I'm not getting work done today anyway. Something I read in the comments late last night has been bothering me all day today. I wish I could reach out to the poster and tell him that there is a time and a place, and that his complaints (or what I think is _actually_ underlying his complaints) is legitimate, but that it belonged in a different forum. Just because he faces discrimination doesn't mean that other groups that also face discrimination are to blame. That there are other places that will support him through his pain. But I chose not to post on the stream last night because the angry comment stream had slowed down by the time I noticed it, and I didn't want to accidentally restart anything. So here's my response.
Easy yar,
There's hate enough everywhere
To start bashing and thrashing and calling the shots
Cause you didn't get the job even though your hot.
You call discrimination
Demand an explanation
from the feminazis that keep you down
because you KNOW we rule the town
in academia
We have our equal rights bill,
We're on the committees to kill
the aspirations of brilliant PHD's like you.
Too true. It must be true.
What else could there be as an explanation
For the difficulties you, and my father
and so many other immigrants find on these shores
of opportunity and luxury and big box stores?
Have I watched my father,
a partition refugee falter?
Be passed by for promotion and honor and raise
by younger, whiter more aggressive men more eager to claim praise
for not only their own work but his?
Truly, at a university? What is this?
The halls of academe are not a meritocracy,
as the halls of DC aren't strictly a democracy,
But it's close. No it's not.
But it's better than a lot
of other options. Otherwise, why are we all here?
I don't mean to appear
to be making fun of your anger
But if we replaced
words gender with those race, or religion
You'd be in the cross-hairs of a schism
that is tearing this country or yours apart.
Maybe that doesn't matter to you, that in your heart
you believe that any attempt at equal opportunity
deserves an eternity
of criticism.
I hope that you don't.
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