We recently discussed a professor who declared that astrophysics is racist due to its focus on “individualism” and exceptionalism.” These critiques are part of a larger movement alleging that everything from math to meritocracy is racist. The latest controversy centers around a lecture by Luis Leyva, associate professor of mathematics education at Vanderbilt University entitled “Undergraduate Mathematics Education as a White, Cisheteropatriarchal Space and Opportunities for Structural Disruption to Advance Queer of Color Justice.” In other words, math is a racist field of study advancing white male, straight “conforming-to-assigned sex” individuals.Leyva advocates the “re-imagining undergraduate mathematics education with structural disruptions that advance justice for learners marginalized across intersections of race, gender, and sexuality.”
This is part of a growing movement across the country. We previously discussed the view of University of Rhode Island and Director of Graduate Studies of History Erik Loomis that “Science, statistics, and technology are all inherently racist.” Others have agreed with that view, including denouncing math as racist or a “tool of whiteness.” There are also calls for the “decolonization” of math as a field.
Leyva does not address meritocracy, which has been denounced by others. The controversy over meritocracy recently enveloped Virginia high schools after various schools admitted to withholding National Merit awards. Some parents allege that they were told the withholding of the awards was to support efforts toward greater equity in schools.
Various teachers and professors have objected that meritocracy is a tool of white supremacy. For example, Alison Collins, the Vice President of the San Francisco Board of Education, declared meritocracy to be racist even in the selection of students at advanced or gifted programs. As we have previously discussed, this has been a building campaign in academia as educators and others denounce selection based on academic performance through testing. Most cities have such gifted programs or institutions, though we have discussed calls for the elimination of all gifted and talented programs in cities like New York.
I can appreciate the calls for greater efforts to develop math skills and teachers in underrepresented populations. I hope that we are all committed to that goal. That does not require “structural disruptions” as opposed to outreach and supportive programs.
It is the repeated calls to “decolonize” math that are most concerning. Math has always been one of the greatest equalizers, no pun intended. As I discussed earlier, it is a shame to see math treated as a field of privilege when many of us view it as a field of pure intellectual pursuit and bias neutrality. Either the math is there or it is not. The race of the mathematician will not change the outcome.
The English set forth with all sales raised, banners unfurled and cannons at the ready to colonize mathematics. At last their is a man who will stand against the enslavement of the prime numbers. Let us not forget that they have chained the numbers to the masthead and give em forty lashes. Blimey mate! Did you see how they keel hauled number 37? It’s surprising that 37 survived his back being torn to shreds and all. Stand tall professor Leyva. It is time that these devil colonizers of the numbers are exposed. God bless you my good Captain. God bless you sir.
The lefties seem bound and determined to have their own McCarthy era.
I can’t recommend it. Joseph McCarthy was right about the prevalence of Communists in the federal government, but his methods were so sloppy, it backfired on him.
The left’s methods are just as sloppy and for what? So 60-year-old weirdos can twerk in front of school kids? C’mon, man!!
“but his methods were so sloppy, it backfired on him.”
Maybe McCarthy’s methods weren’t so bad, but the left was much better at stealing the dialogue. They wiped out history, so we focus on McCarthyism and McCarthy rather than those who tried to topple America.
McCarthy was correct, and though he had some character flaws, we should praise him. We should redirect the repulsion and hate against him toward the left that tried to conceal their attempt to overturn our free nation.
True that, Alan 🙂
LOL!
“Alan!”
Stop it, man, you’re killin’ me!
Allan…….if I’m remembering correctly, McCarthy was from Appleton, Wisconsin,
and was, at one time, a law partner of Greta Van Susteren’s father……even lived with her family for awhile in Appleton.
Cindy, I heard something like that a long time ago. Wasn’t RFK one of McCarthy’s lawyers? People forget a lot. The left is devious and smart when they wish to destroy something or someone. Not so good at building.
I found out something today. That was a big surprise.
Diogenes, I wasn’t sure of what you were referring to but I decided to respond with the following that have to do with the Venona Project which proved McCarthy correct. I am of the opinion that this same problem has been repeated and is being repeated today though in a different fashion. The left is responsible.
Take careful note that Roosevelt was not informed of the Venona Project.
“The most important aspect of the Venona files was the identification of many members of the Roosevelt administration who were secretly spying for the Soviet Union during World War II. Many of these people were confidants of the president and had considerable influence in the administration.” This is what McCarthy claimed.
https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/article/opening-the-venona-files/
https://www.historynet.com/the-venona-project/
May I recommend Witness by Whitaker Chambers?
Alger Hiss was part of Comrade General Secretary Roosevelt’s communist State Department.
Alger Hiss was a communist.
Alger Hiss was guilty.
The whole communist American welfare state is unconstitutional.
Not one bit of it exists in the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
The singular American failure has been and continues to be the communist Supreme Court.
Not to put too fine a point on it.
________________________
“Alger Hiss (pictured), a well-educated and well-connected former government lawyer and State Department official who helped create the United Nations in the aftermath of World War II, was headed to prison in Atlanta for lying to a federal grand jury.”
“The central issue of the trial was espionage. In August 1948, Whittaker Chambers—a senior editor at Time magazine—was called by the House Committee on Un-American Activities to corroborate the testimony of Elizabeth Bentley, a Soviet spy who had defected in 1945 and accused dozens of members of the U.S. government of espionage. One official she named as possibly connected to the Soviets was Alger Hiss.”
– FBI.gov
It’s so sad that this man lives in constant fear. He sees a snake under every rock. This is an obvious case of delirium tremors without the use alcohol being consumed. Yet here he is teaching your children how they should think. Is he devious are just mentally hampered? Both must be the answer. One can only hope that his students never are involved with designing a water treatment plant or a jet airplane. He is a danger not only to those near to him but to all of us. One should remember that he sits at the center of a spider web built on a desire for mediocracy. There will be societal consequences due to his mania. We must let him speak but we must recognize him for what he is and weigh his pronouncements accordingly.
Delirium Tremens
If math is racist and math is the most objective knowledge (it is right or wrong – you might get partial credit, if you show your work), is all knowledge racist?
Should we fall down the crt/deconstructionist worm hole and live as savages?
Did you read this comment out of context?
The words have no objective meaning, so do you really understand what I am saying?
Think before replying.
“…math is the most objective knowledge (it is right or wrong – you might get partial credit, if you show your work)”
It’s a little more complicated than simply “right or wrong.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics
Undergraduate Mathematics Education as a White, Cisheteropatriarchal Space and Opportunities for Structural Disruption to Advance Queer of Color Justice.
He failed to include any trope whatsoever about “climate injustice.” Clearly an amateur.
But seriously, how is this not a manifestation of the Chinese capture of American academics, which in turn is part of its grand strategy of weakening America as a means to facilitate its own ascendency?
The schools of education have a lot to answer for. They should be defunded in the absence of thorough-going reform.
This Nitwit is just the latest of so many examples of the nocuous insanity from the left. The Nitwit must be following Joseph Conrad’s words “Give me the right word and the right accent and I will move the world”.
Trying as I might I could not find any racist numbers.
I don’t know, maybe One could be racist? One (1) could be interpreted as “I” thus if proven “I” might be a racist. But One (1) being a Whole number: confirms only I can prove if I am a racist or not. This [goobbly-gop] is no more absurd than the Nitwits Hypothesis that numbers have more meaning than their number value.
Godel’s incompleteness theorems (First and Second) could prove the Nitwit has no provable data. But it does prove the Nitwit is indeed a Nitwit.
from his bio page
“At the juncture of gender studies, higher education, and STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), Leyva’s interdisciplinary research explores narratives of oppression and agency across historically marginalized groups’ educational experiences to uncover interlocking functions of racism and cisheteropatriarchy in undergraduate STEM. He draws on critical race theory, women of color feminisms, and queer of color critique to conceptually and methodologically ground his scholarship, which centers historically marginalized voices in STEM higher education across intersections of race, gender, and sexuality. Leyva’s research has been distinguished with awards and fellowships from the American Educational Research Association, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (Mindset Scholars Network), National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation, and Vanderbilt University-Peabody College.”
https://peabody.vanderbilt.edu/bio/luis-leyva
i notice that he has a BA in mathematics but his graduated degrees are in Mathematices Education
“Luis Leyva” is part of the Peabody College of Education which is part of Vanderbilt University. Colleges of Education are well known to have the lowest standards of admission as well being hot beds of indoctrination. Vanderbilt bought Peabody so that they could have a place to put their athletes who could not qualify for admission to the College of Arts & Science or College of Engineering
notice that Leyva is a professor of mathematics education. Do teachers even have to take mathematics courses?
How did this person gain a position of authority?
That’s the question.
Colleges were already suffering falling enrollment as the millennial baby boom has long since graduated, and this woke insanity is a form of institutional suicide because it’s accelerating the decline in enrollments.
Why? Because young men–especially young white men–are opting out of college more and more for a variety of reasons. Being mentally castrated by Ritalin and Adderall because modern parents and teachers distain boyishness might be one reason; or being poisoned with Fentanyl because Democrats can’t handle borders might be another reason; or seating young men in the classroom so they can be blamed for all the crimes of history by purple-haired, “heterocidal maniacs” might be the best explanation yet.
But the Democrats have a plan to save woke faculties so they can continue the long march to decadence: egghead welfare. More grants, more studies, more climate research! Who needs students? Screw the taxpayer! Full speed ahead!
Yep, it’s a racket. Diversity officers at public universities are now pulling down $329,000 to $430,000 per year. All to promote DIE – literally.
How to picture modern-day academia? Imagine a tall tower; at the very top – far from the world below – there is a bath tub which is completely empty, even of water. A man (or woman) is sitting up in that tower using a fishing pole to try and catch fish in that tub. That about sums it up.
Yep
Elsewhere, we refer to it as a protection racket.
Tall towers tend to be a mite rickety. I just hope they don’t collapse on top of us.
I’ll offer this warning to our millennial men: you’re not on the invitation list. You’re on the menu.
In Italian there is a proverb – la matematica non è un’opinione. Math is not an opinion. It refers to any situation when people confuse feelings with facts. I personally prefer to live in a building constructed based on real numbers rather than feels. But that’s just me.
These woke professors are making very convincing arguments that racism is good.
I don’t think that was their intention.
The stunningly dumb underlying assumption of these anti-merit “equity” officials is that if it has a disparate impact against Blacks then it must be racist & unjust. Blacks are continually less successful in achievement in Math & Astrophysics (and all STEM fields) so there must be systemic racism about them. Since one is not allowed to consider average IQ differences between groups as at least one major explanation – which psychologists like Jordan Peterson have attested – these fields and achievement in them associated with merit are declared (for political purposes) to be tools of White Supremacy. IMO most people see this as nonsense.
There needs to be frank discussions of IQ differences and illegitimacy rates. But who has the spine to do that?
While I respect Dr. Peterson, it is important to note that the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale was understood to have a few sub tests that respond to “enriched environments” such as vocabulary. Children, regardless of melanin content, tend to do better on some sub tests if their parents are engaging them in enriching experiences. If you have never taken a math course, never had anyone in the home who does math well, you won’t do very well on a test of intellectual capacity. The problem is parenting in poverty, not melanin.
The problem is family structures that do not encourage academic success (or going to school for that matterr) and, in fact, believe it to be “acting White”.
There are many tests for intelligence. Some have an assortment of small biases. ALL do not.
The difference in outcomes between tests that require a developed vocabulary or other cultural and class advantages and those tests designed to be free of those biases is tiny.
While certain math and english tests are also good tests of intelligence, The core to intelligence can be tested without math, and without words.
I would further note that one of Charles Murray’s recent post “the bell curve” damning fundings is that the massive efforts we have put into improving education – particularly for those in poverty have Zero sustained benefit.
Head start as an example has been touted for its demonstrable benefit for poor kids just starting school.
But by 3rd grade it is not possible to tell head start students from those who did not get head start.
But by 3rd grade it is not possible to tell head start students from those who did not get head start.
Pre K education is a pillar of Democrat promises. I always ask them why, when the outcomes dont show any benefit.
I am not trying to piss on Head Start because I do not like it.
I just see know reason to fund something that does not work.
We have similar problems all over with left programs.
Section 8 came from a pilot program at Cabrini Green.
They cherry picked the tennants most likely to succeed, gave then excellent social workers, and top professional assistance.
And the results were off the charts good.
Congress turned the pilot program into a national program and about a decade ago the Atlantic wrote an article citing extensive research that Section 8 has destroyed the Black working class, by exporting drug dealers and other failure from urban communities to minority suburbs that had been doing well.
Many things that work in a “lab” or at small scale do not work in the real world or scaled up.
Real success is extremely difficult, and the requirements for success often are not really clear except in hindsight.
Efforts to improve fail far more than they succeed.
In a free market that is self regulating.
When government does something new and it fails – it keeps it up for lifetimes.
@End PC Jordan Peterson has. You might still be able to find his YouTube video.
As we continue to allow this insanity we spiral towards civil war.
There are not alot of things we can correlate to IQ – i.e. Factors that “cause” increases in IQ. As opposed to things that are the consequences of higher IQ of which there are many.
Further All the differences even those where there are causitive correlations are smaller than the variation between two randomly selected individuals.
That does not mean there are not patterns, and that those patterns do not correlate to causation. And that race is a factor.
There is much we do not know about IQ, and how to improve it.
We do know as an example that the average IQ of the scotts prior to Cullauden was significantly lower than the english.
But there is a reason we talk of the Scottish enlightenment – because a century later the Scotts were more intelligent than the english.
If we wish to improve human intelligence – particularly for groups that have lower IQ’s – we have to accept that such groups exist and then try to determine Why they underperform.
Bending reality to match Woke religion will not benefit anyone.
Trivializing “merit” is just part of the woke agenda of tearing down all western civilization. Other concepts, like “perfection,” are also forbidden because they’re “white supremacist.” In other words, every idea, attitude and behavior that contributed to the creation of western civilization is, to the demented woke mind, responsible for the fact that black people have not “made it” in this society. Instead of investigating the causes of their failure (as a true scientist would do), the lazy woke simply create an excuse (racism) and assign blame to the dominant group (whites). It’s actually very transparent, but the media and academia cover it with a veneer of legitimacy (racial justice) and co-opt the masses by holding out the tantalizing grift of special treatment for “victims.” They are infuriating everyone, but fooling no one but the sad, gullible liberals.
Gio, the left hates America and the west! There has never been a society that has so many self-loathing citizens in it as the modern wealthy west. There has never been a more wealthy or healthy society in history and yet they hate themselves. There is actually a word for it, oikophobia. It is a sickness, one that sees rich white women hiring radicals to come to dinner parties to tell the guests how bad they are and how much they should hate themselves. This is actually happening.
These people are turnips. Though certainly there are nuances along the way, math was basically invented by brown people. The great irony is that in insisting on their idiocy, these ‘scholars’ are widening the gap even further (possibly the whole point), and those that DO grasp actual academic learning will be even FURTHER ahead in the future. Is watching moronic people light themselves on fire *supposed* to be funny? It isn’t as though the rest of us will suddenly be struck incompetent. 🙄🙄
James,
As a farmer, I would argue turnips have more value to society.
Many sports have a subjective element to scoring, like gymnastics, as do many fields of study. What draws some people to study math is it’s inherent objectivity. In the same way, some would rather run a race where the fastest person is the winner than compete in a sport for subjective style points. Apparently the wokesters have already ruined the subjective fields of study (forgive my racist use of the term ‘fields’) and now must ruin math. Let’s just hope the buildings, bridges, airplanes, etc…don’t hurt too many people when they fail due to “structural disruptions”.
This “Professor” is also not very astute or capable in their research. The Singapore method of teaching math is one of the best teaching methods for math in the world and has been introduced into the United States back in 1998. Surprisingly, I’m sure to all of you, it came from, “wait a minute”, SINGAPORE. Which has consistently had the highest testing scores in the world for decades. It was developed there. As I am sure all of you are aware, it is hardly a citadel of white males, or females but is an outstanding mix of primarily asians and it is rich and a key financial center rivaling New York and London.
Math is pure and has no race and has been developed through multiple civilizations over the millennia. And appropriated by every culture because of it’s utility.
So this Professor of Education does not even realize, understand, or otherwise comprehend that their treatise is totally false and based on lack of facts and illogical conclusions. Certainly would never threaten the purity of “math”.
My assessment of math is “math sucks” because it was so hard for me and calculus took me to the level of my incompetence. Thats why I pursued medicine. Now my daughter, well she is a genius at math with a Ms in Aerospace Engineering from Purdue. I could not even comprehend the 1st sentence in her treatise.
The fact that someone gave this person a forum to expound this insanity shows a total lack of quality control and standards
” . . . show a total lack of quality control and standards.”
Lack of standards. That right there. Lower them to the point everyone is dumb. That is their goal.
Fortunately, more than a few of us are not buying it. Read an article the other day about the decline of students in the public education system for private schools, charter schools or home schooling.
A number of parents stated how distance learning during the COVID lockdowns showed them exactly what was going on in the class room and that lead to their decision to get their kids out of public schools.
There are sports with a subjective element to judging, like gymnastics, and there are many fields of study with subjective elements in grading. Objectivity is one reason people pick running over gymnastics. Math has always been a field people are drawn to because it’s so concrete, objective. I guess the wokesters have finished ruining the subjective fields (forgive my racist use of the word ‘field’) and now will attempt to ruin math. Let’s just hope the buildings, bridges, airplanes, etc…don’t hurt too many people when they fail due to “structural disruptions.”
Whoops, I didn’t realize this accidentally posted when I hit ‘post comment’ before entering my name – so re-wrote it and posted again!
Because he can’t figure it out, he found a name to give it. This is a great way to explain away his failings.
I have applied to CAMPUSPEAK for a lecture proposal entitled, “The Dumbing Down of America.” I have included mathematical formulae to indicate a declining lowest common denominator.
Lin,
Dumbing down of America is right.
And it is a race to the lowest common denominator.
We need to form two separate societies where the two shall never meet.
If you can locate a lower common denominator than a TV lawyer’s political website talking about math, I’ll personally nominate you for a Nobel Prize.
Apparently Leyva is not an outlier. According to Vanderbilt’s website, the University proudly announced that he was named “2022 LGBTQ+ Educator of the Year” by a national organization called Out to Innovate. The organization claims to have a lot of members dedicated to providing a “supportive environment for career development and enrichment for LGBTQ+ students, academics, and career professionals in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields.” Obviously, this “supportive environment” includes honoring a racist who apparently is one of the best of the lot. Like cigarettes, bridges and other structures should have a warning sign: “CAUTION– designed by a Vanderbilt engineer.”
Vanderbilt’s College of Engineering is the 2nd hardest Vanderbilt college to gain admission to. The first is the college of Arts & Science. Leyva is part of the Peabody College of Education which merged with Vanderbilt bought so that Vandy could have a place to put their athletes
PeterK– thanks for the clarification. Hopefully, what is taught at Peabody College will not bleed over into the rest of the university. Things do seem to be changing all over. Texas A&M for example has dropped the admissions requirement for SAT and other standardized test scores, making such tests optional, citing diversity and inclusion as the reasons.