I asked if the UW had any studies available for why people might be leaving or who was at risk, and was told that we needed to do this, with an explanation flavored with a couple of unhappy anecdotes.
Discussion rapidly devolved from general discussion to suggestions for making diversity training mandatory for faculty (using a "stealth" program), and from that to complaining about their budgets and the evil fiscal conservative student government.
Despite the hints at the start by the facilitator's assistant (?) that voices could get overlooked if some people talked too much, two dominated--one an aggressively aggrieved administrative assistant who didn't like people ignoring her in favor of the degreed, and the other a month-new liason to Indians and Eskimos giving chapter and verse of how the student charged with running a pow-wow was disrespecting her. Neither the facilitator nor the assistant tried to steer the discussion back to something useful.
"Was there enough oversight of students running the student segregated fees?" was the question of the hour. I'm not sure what it had to do with how to make students feel welcome, but somehow it seems like a natural evolution of the project.
It would be a bit much to expect any careful thought about what "diversity" is or needs from such a group. And to be fair, the pettiness was driven by a few of our number (one lady barely said a word).
If I'd tried to redirect the meeting I'd have gotten flack about white male privilege, and I didn't think the chances of getting anything useful were worth the bother. But noblesse oblige, maybe I should have tried--it couldn't have been worse and the noisy ones would have had the joy of seeing their prejudices confirmed.
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Bethany over at Bad Data, Bad! has a younger brother who works for Sojourners. Wonderful young (30) man, even if he is farther left than is meet.
He attended a conference which purported to address a particular problem - homelessness, perhaps, or unemployment. The entire morning was taken up with one aggrieved group after another taking the floor to make sure the importance of their group was not being shorted in any way. The actual issue was not addressed. He thought "I'm not liberal enough for this."
There is a more-oppressed-than-thou attitude that prevents actual solutions that would help everyone. I have concluded that the professional activists do not want problems actually solved. All that is necessary is for others to recognise that they are among the elite oppressed.
The actual oppressed, who they hire to represent them, don't seem to be getting their money's worth.
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