The Diversity Delusion: How Race and Gender Pandering Corrupt the University and Undermine Our Culture. Heather Mac Donald. St. Martin's Press, New York, 2018.
Below is an example of super critical reading and analysis. I know for many it takes up a lot of time (for me it takes up a lot of time), but breaking the book down and doing additional research as you read are key in learning about any subject. For this book I not only did a review, but pulled parts of it out to show you examples of how to read a text critically. Sorry for the length of this post.
One of the things I noticed about this book is that Donald likes to call people she disagrees with anarchists. This made me question my definition of the word so I decided to look it up. So according to the dictionary on the web an anarchist is "a person who advocates or promotes anarchism or anarchy" and then anarchism is "a political theory advocating the abolition of hierarchical government and the organization of society on a voluntary, cooperative basis without recourse to force or compulsion" (AS2&3). So I wasn't wrong in my understanding of the word. In our society we usually go with the first part of the definition where it is someone that wants to reduce or have no government and not that other definition. She only seems to focus on this last definition and uses it more as a way to dehumanize those who protest against her. If we wanted a real example of the last definition
One of the things I do when I read books is I look into the author. By work she has experience in writing, journalism, and law. Basically the same fields that a lot of politicians come from. She currently holds both a BA and and MA in English (BA from Yale and MA from Cambridge) and then a JD from Stanford. So basically her education is one that shows super privilege (AS1). I feel like if maybe at least one of her degrees would have been from a state school it would have been more meaningful vs just having the who's who of schools. One thing I have learned about education after working in higher education for years is that the price tag of your degree doesn't represent its actual value. These high end schools give a very limited world view to their students and their curriculum isn't all that different for each topic then you would find at any other schools. So, while she may look impressive on paper in reality here over all scope of not just the topic for this book, but in general is very limited.
The resources she used for this book were very much cherry picked with few counter articles to her points used. She also relied on interviews with people on other communications which are opinion based and not always fact based. The people she used for these were also a limited pool of people that may have fit the story she was trying to tell instead of a diverse group of experts.
Overall the only thing this book is good for is raising a few questions that will lead me to do more research in certain areas. As someone that has worked in higher education for years her lack of knowledge on not only higher education, but on society and humanity in general glares for anyone with any basic knowledge set. Her books need detailed foot notes, better references, and less opinion if she is going for anything that could be seen as a piece of factual nonfiction. 1 star out of 5 or a F-.
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Detailed Breakdown
"History should convey the hard work it took over centuries to carve stability and prosperity out of violence, tyranny, and corruption." (P4) So this is one of the few things that she says that I do agree with. This actually shows a deeper understanding of history that people need to have. History is not just a bunch of dates and events, but an evolving creature that can bite us if be do not pay attention to all of its small clues.
"Masked anarchists use force to block conservatives from speaking in public forums." (P4) People have the right to say who they want to speak on their campus because that is their area and not the speaker's. If a speaker is having a hard time finding a place to speak without major disruption then the speaker should think about what they are saying and the impact that it has on people. If they feel that they are non-biased on a subject, such as Donald thinks she is on say police topics, then she needs to look at how she is presenting things. Like if she is using statistics, instead of just throwing out a number, then she should provide the source right there (maybe in a PowerPoint) so that people can check the source on their phones if they have an issue with the number she has given. It seems that a lot of her issues is that she does not know how to present information. I would think that someone with her education would, but it seems that she either does not have these skills or chooses not to use them. Either way it hurts her. Also on top of this I was able to find that she doesn't always have the correct numbers or reliable sources of information. For example when fact checked about statistics she actually gave has testimony it turned out she got a random number from a random LA Police Officer with nothing to back it up, yet she tried to use it as actual proof for what she was saying (AS4). So she uses bad information and a lawyer should know better then to spread misinformation or heresay.
"Asked if the demand to efface the course raised free speech problems, the student dismissed the First Amendment as an "outdated" law "written by a bunch of white men." It is a certainty that she has read neither the amendment nor the history of the Bill of Rights." (P5) As a historian I can 100% say that Donald is wrong and that the student is much closer to understanding the Constitution/Bill of Rights then she is. These are very outdated. All we would have to look at for example is the right to bear arms that conservatives like to focus so much on. If the founding fathers knew what kind of mass killing weapons we today call "guns" I think that they would not have written the second amendment how they did. Guns back then were slow to load and could not hold the crazy amount of bullets that our modern 'guns' can. This shows how outdated it is. We try to change the laws to adapt to the current times since older things just do not apply and our constantly evolving society needs to be adaptable instead of relying on outdated information. Like when it comes to freedom of speech I have a feeling the founding fathers never even dreamed of anything like the internet and the mass bullying and misinformation that would run amuck.
"As for "We, few"'s gross misreading of my work, it showed that reading skills are in short supply at the Claremont colleges as writing skills." (P20) Those shows how she is quick to tear down anyone who disagrees with her views and writings with a personal attack which is one of the things she seems to dislike others doing to her. This statement is not based on any type of direct fact, but is just a generalization that there is no evidence for. This is a form of hypocritical behavior.
"Colleges today are determined to preserve in many of their students the thin skin and solipsism of adolescence." (Forgot to write down the page number). I can say that I do not disagree that some colleges do baby students. It is true that many colleges do not teach students to 'adult' and help them develop bad skills through to much hand holding and bending backwards that will negatively impact them in the real world. This is one of the few things I did agree with.
"...if the so-called stereotype threat really were inhibiting minorities from showing what they know and can do, standardized tests should predict that black and Hispanic students will do worse in college than they actually do." (47).
Unreliable resources: For example in chapter 4 (P83) she mentions some specific numbers from some 2004 study that was published in Social Science Quarterly, but the name of the study was missing and this source was missing from the notes at the back of the book. This means that she could have easily made up these numbers because no one can fact check her with so little information. Writing this way shows bad research and writing skills.
In chapter 3 she talks about the Arcidiacono paper. One of the things this paper looked at was black students that hard started out in science majors, changing their program to 'easier' programs once they realized that they couldn't keep up with the academic challenges of their initial program. This is something that I think needs to be studied more in general. From my experience in a registrar's office, there are always a lot of change of program forms to process and some students change their program more than once. I think that more research is needed on why students change their program in general and then on the specific demographics related to those changes. Peter Arcidiacono, Esteban M. Auceju, and Ken Spenner, "What Happens after Enrollment? An Analysis of the Time Path of Racial Differences in GPA and Major Choice," IZA Journal of Labor Economics 1, no. 5 (Oct. 2012). https://izajole.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/2193-8997-1-5.
Chapter 6 is riddle with miss information about rape and rape culture. As a woman it shows no understand of rape and no care to the victims.
Chapter 7 shows her lack of understand about sexual freedom vs. unwanted touching.
Her part 2 section that focused on gender actually focused on sexual assault mostly male on female. This section showed not only a lack of empathy for the victims, but again a lack of understanding of the victim experience.
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Important Questions
Below are some questions that the book did raise for me to look into more.
1. What are the retention rates at schools for affirmative-action students and minority students when compared to the general school population and other populations (like first generation students)?
2. What research has been done into why students change their program of study and is the links to race and early education success?
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Additional Sources
1. "Heather Mac Donald." Manhattan Institute. Accessed February 27, 2024. https://www.citationmachine.net/bibliographies/0eb4c7ff-5d89-4084-9c9f-247b15d508e7
2. "Anarchism" https://www.google.com/search?sca_esv=85af15397c77c0f6&rlz=1C1GCEW_enUS1087US1088&sxsrf=ACQVn0_plsSYlg9N0dArpIcwY0uKHHBuEA:1709068943746&q=anarchism&si=AKbGX_onJk-q0LQUYzV7-GRhpJ5D6TuRxjcESSzFd44Dt1FqHkSU5aolofXqUlmCzqZO_JXRUcZ2acEDzlf9hpDjSKDbfQrfL35uQnApwQAizkGg_vg0ojA%3D&expnd=1
3. "Anarchist" https://www.google.com/search?q=anarchist&rlz=1C1GCEW_enUS1087US1088&oq=anarchist&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyDwgAEEUYORiDARixAxiABDINCAEQABiDARixAxiABDINCAIQABiDARixAxiABDIMCAMQABhDGIAEGIoFMg0IBBAAGIMBGLEDGIAEMgcIBRAAGIAEMgoIBhAAGLEDGIAEMgcIBxAAGIAEMgcICBAuGIAEMgcICRAAGIAEqAIAsAIA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
4. Jacobson, Louis, and Miriam Valverde. “Politifact - Fact-Checking an Immigration Meme That’s Been Circulating for More than a Decade.” @politifact, July 5, 2018. https://www.politifact.com/article/2018/jul/05/fact-checking-immigration-meme-s-been-circulating-/.
To Read: The Victim's Revolution and Tenured Radicals (two separate books), The War on Cops, When Race Trumps Merit, The Immigration Solution: A Better Plan than Today's.
Top Picture From: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38492016-the-diversity-delusion
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Additional things to Research:
-Implicit Association Test and it's connection to the National Science Foundation and Institute of Mental Health.
