Propaganda Scholarship and Orwellian "Diversity" in Academia
A Wooden Stake Essay
OVERVIEW
In this essay, I expose the deeply misleading and misguided academic rhetoric around diversity, and highlight how the policies and practices that it emphasizes are likely illegal. I do this through a wooden stake essay. These are essays that debunk a small piece of a published academic article, called such because, metaphorically, they drive a wooden stake through the heart of academic claims that suck the blood out of social science. For previous wooden stake essays, go here or here.
The particular article in question is this one:
A Shapeshifting Vampire: Orwellian Progressive “Diversity”
But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought. George Orwell
First, let’s identify the vampire doing the bloodsucking.1 The first several pages of this publication are a discourse on the meaning of “diversity.” Their first paragraph acknowledges the original and still-common use of the term diversity:
The Oxford dictionary defines diversity as “a range of many people or things that are very different from each other” (Oxford Dictionary, 2022). Notably, this lay definition implies that any quality that is different can contribute to diversity.
So far, so good. Nothing vampirish or Orwellian here. But then they pivot:
Yet, these broad definitions omit or downplay demographic subgroups legally protected from discrimination, such as ethnic and religious minorities.
Heh. Game on. Jesse Singal has a superb post titled “People Who Can’t Understand The Written Word Probably Shouldn’t Be In Academia.” Although there is no specific list of “people or things who are very different from each other,” the definition excludes nothing, and I posit that any sane moderately literate person who is not grinding a progressive ax would understand that the definition includes all sorts of minorities. Similarly, the only sense in which the definition can be viewed even as “downplaying” minorities is by virtue of not having a specific list of minorities or demographic statuses progressives generally believe deserve special treatment. Of course, if there were such a list in the definition, our sane, moderately literate person not grinding progressive axes would realize that it was not that the specifically listed minority groups were “included” or “not downplayed” — rather, it would be that they were being afforded special treatment by virtue of being listed (compared to the many groups that, in such a case, were not listed). This is painfully obvious.
They continue:
Although this might seem more inclusive of a wider range of individuals, does it simultaneously erase oppressed groups?
What type of scholar thinks this is a reasonable question? Ah, social justice. A universalistic, inclusive definition of diversity could “erase” oppressed groups. Universal civil rights protections have been in place since the 1960s — rather than having been “erased,” Black people are more prominent in American society and there are vastly more individuals in the U.S. from all sorts of ethnic and religious minority groups than than 60 years ago.
But then, the story gets even better. After correctly laying out the broad and general definition of “diversity” in their first paragraph, they reverse themselves, and start treating “progressive diversity” (my term, not theirs) as if it is the “traditional” (their word, not my) usage.
This shapeshifting can be seen here, where, instead of acknowledging that progressives imposed a new meaning on “diversity,” one that did not previously exist, progressive diversity becomes “traditional.” As if anyone invoking the older conception is somehow doing exactly what progressives have actually done — impose a new meaning on a word. Kirby et al again:
scholars have distinguished between two different types of diversity, seeking to understand their effects on workgroup performance. One conceptualization, alternatively labeled as “demographic” (Howard et al., 2022), “surface-level” (Mohammed & Angell, 2004), “relations-oriented” (Jackson et al., 1995), and “social category” (van Knippenberg et al., 2004) diversity, focuses on demographic group identities typically protected from discrimination, such as race, gender, and sexual orientation … we refer to this more traditional conceptualization of diversity in the US as the demographic definition of diversity. (emphasis mine).
This is progressive diversity and there is only one sense in which it is “traditional.” The U.S. Supreme Court first (hence SCOTUS) declared “diversity" to be an acceptable criteria for college admissions in its 1978 Bakke decision. Ever since, academics have “traditionally” conspired2 to exploit that decision to engage in group preferences (in admissions, hiring, invitation, funding, and more) that are almost certainly illegal and which clearly violate the normal English meaning of civil rights laws and SCOTUS decisions (more on this later in this essay).
Given Kirby et al’s confused perspective, however, what follows next is internally consistent. If the narrow progressive view of diversity they advocate is “traditional” then those who use the original broader definition are actually underhanded sneaks, unduly trying to “broaden” the meaning of diversity.
In this research, we distinguish between broadened definitions of diversity that include both demographic and nondemographic characteristics (broad + demographic definition) and ones that omit oppressed demographic groups entirely (broad definition).
Here you see the mischaracterization of definitions of diversity. Note the verb “broadened” — as if those who use the broad definition have actively done something to expand it, when, in fact, it has been progressives who have instituted the meaning-change by creating a narrower, political activist meaning that never previously existed (more on this later, too).
But they go further. They accuse those of us using the original meaning of “diversity” to refer to a wide variety of things or people as engaging in “concept creep”:
This potential shift toward an expanded definition of diversity represents a form of concept creep, or the extension of a concept to apply to a wider range of phenomena (Haslam, 2016).
and:
Broadening diversity would represent a horizontal expansion of the diversity concept, whereby diversity is defined in a way that includes qualitatively different characteristics (e.g., introversion) than the original social psychological and legal focus in the US (e.g., minoritized racial identities).
That those of us (including, as shall be seen, SCOTUS since 1978) who use “diversity” in its original meaning have “broadened” the concept in ways “qualitatively different” than the “original…legal focus in the U.S.,” is spectacularly wrong, as I shall show here. But first…
The Rhetoric and Policies Around Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
A just-published paper titled Politicizing Science Funding Undermines Public Trust in Science, Academic Freedom, and the Unbiased Generation of Knowledge addresses some of these issues in detail, and is worth quoting at some length. It captures the shapeshifting nature of this particular vampire:
There has been a broad effort to use science funding to further the “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” (DEI) agenda (Barabino et al., 2023; OSTP, 2022; EO 14091). While the terms “diversity,” “equity,” and “inclusion” connote lofty goals with which the majority of Americans agree, a close look at what is actually implemented under the DEI umbrella reveals that these words represent something entirely different.
Actual DEI policies do not promote viewpoint diversity, equitable treatment of individuals based on their accomplishments, or equal opportunity for individuals regardless of their identity (e.g., race, sex, ethnicity). It can scarcely be questioned (Krylov and Tanzman, 2024) that DEI programs today are driven by an ideology, an offshoot of Critical Social Justice1 (CSJ) (Pluckrose, 2021; Deichmann 2023). DEI programs elevate the collective above the individual. They group people into categories defined by immutable characteristics (race, sex, etc.) and classify each group as either “privileged” or “victimized,” as “oppressor” or “oppressed.” The goals of DEI programs are to have each group participate in proportion to their fraction of the population in every endeavor of society and to obtain proportionate outcomes from those endeavors. Disproportionate outcomes (with respect to science, such outcomes as publications, funding, citations, salaries, and awards), or disparities, are axiomatically ascribed to systemic factors, such as systemic racism and sexism, without consideration of alternative explanations (Sowell, 2019, 2023). Claims, such as “The presence of disparities is proof of systemic racism” and “Meritocracy is a myth” are propagated widely despite the vagueness of the claims and their lack of support by concrete data. Similarly, tenets that are central to DEI ideology—such as diversity is excellence, diverse teams outperform homogenous teams, and the advancement of women is impeded by biases—lack a robust evidence base, particularly when applied to science (Abbot et al., 2023; Krylov and Tanzman, 2023; Ceci et al., 2021, 2023).
After documenting how these initiatives now pervade U.S. federal funding agencies, they highlight this:
The NIH’s BRAIN initiative has implemented a requirement that, as part of the grant application, applicants submit a “Plan for Enhancing Diverse Perspectives (PEDP)” (NIH, 2021). NIH explains, however, that by “diverse perspectives,” they mean people, without regard to their scientific or scholarly perspectives.
Other NIH programs require similar DEI plans and reporting. For example, applicants are required to describe how their strategies for recruiting students and postdocs (“trainees,” in NIH's lingo) will increase the participation of underrepresented groups (NIH, 2023b, 2023).
Diversity perspectives in science sounds good, until the disingenuousness of the rhetoric is revealed to exclude all but demographic diversity. They continue later:
Based on feedback the authors have received from federal agencies, uncritical adoption of the doctrine of systemic racism is required, even if entirely unrelated, or even detrimental to, the proposed project. Similar to what has been observed in faculty hiring (Abbot et al., 2023; UC Berkeley, n.d.; Sailer, 2023a, 2023b; AFA, 2022; Brint and Frey, 2023; Brint, 2023), DEI statements informed by a doctrine of colorblindness and equal opportunity are generally rejected as “insufficient.”
While the goal of achieving equal opportunity is uncontroversial in the scientific community and in American society at large (Gramlich, 2023), equality of outcome—so-called “equity”—is not.
The paper makes some killer points about how federal agencies compelling scientists to profess fealty to DEI/CSJ doctrines that they do not believe are true probably violates First Amendment prohibitions against government compelled speech. Those points are beyond the scope of the present essay, but their next points are bullseye:
there are strict laws against discrimination on the basis of race and gender, both at federal and state levels. Thus, invoking DEI explicitly attempts to circumvent existing laws. Any actual “barriers” or “systemic discrimination” can be prosecuted under existing anti-discrimination statutes, following due process.
Direct evidence of the intent of funding agencies to consider race as a factor in funding was revealed in an NIH initiative from 2021. The NIH put out a notice encouraging black scientists and those from other underrepresented groups to fill out a box for race on the funding application, which would flag their application for further consideration “even if the quality score that peer-review panels award the proposal falls outside the cutoff for most grants” (Kaiser, 2021a). The initiative has since been rescinded (Kaiser, 2021b), but NIH continues to emphasize that “diversity of the teams” is an asset in funding decisions.
Funding agencies attempt to circumvent the laws prohibiting them from basing funding decisions on race or ethnicity by cloaking DEI requirements in nebulous language (NIH, 2019; Renoe, 2023) and by disguising racial preferences and even quotas as “diversity of backgrounds” and unequal treatment as “broadening participation of underrepresented groups.” The determination of which groups to treat as underrepresented and worthy of special treatment is highly subjective, as Americans hold many identities and can be split up in a multitude of ways. In practice, implementing equity-focused DEI programs means preferring members of some groups over others (Kendi, 2019). To paraphrase Orwell, all groups are equal, but some groups are more equal than others (Orwell, 1945).
And then they address the unintended side effect of politicizing science by compelling fealty to CSJ & DEI (and anything else):
DEI politicizes science, which erodes public trust in scientific institutions, scientists, and the entire scientific enterprise.
Public trust in institutions is essential for a functioning democracy. Science funding ultimately depends on the goodwill of the voting and tax-paying public. When federal funding agencies infuse political agendas into their function, they contribute to public mistrust in the process by which science is funded. When universities become complicit by subjugating their mission of truth seeking to ideologically driven DEI programs, they contribute to public mistrust in scientific institutions (Kennedy and Tyson, 2023). Should the public withdraw its support for science, loss of funding will ultimately ensue, with attendant detrimental consequences to the nation.
The politicization of science by DEI also erodes the trust in scientists and the scientific enterprise itself (Kahan, 2010, 2015) that is required for experts, the public, and legislators to effectively work together to solve pressing problems, such as climate, energy, and pandemics.
Time to take out the wooden stake to kill this particular vampire.
Preferential Treatment Based on Race, Sex, Ethnicity, or Religion is Illegal
U.S. civil rights law prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, sex, ethnicity and religion. It does not exclusively apply to groups progressives believe deserve special treatment or are “underrepresented,” “minoritized,” or “oppressed.” It protects everyone from discrimination based on their race, sex, ethnicity, and religion. Here is the key text from the 1964 law:
No person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color, or national origin, be exclued from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.
This clearly should apply to federal grants and probably applies to any institution of higher education that receives federal funding via student aid or loan programs, which is to say, nearly all.
The 1964 act continues:
It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
Note there is nothing here about specific groups (oppressed or otherwise). It is illegal to discriminate against individuals from oppressed groups, from non-oppressed groups, from oppressor groups, from underrepresented groups, from adequately represented groups, and from overrepresented groups because of their race, color, religion, sex or national origin.
The members of Congress who passed this legislation also anticipated how it might be misinterpreted and misused:
Nothing contained in this title shall be interpreted to require any employer … to grant preferential treatment to any individual or to any group because of the race, color, religion, sex, or national origin of such individual or group on account of an imbalance which may exist with respect to the total number or percentage of persons of any race, color, religion, sex, or national origin employed by any employer…in comparison with the total number or percentage of persons of such race, color, religion, sex, or national origin in any community, State, section, or other area, or in the available work force in any community, State, section or other area.
Enter Diversity: The Bakke & Grutter SCOTUS Decisions
The 1978 Bakke and 2002 Grutter SCOTUS decisions permitted diversity to be used as one factor in college admissions. But what did they mean by “diversity”? Did they mean the type of progressive diversity that Kirby et al championed and characterized as “traditional”? Or did they mean diversity in the actual original meaning of the word? The text from those decisions is vividly clear. From Bakke:
The atmosphere of "speculation, experiment and creation" so essential to the quality of higher education is widely believed to be promoted by a diverse student body. As the Court noted in Keyishian, it is not too much to say that the "nation's future depends upon leaders trained through wide exposure" to the ideas and mores of students as diverse as this Nation of many peoples.
“Students as diverse as this Nation of many peoples.” This is not some narrow form of demographic diversity or something restricted to “oppressed” or “underrepresented” groups, it is diversity writ large. Contrast this with the state of political diversity within academia:
This part of the 1978(!!) Bakke decision bears repeating:
the "nation's future depends upon leaders trained through wide exposure" to the ideas and mores of students as diverse as this Nation of many peoples.
Academia has failed miserably at achieving the diversity embraced in Bakke.
Bakke continued:
Ethnic diversity, however, is only one element in a range of factors a university properly may consider in attaining the goal of a heterogeneous student body.
and:
The diversity that furthers a compelling state interest encompasses a far broader array of qualifications and characteristics, of which racial or ethnic origin is but a single, though important, element. Petitioner's special admissions program, focused solely on ethnic diversity, would hinder, rather than further, attainment of genuine diversity.
Nothing quite says “we are using the broader” definition of diversity that “encompasses a far broader array of qualifications and characteristics…” than merely racial or ethnic ones.
This emphasis on the original, dare I say, “traditional,” understanding of diversity as quite broad was repeated in Grutter:
The Law School [of Michigan, the defendant accused of racial discrimination] does not, however, limit in any way the broad range of qualities and experiences that may be considered valuable contributions to student body diversity. To the contrary, the 1992 policy makes clear “[t]here are many possible bases for diversity admissions,” and provides examples of admittees who have lived or traveled widely abroad, are fluent in several languages, have overcome personal adversity and family hardship, have exceptional records of extensive community service, and have had successful careers in other fields. The Law School seriously considers each “applicant’s promise of making a notable contribution to the class by way of a particular strength, attainment, or characteristic—e. g., an unusual intellectual achievement, employment experience, nonacademic performance, or personal background.” Id., at 83–84. All applicants have the opportunity to highlight their own potential diversity contributions through the submission of a personal statement, letters of recommendation, and an essay describing the ways in which the applicant will contribute to the life and diversity of the Law School.
If any of you know any academic programs that give students an admissions boost for “overcoming personal adversity” or “traveling widely” do let me know.
Discrimination is Illegal; Discrimination to Remedy Oppression is Illegal; Discrimination as Reparations is Illegal; Discrimination is Illegal (It bore repeating)
Bakke (all bold italics for emphasis are mine, not Bakke’s):
The guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment extend to all persons. Its language is explicit:
"No State shall . . . deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." It is settled beyond question that the rights created by the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment are, by its terms, guaranteed to the individual. The rights established are personal rights…The guarantee of equal protection cannot mean one thing when applied to one individual and something else when applied to a person of another color. If both are not accorded the same protection, then it is not equal.
Even in Bakke, the modern concept of “equity” (a term not in common use at the time) as mandated equal outcomes was declared illegal if it will be accomplished by discrimination. To hammer this point home, Grutter quoted from the Bakke passage shown above.
Bakke continues:
there are serious problems of justice connected with the idea of preference itself.
First, it may not always be clear that a socalled preference is, in fact, benign. Courts may be asked to validate burdens imposed upon individual members of a particular group in order to advance the group's general interest … Nothing in the Constitution supports the notion that individuals may be asked to suffer otherwise impermissible burdens in order to enhance the societal standing of their ethnic groups…there is a measure of inequity in forcing innocent persons in respondent's position to bear the burdens of redressing grievances not of their making.
and:
Hence, the purpose of helping certain groups whom the faculty of the Davis Medical School perceived as victims of "societal discrimination" does not justify a classification that imposes disadvantages upon persons like respondent, who bear no responsibility for whatever harm the beneficiaries of the special admissions program are thought to have suffered. To hold otherwise would be to convert a remedy heretofore reserved for violations of legal rights into a privilege that all institutions throughout the Nation could grant at their pleasure to whatever groups are perceived as victims of societal discrimination. That is a step **we have never approved.**
and later:
Disadvantaged applicants of all races must be eligible for sympathetic consideration, and no applicant may be rejected because of his race in favor of another who is less qualified, as measured by standards applied without regard to race.
Again, much of this analysis in Bakke was reaffirmed and quoted in Grutter.
No, Virginia, the “traditional” understanding of diversity was never special treatment of “oppressed” groups. Special treatment was widely illegalized by the 1964 Civil Rights act and its status as illegal was reaffirmed by Bakke and Grutter.
So What’s A Good Progessive to Do? Change the Meaning of Diversity!
If protection from racial, ethnic, religious and ethnic discrimination is not a special right afforded oppressed groups, but, instead, is afforded universally, how could progressives institute preferential treatment based on membership in an oppressed group? Step 1: Recognize that Bakke and Grutter did permit selection based on “diversity.” Step 2: Change the meaning of “diversity” so that it is restricted to membership in oppressed groups! I am not saying there was some Central Committee of Academia making this decision or conspiring in dark corners to change the definition. It was more like this: When SCOTUS affirmed “diversity” as a legal criteria for admissions, progressives broadly realized that this was the cracked opening in the door barring discrimination in the form of preferences based on “oppressed” or “marginalized” race, sex, etc. statuses. They then barged through that door and almost exclusively used “diversity” to engage in affirmative action/preferential selection/illegal discrimination, in academia and elsewhere. Now, “everyone in academia knows” (such as Kirby et al) that “diversity means membership in oppressed, marginalized, minoritized, or progressive term du jour groups.”
Once enough academics realized “we can pay lip service to diversity in the broad sense but simply treat SCOTUS diversity rulings as if they only apply to oppressed or underrepresented groups,” they could can institute discrimination favoring oppressed groups under the rhetorical umbrella of “diversity.” It may not be legal, but, hey, if one used vague enough language it would take a while for the rest of society to notice, and even longer for someone to bring a discrimination case, so this provided decades of license to engage in discrimination and call it “diversity”! Literally, decades. Bakke, which was the first case to permit diversity to be used in admissions was decided in 1978. It was not until 45 years later that the 2023 SCOTUS case (Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard; hence “Fair Admissions”) illegalized “diversity” as a criteria in admissions.
SCOTUS Sees Through the Rhetoric and What it Saw was Illegal Racial Discrimination
They did so because it became clear that diversity rhetoric and policies were being used to implement exactly the types of racial discrimination prohibited by the 14th Amendment, civil rights law, and the Bakke and Grutter decisions. As SCOTUS wrote in Fair Admissions:
Because Harvard’s and UNC’s admissions programs lack sufficiently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race, unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereotyping, and lack meaningful end points, those admissions programs cannot be reconciled with the guarantees of the Equal Protection Clause.
Roberts, writing the majority opinion:
In the wake of the Civil War, Congress proposed and the States ratified the Fourteenth Amendment, providing that no State shall “deny to any person . . . the equal protection of the laws.” To its proponents, the Equal Protection Clause represented a “foundation[al] principle”—“the absolute equality of all citizens of the United States politically and civilly before their own laws.” The Constitution, they were determined, “should not permit any distinctions of law based on race or color…”
and later:
The conclusion reached by the Brown Court was thus unmistakably clear: the right to a public education “must be made available to all on equal terms.” As the plaintiffs had argued, “no State has any authority under the equal-protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to use race as a factor in affording educational opportunities among its citizens.”
and especially:
Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it. And the Equal Protection Clause, we have accordingly held, applies “without regard to any differences of race, of color, or of nationality”—it is “universal in [its] application.”
Nothing quite says Kirby et al were spectacularly wrong in claiming that the law affords civil rights protections specifically or uniquely to members of oppressed groups as SCOTUS declaring such protections apply “universally.” One can only hope, by extension, the same reasoning will apply in hiring, other employment practices and grant funding. However, such cases have not yet been brought to SCOTUS, which means the progressives who rule the academic roost probably have years, maybe decades, to implement the rest of their “diversity” practices with impunity.
When Did “Diversity” Come to Have the Narrow Progressive Meaning?
Thus, the Kirby et al paper is a case study emblematic of the progressive Orwellian rewriting of history. The Orwellian use of “traditional” to refer to recently-invented3 progressive diversity in the Kirby et al paper inspired me to track down newer and older definitions of the word. When the Hell did “diversity” come to mean “oppressed groups”?
Modern Definitions of “Diversity”
The narrow progressive meaning of diversity is now embedded in many, perhaps most, English language dictionaries. Progressive definition is in bold italics. These were all retrieved on 7/19/24.
Dictionary.com:
the state or fact of being diverse; difference; unlikeness:
diversity of opinion.
variety; multiformity.
the spectrum of individual differences and the corresponding group memberships and identities that human beings have in society
the inclusion of individuals representing more than one national origin, color, religion, socioeconomic stratum, sexual orientation, etc
Oxford Dictionary Online
Oxford is ridiculously detailed and goes on for pages of stuff going back to the 14th century. I only present here the first definition and the progressive definition.
The quality, condition, or fact of being diverse or different; difference, dissimilarity; divergence.
The fact, condition, or practice of including or involving people from a range of different social and ethnic backgrounds, and (more recently) of different genders, sexual orientations, etc.
Merriam-Webster Online
the condition of having or being composed of differing elements : VARIETY, especially : the inclusion of people of different races, cultures, etc. in a group or organization
Older (Dare I Say It?) Traditional Definitions of Diversity Did Not Include the Progressive Meaning
Ok, this was one of the most interesting aspects of working on this post. I had to track down old definitions. I did this in two ways: 1. crowdsourcing this on X (formerly Twitter); 2. Going to web archiving services to find posts of old Websters dictionaries. Progressive diversity is nowhere to be found in older dictionaries.
First, some of the X posts:
Funk&Wagnalls, 1984, via @crazytinkas:
Random House, 1995, courtesy of @ShineboxHukster
As late as 2004, Oxford English Dictionary provides no progressive diversity variant, courtesy of
So then I started using web archiving services.4 I focused only on Websters to keep this effort tractable and to try to hone in on about when the progressive diversity variant first appeared. Websters, 1989:
As late as 2009, Webster’s did not include progressive diversity, and simply has diversity as the noun form of the adjective, diverse:
But by 2016, the progressive meaning of diversity does appear in Websters:
So certainly before about 2010, the only definition of diversity I found was the broad and general one. In the 1978 Bakke and 2002 Grutter SCOTUS decisions, they used diversity in its original (and then, only) broad sense. Some time around 2010 (plus or minus a few years), the dictionaries started incorporating the newer progressive meaning. Use of the original broad meaning of “diversity” is not concept creep. The progressive meaning of diversity is concept narrowing to “justify” the preferential treatment form of affirmative action.
Rewriting History
“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”
“Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.”
Orwell, 1984.
When declaring that those of us emphasizing the original, traditional, broader use of diversity engage in concept creep, and that such usage is “qualitatively different” than used in law, the Kirby et al paper, intentionally or not, rewrote the history of the meaning of “diversity.”
But it gets better. Enter Woke AI.
Woke AI Also Rewrites the History of the Meaning of Diversity
AI being bizarrely woke is, by now, well-known (Black, indigenous, and female Popes or Vikings; claiming its better for nuclear war to destroy humanity than to misgender Caitlyn Jenner, etc.). But I was more than a little taken aback when it also rewrote the history of definitions of diversity. You would think (or, rather, I did think) that basic text regurgitation would be one of the easiest things AI could do. Before tracking down old dictionaries, I actually asked ChatGPT to provide definitions of diversity from various dictionaries before 2000. I thought this would be a shortcut. Silly me. Here is what happened (my questions appear in upper right with some greyish background; ChatGPT’s answers follow below):
“Ok,” I figured, “its just gotten a bit confused, because I did not ask a sufficiently focused question. Let’s try again.”
Really?
So not only does it quote Merriam-Webster’s 1993 dictionary right after saying it cannot do so, it claims that M-W’s 1993 definition of diversity is the progressive one. So I went back to the web archive and tracked down Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (10th Edition, 1993):
Progressive diversity is nowhwere to be found. ChatGPT’s original answer, like the Kirby et al article, rewrote the history of the meaning of the word.
What’s at Stake Here
How the politicization of science and progressive activism corrupts scholarship and truth.
A demonstration of academic misinformation appearing in peer review.
A demonstration of how progressive activism directly engaged in Orwellian rewriting of history (whether progressives do this any more than anyone else, including those on the right, is beyond the scope of this essay).
Given how long it took me to read the Kirby et al article, track down the text of civil rights law and SCOTUS cases and old dictionaries, and wrangle with ChatGPT, Brandolini’s Law: It takes 1000 times more effort to debunk bullshit than to produce it.
If Kirby et al’s perspective on diversity was unique to their article, I would not have written this essay. Instead, I think they speak for and capture much of the deeply misguided, illegal, and immoral rhetoric, and, more important, policies and practices around diversity that have come to dominate academia.
Footnotes
Bloodsucking vampire. Kirby et al reported 4 studies assessing the effects of various types of organizational diversity statements on people of color and sexual minorities. The interpretation and meaning of their empirical findings is beyond the scope of this essay, which focuses narrowly on their discussion of the meaning of diversity. Wooden stake essays do not usually debunk an entire article and, instead, focus on one particularly portion that is spectularly wrong. Whether the entire article could or should be debunked is another question entirely.
Academics have “conspired” to exploit SCOTUS diversity rulings. This is not a conspiracy theory. Cabals of mustachio-twirling academics were not meeting in dark basements to figure out how to corrupt and exploit the rulings. Instead, this has been a grassroots effort largely born of the progressive bubble that academia has been becoming for decades. It is reflected in broad academic support for implementation of DEI policies, DEI statements, and programs that de facto are set asides for admitting or hiring or otherwise advantaging individuals from groups progressives deem worthy of special treatment to advance what they say are “prosocial” societal goals. One definition of conspiracy is “an agreement between two or more persons to commit a crime, fraud or other wrongful act.” Redefining “diversity” to permit illegal discrimination has been a collective effort and fits this definition.
“Recently invented” progressive definition of diversity. I am 68. Anything after about 2010 to me is “recent.”
I am not sure the web archive link will work for everyone. I may have accessed it via Rutgers libraries (worked on this post over several days, it was open and frankly, it was a bit of a slog figuring out how to do it and I no longer remember whether it was openly available or I had to log in somewhere to access it).
My word that was good. Nailed it.
Another great article! The very short version: Diversity is a Motte and Bailey doctrine, mostly constructed by Humpty Dumptying.