IP: Re: degreeless talent

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

> X-Sender: dpreed () mail reed com
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> Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2001 09:54:34 -0400
> To: David Farber <dave () farber net>
> From: "David P. Reed" <dpreed () reed com>
> Subject: Re: Fwd: Re: IP: degreeless talent
>
> Perhaps my irony was too subtle in my original comments.  So here's some 
> decoding.
>
> I am deeply offended by the chauvinism/racism inherent in the idea that 
> the ethnic background of research lab workers is a measure of whether 
> Americans are innovative.  Most of those under-45 HP'ers are not on H1B 
> visas.  The majority are just Americans who happen to have last names that 
> are Asian or Hispanic or European.  My alma mater (MIT) and my son's 
> (Caltech) are also now full of people who don't have the traditional 
> surnames associated with "Americans".  If the "New Democrats" focus on 
> surnames as a measure of "Americanism", they deserve to fail (and as one 
> who votes Democrat often, I hope they wise up).  The Democrats of the 
> '70's would never have played this game of equating ethnicity with 
> American.  Thus my snide comment about "white boys" - intended to poke fun 
> at those who measure "American" by such stereotypes.
>
> I mention Bush, Gates, and Andreesen's attitudes about education because 
> their public comments devaluing learning are also deeply offensive to 
> me.  As Dan Lynch points out, they are indeed full of shit, but as our 
> recent dot-com hysteria points out, American culture (at least the 
> news&media) tends to celebrate the idea that learning is useless, 
> clever/sharp dealing is more worthwhile than scientific understanding, and 
> technical skills are less important than glamor and power.  America is no 
> longer the culture that celebrated Einstein in the first half of the 20th 
> century.
>
> A couple of people seemed to think my comments were "racist".  It's hard 
> not to use some concept of race or skin color in responding to actual 
> racist remarks such as those uttered by the HP lab director and embraced 
> by the "New Democrats".  Let's instead focus on helping everyone learn - 
> no matter their name, skin color, or country of origin.  Innovation comes 
> from diversity of inputs, and our (world) economy will succeed if we stop 
> trying to draw boundaries between America and non-America.



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