Whitesplaining Racial Disparities in STEM Fields

Today I came upon an article on Chris Stedman’s Religious News Service blog, titled Instead of hating on social justice, atheists should tackle STEM segregation. The article was written by Sikivu Hutchinson, a black activist and author.

At this point it’s a cliché that white “New Atheist” elites love to saber rattle against the inclusion of social justice in atheist organizing. Yet, when it comes to anti-racist social justice, even the “kinder, gentler” Humanist community often nods its head in well-intentioned sympathy, issues a press release, then shuffles into oblivion.

Indeed, even in the vaunted arena of science education—in which the secular humanist and atheist communities claim to have the greatest investment in improving—Humanists are woefully missing in action on the issue of STEM segregation.

Last weekend I gave a talk at the Institute for Humanist Studies which linked the skyrocketing rates of incarcerated youth of color with their under-representation in STEM majors and careers. Despite being 34 percent of the U.S. young adult population, African American, Latino, and Native American youth receive only 12 percent of engineering undergraduate degrees. While white conservatives are fond of proclaiming that the U.S. is a “colorblind” and “post-racial” nation, STEM fields are the most blatantly segregated in the country.

Sikivu’s basic argument appears to be that atheist activists interested in science education should tackle the issue of STEM segregation. It’s a good point—even those activists most concerned about “mission creep” should be able to see the relevance of addressing racial disparities in STEM fields. But a look at the comments on this article highlighted the problem—too many white male atheists don’t think racial injustice exist. “I don’t believe in unicorns because I have never seen one.” “I don’t believe in racial discrimination because I have never experienced it.” Or maybe that’s because you’re white?

I want to look at a few of these comments because I think they’re instructive of some general patterns. The first commenter, Stephen, wrote a book to explain that “There is no such thing as ”’social justice’.” Here is a key excerpt:

Janusz Korwin-Mikke argues simply: “Either ‘social justice’ has the same meaning as ‘justice’ – or not. If so – why use the additional word ‘social?’ We lose time, we destroy trees to obtain paper necessary to print this word. If not, if ‘social justice’ means something different from ‘justice’ – then ‘something different from justice’ is by definition ‘injustice.’”

Here, let me rephrase that for you: “Either ‘microbiology’ has the same meaning as ‘biology’ – or not. If so – why use the additional word ‘micro?’ We lose time, we destroy trees to obtain paper necessary to print this word. If not, if ‘microbiology’ means something different from ‘biology’ – then ‘something different from biology’ is by definition ‘not biology.’” You see how quickly that falls apart? Wikipedia defines social justice as “justice in terms of the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society.” When we talk about social justice we are talking about applying justice to society. Words. They’re not that complicated.

And while we’re at it, I looked up Janusz Korwin-Mikke. I’d advise Stephen against taking at face value the words of a politician who says things like “women are dumber than men and should not be allowed to vote” and “Evolution has ensured that women are not too intelligent. After all, no intelligent being would last more than an hour a day with a baby and all its goo-goo ga-ga gibberish.”

And of course, Stephen’s wall of text is based on libertarian assumptions:

In fact, since the program of social justice inevitably involves claims for government provision of goods, paid for through the efforts of others, the term actually refers to an intention to use force to acquire one’s desires. Not to earn desirable goods by rational thought and action, production and voluntary exchange, but to go in there and forcibly take goods from those who can supply them!

Stephen sees government action as inherently coercive, but there’s more than that going on here. The entire reason that we need social justice is that the system is not fair. The system is built on disadvantaging some and by doing so advantaging others. Because black people are less likely to be called in for an interview or hired, I am more likely to be called in for an interview or hired. I as a white person benefit from systemic discrimination. People like Stephen can only use arguments like these to condemn social justice because they are blind to the injustice people of color and other disadvantaged groups face every day.

And that’s the problem, isn’t it? Injustice affects everyone, but it is those it disadvantages who see it most clearly. This is why listening is important. This is why being willing to learn and grow is important.

The next commenter, Samuel, adds this:

Re: STEM: this article confuses cause and effect. “Despite being 34 percent of the U.S. young adult population, African American, Latino, and Native American youth receive only 12 percent of engineering undergraduate degrees.” Education and/or job training cannot be given or distributed – it must be acquired by work and mastery of skills at the college and graduate school level.

Right, because Sikivu was totally saying that STEM employers should go out and hire random people of color. Except that she wasn’t. Sikivu made it very clear that elementary and secondary education do not properly equip people of color to obtain STEM degrees, pointing out that people of color are more likely than other students to drop out of STEM programs and that high poverty high schools are less likely to offer college preparatory classes than other high schools.

But Samuel goes on, explaining that he feels the public school system does not adequately prepare students, both minority and majority, for success in college. He then offers this as his solution:

If the process [i.e. teachers putting themselves and their interests before the interests of the children] could be reversed for about twenty years, the disparity of minority preparation would disappear. The rub is that the current system, and its employees would have to be scrapped. So what to do to replace it? In a phrase – tough love. I would start by asking every quality private school to take on the management of one public school. A mentor system, if you will. They should be given a free hand, since they have a proven track record. Let us say they make the public school kids feel inferior. So what, if the end result is that they succeed. Successful adults have the power to make their own decisions. I suspect, however, that most of the public school kids will feel they are lucky, especially when they see their older brothers and sisters getting jobs and respect. Perhaps they will send their children to private schools. Perhaps they will invent better public schools. I do not intend to respond to any comments, because I know what to expect from the victim industry.

Um, no. Samuel completely misunderstands, well, basically everything about the problem. First off, a big part of the problem is disparity in school funding, which is not about teachers putting themselves first but rather about the rich putting themselves first. Samuel says nothing about equalizing school funding. Second, another part of the problem is systemic poverty. When parents are struggling to make ends meet or working multiple jobs, being involved in their children’s education can be difficult. Giving private schools free reign over public schools in their area will not change this.

Yes, private schools have better test scores than public schools, but there are reasons for this. First, private school students come from wealthier families, because only wealthy families can afford them, and second, private schools can just kick out problem students. Private schools are not some sort of magic fix, but Samuel appears unaware of any of this. He is also apparently unaware that when children are made to feel inferior, they underperform. If children are told that they simply aren’t as good as other children, they likely won’t be. So no, making children feel inferior is not going to make them succeed.

It’s this kind of cluelessness people of color have to deal with day in and day out when trying to make change. It’s hard enough reading this as a white person; I can’t begin to imagine how hard it must be for a black person.

The final comment I want to deal with comes from someone going by “Retired EE”:

Calling STEM jobs “segregated” while at the same time stating that “African American, Latino, and Native American youth receive only 12 percent of engineering undergraduate degrees” suggests you’re either re-defining the word “segregated” or just looking for a nonsensical argument. If you want a STEM job, you must have the appropriate educational background, or you’re not going to be productive. The jobs themselves are NOT segregated, at least not on the west coast, not in the many companies I worked for.

Oh yes, let’s respond to an article about racial disparities in STEM fields by arguing about whether the author used the word “segregated” correctly. That sounds very productive.

I’ve read a lot of resumes in my time, and held a number of interviews, and no doubt about it – the job goes to the best qualified candidate. Nobody gives a dang about their race or ethnicity – companies just want productive results from people who are team players. Take it or leave it, but quit calling STEM jobs – the jobs themselves – inappropriate names like “segregated”. You’re just making noise.

Hmm. Let’s look at what the research says:

The authors took the content of 500 real resumes off online job boards and then evaluated them, as objectively as possible, for quality, using such factors as education and experience. Then they replaced the names with made-up names picked to “sound white” or “sound black” and responded to 1,300 job ads in The Boston Globe and Chicago Tribune last year.

Previous studies have examined how employers responded to similarly qualified applicants they meet in person, but this experiment attempted to isolate the response to the name itself.

White names got about one callback per 10 resumes; black names got one per 15. Carries and Kristens had call-back rates of more than 13 percent, but Aisha, Keisha and Tamika got 2.2 percent, 3.8 percent and 5.4 percent, respectively. And having a higher quality resume, featuring more skills and experience, made a white-sounding name 30 percent more likely to elicit a callback, but only 9 percent more likely for black-sounding names.

The job always goes to the best qualified candidate, does it?

Each of the individuals commenting on Sikivu’s article clearly think themselves well informed critical thinkers on the subject. I’ve seen enough of this that appeals to “reason” or “rational thought” are starting to make me twitch. Too often this is code for “you’re wrong and your lived experience is irrelevant, let me tell you how it actually is.” Look, when a person has not even considered that systemic racism might constitute a “taking” or assumes that the real solution to failing schools is to give the students some “tough love,” they are neither well informed nor a critical thinker—and their sense of compassion is underdeveloped at best.