4 ms·

Is there anyone on here for which the headline holds true? Most of us are likely degree-holders here. Major-specific classes (at least for engineering) didn’t

Is there anyone on here for which the headline holds true? Most of us are likely degree-holders here. Major-specific classes (at least for engineering) didn’t have time for any sort of indoctrination and non-major classes were jokes that you put as little effort into as possible in order to focus on the major courses.

andrew_ 5y ago
There's likely a lot of us with some college that took a gig before graduation during or immediately after the dotcom boon. I wasn't exposed to this in the late 90s / early 2000s when I was in school for a CompSci degree. I took all kinds of sociology, English comp, and psych fillers and can't recall any kind of the post-modernist progressivism cited. They were interesting, fairly neutral courses.
nixpulvis 5y ago
Schools of thought are pronounced throughout engineering. Just look at metric vs imperial systems for a quick example. The difference is often that there are more objective measures for "correctness". But even still, context, history, and situational awareness matter immensely. A 2" screw might be just what you need. This of course all starts to break down at the language level itself. Complexity simply refuses to be wrangled.
hemloc_io 5y ago
As a fairly recent grad I can share some anecdata. How much this applies to you pretty much relies on two things. 1. Where you went to school and 2. What your major was. I went to an engineering focused school and in my major classes most if not all of the profs had a neutral POV on these kinds of issues, and the class content was pretty much only CS stuff. Some non-major classes, particularly in the humanities like COM had this kind of focus where the prof/grad student had a liking to modern progressive topic and would bring them into the class one way or another. (Think sex vs gender, toxic masculinity etc in a COM class.) Generally speaking these would be filler classes taught by grad students/younger profs. Outside in extra curricular like clubs and fraternities DNI stuff mostly comes up in the context of some activity the university wants you to do to show you're not racist or will engage in sexual assault. I got the vibe that it was more of a BS metric for insurance or marketing an not actually meant to do anything. (There's a whole cottage industry of speakers who get paid way too much money for giving these trainings I should write a blog post about one day. ;) I had friends who went to a small liberal arts college where this was much more common, both in class and culturally. The students there were less HR DNI type stuff and more the "woke" side of things. Most if not all people there are true believers. Overall for students + faculty it's a cultural thing, where you go to school more or less determines the level and type of politics that come into your classes. For University admins it's an HR checkbox, similar to corporate diversity training. In more left leaning disciplines it's usually populated by true believers.
sayonaraman 5y ago
I recall about 10 years ago in college we had these required 'core' classes, and the very first course, on writing I think, included mandatory readings from Edward Said*, a well known academic whose entire career was built around pushing anti-Western ideology and "Western guilt", I think it was framed as "cultural criticism". When I hear the woke talk about "cultural appropriation", "colonialism","white privilege", etc., it all sounds very familiar. Only now cultural criticism turned into full-blown cultural indoctrination. *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism_(book)
throwoutway 5y ago
I met with a family member recently who is a college student and mentioned they had a mandatory DNI class. I didn’t press for more details (not sure if it was webinar or for credits)

andrew_ 5y ago

There's likely a lot of us with some college that took a gig before graduation during or immediately after the dotcom boon. I wasn't exposed to this in the late 90s / early 2000s when I was in school for a CompSci degree. I took all kinds of sociology, English comp, and psych fillers and can't recall any kind of the post-modernist progressivism cited. They were interesting, fairly neutral courses.

nixpulvis 5y ago

Schools of thought are pronounced throughout engineering. Just look at metric vs imperial systems for a quick example. The difference is often that there are more objective measures for "correctness". But even still, context, history, and situational awareness matter immensely. A 2" screw might be just what you need. This of course all starts to break down at the language level itself. Complexity simply refuses to be wrangled.

hemloc_io 5y ago

As a fairly recent grad I can share some anecdata. How much this applies to you pretty much relies on two things. 1. Where you went to school and 2. What your major was. I went to an engineering focused school and in my major classes most if not all of the profs had a neutral POV on these kinds of issues, and the class content was pretty much only CS stuff. Some non-major classes, particularly in the humanities like COM had this kind of focus where the prof/grad student had a liking to modern progressive topic and would bring them into the class one way or another. (Think sex vs gender, toxic masculinity etc in a COM class.) Generally speaking these would be filler classes taught by grad students/younger profs. Outside in extra curricular like clubs and fraternities DNI stuff mostly comes up in the context of some activity the university wants you to do to show you're not racist or will engage in sexual assault. I got the vibe that it was more of a BS metric for insurance or marketing an not actually meant to do anything. (There's a whole cottage industry of speakers who get paid way too much money for giving these trainings I should write a blog post about one day. ;) I had friends who went to a small liberal arts college where this was much more common, both in class and culturally. The students there were less HR DNI type stuff and more the "woke" side of things. Most if not all people there are true believers. Overall for students + faculty it's a cultural thing, where you go to school more or less determines the level and type of politics that come into your classes. For University admins it's an HR checkbox, similar to corporate diversity training. In more left leaning disciplines it's usually populated by true believers.

sayonaraman 5y ago

I recall about 10 years ago in college we had these required 'core' classes, and the very first course, on writing I think, included mandatory readings from Edward Said*, a well known academic whose entire career was built around pushing anti-Western ideology and "Western guilt", I think it was framed as "cultural criticism". When I hear the woke talk about "cultural appropriation", "colonialism","white privilege", etc., it all sounds very familiar. Only now cultural criticism turned into full-blown cultural indoctrination. *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism_(book)

throwoutway 5y ago

I met with a family member recently who is a college student and mentioned they had a mandatory DNI class. I didn’t press for more details (not sure if it was webinar or for credits)