☆ Opinions: Critical social justice ideology commits a fatal mathematics error (4/6)
We all learned it in grade school: correlation ≠ causation. Unless you're a local Woke university trying to define (and box in) students by their heritage and skin color—which has huge consequences for The Academy's central mission. An Opp Now exclusive with experts Dr. Tabia Lee and Kenny Xu.
Opportunity Now: Can you explain what you believe are the drawbacks to a critical social justice ideology, commonly adopted by local higher ed institutions (if not in name, then in practice)?
Kenny Xu: Critical social justice is the ideology of highly paranoid people. People who believe society is out to get them. So they’ll interpret and contort reality to support their conclusions.
I'll give you an example from my book, An Inconvenient Minority. I did an investigation on Silicon Valley and found that Asian American men are less likely to be promoted to the C-suite executive salons as white men. Okay, that's true. At the FAANG companies, the Meta companies—it's just a fact.
Now, the question is: is it systemic racism? Is it racism that's preventing the Asians from getting these promotions? Those in the critical social justice camp would think so.
But I believe the actual bias against Asian Americans—assuming it’s a factor in this—is a very small factor. We should focus on much bigger elements: where investment capital comes from in Silicon Valley, the particular traits that Asian Americans are training towards, and how that aligns with higher-level traits sought by these companies.
Your publication is called Opportunity Now. If we really want to create opportunities for Asian Americans to advance within Silicon Valley, we need to focus on engendering those traits in people who want to advance. Not blaming racial discrimination and bias for what we observe in the data. I’m very skeptical of people who do that.
Tabia Lee: I would concur with Mr. Xu. These discussions have taken our focus away from things like merit and the traits that are needed for success, which apply to all of humanity. Not just this group or that group.
What if we stopped obsessing over these processes of racialization and minoritization and started emphasizing human agency and will? What if we focused instead on critical thinking and education and innovation, on developing the qualities that are needed to access them at deep levels? We would see so much more in terms of equality of opportunity.
ON: So you're saying that by zeroing in on one construct—race—we neglect other important factors like culture, education, and individual strengths?
TL: Race has historically been a socially engineered construct used to define and divide people. There's one race—the human race. We're focusing on these made-up categories rather than things that truly matter.
What’s more, we’re teaching it through a single lens and stifling all other philosophies. There are many different ways to view race that I was never taught in my background as an educational sociologist.
Critical social justice has completely supplanted the mission of many colleges; it started out as a fringe movement in Ethnic Studies departments, but make no mistake—it's been mainstream for a while now. Ironically, it's become the dominant force of higher education.
ON: Though we wonder how many everyday Californians actually buy into the ideology.
TL: Right, the polling numbers tell a different story about popularity than Woke activists would have you believe. The numbers say that maybe we're not so alone. And I love that hopefulness for people in the decent middle, the silent majority right now—knowing that the far left and far right aren't truly representative of America.
The pendulum is swinging back. The balance of things is shifting—a little bit—to be more aligned with reality.
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