> DEI is an immoral, hate based and anti-truth ideology.
Much of the DEI work stems from people looking around a decade or so ago at tech conferences, and noticing that they were almost entirely comprised of men.
There's way too much to address in a single comment, so I'll share one specific thing the Python community has done over the past ten+ years that's made a world of difference: The talk proposal process has been standardized so identifying information is hidden in the first round of reviews.
That one change helped shift the dial from almost entirely male speaker lineups to a much more balanced speaker lineup. As a result, we get a much broader range of talks.
There is nothing "immoral, hate based, and anti-truth" about efforts like this.
>> The talk proposal process has been standardized so identifying information is hidden in the first round of reviews
Making the talk proposal process blind seems more like meritocracy than DEI. The people opposing DEI [claim to] want qualifications to matter and race/gender/whatever issues not to.
> Making the talk proposal process blind seems more like meritocracy than DEI. The people opposing DEI [claim to] want qualifications to matter and race/gender/whatever issues not to.
Making a process blind to the person applying is a common DEI tool. Orchestra auditions are the famous one that I know about off the top of my head. Some links I googled and skimmed for rough quality, not vetted for serious study and may only be a starting point:
> Making the talk proposal process blind seems more like meritocracy than DEI
... I mean, that's because they're the same thing, presuming that you use the literal definition of 'meritocracy'. Now, 'meritocracy' is sometimes used to mean "only hire straight white guys who went to one of about four universities", but that it is being used as a euphemism, not in its literal meaning (however, these days it is so often used in that euphemistic sense that it has become honestly pretty pointless as a term.)
Sure. Is it doing anything to push people away? Yes, it pushes away people who disagree with far left ideological ideas, like when it purged Tim Peters who worked on Python for 20 years.
Stop leftists waging ideological war against long term Python contributors and it will be a more inclusive place, whilst acting in a moral way.
if you were to poll this very forum, you would find out that it is too almost entirely comprised of (biological) men. shall we apply the DEI principles here and give female posters +100 free karma on every comment/submission?
Wrong fallacy. A strawman argument is where you claim someone else said something that they didn't, you put words in their mouth. hn_shill didn't do that.
machomaster says it's reducto ad absurdum. It's not that either. There's nothing absurd about the proposal, it's exactly the same idea as many other DEI policies like female-only shortlists, which are found in politics or female only bonus/prize pools found everywhere.
It's no fallacy! What they did was pose a hypothetical designed to test people's commitment to their stated principles. Does a minor change in context cause someone to recoil from their own ideas? If yes, the ideas are bad and they haven't thought it through.
PSF made their own choice based on their own politics and optics. Note that requirements had nothing against diversity or fairness. It was fairly specific: "discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws."
DEI was weaponized in the USA, where in quite a few instances, people couldn't get promoted or hired because of their race (typically white or asian). It was about preferential treatment, where you would get hired because of your race, and not merit.
I am all for diversity, I am all for fairness, and I don't think we should exclude people based on the color of their skin or their socioeconomic status.
Yet, that is exactly what DEI did, and I have seen it firsthand many, many times.
> Note that requirements had nothing against diversity or fairness. It was fairly specific: "discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws."
Are we reading the same thing? You are quoting something that says that the PSF's standard DEI policies are a violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws, which the PSF does not agree with, and likely no court would ever agree with.
Compliance with law is always mandatory, but by signing a contract that misstates the law and in fact endorses a particular and incorrect interperation of the law, means that actually litigating the law correctly lately in the courts is harder.
Further, by carrying out the PSF's existing policies, the PSF is carrying ou their principles, rather than your derisive and inaccurate characterization of that as mere "optics."
> I am all for diversity, I am all for fairness,
If you were actually for those things, you'd be for what the PSF does! That's what they do! Instead you are supporting the oppression of those things with your comment.
Much of the DEI work stems from people looking around a decade or so ago at tech conferences, and noticing that they were almost entirely comprised of men.
There's way too much to address in a single comment, so I'll share one specific thing the Python community has done over the past ten+ years that's made a world of difference: The talk proposal process has been standardized so identifying information is hidden in the first round of reviews.
That one change helped shift the dial from almost entirely male speaker lineups to a much more balanced speaker lineup. As a result, we get a much broader range of talks.
There is nothing "immoral, hate based, and anti-truth" about efforts like this.