Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Over at the City Journal California website, Mac Donald takes a scalpel to the ludicrous, over-the-top reaction to the affirmative action bake sale held by the campus Republicans at U.C. Berkeley. She writes:
Gibor Basri, Berkeley’s vice chancellor for equity and diversity, could have served a valuable role here by pointing out that the bake sale was obviously a parody of racial and gender preferences, not a criticism of students themselves. Whatever one thinks about the issue of preferences, he might have said, such political theater belongs to Berkeley’s once-revered tradition of free speech. Instead, Basri chose to stoke the melodramatic self-pity of today’s college students. “A lot of students, especially students of color, read [the bake sale] as placing a higher value on white students,” Basri told the New York Times. Basri, in other words, obeyed the ironclad script for all such minor perturbations in the otherwise unbroken reign of campus political correctness. That script requires that the massive campus-diversity bureaucracy treat the delusional claims of hyperventilating students with utter seriousness.
Mac Donald also points out that Basri pulls down $194,000 a year for peddling this nonsense. Read the whole thing.
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Oct '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
So the liberals are re-introducing affirmative action in 2011?
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
I just don't understand the liberal reaction to this Berkeley bake sale (or the others that have gone before it on other campuses). It's a simple demonstration of affirmative action in practice and how insulting, unfair and even unethical of a policy it is. How can one be so blind --or forgive me--stupid as to completely miss the point?
Jun '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
...the student senate passed an emergency resolution on Sunday condemning “the use of discrimination whether it is in satire or in seriousness by any student group.”
So let me get this straight: it's wrong when a student group discriminates (even in jest), but right and laudable when the university admissions board does so. Right, got it.
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Surprisingly enough, this isn't even the worst thing I've seen this month in terms of talking about affirmative action. There was a video of a man giving a speech at Madison who said just about the same thing you just said in front of a group of students.
They acted as if he were Bull Connor. It reminded me of Ann Coulter's book "Demonic." The man was talking, alone, in front of a gigantic crowd. Reason bounced off the underbelly of the rabble- I think they laughed when he called affirmative action "racist." It was a liberal mob.
Apr '11
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Excellent (and hilarious) photo essay of the Berkeley bake sale here.
May '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Because, Diane, these nitwits have been indoctrinated into parroting the cliches of group-rights group-think. This is what passes for university-level students these days. Pitiful.
Oct '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Ann Althouse on the "Doubletree Protest" in Wisconsin.
Jul '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
I seem to recall some campuses in the past few years where some student Palestinian-rights groups set up a mock "checkpoint" on campus, harassing and threatening passerby. It was supposed to communicate the experience of an Israeli checkpoint.
Nobody on the left raised hell about that one.
Oct '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Kervinlee
Because, Diane, these nitwits have been indoctrinated into parroting the cliches of group-rights group-think. This is what passes for university-level students these days. Pitiful.
And let’s not forget it’s an industry now. This Basri person makes nearly $200K per annum by (as Heather MacDonald nicely put it) “stok(ing) the melodramatic self-pity of today’s college students.” Every major institution, to include all Federal agencies, has a substantial complement of persons dedicated to the proposition that “equity and diversity” are under relentless threat. One cannot expect this cadre to suddenly conclude, “I really shouldn’t get paid this handsome salary just to ‘care and feed’ the grievance machine mandated by Liberal orthodoxy.” Instead, they use every opportunity to remind us that they are vital and deserving.
Sep '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
You do understand it. But that is not important. What the college GOP needs to do now is reverse the prices. Ie: $2 for blacks, $.50 for whites. and watch the reaction. Their bake sale is proving to be a great success.
Aug '11
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Between this story and the recent nonsense in Madison over admissions, I have come to the conclusion that being a "Vice Chancellor for Equity and Diversity" is a really awesome job with excellent pay and benefits. Where do I apply?
(By the way, it's not for nothing that we refer to Madison as "the Berkeley of the midwest.")
Sep '11
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Vice chancellor for equity and diversity is one of those useless administrative positions that increases costs without bringing any productive value to the school. But how far does $194,000 really go in the Bay area? Isn't that more like $100,000 to the rest of the country?
Aug '11
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
I'll do it for $90,000!
Aug '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
I love that the Vice Chancellor for Equity and Diversity cannot even do math.
“A lot of students, especially students of color, read [the bake sale] as placing a higher value on white students,” Basri told the New York Times.
<snort> Uh, no my dear Ms VCED - they value their dollars less, in that they want MORE of them for the same product. Your $0.50 doesn't go very far if you are White.
Aug '11
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Was that part of the job description?
Sep '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
The extreme and vociferous reaction by libs to all these bake sales just highlights the beauty of the concept. It's such a simple and straighforward way to illustrate the injustice of affirmative action that it hits a raw nerve every time.
Oct '10
Re: Heather Mac Donald on the Berkeley Bake Sale
Steven Drexler
The extreme and vociferous reaction by libs to all these bake sales just highlights the beauty of the concept. It's such a simple and straighforward way to illustrate the injustice of affirmative action that it hits a raw nerve every time. · Sep 29 at 10:24am
Yeah verily! College students are well tutored on when and over what to show outrage. But they can’t formulate a coherent counter-argument to an instructive cupcake pricing gimmick, so they fall back on the Left’s last refuge: wounded racial pride. “Gosh, now you’ve gone and hurt poor Johnny’s and Suzy’s feelings, brute!” cry the Diversity Zampolits. This is one tough-minded bunch the University is inculcating into Leftism. They know when to cry to Mama, but not to question why nearly a half-century of affirmative action isn’t having the desired result.