Related ongoing thread: Harvard&#x27;s response to federal government letter demanding changes - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=43684536">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=43684536</a>

&gt; it has also been de facto illegal to have demographic compositions substantially different from the general populationHow so? To which law or case precedent?

&gt; It has been illegal to discriminate for a very long time, but it has also been de facto illegal to have demographic compositions substantially different from the general population.&gt; So, they&#x27;ve always been faced with the problem of needing to either discriminate to get the numbers to match, or not discriminating and risking the numbers falling out of line.Not disagreeing with your larger point, but this sounds wrong (in a sense that, I don’t think that’s the case).If what you claim was the case, how has CalTech been managing to have such a large percentage of Asian undergrad students (44% according to their Fall 2024-2025 enrollment data[0], with numbers from previous years not straying that far off either) without ever even a hint of getting in trouble over it (given that Asian people make up roughly 7% of the US population)?I am sure there are similar examples of other schools, this was just the first major known one that came to my mind. Perchance you are correct, and there is simply something special that CalTech has (and Harvard doesn’t) that lets them not worry about this. But that seems unlikely.0. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;registrar.caltech.edu&#x2F;records&#x2F;enrollment-statistics" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;registrar.caltech.edu&#x2F;records&#x2F;enrollment-statistics</a>

&gt; de facto illegal to have demographic compositions substantially different from the general populationThe Trump administration mid level staffing decisions are something like 70%+ white men! This seems laughable. Controversial maybe, certainly not &quot;illegal&quot; or they wouldn&#x27;t have done it.

While you are completely right about the impossible&#x2F;conflicting legal standards here, this is not an unusual state of things. For example: it has been illegal to discriminate for a very long time, but it has also been de facto illegal to have demographic compositions substantially different from the general population. So, they&#x27;ve always been faced with the problem of needing to either discriminate to get the numbers to match, or not discriminating and risking the numbers falling out of line. The real law has always been, and always will be, prosecutorial discretion. Whatever party is in control will choose whether they go after you or not, and they can because you&#x27;re always violating one side of something.

Viewpoint diversity is that you want fsr right propagated more. Bonus points for open racism and sexism.However, left of any kind is not part of diversity. No one arguing for Palestine, no one arguing for equality. I was tempted to say &quot;no communists&quot; but those kind of don&#x27;t matter.

Viewpoint diversity is not the same as diversity of opinion. When someone is seriously trying to justify DEI practices, viewpoint diversity is usually the first thing they talk about. They argue that having people from diverse backgrounds is important, as diverse experiences lead to diverse viewpoints, which may allow the organization notice and do things it could otherwise not do. They may even argue that if viewpoint diversity and diversity of opinion are in conflict, viewpoint diversity should prevail, as it contributes directly to the mission of the organization.Or at least that&#x27;s how it started, before DEI became a big controversial topic.

You are using a throwaway.Your own views are not valuable enough for you to risk your livelihood for.

&gt; telling things (as) they really areLol, what reality do you live in?

&gt; What if people of merit skew towards certain viewpoints?What if admissions is actually a cyborg alien race??? I am just asking questions!Having the government dictate University level programs is bad, we should all agree to let Universities and colleges run themselves.

It is far from universally accepted that &#x27;the current interpretation of diversity is of outward characteristics, not points of view&#x27;. In fact, I would be surprised if anyone who favors DEI aggrees with that statement.Moreover, the actual interpretation of most proponents of diversity is very much that we desire a diversity of views, which it wants to get through getting a diversity of backgrounds.
That is, of course, not the only reason behind DEI. There is also the fact that it is fair to allow people of all backgrounds the same opportunity.

Nah, you&#x27;re just confusing the KPI with the desire.You get different viewpoints by having people with different sets of experience.Differing gender, race, and socioeconomic backgrounds are drivers of different experiences, and therefore viewpoints. You can&#x27;t easily measure &quot;did this company hire different experiences&quot;, but you can easily measure &quot;did this company hire a bunch of different genders, races, etc&quot;, which doesn&#x27;t guarantee differing viewpoints in individuals, but does strongly suggest it in aggregate&#x2F;at the statistical level.

It&#x27;s the points of view that people are after when they promote diversity. The outward characteristics are at best a convenient proxy. Monocultures fail, diversity is a hedge against that.

&gt; The current interpretation of &quot;diversity&quot; is of outward characteristics, not points of view.Only, amusingly, to people one particular point of view. No, that&#x27;s ridiculous. There is no woker impulse than listening carefully and respectfully to all points of view.

Was this pedantry really worthwhile? The current interpretation of &quot;diversity&quot; is of outward characteristics, not points of view. So, technically, you&#x27;re right. Kudos.

&gt; DEI statementsJust going to point out that this is absolutely not the same thing as rescinding research grants using some lazy grepping of abstracts like the absolute clown show going on now.&gt; horseshoe theory is true.Had to look this one up. Apparently the &quot;far left&quot; and &quot;far right&quot; are somehow the exact things we are dealing with here and now.Nope, sorry. Not equivalent. Not at all.

DEI has led to anything but viewpoint diversity, fostering ideological conformity via practices such as DEI statements, DEI metrics, mandatory trainings, or cancel culture leading to censorship.That the current administration is also purging viewpoints it doesn&#x27;t like, adopting the same authoritarian mindset, but having it enforced by the government (which is worse, IMO), that goes to show horseshoe theory is true.

The points &quot;Viewpoint Diversity in Admissions and Hiring&quot; and &quot;Discontinuation of DEI&quot; seem inconsistent. Enforcing &quot;viewpoint diversity&quot; is a DEI practice in all but name. Actually, it is even in the name. Also with the merit-based stuff, of course. What if people of merit skew towards certain viewpoints? Then hiring&#x2F;admissions won&#x27;t be merit based after all?

Or one can view it as the increasing intellectual vacuousness of ideas on the &quot;right&quot;. (In quotes because the dividing line between left and right itself has shifted rightward over the years.)

I don&#x27;t understand why &quot;rightward&quot; viewpoints need affirmative action in the form of government regulations?

&gt; not all viewpoints are presented anymore. Universities used to be billed as a &quot;marketplace of ideas&quot;.That&#x27;s true. Universities no longer present the viewpoint that black people are inferior to whites and deserve to be slaves. They no longer present the viewpoint that human health comes from the balance of the four humours. They no longer present the viewpoint that women are the property of their fathers&#x2F;husbands. They no longer present the viewpoint that nature is fundamentally made up of earth, aire, fire, and water. How dare they abandon these ideas and still call themselves a &quot;marketplace of ideas&quot;! Hypocrisy!

how dare people slander the right like this. Are you saying you can’t make a right leaning argument without government help?The right should have pride in their selves, and build their own universities, if not their own realities!

I think the intent is to reduce the politically leftward trend in universities, as well as the fact that not all viewpoints are presented anymore. Universities used to be billed as a &quot;marketplace of ideas&quot;.Also, the hermeneutics used for interpreting literature on the fringes in the 1980s are now mainstream -- students aren&#x27;t learning the methods of interpretation used everywhere in the west up until the turn of the century.

&gt; If students and staff have to fill out some kind of viewpoint survey, the only rational strategy is for them to randomize their answers to minimize the chance of being in the group that gets told “sorry, we have too many of your type this year”.This seems obviously preferable to &quot;Sorry, we have too many of your race.&quot;

I think in practice everyone would just claim to be right. Clearly &quot;viewpoint diversity&quot; is code for more (if not mostly) right wing students and faculty.

&gt; If students and staff have to fill out some kind of viewpoint survey, the only rational strategy is for them to randomize their answers to minimize the chance of being in the group that gets told “sorry, we have too many of your type this year”.University students love messing with surveys.My prediction: They&#x27;d coordinate to answer according to the groups they don&#x27;t belong to. Right-leaning people would claim to be on the left. Left-leaning people would claim to be on the right.

&gt; Viewpoint Diversity in Admissions and Hiring. By August 2025, the University shall commission an external party, which shall satisfy the federal government as to its competence and good faith, to audit the student body, faculty, staff, and leadership for viewpoint diversity, such that each department, field, or teaching unit must be individually viewpoint diverse.I kind of hope they go through with this just for the comedy. If students and staff have to fill out some kind of viewpoint survey, the only rational strategy is for them to randomize their answers to minimize the chance of being in the group that gets told “sorry, we have too many of your type this year”.

It was flagged, but saved by the mods soon after, I saw it.

I&#x27;m amazed this isn&#x27;t flagged.The earnest determination of segemnts of the HN comments &quot;community&quot; to prevent discussion of topics they don&#x27;t agree with is almost as concerning as the actions of this adminstration.

ah yes &quot;ad absurdum&quot; is how i want my policies to be made - similar to the tariffs, renaming the gulf of mexico, threatening to take over Canada and Greenland, DOGE... great moves all of them! I&#x27;m sure they are just using reverse psychology to make the american public understand how corrupt their government is

This is such a great move by this administration. The Executive branch has been doing this for a long time across the nation. They use funding to pull strings and execute their views. This latest move is ad absurdum and the whole country will see how ridiculous it is that the President can demand a university (or any other body) do this or that... well guess what folks, you&#x27;re right, and it has been going on for a long time. Look at the Dept of Education next. It needs to stop. The federal Executive Branch is way too large it is breaking the idea of independent states - incubators of ideas and democracy.

I&#x27;m glad my sarcasm was misplaced.I&#x27;m not supporting the government... Instead I was bemused by how Columbia just folded on all points, after lecturing the world from its position of absolute superiority.Interesting one to watch now.

The entertaining thing for you is the university response and it doesn&#x27;t concern you that the government is blatantly forcing ideology on people via every lever of power they can?

The mask obsession these people still have is just amazing. So angry at being told to wear a mask during a pandemic that they want to ban anyone else from doing it now. I would expect better behavior from a toddler.

The mask ban isn’t about covid. The purpose is to facilitate facial recognition. It is analogous to the HK protests a few years ago: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bbc.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;world-asia-china-49931598.amp" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bbc.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;world-asia-china-49931598.amp</a>

&quot;You must disband these groups, including the National Lawyer&#x27;s Guild student group. In addition, you must discipline officers and members of these groups, and you must make them ineligible to join any other student group.&quot;Sorry, I&#x27;ll take &quot;holier than thou&quot; institutions over government-mandated &quot;these student groups are acceptable and these are not&quot;.&quot;You must ban all masks and have penalties no less than suspension for any violation&quot;.Oh yes, look at these ethical high ground ivory tower types...

Federal Government's letter to Harvard demanding changes [pdf]