undefined | Better HN

story

0 pointshall0ween1y ago0 comments

Could you explain more about the "highly discriminatory and ideological" behavior you've seen? Is it across the board, in the sciences? For example, is a neurosurgery lab at UC Davis working on glioma research either discriminatory and ideologically driven?

0 comments

gameman1441y ago

I can speak to one instance of this (which was before COVID and the events surrounding George Floyd, so apply context as needed), but I took a class on networking implementations in low-budget and rural regions.

As part of the curriculum, there were distinct lessons (in this hard-science course) on feminist design, avoiding white-savior rollouts, and cultural relativism -- with much room to expound on their importance, and little room to critique.

I happened to agree with lots of the mindsets of these lessons a priori, but I was definitely acutely aware the whole course that there was an ideological bent, even in STEM.

The networking stack obviously had no viewpoint, but the course teaching it certainly did.

jimkleiber1y ago

I don't know if networking implementations in low-budget and rural regions is a purely STEM topic. The mere fact it talks about low-budget and rural regions suggests to me it interacts with geography and sociology and development economics, which to me makes sense that it'd incorporate ideas from those fields as well.

jccalhoun1y ago

A lot of universities have found that female professors have significantly less lab space than male professors. https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/2023/02/09/uc-san-diego... https://news.mit.edu/2014/research-reveals-gender-gap-nation...

In neuroscience there have been studies showing that the methods developed may not be effective for all races or sexes https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-022-01046-0

Historically studies have had an overrepresentation of white men as subjects. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1761670/

AlexandrB1y ago

Here's a good account of some of it: https://unsafescience.substack.com/p/the-last-four-years-wer...

lnwlebjel1y ago

I can't deny that person's experience but mine has not been that at all.

anonistheback1y ago

This is one of the core problems that many on the "left" will not understand.

The problem is that the people who have seen and who have experienced this will never tell you. I and many like me I've talked to will simply never tell their actual beliefs to a colleague who believes like this.

Cannot tell you how many countless meetings I've been in where I have a differing opinion and say nothing because of backlash and loss of softpower.

The truth is that there are huge numbers of your coworkers, bosses, and employees who have different thoughts that don't align with the current ideology. These people have learned to say nothing. I myself being one of them.

I have on multiple occasions just straight lied to a liberal coworker about my beliefs because me telling what I actually think would make it very difficult to work with them.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse