"Country Would Do Well To Abandon 'Diversity'"

This article, by Peter Wood in the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star, Apr. 13, ran in today's Pittsburgh Tribune-Review:

.... So what does diversity mean?

It means pretty much what Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell said it meant when he launched the word on its current career on June 28, 1978. That's the day he gave his opinion in the Bakke case, proposing that racial preferences in college admissions would be acceptable if they helped to create a greater "diversity of viewpoints" in the classroom. No other justice agreed with Powell, but, in the following years, higher education gradually took up the idea that its best chance of getting away with racial discrimination in favor of (mostly) black students would be to cite Powell's views on diversity.

From this acorn of racial preferences in college admissions grew the mighty oak of diversity today. In its fullest form, diversity is the idea that America is made up of competing groups; that our history as a nation is essentially a story of one group (i.e. white males) oppressing all the other groups; and that a better society can be had by honoring those groups that were oppressed and henceforth distributing to their members their fair share of all good things.

The diversity in diversity is, bluntly, the diversity of victim groups. Originally the term looked almost exclusively at African-Americans, but its logic was irresistible. Diversity became the rhetoric of choice of any bunch of people able to set themselves up as inheritors of a historical grievance.

Diversity, which began as Powell's euphemism for racial stereotyping, never lost its double-sidedness. It was from the beginning both a weapon and a seduction. On one hand, it could be used as a legalistic cudgel with which to beat anyone who threatened the spoils of identity politics. On the other hand, it promised a gentle world of tolerance, mutual respect, and the pleasures of mutual enrichment from contact with people unlike one's self.

The sweet version of diversity became the school curriculum and Sunday-go-to-church theme. The brutal version was left to the professional race intimidators, backroom politicians, government bureaucrats, and hard-nosed careerists in the universities. This dual-track strategy has been successful beyond the wildest dreams of the leftists who invented it. For millions of Americans, diversity stands for tolerance, inclusiveness, and open-minded acceptance of other cultures. They are convinced that to be in favor of diversity is to be in favor of fellowship and goodwill.

But they are mistaken. To be in favor of diversity really is to be in favor of group rights. It means giving up on the equality of individuals before the law to have, instead, the perpetual scramble of organized ethnic cohorts for bigger pieces of the pie. It means forsaking the freedom to decide for yourself who you are and how much you want to be defined by your ethnic heritage, and instead to turn this decision over to the diversicrats who will decide for you....

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Sun. 04/27/03 08:37:14 PM
Categorized as Social/Cultural.

On Hollywood's Vacuumheads

A couple of interesting articles today.

First, Eerie Silence in Hollywood as Anti-War Stars Vanish, at Reuters:

In the weeks leading up to war in Iraq actors Martin Sheen, Mike Farrell, Sean Penn and Janeane Garofalo joined a cast of thousands in a fierce Hollywood resistance played out in protest marches and from the sofas of television talk shows.

But with the war in its waning hours, all is quiet on the western coast -- leading conservatives to suggest that Garofalo and her fellow travelers are in full retreat from a public backlash and feeling chastened by a swift American victory....

I think many of them are lying low because (1) they don't want to admit they were mostly wrong about the War Against Saddam Hussein and (2) they hope that by the next time they take a public political stand, people will have forgotten how wrong the Hollywood Vacuumheads were about the War Against Saddam Hussein. That would have been far more likely before the age of the Internet, the World Wide Web, and the Blogosphere.

Second, A chill wind blows, the gasbags now huff, a great column by David Reinhard in The Oregonian:

.... Were government agents rounding up antiwar activists or censoring their latest pronouncements? No. Nothing so chilling. What's got the wind-chill-factor folks so heated up is that other Americans -- radio talk-show hosts and other opinion-meisters, as well as consumers -- are taking exception to their antiwar arguments. Many aren't buying their antiwar arguments or the entertainment wares that made their political views noteworthy in the first place.

Michael Moore was booed at the Academy Awards -- amid a standing ovation as he picked up an Oscar! Former fans smash and boycott Dixie Chicks albums after one Chick told an English audience they were ashamed of being from the same state as George W. Bush! Robbins and Sarandon were (temporarily) disinvited to a baseball shindig! Madonna felt moved not to release an anti-Bush, antiwar video!

This is evidence of some dark night descending over the land? Humbug....

The fact is it's always easier to say nothing when you know the crowd will likely reject your arguments and may even argue back. This is hardly new, much less confined to the antiwar left. Try holding traditional views on homosexuality or abortion in certain quarters or not embracing the entire diversity canon. The liberal orthodoxy became so intimidating -- oppressive? -- that it even took a name: They call it political correctness.

If Robbins is really worried about efforts to punish people for speaking up, he might start defending Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Rick Santorum.

Bundle up if you do, Tim.

This "chill wind" Hollywood fears is actually a gigantic breath of fresh air, blowing in from the rest of the country. Long may it last!

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Sun. 04/27/03 12:26:09 PM
Categorized as Social/Cultural.

Bright Sunday: the Second Sunday of Easter

Easter sermons by Ven. John Henry Newman.

At Newman Reader:

• The Resurrection of the Body
• Witnesses of the Resurrection
• Difficulty of Realizing Sacred Privileges (Easter Day)
• Attendance on Holy Communion (First Sunday After Easter)

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Sun. 04/27/03 07:44:49 AM
Categorized as Historical & Religious & Speeches and Suchlike.