
don't care if it is from now on identified as "doing the most blessed,
decent, kind and righteous thing on earth" (DMBDKRTOE), as long as we
all know what we mean by it.


"There *is* confusion worse than death"		Daniel R. Simon
			     -Tennyson		(me@theory.toronto.edu)