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Posted
1 minute ago, Dahobbs said:

 

I have no idea why you derisively dismissed this post

Sure you do, you hit the nail on the head that it's personal for him. He was acting out like a baby and wanted people to indulge his tantrum.

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Posted
2 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

manufacturing jobs

Este.

Nothing more perfectly encapsulates this naive fetishization of those jobs than Mike Rowe, the QVC host who realized that he could "look the part" of a blue collar guy and get paid a lot of dark money to push an anti-intellectual agenda.

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Posted
1 minute ago, chainsaw said:

Nothing more perfectly encapsulates this naive fetishization of those jobs than Mike Rowe, the QVC host who realized that he could "look the part" of a blue collar guy and get paid a lot of dark money to push an anti-intellectual agenda.

 

It's funny you bring him up as I was just thinking about how his shit is basically blue collar porn for suburbanites.

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Posted
30 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

Good post. 

 

29 minutes ago, G650 said:

I don't think anyone has denied that, I think we are debating what it means.

The best analogy I can come up with is that these white guys had been prepping to play golf in a tournament where the straight lowest score determined placing. Then at their tee time, it changed to using handicaps. 
 

Handicaps aren’t unfair. It’s a legit way of scoring golf and it means that more people can play and compete. But for that group who had the change drop, it’s totally unreasonable not to expect some pushback. 

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Posted
6 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

 

The best analogy I can come up with is that these white guys had been prepping to play golf in a tournament where the straight lowest score determined placing. Then at their tee time, it changed to using handicaps. 
 

Handicaps aren’t unfair. It’s a legit way of scoring golf and it means that more people can play and compete. But for that group who had the change drop, it’s totally unreasonable not to expect some pushback. 

I am not sure how many times I can say we aren't disagreeing. I really didn't need another analogy.

Posted
6 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

 

The best analogy I can come up with is that these white guys had been prepping to play golf in a tournament where the straight lowest score determined placing. Then at their tee time, it changed to using handicaps. 
 

Handicaps aren’t unfair. It’s a legit way of scoring golf and it means that more people can play and compete. But for that group who had the change drop, it’s totally unreasonable not to expect some pushback. 

That's a great analogy.

Posted (edited)
35 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

You've definitely said that. The question is whether the evidence actually shows it. I'm sure it has happened in particular companies and maybe even in particular industries. And that sucks. As I said in my first posts in this thread, a rush to change can also lead to an outsized and immediate impact. I think poorly implemented policies or ones that had a goal of making significant changes to the diversity of a company in short time frame (e.g., a couple of years) had negative impact on certain groups of workers. But the primary driver of the resentment in the original article appears to be the belief that prior to DEI policies becoming mainstream, the workplace was more fair and meritocracy based. That isn't a call for fair treatment. It is a call for the return of treatment that more favored white males. What is true is that the ones who lost some of the privileges attached with being a white male weren't those that most benefitted from them. And from a certain angle that can be seen as an unfair punishment. It would be fairer to take from those that reaped the awards of privileged, and I've repeatedly advocated that in this thread (despite your insistence that I don't care and want to abandon these people). 

Good post. Two things

1) In the bolded above you’re saying they “lost privilege.” I don’t think they had it to lose, but were denied opportunities. It’s a narrow but important distinction, but we agree that the most privileged people did not lose much if anything when efforts were made to establish a level of parity.

2)We haven’t really talked about this, but my own observations of the period was that the people who did benefit were themselves almost always enjoying other forms of privilege - affluent, well connected, etc. To the extent that “greater diversity” was achieved, it came at a cost of making class and power structures even more rigid and impenetrable. 

Edited by Bozo_Casanova
Posted
7 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

 

The best analogy I can come up with is that these white guys had been prepping to play golf in a tournament where the straight lowest score determined placing. Then at their tee time, it changed to using handicaps. 
 

Handicaps aren’t unfair. It’s a legit way of scoring golf and it means that more people can play and compete. But for that group who had the change drop, it’s totally unreasonable not to expect some pushback. 

 

1 minute ago, Vegas64 said:

That's a great analogy.

Is it? The suggestion is that the initial framework before was entirely skill/merit based. Since we know that isn't true, the analogy is flawed. It's more like they were playing a game of golf where the white guys had a few strokes handicap or maybe got to skip the first few holes. They also may have had better clubs, a caddy, and have played the course previously. The rules changed to remove the handicap and give everyone else slightly more comparable equipment. 

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Posted

If there's one thing I love it's torturing analogies. So here's my take. 

That analogy is really good if we stipulate that the white guys had received golf lessons since they were 6 thanks to their affluent upbringing while the rest of the entrants had not received any lessons and had only played enough golf to register an official handicap. So they thought they were entering a "fair" competition where they could pretend that everyone had an even shot and ignore their tremendous structural advantage. Now that the playing field is leveled they are aggrieved. 

There, that enough torture? 

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Posted
4 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

 

Is it? The suggestion is that the initial framework before was entirely skill/merit based. Since we know that isn't true, the analogy is flawed. It's more like they were playing a game of golf where the white guys had a few strokes handicap or maybe got to skip the first few holes. They also may have had better clubs, a caddy, and have played the course previously. The rules changed to remove the handicap and give everyone else slightly more comparable equipment. 

No, I think by 2014 my analogy is better. I will say that the white guys had been coached all their lives, had families who loved the sport and helped them learn to play, and had given them great equipment and lots of tee times. The others had recently begun playing, didn’t have coaching, etc. 
 

The actual structure handicaps in favor of white guys and “skipping holes” had been eliminated by then. That is the difference between “inequality” and “inequity”. 

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Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, G650 said:

That is true, but the bigger challenge almost all humans face is getting over the fact that life, itself, is not fair.

it's also not UNfair. it just HAPPENS.

over the years i've explained that to a number of young people in my life, when they've faced challenges and obstacles and wanted to claim victimhood...

life is NOT out to 'get you' and it is not inherently unfair or unjust...it just IS. a lot of shit just happens and it's up to the individual to assess and respond accordingly - that's where the responsibility lies. life really doesn't give a shit one way or another. 

maybe i need to talk to these millennial white boys 🤔😄

Edited by mchookem
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Posted
5 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

No, I think by 2014 my analogy is better. I will say that the white guys had been coached all their lives, had families who loved the sport and helped them learn to play, and had given them great equipment and lots of tee times. The others had recently begun playing, didn’t have coaching, etc. 
 

The actual structure handicaps in favor of white guys and “skipping holes” had been eliminated by then. That is the difference between “inequality” and “inequity”. 

We know that isn't true. Plenty of studies show that if you put two applicants with the same qualifications, one with a black sounding name and one with a white sounding name, the one with the black sounding will get rejected more often. 

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Posted
16 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

We know that isn't true. Plenty of studies show that if you put two applicants with the same qualifications, one with a black sounding name and one with a white sounding name, the one with the black sounding will get rejected more often. 

At this point you’re doing the lawyer thing and torturing the analogy while also not registering counter-examples (for example, grad and professional school admissions stats based on GPA and test scores). And of course, a name is an individual marker, even if some of those individual markers are often linked to group markers. 

To torture the analogy further, the golfers all get assigned a handicap based on the average handicap for other members of their gender/ethnic group in the tournament. instead of their own registered handicap. Which to @Bozo_Casanova’s has the explicit impact of greatly favoring the skilled, practiced, and elite players across all groups and tremendously disadvantaging people who really need a  handicap.

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Posted
1 hour ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

Again, do you not understand that the consistent theme of what I've posted, including the post you repsonded to is that GenX and Boomer white males did not give up anything or lose any advantage?

Yep.  And the term you are looking for is - unironically - called "grandfathering."

If tomorrow, the City of Austin passes a regulation that as of 1/1/26 no new single-family home can be over 1-story tall, then any house that is not already over 1-story or has not applied for a permit under the current rules, cannot be more than 1-story tall.  That is a legal framework that presently exists, is enforced nationwide, and does not result in any taking of property or other actionable harm to anyone.

If, on the other hand, the City of Austin passed that same regulation, but followed it with "and we're going to have to tear down 10% of the current 2-story houses," every owner of such a house picked for destruction would have a lay-down taking claim.

To bring the metaphor back home, actually firing or demoting people to make room for someone else would curl your hair and everyone else's, and for good reason.  Changing the rules going forward, while it might FEEL unfair relatively speaking, is generally considered fair.  Changing them retroactively, and actively taking away rights/things you have?  Those are universally regarded as wrong and unfair.  And as you seem to be hung up on the fact that Gen Z white males are pissed not because the playing field going forward doesn't favor them as much, but because those who played before aren't being penalized, then . . . yeah.  My sympathy/empathy is low.  That's just our monkey-banana brain at work.  "No matter how many bananas I get, if some other monkey got more, I'm pissed." 

But, again, y'all are missing the punch line that obliterates this conversation: white male grievance has WON.  There will never be a better time to be a white male than in this new era.  It is official US policy that they are the most favored demographic, and any time any white male loses at anything it is per se evidence of racial/gender discrimination and non-merit-based hiring etc.  I have little sympathy for people who have captured all the levers of power, and are actively and proudly using them to favor one small group at the expense of literally everyone else.....and then bitch about how they haven't been able to....what, eliminate all non-white male competition from earth entirely? THEY'VE FUCKING WON.  TAKE THE FUCKING W AND SHUT THE FUCK UP.

Posted
3 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

At this point you’re doing the lawyer thing and torturing the analogy while also not registering counter-examples (for example, grad and professional school admissions stats based on GPA and test scores). And of course, a name is an individual marker, even if some of those individual markers are often linked to group markers. 

To torture the analogy further, the golfers all get assigned a handicap based on the average handicap for other members of their gender/ethnic group in the tournament. instead of their own registered handicap. Which to @Bozo_Casanova’s has the explicit impact of greatly favoring the skilled, practiced, and elite players across all groups and tremendously disadvantaging people who really need a  handicap.

Your analogy had a built-in assumption that the prior system was merit based. It's the same flaw in the original article. My only intention was to bring it out for discussion. The truth is neither system is a pure merit-based system. The question is whether one is more desirable than the other for society in general.

Further, there is an error here in conflating all methods of improving equity as operating in the same manner. Some of them may operate by modifying the scoring (e.g., your testing scores example). Others may operate by providing equipment or training. I think the former are going to seem inherently more unfair to other competitors and are more likely to generate resentment. 

Posted
56 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

We know that isn't true. Plenty of studies show that if you put two applicants with the same qualifications, one with a black sounding name and one with a white sounding name, the one with the black sounding will get rejected more often. 

My buddy in grad school told me about applying for jobs after he got out of the army and finishing up his undergrad degree. When he applied as José... crickets. When he changed his resume to show Jason... callbacks. On his first day I think at EY, his colleagues kept calling him Jason and he practically ignored them because he forgot that was his cover name.

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Posted
32 minutes ago, YChang said:

My buddy in grad school told me about applying for jobs after he got out of the army and finishing up his undergrad degree. When he applied as José... crickets. When he changed his resume to show Jason... callbacks. On his first day I think at EY, his colleagues kept calling him Jason and he practically ignored them because he forgot that was his cover name.

My new favorite thing is when I get a customer service call back from "Donald," a guy with a thick Bangladeshi accent

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Posted

Anglicizing is a thing that goes as far back in America to the Ellis Island Jews, Irish and Italian mass immigration era, nothing new there. Some might argue it's cultural assimiliation and adaptation and resilience, others might argue it's racism and assualt for not letting people bring their whole self to work. I've always subscribed to the quaint philosophy of "Mind My Own Darn Business", personally.

Posted
On 12/20/2025 at 9:51 AM, wildcat09 said:

I don't think this really happened. I think a much more accurate description of the story this author is telling and that you're buying is that in the pivot to try to diversify, some employers in certain fields adopted poorly-considered hiring and promotion policies that were moderately discriminatory against white men. I don't think it qualified as "en masse" and I think it's likely that more often than not, they weren't actually discriminatory against white men to any substantive degree, but mediocre white men felt discriminated against because they no longer had it as easy as they used to. 

Jacob Savage is a mediocre writer with an axe to grind. Compact Mag is a reactionary centrist rag with a clear agenda. The essay even acknowledges that the biggest problem in the industry is its severe contraction, but they want to focus on the race angle because their agenda is to cater to entitled white boys with imagined grievances. I also question the truthfulness and accuracy of much of the piece, for the same reasons other posters have already addressed.

Over the last 3 years, we've had around 30 summer clerks come through our firm. Most have been white and it's probably been a couple more women than men.  Of the 30 or so clerks we've had, there's only been 4 who've been below standard. Their quality of work was poor (one even turned in a clearly-AI generated memorandum that was not responsive to the assignment), they were arrogant and rude to their peers (and sometimes even to attorneys at the firm), one got belligerently drunk at a firm happy hour, etc. They were all straight white men. They were boys who hadn't grown up.  But we've never had any issues with any of the other clerks (many of whom were also straight white men). Everyone else was capable of behaving like adults, in the office and socially, did great work, and will be good lawyers. Of those ~26 good clerks, we've hired 5. Despite being good to great candidates, we couldn't hire the rest. I'm pretty sure that one of the bad clerks thinks he didn't get an offer because he imagined that we'd decided we needed to hire more women. I suspect the others have the same or similar thoughts about why they weren't hired.  Is this just a tiny sample size in a unique industry? Sure. Is it any less representative of larger trends than the anecdotes in the Compact essay? Not really.

Despite its whining, the essay does describe a shift that has happened and impacted mostly millennials, as Bozo notes. That change was bound to happen though, given the greater diversity of our generation and numerous other factors. 2020 got a little wacky in response to the George Floyd protests, but that was the mother of all outliers. It's still much easier to be a white man in America than it is to be anything else. It might not be as easy as it used to be for white millennial men in media as was for prior generations, but that's less about them being white and more about them being in an industry that's an absolute nightmare to break through in for anyone. If you're an entitled, mediocre white man who thinks you deserve to get a spot on the NY Times op-ed page before you're 30 or get your first screenplay greenlit or whatever, of course you're going to be fucked.

Bozo, I know you've been spending a lot of time monitoring what the right is saying these days and that you've been thinking through how to combat their messaging to white men. I could be wrong here, but the sense I get from your posting is that you think we need to acknowledge in our messaging that they've been screwed over by well-intentioned progressive policies. I think that would be a mistake. One thing that I don't think has been discussed here, is that though this essay described a phenomena that affected millennials, millennials still hold the most progressive views on diversity of any generation. Most white millennial men who've lived through what has been described are generally fine with their lot in life and think that phenomena was generally good. The rise in racism among younger people has been among Gen Z and Gen Alpha, not millennials. That's not because they've been discriminated against in hiring, that's because the GOP, the richest people on earth, and much of the mainstream media and alternate "centrist" media like Compact Mag and the Free Press all tell them they're being and are going to continue to be discriminated against.

Do I have a great idea about how to counter that? Not really. But the most important thing in trying to reach that demographic is not validating that messaging. What we probably need is a not-insane Jordan Peterson of the left, who can tell them to make their bed and stand up straight and learn to act like fucking adults. 

I think this is a very interesting post.  You say your firm has had 30 or so summer interns over the last 3 years and that most of them have been white.  I don't know if your firm is in Texas or not, but in 2022 42% of law school students in Texas were from "racial/ethnic minorities" and nationally it is around 35%.

So why did your firm mostly have white summer interns?  If we are to believe the vast majority of posters on this thread, you must work at a GOP dominated racist/white supremacist law firm?  

Based on your post history, I seriously doubt you work for a racist/white supremacist firm.  But if we are to believe the Briskets of this topic, you must.

So I am curious what the answer is?  

Posted
6 minutes ago, sheeeit said:

I think this is a very interesting post.  You say your firm has had 30 or so summer interns over the last 3 years and that most of them have been white.  I don't know if your firm is in Texas or not, but in 2022 42% of law school students in Texas were from "racial/ethnic minorities" and nationally it is around 35%.

So why did your firm mostly have white summer interns?  If we are to believe the vast majority of posters on this thread, you must work at a GOP dominated racist/white supremacist law firm?  

Based on your post history, I seriously doubt you work for a racist/white supremacist firm.  But if we are to believe the Briskets of this topic, you must.

So I am curious what the answer is?  

I know you aren't asking me, but I would hazard a guess:

- He works at a good law firm.

- There are a TON of crappy law schools. Tier 3 and 4 level rankings nationally.

- The majority of the racial/ethical minorities that make up your stat come from the law schools that accept anyone with a BA from any schools and arent generally competitive. A lot of the aforementioned are first generation college students who probably didn't go to prestige undergrad.

- The recruiting of a top law firm still targets top targets (undergrads) which still over-represent white (but probably now skew more women).

Posted
22 minutes ago, Vegas64 said:

Anglicizing is a thing that goes as far back in America to the Ellis Island Jews, Irish and Italian mass immigration era, nothing new there. Some might argue it's cultural assimiliation and adaptation and resilience, others might argue it's racism and assualt for not letting people bring their whole self to work. I've always subscribed to the quaint philosophy of "Mind My Own Darn Business", personally.

Maybe I'm just cynical, because these companies clearly know that American customers fucking hate being forced to deal with south asian call centers, so this is just their way of trying to cover that up.

Posted
On 12/20/2025 at 6:30 PM, aggie08 said:

I qualify as a millennial (about to cross 40), and I'm pretty comfortable admitting that some of my career advancements have come, in part, to me being a tall, relatively handsome, socially competent white dude. Mechanical Engineer FWIW.

If we're throwing around isolated anecdotes.

This is just so much bullshit.  You honestly believe that you have had advancements over other tall, relatively handsome, socially competent male minority engineers?  So you admit you are fine working for a racist organization?  

Posted
18 minutes ago, Vegas64 said:

I know you aren't asking me, but I would hazard a guess:

- He works at a good law firm.

- There are a TON of crappy law schools. Tier 3 and 4 level rankings nationally.

- The majority of the racial/ethical minorities that make up your stat come from the law schools that accept anyone with a BA from any schools and arent generally competitive. A lot of the aforementioned are first generation college students who probably didn't go to prestige undergrad.

- The recruiting of a top law firm still targets top targets (undergrads) which still over-represent white (but probably now skew more women).

Texas is 53-47 female to male (and in terms of "the best students," in my experience, it's even more skewed.  Probably closer to 60-40).  But law schools in Texas still skew white, compared to overall population (in Texas, white population is around 40%):

tx-aba-approved-law-schools-race-demogra

So, from decent schools, your pool of candidates is going to skew white and female, and the pool of better candidates skews even more heavily female.

It also depends on the field you're hiring for.  The pool of candidates interested in high level M&A work is almost certainly going to skew white, and probably even male.  Family law?  From my experience, more heavily female and minority.  IP?  Gonna draw more heavily from people who already have engineering and science degrees, which will see asians at a higher percentage than their share of population.  No individual case is determinative -- I'm sure there are brilliant black female M&A lawyers, and I know of lots of great white male family law attorneys.

Law is a very variable business, based on the entities hiring, the practice type at issue, etc.  What I will suggest that if you look at the top 50 students from any of these schools, they're going to skew even more female than the total female population of the school.

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Posted
10 minutes ago, sheeeit said:

This is just so much bullshit.  You honestly believe that you have had advancements over other tall, relatively handsome, socially competent male minority engineers?  So you admit you are fine working for a racist organization?  

Tom Cruise What GIF

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Posted
9 minutes ago, sheeeit said:

You honestly believe that you have had advancements over other tall, relatively handsome, socially competent male minority engineers?  So you admit you are fine working for a racist organization?  

He works with human beings with some racial biases.  Which we all do.  And for that matter, oddly enough, even minorities and women can still look more favorably on a good looking white dude, because socially, that's what America is trained to think that's what "leadership" looks like.  It's just a reality.

Kinda like the very attractive gal with an incredible rack is going to get more attention and chances for promotion than Marla Hooch.

fw0ZZQgKJTpTV5bolrOqjSIG-wmtTMwHLdtZORr1

And yeah, kinda like a dude with face tats probably isn't going to end up managing partner at Skadden.

Posted (edited)
42 minutes ago, sheeeit said:

I think this is a very interesting post.  You say your firm has had 30 or so summer interns over the last 3 years and that most of them have been white.  I don't know if your firm is in Texas or not, but in 2022 42% of law school students in Texas were from "racial/ethnic minorities" and nationally it is around 35%.

So why did your firm mostly have white summer interns?  If we are to believe the vast majority of posters on this thread, you must work at a GOP dominated racist/white supremacist law firm?  

Based on your post history, I seriously doubt you work for a racist/white supremacist firm.  But if we are to believe the Briskets of this topic, you must.

So I am curious what the answer is?  

I think this is a great opportunity for this discussion to advance. Should we placate @sheeeit's beliefs or address them honestly? Does it help to tell him what he wants to hear or what the evidence actually is?  Does empathizing with his plight require us to admit his beliefs are true? 

Edited by Dahobbs
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Posted
21 hours ago, wildcat09 said:

Fewer boys are applying for colleges for a very simple reason: more girls are. There’s a type of male (conservative) who wants absolutely nothing to do with anything that woman do. We’ve seen this in various professions (e.g. teaching and nursing) and now we’re seeing it in education. 

They’re not being denied opportunities, they’re refusing them. Because they have shitty parents that instill shitty values in them. There’s not an equivalent to Title IX that can fix that.

Lulz.  So according to this logic, shitty parents only have sons and good parents only have daughters?



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