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I am curious if anyone can find the text for "IBM's Policy Letter #4" written by IBM's chairman in 1953, which is referenced in this article. I did some searchi

I am curious if anyone can find the text for "IBM's Policy Letter #4" written by IBM's chairman in 1953, which is referenced in this article. I did some searching but all the links I found to the full text were broken. I ask because I think it shows what a Rorschach test the arguments over DEI have become. I at least found one quote from the Policy Letter #4 which stated "It is the policy of this organization to hire people who have the personality, talent and background necessary to fill a given job, regardless of race, color or creed." Of course, in 1953 that was a pretty bold stance given the widespread official segregation policies in the Southern US at the time. Now, though, it feel like how you view that statement depends on which "tribe" you align with in the DEI debate: Anti-DEI folks say "Exactly, we want to hire people based on merit regardless of race, color or creed, and DEI has basically turned into a policy of racial quotas" while pro-DEI folks say "The policy back then was to fight official and systemic racism, which we still need to combat today." So I'd just like to find the full original policy document so I can make up my own mind.

easterncalculus 2y ago
[flagged]
- eastbound 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - colechristensen 2y ago
    Are you being serious?
    - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 2y ago
      I think they are: the sociological definition of a minority is a member of a class which is socially disadvantaged (sociologists talk about women as minorities for this reason) and a sociological "-ism" (racism, sexism) is policy or decisions which disadvantage the socially disadvantaged. Presuming that position, it's understandable that they further believe that not favoring the disadvantaged is continuing the status quo, which is a disadvantage to the already-disadvantaged, hence the sociological "-ism".
- Filligree 2y ago
  They’re not wrong. The tension is that on average, dark-skinned folk have lower merit — because of racism in the past that limited their educational opportunities, and also because it’s hard for a child to lever themselves into a higher socioeconomic group than their parents. Among a number of other reasons. Equity vs. equal opportunities; I’m sympathetic to the latter, but what do you do when the opportunities were unequal in the past, and that causes inequitable results in the present? One might, for instance, attempt to make up for it with targeted education. It’s a pity that the US educational system is such a disaster.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - zer8k 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - alabastervlog 2y ago
      > The book “the coddling of the American mind” should be a must read for anyone who takes the societal problem of DEI hysteria seriously. Hey, look at that, it's an If Books Could Kill alum! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/id1651876897?i=1000603422829 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coddling-of-the-am...
    - femiagbabiaka 2y ago
      > White children who don’t have daddy big bucks backing them (e.g. 90+ percent of them) are left out of important programs, less likely to be chosen for university admission and job placement, etc. None of this is true, which really problematizes your entire manifesto: https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-racial-wealth-gap-financial-aid-and-college-access/ https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-racial-wealth-gap-fin...
    - mullingitover 2y ago
      > White children who don’t have daddy big bucks backing them (e.g. 90+ percent of them) are left out of important programs, less likely to be chosen for university admission and job placement, etc. There's a lot of anti-DEI folks who are furious at what they believe DEI is. First generation college students, veterans, disabled people, including white ones, benefit from DEI programs. Our Vice President benefitted from Yale's Yellow Ribbon program as a veteran! He's a DEI admit!
MyPasswordSucks 2y ago
> I am curious if anyone can find the text for "IBM's Policy Letter #4" written by IBM's chairman in 1953, which is referenced in this article. https://web.archive.org/web/20110409171021/http://www-03.ibm.com/employment/us/diverse/50/downloads/eo-policy-letter.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20110409171021/http://www-03.ibm... It has both the original typewritten scan and a searchable-text version right underneath.
- maerF0x0 2y ago
  That's a pretty solid letter given the 1953 date! Consider it predates MLK's and Rosa Park's most famous activism. Not bad.
  - eddieroger 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - hdjjhhvvhga 2y ago
      To people downvoting the above comment - could you explain your reasons? You may feel all arguments have already been said on this issue but the situation is different today. And especially young people, whether white or colored, feel they have more bleak future in front of them than the previous generations and basically refuse to reproduce globally. In this light, it's worth having this discussion again because it is not the same.
      - fc417fc802 2y ago
        I didn't but I would have. It appears to be dragging the discussion towards political flamewar. It doesn't present any substantial observations or reasoning, just ideological talking points that we've all heard countless times by now. If there had at least been some attempt to tie things back to the headline article in a nontrivial way then maybe I'd be more sympathetic.
      - scoofy 2y ago
KerrAvon 2y ago
[flagged]
croes 2y ago
Merit seems to be highly subjective given that the people in current US administration are all hired based on merit.
- op00to 2y ago
  The merit they evaluate for is loyalty to the leader, not academic merit, or some other measure.
  - rayiner 2y ago
    And zeal for carrying out the elected official’s agenda. Which is the whole point of political appointments.
    - mlinhares 2y ago
      That didn't work very well for the folks that tried that defense in the Nuremberg trials. If the agenda is to commit crimes and destroy the constitution I would have expected people to be a bit more patriotic.
  - DFHippie 2y ago
    Yes, but this isn't what they'll say if you ask them. Hiring based on the worst prejudice or nepotism is still merit based in this sense. Meritocracy is supposed to be about varieties of merit which you aren't ashamed to admit are relevant.
- stego-tech 2y ago
  ...damn, that's a legitimately sick burn that's also a prime example of why "Meritocracies" are a bad thing on their face. "Whose merit? What is merit? Why is X merit but not Y? How come person A's merit is worth less than person B's?" Your response was beautifully eloquent.
  - achenet 2y ago
    counter-example: Most systems that work with standardized tests, while they can systematically fail to capture certain types of talent, are fairly objective - "if you're in the top 10% on this test, then we take you". The format and subject matter of the test is known in advance, people are free to prepare for it in whatever way they want. Of course, being good at passing tests doesn't mean one will be good at other things, in much the same way that one can be good at Leetcode problems but not good at building and maintaining large scale software systems in a large corporate environment. Still, it remains a 'credible' example of 'how to do meritocracy right', with examples dating back to the Chinese civil service examinations during the Sui and Tang dynasty (from around 593 AD). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination
throwaway382736 2y ago
I've observed the people who are very anti-DEI will change their talking points when they are competing with Asians and Indians. Suddenly they start espousing DEI principles and emphasize how it's important to find a more "well rounded" individual.
- totalkikedeath 2y ago
  [dead]
- SpicyLemonZest 2y ago
  I’ve seen people who say that, but what’s much more common in my experience is people who note that thinking seriously about Asians and Indians in tech isn’t very compatible with “DEI” as commonly construed. To me it seems clear that IBM promoting a dark-skinned immigrant to CEO proves their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion; I know this position is controversial but for the life of me I can’t understand why.
  - ghaff 2y ago
    Well I have no reason to think the IBM board had any reason to think Arvind wasn’t supremely well qualified and, if anything, Microsoft’s decision to go with Satya has proven an amazingly good choice.
- freedomben 2y ago
  I have observed this too, but I don't think it either affirms or refutes either position. Generally speaking, people are ultimately self-interested, and will make whichever argument advances their interests. Being objective about something where you have a conflict-of-interest is very difficult.
harimau777 2y ago
The issue that I have is that I've almost never seen an anti-DEI advocate actually engage with the issues. Even if I ultimately disagreed with them, I could respect someone who was willing to look at the problems the US is having with inequality and present a reasoned argument for alternatives to DEI. However, what I usually see is people either ignoring the issues people are facing, ignoring the arguments put forth by advocates of DEI, or substituting slogans for arguments.
- cynicalpeace 2y ago
  The problems the US has with inequality can be laid squarely at the foot of the dollar being the world's reserve currency. It works like this: The world uses dollars in international trade. Who produces the world's dollars? Washington and Wall St. Congress mandates spending, which is funded by the Fed printing money and purchasing bonds. The Fed also controls the money supply via interest rates and fractional reserve banking. This is a very complicated system, but the end result is the same. Washington and Wall St produce dollars that the world very much wants. World needs dollars from Washington and Wall St, but Washington and Wall St. need something in return. This ends up being cheap manufactured goods. The result: dollars and manufacturing jobs get exported abroad, and cheap goods get imported. Washington, Wall St, and their hangers-on (their investments in tech, hollywood, etc) become rich. The average American gets a bunch of junk in their front yard. They don't work at Bath Iron Works like their grandfather, they get everything they "need" simply by working at 7/11 or as a mortgage broker. This is easily demonstrated by a wealth of data and theory. You can check out [WTF Happened](https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/) in 1971, see the [Elephant Curve](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elephant_Curve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elephant_Curve), and see the [Triffin Dilemma](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triffin_dilemma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triffin_dilemma). The stuff about taxing the rich, deregulation, DEI, nationalism, etc have been a distraction from this fundamental shift in American society. Always follow the money. Fortunately, the current administration understands this better any previous one.
- s1artibartfast 2y ago
  I don't like DEI and am willing to engage. The US has a huge disparity of outcomes along racial lines. This is a legacy of slavery as well as social and governmental discrimination following slavery. [Racial biases persist today, but are much better today than the past, and we should focus on elimination of those biases, not adding new ones.] These factors result in real disparity in capabilities and merit today. This is precisely why racism was and is so detrimental. I oppose DEI because I think it is racist, even if good intended. I think our laws and institutions should strive to be race blind and treat people equally, as individuals, based on their individual actions and merit. I don't think that group statistic should be a higher priority than equality for individuals. In my mind, DEI is a myopic obsession with the group statistics, to the detriment of individual equality. If a school enroll someone with a 400 point lower sat over the higher person on the sole basis of their race, that is a major Injustice on the scale of individual humans, even if it moves some group statistic closer to equal. I think countering racism with racism is a very dangerous game, likely to blow up in everyone's face. Instead, equality under law should Ensure equal treatment moving forward. Past wrongs should be addressed by race blind improvements to economic mobility.
jgalt212 2y ago
Just because you don't like people or tribe supporting a policy or their motives supporting such policies doesn't make a policy good or bad or valid or invalid. During COVID times, some statements or policies that turned out to be true were overly supported by some b wacky and or political undesirable people. Reacting to this, many decisions or policies stayed in place or were undertaken.
- jensensbutton 2y ago
  Is this an argument to keep DEI in place?
  - jgalt212 2y ago
    It's an argument to not trust a book by its cover.
foobiekr 2y ago
Scott Alexander has a good summary of what went wrong with the former mindset (fill the job with the qualified candidate becomes mimic the population at large or else): https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/book-review-the-origins-of-woke https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/book-review-the-origins-of-... The problem with DEI is that it did, in fact, turn into a policy of racial quotas, only the quota-ness was denied even though the threat of legal action was omnipresent.
Flameancer 2y ago
Thanks for bringing this to my attention would’ve never guessed.

easterncalculus 2y ago

[flagged]

eastbound 2y ago
[flagged]
- colechristensen 2y ago
  Are you being serious?
  - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 2y ago
    I think they are: the sociological definition of a minority is a member of a class which is socially disadvantaged (sociologists talk about women as minorities for this reason) and a sociological "-ism" (racism, sexism) is policy or decisions which disadvantage the socially disadvantaged. Presuming that position, it's understandable that they further believe that not favoring the disadvantaged is continuing the status quo, which is a disadvantage to the already-disadvantaged, hence the sociological "-ism".
Filligree 2y ago
They’re not wrong. The tension is that on average, dark-skinned folk have lower merit — because of racism in the past that limited their educational opportunities, and also because it’s hard for a child to lever themselves into a higher socioeconomic group than their parents. Among a number of other reasons. Equity vs. equal opportunities; I’m sympathetic to the latter, but what do you do when the opportunities were unequal in the past, and that causes inequitable results in the present? One might, for instance, attempt to make up for it with targeted education. It’s a pity that the US educational system is such a disaster.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- zer8k 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - alabastervlog 2y ago
    > The book “the coddling of the American mind” should be a must read for anyone who takes the societal problem of DEI hysteria seriously. Hey, look at that, it's an If Books Could Kill alum! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/id1651876897?i=1000603422829 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-coddling-of-the-am...
  - femiagbabiaka 2y ago
    > White children who don’t have daddy big bucks backing them (e.g. 90+ percent of them) are left out of important programs, less likely to be chosen for university admission and job placement, etc. None of this is true, which really problematizes your entire manifesto: https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-racial-wealth-gap-financial-aid-and-college-access/ https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-racial-wealth-gap-fin...
  - mullingitover 2y ago
    > White children who don’t have daddy big bucks backing them (e.g. 90+ percent of them) are left out of important programs, less likely to be chosen for university admission and job placement, etc. There's a lot of anti-DEI folks who are furious at what they believe DEI is. First generation college students, veterans, disabled people, including white ones, benefit from DEI programs. Our Vice President benefitted from Yale's Yellow Ribbon program as a veteran! He's a DEI admit!

MyPasswordSucks 2y ago

> I am curious if anyone can find the text for "IBM's Policy Letter #4" written by IBM's chairman in 1953, which is referenced in this article. https://web.archive.org/web/20110409171021/http://www-03.ibm.com/employment/us/diverse/50/downloads/eo-policy-letter.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20110409171021/http://www-03.ibm... It has both the original typewritten scan and a searchable-text version right underneath.

maerF0x0 2y ago
That's a pretty solid letter given the 1953 date! Consider it predates MLK's and Rosa Park's most famous activism. Not bad.
- eddieroger 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - hdjjhhvvhga 2y ago
    To people downvoting the above comment - could you explain your reasons? You may feel all arguments have already been said on this issue but the situation is different today. And especially young people, whether white or colored, feel they have more bleak future in front of them than the previous generations and basically refuse to reproduce globally. In this light, it's worth having this discussion again because it is not the same.
    - fc417fc802 2y ago
      I didn't but I would have. It appears to be dragging the discussion towards political flamewar. It doesn't present any substantial observations or reasoning, just ideological talking points that we've all heard countless times by now. If there had at least been some attempt to tie things back to the headline article in a nontrivial way then maybe I'd be more sympathetic.
    - scoofy 2y ago

KerrAvon 2y ago

[flagged]

croes 2y ago

Merit seems to be highly subjective given that the people in current US administration are all hired based on merit.

op00to 2y ago
The merit they evaluate for is loyalty to the leader, not academic merit, or some other measure.
- rayiner 2y ago
  And zeal for carrying out the elected official’s agenda. Which is the whole point of political appointments.
  - mlinhares 2y ago
    That didn't work very well for the folks that tried that defense in the Nuremberg trials. If the agenda is to commit crimes and destroy the constitution I would have expected people to be a bit more patriotic.
- DFHippie 2y ago
  Yes, but this isn't what they'll say if you ask them. Hiring based on the worst prejudice or nepotism is still merit based in this sense. Meritocracy is supposed to be about varieties of merit which you aren't ashamed to admit are relevant.
stego-tech 2y ago
...damn, that's a legitimately sick burn that's also a prime example of why "Meritocracies" are a bad thing on their face. "Whose merit? What is merit? Why is X merit but not Y? How come person A's merit is worth less than person B's?" Your response was beautifully eloquent.
- achenet 2y ago
  counter-example: Most systems that work with standardized tests, while they can systematically fail to capture certain types of talent, are fairly objective - "if you're in the top 10% on this test, then we take you". The format and subject matter of the test is known in advance, people are free to prepare for it in whatever way they want. Of course, being good at passing tests doesn't mean one will be good at other things, in much the same way that one can be good at Leetcode problems but not good at building and maintaining large scale software systems in a large corporate environment. Still, it remains a 'credible' example of 'how to do meritocracy right', with examples dating back to the Chinese civil service examinations during the Sui and Tang dynasty (from around 593 AD). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination

throwaway382736 2y ago

I've observed the people who are very anti-DEI will change their talking points when they are competing with Asians and Indians. Suddenly they start espousing DEI principles and emphasize how it's important to find a more "well rounded" individual.

totalkikedeath 2y ago
[dead]
SpicyLemonZest 2y ago
I’ve seen people who say that, but what’s much more common in my experience is people who note that thinking seriously about Asians and Indians in tech isn’t very compatible with “DEI” as commonly construed. To me it seems clear that IBM promoting a dark-skinned immigrant to CEO proves their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion; I know this position is controversial but for the life of me I can’t understand why.
- ghaff 2y ago
  Well I have no reason to think the IBM board had any reason to think Arvind wasn’t supremely well qualified and, if anything, Microsoft’s decision to go with Satya has proven an amazingly good choice.
freedomben 2y ago
I have observed this too, but I don't think it either affirms or refutes either position. Generally speaking, people are ultimately self-interested, and will make whichever argument advances their interests. Being objective about something where you have a conflict-of-interest is very difficult.

harimau777 2y ago

The issue that I have is that I've almost never seen an anti-DEI advocate actually engage with the issues. Even if I ultimately disagreed with them, I could respect someone who was willing to look at the problems the US is having with inequality and present a reasoned argument for alternatives to DEI. However, what I usually see is people either ignoring the issues people are facing, ignoring the arguments put forth by advocates of DEI, or substituting slogans for arguments.

cynicalpeace 2y ago
The problems the US has with inequality can be laid squarely at the foot of the dollar being the world's reserve currency. It works like this: The world uses dollars in international trade. Who produces the world's dollars? Washington and Wall St. Congress mandates spending, which is funded by the Fed printing money and purchasing bonds. The Fed also controls the money supply via interest rates and fractional reserve banking. This is a very complicated system, but the end result is the same. Washington and Wall St produce dollars that the world very much wants. World needs dollars from Washington and Wall St, but Washington and Wall St. need something in return. This ends up being cheap manufactured goods. The result: dollars and manufacturing jobs get exported abroad, and cheap goods get imported. Washington, Wall St, and their hangers-on (their investments in tech, hollywood, etc) become rich. The average American gets a bunch of junk in their front yard. They don't work at Bath Iron Works like their grandfather, they get everything they "need" simply by working at 7/11 or as a mortgage broker. This is easily demonstrated by a wealth of data and theory. You can check out [WTF Happened](https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/) in 1971, see the [Elephant Curve](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elephant_Curve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elephant_Curve), and see the [Triffin Dilemma](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triffin_dilemma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triffin_dilemma). The stuff about taxing the rich, deregulation, DEI, nationalism, etc have been a distraction from this fundamental shift in American society. Always follow the money. Fortunately, the current administration understands this better any previous one.
s1artibartfast 2y ago
I don't like DEI and am willing to engage. The US has a huge disparity of outcomes along racial lines. This is a legacy of slavery as well as social and governmental discrimination following slavery. [Racial biases persist today, but are much better today than the past, and we should focus on elimination of those biases, not adding new ones.] These factors result in real disparity in capabilities and merit today. This is precisely why racism was and is so detrimental. I oppose DEI because I think it is racist, even if good intended. I think our laws and institutions should strive to be race blind and treat people equally, as individuals, based on their individual actions and merit. I don't think that group statistic should be a higher priority than equality for individuals. In my mind, DEI is a myopic obsession with the group statistics, to the detriment of individual equality. If a school enroll someone with a 400 point lower sat over the higher person on the sole basis of their race, that is a major Injustice on the scale of individual humans, even if it moves some group statistic closer to equal. I think countering racism with racism is a very dangerous game, likely to blow up in everyone's face. Instead, equality under law should Ensure equal treatment moving forward. Past wrongs should be addressed by race blind improvements to economic mobility.

jgalt212 2y ago

Just because you don't like people or tribe supporting a policy or their motives supporting such policies doesn't make a policy good or bad or valid or invalid. During COVID times, some statements or policies that turned out to be true were overly supported by some b wacky and or political undesirable people. Reacting to this, many decisions or policies stayed in place or were undertaken.

jensensbutton 2y ago
Is this an argument to keep DEI in place?
- jgalt212 2y ago
  It's an argument to not trust a book by its cover.

foobiekr 2y ago

Scott Alexander has a good summary of what went wrong with the former mindset (fill the job with the qualified candidate becomes mimic the population at large or else): https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/book-review-the-origins-of-woke https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/book-review-the-origins-of-... The problem with DEI is that it did, in fact, turn into a policy of racial quotas, only the quota-ness was denied even though the threat of legal action was omnipresent.

Flameancer 2y ago

Thanks for bringing this to my attention would’ve never guessed.