4 ms·

"In a world where world-class scientists’ merit is now determined by their sex and skin color—with white men’s work being dismissed in the name of promoting wom

by deogeo 8y ago

"In a world where world-class scientists’ merit is now determined by their sex and skin color—with white men’s work being dismissed in the name of promoting women and minorities" A bit off-topic, but talking about 'minorities' when discussing world-wide topics such as science always seemed so bizarre to me. No single race/ethnicity represents over 50% of the world population, so isn't everyone a minority? Or does only the US count?

AnimalMuppet 8y ago
Let's call the country X. In country X, the majority of scientists are of race Y. If scientists are viewed as having more merit because they are not of race Y, that's a problem, no matter what the values of X and Y are.
- deogeo 8y ago
  But the articles (not just this one, but very nearly all of them) don't talk about X and Y - they talk about "white people" and "minorities", and stubbornly pretend the two groups are distinct. A quick search (though I couldn't find any particularly authoritative sources) says white people are ~16% of the global population, behind both south and east asians. To keep calling everyone else 'minorities' is more than a little US/Eurocentric. Especially when they put phrases such as "In a world where world-class...", implying they're not limiting themselves to 'country X'
  - AnimalMuppet 8y ago
    The discrimination isn't worldwide; it's within a country. So, since the conversation we're having is about discrimination within a country, it makes sense that the term "minority" is also to be understood as being within that country. Whether any race has a majority world-wide is completely irrelevant to the discussion at hand.
  - tathougies 8y ago
    Oh stop it. Asian here. Discrimination happens in individual societies. The united states and Asian countries do not share societies. It is clear from the language and website of the article that it is targeted towards the USA
    - nkurz 8y ago
      > It is clear from the language and website of the article that it is targeted towards the USA Maybe, but since the author is Canadian, and the website is Australian, I'm surprised you would be so confident of this.
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dragonwriter 8y ago
> A bit off-topic, but talking about 'minorities' when discussing world-wide topics such as science always seemed so bizarre to me. “Minority” in many contexts of discrimination refers to power minorities, not necessarily numerical minorities (the two sometimes align); once you recognize that this is often intended, when it is intended is usually clear from context.
- NavyNuke 8y ago
  What/who are considered "power minorities"?
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by deogeo 8y ago

AnimalMuppet 8y ago

Let's call the country X. In country X, the majority of scientists are of race Y. If scientists are viewed as having more merit because they are not of race Y, that's a problem, no matter what the values of X and Y are.

deogeo 8y ago
But the articles (not just this one, but very nearly all of them) don't talk about X and Y - they talk about "white people" and "minorities", and stubbornly pretend the two groups are distinct. A quick search (though I couldn't find any particularly authoritative sources) says white people are ~16% of the global population, behind both south and east asians. To keep calling everyone else 'minorities' is more than a little US/Eurocentric. Especially when they put phrases such as "In a world where world-class...", implying they're not limiting themselves to 'country X'
- AnimalMuppet 8y ago
  The discrimination isn't worldwide; it's within a country. So, since the conversation we're having is about discrimination within a country, it makes sense that the term "minority" is also to be understood as being within that country. Whether any race has a majority world-wide is completely irrelevant to the discussion at hand.
- tathougies 8y ago
  Oh stop it. Asian here. Discrimination happens in individual societies. The united states and Asian countries do not share societies. It is clear from the language and website of the article that it is targeted towards the USA
  - nkurz 8y ago
    > It is clear from the language and website of the article that it is targeted towards the USA Maybe, but since the author is Canadian, and the website is Australian, I'm surprised you would be so confident of this.
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dragonwriter 8y ago

> A bit off-topic, but talking about 'minorities' when discussing world-wide topics such as science always seemed so bizarre to me. “Minority” in many contexts of discrimination refers to power minorities, not necessarily numerical minorities (the two sometimes align); once you recognize that this is often intended, when it is intended is usually clear from context.

NavyNuke 8y ago
What/who are considered "power minorities"?
- deleted 8y ago
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