Obviously we have standards by which the university evaluated all of its students. The idea and discussions surrounding diversity don’t have to do with who is better or how to evaluate, but rather how to make the campus safer and more welcoming of individuals that aren’t white heterosexuals, generally.

I’m not sure if you are attempting to make a point here, but it is poorly formed and borders on xenophobic. Promoting diversity is bad?

I suppose I hear your argument, as it is a recycled argument, but it should be patently obvious that the gains made in diversity over the past 20-40 years in the United States are substantial. The course we’re on, in regard to giving all citizens equal standing and sewing the seed of the American dream, is a righteous one.

We should not look at “different” people in our day-to-day lives and assume they have achieved success through social promotion or pity; we should test their worth and substance through interaction.

Diversity would be great, but not best achieved by bashing white heterosexual males. We’re not all hateful racists and bigots and attacking us as a demographic is an idea that has gotten pretty stale. I thought diversity was about bringing people together to discuss ideas and promote understanding, but apparently there are exceptions. I expected more from liberals. I guess I expected too much.

This article is very well written and makes several good points. The philosophical prejudice against homogeneity is shown every day to be clearly false in, for example, professional basketball. In the NBA, no diversity advocates are pushing to make sure older white men and woman are included on the teams. On the contrary, we want the maximum quality of play and accept that that is accomplished by having a homogeneous team of tall young black men. Basketball only stands out as a good example because the disastrous prospects of forced diversity is so obvious.

I agree with 4:16am. Not only do you sound like you are a white straight dude reveling in his position of white privilege, you are ignoring the simple fact that exclusion based on race (not only as policy, but as the aftereffects on non-White students once they arrive on such a WHITE campus) is rampant at the institutional levels in the 21st century whether you choose to acknowledge it or not. And it is in your best interest to do so, Allard, considering that your limited viewpoint ridiculously constricts the meaning of diversity and of course conservatively nitpicks the hell out of it to the point of oblivion. Some things in life are a bit more nebulous than you’d prefer apparently, so get over it. The UW is attempting to integrate all kinds of diversity, stop trying to overanalyze it to death at this point because it isn’t going to stop anything. The non-Whites are here to stay, and thank god! Cuz this White girl can’t stand all these other White people mushed together in their ignorance on this campus.

Oh man, do I love it when white people stand atop their privileged soapboxes and proclaim race is “irrelevant.” That’s an excuse. “Race doesn’t matter, so we don’t have to talk about it. We’re just going to ignore the fact that the number of impoverished people of color is disproportionately high, the fact that the number of incarcerated people of color is disproportionately high, and the fact that the number of people of color in the wealthiest 5% of the country is disproportionately low. Because we are colorblind and race doesn’t matter to us.”

And for the record, Jim, many if not most “differently-abled” people bristle at that term. Just fyi.

Finally, 11:11—this is satire, right? The NBA? I want to laugh, but I am too afraid you might be serious. Please let me know.

@ 11:11 I believe that the argument is that we should value a system that only depends on a person’s individual talents, not other “unrelated aspects” of a person’s individuality. It does not condone racial profiling (which is what the writer is actually damning) which is what you seem to imply that the writer encourages.

Also, whether or not the writer is a white and or male is irrelevant to his argument. Basing the logical validity of an argument on the person giving it is like the fundamental logical fallacy that you learn in any critical analysis class.

So, for anybody else who is reading these comments, don’t base their argument’s validity on who they are, or what they represent, but on what they said.

So, again @ 11:11, you didn’t actually make any arguments against the writer’s article. Please, make an argument instead of using emotional appeals and attacking the validity of the writer himself.

I actually meant those comments I just wrote at 2:51, not 11:11.

Liked the article. Thank you.

If you want to know how the term diversity is used regarding higher education here it is:

diversity = acceptable proportion of African Americans and Latinos

I think part of the problem is using fluffy language like the term diversity. Universities don’t care about actual diversity, they are really seeking to increase the percentage of Latinos and African Americans in their campuses.

I agree with the GOAL of increasing underrepresented minorities in higher edicuation. However, I disagree with how schools seek to achieve that goal and I disagree with using the term diversity to describe that goal.

4:16 “The idea and discussions surrounding diversity don’t have to do with who is better or how to evaluate, but rather how to make the campus safer and more welcoming of individuals that aren’t white heterosexuals, generally.”

This is my point. The idea of diversity is not to evaluate or even ask what standards would constitute a proper academic environment.

If they did it would become clear that a question such as “how to make the campus safer and more welcoming of individuals that aren’t white heterosexuals” is unanswerable.

Why? Because any rational standard in respect to such issues is independent of race and sex. Therefore university programs and policies should treat individuals as individuals regardless of race or sex.

Jim,

This is your (main) opposition from last week back again for more.

To the Herald Editors and Jim - I don’t think this should have gone to press as is. I do have to congratulate you on doing some more research into the topic, that’s good and it’s clear that effort went into finding things to talk about.

However, what’s unclear to me, at least, is how this abides by any journalistic ethic whatsoever. This is poor quality, rips quotations from full sentences to make it look like there’s something mischievous going on and fails to discern between quotations which are supposed to be attributed and quotations which are used for satirical mockeries of these programs.

Rest assured this is not motivated by your position in the article. While I know you’re not going to come around to my view point (and I won’t come around to yours either for that matter), what’s important is that you learn how to write and you learn how to write well. That’s a big part of writing in a public forum like this, and when you’re writing in a specific setting like a newspaper column, you follow specific rules.

the basics: Rule #1, have a lead, typically at the beginning of your column. Let me know why I should keep reading the rest of this column. What you have isn’t very interesting to start with, lure us in.

Rule #2, make the point in the first or second paragraph. This is sometimes referred to as “front loading,” but it makes it easier for everyone. 5, 6, 7 paragraphs in is WAY too far down for there to be a point, UNLESS if you have a catchy lead or story, which it’s clear you do not.

Lastly, and this is the big one, Rule #3, make clear where your quotes are coming from. I have no idea if John told you this in an interview or if you stole it off another newspaper or if you found on UW’s website. Attribute, attribute, attribute.

Reading some of the columns from the Times or, as I’m willing to bet you prefer, the Wall Street Journal would be best for your future writing. Good luck and keep hatin’ on discrimination.

There are so many problems with UW’s and other institution’s fight for diversity that it would take hours to write. To begin, diversity will only work if it is embraced among people and not forced down there throats, like the UW administration would like to. People are going to spend time with and form relationships with those that they want no matter how many classes and clubs exist to try to prevent it. As I believe someone alluded to earlier, the main people that forced diversity hurts are White, Christian, Heterosexual males. We are the main victims of reverse discrimination, in this particular case. I don’t want to stray away, but after reading 2:51PM’s entry, I do feel it necessary to make a related segway to this article, and what I’ve already written.

There appears to be this fantasy out there that all white kids who grow up in affluent neighborhoods, are blessed with money and perfect lives. I, and almost all of my WHITE friends grew up in the burbs in households where the combined incomes of their parents were well over $100,000 per year. However, out of probably 30 people that I knew, only maybe 5 had their parents pay for every college expense from beginning to end. The others, worked their asses off during and not during school semesters, and/or are extremely in debt, as I am. Now, my parents could have paid for a good portion of it, but I wanted to learn the value of hard work.

Now, 2:51PM, it isn’t hard to tell from your statement that you are a minority, and are probably black due to the lazy work ethic that I can smell coming from that article to where I’m sitting in Chicago. The fact that there are so many impoverished blacks out there is because they are too lazy to get an education and then work, even when univerisities are practically begging them to enlist with free scholarship money so that the universities can increase their minority numbers. Even though the hispanics will drive me nuts with their intolerance to learn English, they at least will work to support a family, instead of relying on State Entitlement Plans.

As far as the incarceration numbers, I have the answer for you, and it’s a real simple one that even you will be able to comprehend. The reason that the majority of inmates are black is because the majority of those comitting crimes are black!!! Oh my God I solved it!!! I can’t believe it; if only the rest of the world knew the answer to that question.

I find it funny that I waste my time writing into this joke of a newspaper, 8 years after graduating. However, I feel I would be doing the human race a disservice if I didn’t provide the proper knowledge and guidance, so that the readers would actually have some sort of a clue.

“Also, whether or not the writer is a white and or male is irrelevant to his argument.”

No, I agree with 2:51 (which I think is the one you’re getting at). Any time you have somebody talk about race relations, their race is relevant, because race is relevant to the way we experience almost everything in our society. That’s not to say that someone who’s white can’t or shouldn’t be heard, or that someone who isn’t white will always know more about it, but I do believe that it is always relevant because it will influence how a person reacts to (and forms arguments about) the world. I think to say that it doesn’t matter glosses over the fact that racism is still a real problem in our society.

I have lived in Wisconsin my whole life. I have to say, I don’t particularly care about hurricanes—they don’t affect me at all, you know, so I’d say they’re pretty irrelevant.

Please remember, who I am and what my background is has no bearing on the way I perceive hurricanes.

WOOOOW so 10:01pm is SERIOUSLY going to sit here and try to make the elementary school argument that many Blacks are in the position they’re in because of ‘laziness’ and the “FACT” that they commit the most crimes?! Absurrrrrrrd. Along with incorrect, racist, and ignorant. Um, ever heard of institutionalized racism? Or something called historical trauma? WOOOW again. This university needs to push more than the current 3 credits of ethnic breadth requirement before we unleash these fools into our society…progress is the goal, not stagnancy.

Jim,

Your analysis of diversity is poorly informed and entirely misses the mark. In an ideal world, identity markers such as race, ethnicity, nationality, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, sex, religion, class, ability etc. should not matter. Regarding race and ethnicity, we live in a white supremacy (and I don’t mean the KKK here) in which white supremacy is a historical, institutionally-perpetuated domination of people and nations of color by white, European people for maintaining privilege and wealth. UW-Madison is an institution, and if it has any commitment to slowly correcting the injustices of institutional racism, it must provide people of color with an opportunity to gain a higher education, as a college education is essential to gaining some socioeconomic power in our capitalist society. Your remarks resonate with the classically racist opposition to affirmative action programs. I would like to remind you that white people have benefited from 500 years of affirmative action. White people dominate and control education systems, the media, publishers, prisons, the military, housing markets, corporations etc., and white people inherit wealth and access to these institutions because of white privilege/affirmative action for white people. Lastly, your concept of diversity attempts to strip any meaning of how this word is typically used. Diversity, in university settings, refers to the “primary” meanings of diversity e.g. race, class, gender identity, sexual orientation etc. that are attached to social power; the “secondary meanings” refer to components of ourselves that are not powered e.g. I play the violin, you like soccer etc.

By taking a “colorblind”stance-or where all differences between people that constitute diversity-operate in a vacuum where there is no social power attached to these differences, is injust and could not be more wrong.

You should educate yourself on what oppression is, rather than “speak the truth” form your privileged position that clouds your view of reality.

12:11, it’s 10:01. First of all your argument that my comments were racist or ignorant is the oldest trick in the book that people like you will make to undermine my argument. Also, your argument was so pythetic that I would have to guess that you are possibly a kidnergartner.

Please, 12:11, produce a more compelling argument than the typical race card one that is used daily by minorities. Use the little brain power that you have to produce a compelling and logical argument on this issue.

Hey 10:01—

I am 2:51. And I am about as white as they come.

And you are about as fucking stupid as they come.