This is a reply to my post 'Meritocracy' from 9/23. 'D' is a regular reader who remains anonymous but who by writing and referencing is an educated and well-read person. In comment on 'D's comment, 'The Bell Curve' looked at the outcomes of affirmative action, in NY teachers and plumbers. Most affirmative action plumbers failed their master exams. As apprentices they had much higher rates of absenteeism and lateness. The plumbers' union only admits those who pass master plumber tests. Affirmative action has had almost no impact. NYC teachers used affirmative action, and had a similar result. Most affirmative action teachers failed their qualifying exams. The teachers' union lowered the passing mark until there was 'enough' racial diversity in its ranks.
Merit, not race, sex or religion, should control. Anything else is simply racism and sexism of a stripe that someone approves of.
'D's reply-
Sometimes, when considering a law or rule, it is helpful to look at what happens when the law or rule is broken. As they say, "the exceptions prove the rule."
I have just finished reading the first volume of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago, and if ever a society were turned upside down with respect to "meritocracy," then it was the Soviet Union following the downfall of the tsar with the Russian Revolution of 1917. The decades of Soviet life under Stalin were miserable - just miserable. It wasn't just that the best and brightest were taken down by arbitrary and senseless arrests, tortures, and executions. It was also that many of the most productive people who were not professionals - especially the farmers who produced food or those who worked to maintain a clean water supply - were thrown into the maw of the prison system, had their lands and goods taken from them, and consequently, starvation (in millions of cases, to death) and disease became rampant. Soldiers who fought for the U.S.S.R. during the Second World War and were captured by the enemy, came back to the mother-land at the end of the war...and were imprisoned in their own gulag system (or shot). There was no meritocracy there, just the malevolent spirit of a mentally ill dictator and the selfish, dull-witted, powerful bullies who made up the Soviet system that blindly followed him. The hard workers, the heroes, the just: they all got thrown away. And how did it affect Russians and those in the countries under the Soviet control? Answer: it was a DISASTER, in any way you look at it: intellectually, physically, in terms of production and development, growth as a nation, cultural maturity, and spiritually. Everyone became a spy on everyone else; everyone learned to lie; and everyone learned that style and loyalty were more important than substance.
The same was true in China under Mao. The Great Leap Forward was a disaster, made by incompetent leadership, and millions starved. Those regions of China that did not produce good crops (because they were following "political" ways of farming that any farmer with sense and experience knew were disastrous) confiscated rice from those who were wise enough to ignore the official rules and farm in a sustainable fashion. There was no merit here: those with merit were punished. And again, it wasn't just the farmers who suffered. The intellectual life and rich cultural heritage of China got sucked down the drain by those who simply wanted power. The destruction of China's patrimony was a heavy price to pay. "Meritocracy"? Oh no. Political correctness went spread-eagle on the country and China - with millennia of progress from a people who were inventive (gunpowder, the compass, block printing, paper making, voyages of discovery) became a backward, 3rd world country.
I agree that all of nature is a meritocracy. And while there are exceptions where racial hiring is appropriate (e.g., the Harlem Globetrotters only hired players who were black, male, and had basketball skills), most of the time, professional or academic hiring for reasons of race, gender, or sexual orientation is a bad idea. If someone is a minority who will be "ok" at what they do - rather than a professional who constantly pays attention to detail and seeks a high standard of excellence - then ask yourself the following. Some day, would I want THIS person to be MY attorney when the chips are down and I need someone to defend me? Would I want THIS person to be MY doctor who is going to operate on me (while I am under anesthesia and defenseless)? Would I want THIS person to be MY airplane pilot?
...and for those who think that hiring based on bias in favor of race or gender does not have much potential to cause grave consequences, I would strongly recommend reading Thomas Sowell's book Affirmative Action Around the World: An Empirical Study. Sowell looks at the consequences of affirmative action in India, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Nigeria, and the United States. In the Preface, Sowell notes, "Many - if not most - people who are for or against affirmative action are for or against the theory of affirmative action. The factual question of what actually happens as a result of affirmative action policies receives remarkably little attention. Assumptions, beliefs and rationales dominate controversies on this issue in countries around the world. This book addresses the empirical question of just what does and does not happen under affirmative action - and to whose benefit and whose detriment." Read it, and find out what happens when meritocracy is tossed aside in favor of racial preference...
Merit, not race, sex or religion, should control. Anything else is simply racism and sexism of a stripe that someone approves of.
'D's reply-
Sometimes, when considering a law or rule, it is helpful to look at what happens when the law or rule is broken. As they say, "the exceptions prove the rule."
I have just finished reading the first volume of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago, and if ever a society were turned upside down with respect to "meritocracy," then it was the Soviet Union following the downfall of the tsar with the Russian Revolution of 1917. The decades of Soviet life under Stalin were miserable - just miserable. It wasn't just that the best and brightest were taken down by arbitrary and senseless arrests, tortures, and executions. It was also that many of the most productive people who were not professionals - especially the farmers who produced food or those who worked to maintain a clean water supply - were thrown into the maw of the prison system, had their lands and goods taken from them, and consequently, starvation (in millions of cases, to death) and disease became rampant. Soldiers who fought for the U.S.S.R. during the Second World War and were captured by the enemy, came back to the mother-land at the end of the war...and were imprisoned in their own gulag system (or shot). There was no meritocracy there, just the malevolent spirit of a mentally ill dictator and the selfish, dull-witted, powerful bullies who made up the Soviet system that blindly followed him. The hard workers, the heroes, the just: they all got thrown away. And how did it affect Russians and those in the countries under the Soviet control? Answer: it was a DISASTER, in any way you look at it: intellectually, physically, in terms of production and development, growth as a nation, cultural maturity, and spiritually. Everyone became a spy on everyone else; everyone learned to lie; and everyone learned that style and loyalty were more important than substance.
The same was true in China under Mao. The Great Leap Forward was a disaster, made by incompetent leadership, and millions starved. Those regions of China that did not produce good crops (because they were following "political" ways of farming that any farmer with sense and experience knew were disastrous) confiscated rice from those who were wise enough to ignore the official rules and farm in a sustainable fashion. There was no merit here: those with merit were punished. And again, it wasn't just the farmers who suffered. The intellectual life and rich cultural heritage of China got sucked down the drain by those who simply wanted power. The destruction of China's patrimony was a heavy price to pay. "Meritocracy"? Oh no. Political correctness went spread-eagle on the country and China - with millennia of progress from a people who were inventive (gunpowder, the compass, block printing, paper making, voyages of discovery) became a backward, 3rd world country.
I agree that all of nature is a meritocracy. And while there are exceptions where racial hiring is appropriate (e.g., the Harlem Globetrotters only hired players who were black, male, and had basketball skills), most of the time, professional or academic hiring for reasons of race, gender, or sexual orientation is a bad idea. If someone is a minority who will be "ok" at what they do - rather than a professional who constantly pays attention to detail and seeks a high standard of excellence - then ask yourself the following. Some day, would I want THIS person to be MY attorney when the chips are down and I need someone to defend me? Would I want THIS person to be MY doctor who is going to operate on me (while I am under anesthesia and defenseless)? Would I want THIS person to be MY airplane pilot?
...and for those who think that hiring based on bias in favor of race or gender does not have much potential to cause grave consequences, I would strongly recommend reading Thomas Sowell's book Affirmative Action Around the World: An Empirical Study. Sowell looks at the consequences of affirmative action in India, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Nigeria, and the United States. In the Preface, Sowell notes, "Many - if not most - people who are for or against affirmative action are for or against the theory of affirmative action. The factual question of what actually happens as a result of affirmative action policies receives remarkably little attention. Assumptions, beliefs and rationales dominate controversies on this issue in countries around the world. This book addresses the empirical question of just what does and does not happen under affirmative action - and to whose benefit and whose detriment." Read it, and find out what happens when meritocracy is tossed aside in favor of racial preference...
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