The most unmeritocratic job filling I’ve seen. He got the job for being black.
They should have just employed the Rooney Rule to make things seem fair. This will just spurn the opponents of Affirmative Action that much harder, myself included. Weird that the NFL has the better idea here.
Affirmative action is here for a reason. If there wasn't systemic racism in hiring, there would be no need for it.
What affirmative action is supposed to do is to ensure that your race isn't a determining factor in not getting hired for a job that you are qualified for.
The Rooney Rule in the NFL wouldn't need to be a thing if being a black coach in the NFL meant statistically you had a greater chance of getting fired or not being hired at all
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rooney_Rule
Affirmative action is idiotic, likely from the start. It seems entirely wrong applied to most every situation. For example, would it make sense to force restaurants to always have a demographically aligned percentage of black patrons at any given moment? How about local little-league baseball teams? school clubs? technology events?
> "discriminate against ... in order to counter balance the discrimination"
Doesn't that sound like a bad idea?
This is not an affirmative action program. YC is an accelerator, not a charity.
Let's not inject FUD about affirmative action into this conversation.
MIT, for instance, has a robust affirmative action program and I can assure you the Institute isn't in the business of picking unqualified applicants. One of the most famous (and successful) affirmative action programs in the world is implemented by the NFL — hardly a charity.
No, it really is not more complicated. The US has its own implicit systems of discrimination. The white racist from Tennessee is going to be looked down upon by the white racist from Connecticut who will be looked down upon by the white racist with a Central Park apartment.
Affirmative action is not "always bad." There are multiple purposes of affirmative action, some of which have NOTHING to do with the individual student.
About 60% of NFL alumni in the US are of African-American origin, and that number climbs every year. Most coaches in the NFL are either former players or coaches at some other level of football. The VAAAAST majority of coaches at the NFL level at ALL levels are white. Of the 32 head coaching positions in the league, only 3 are held by black coaches, and black coaches are more likely to get fired quicker than their white counterparts.
You know why? Because the owners are white. People hire who they relate to, and a white guy is going to relate to another white guy more than they will to most black guys. It's simple.
Same thing applies to affirmative action. A lower caste person who gets a chance and succeeds is more likely to hire lower caste employees. So even though those lower caste employees may not have been direct beneficiaries of affirmative action, they can still benefit from the network effect.
There is no reason to identify as "upper caste" unless one is interested in maintaining that hierarchy.
I don’t think this is right. Affirmative action has been upheld by the courts, and is currently in practice at some private employers (and is mandated for government contractors).
Any affirmative action is by definition discriminating on the basis of race. If you want the best candidate for the job, you don't look at race, you look at their abilities to do the job. Period. Any bias towards hiring one race implies bias against hiring from other races. Why is it okay to have almost no Asian players in the NBA while a small percentage of black people in tech is a big fuss? It is all hypocrisy.
I dislike how affirmative action has a bad reputation. Affirmative action is not about lowering standards. It's about having a diversified candidate pool. Sounds like Twitter wasn't willing to invest the effort to have a diversified pool.
It definitely pays off in the long run, but it takes some effort in the short run. My company sponsors some student groups and encourages engineers to be active in recruiting outside of their circles. It's paid off as we've moved from a monoculture to a company with a workforce that represents our community.
They should have just employed the Rooney Rule to make things seem fair. This will just spurn the opponents of Affirmative Action that much harder, myself included. Weird that the NFL has the better idea here.
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