Customer Reviews

The Diversity Hoax: Law Students Report from Berkeley

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

It must have taken a lot of courage for David Wienir and his contributors to bare their stories before the eyes of their fellow students and administration at Boalt Hall. You can read it in the writing style contained in these essays. Many of the students are tentative, defensive, overly careful in their prose and in their choice of words. It is possible to infer much anguish in the authors of these chapters.

Recently there have been some exposes of the direction our elite universities have taken. The Shadow University, by Kors and Silverglate; The Killing of History, by Windschuttle; Beyond All Reason, by Farber and Sherry; Literature Lost, by Ellis; and Fashionable Nonsense, by Sokal and Bricmont each seeks to expose the destructive trends of thought control in places formerly dedicated to the pursuit of truth above that of political correctness. David Wienir's book is the first account I know of coming directly from the students' point of view. As such it presents a tragic picture of the decline of a once great institution.

I was an undergraduate at Berkeley during the early sixties. What the students fought for in those heady days is a bygone dream overtaken by anti-intellectual tactics. Read the reviews in Amazon carefully. And read this book to decide for yourself.

As a Boalt Hall law school graduate from the mid-1980s, I enjoyed reading this book.

One of the more interesting facts about The Diversity Hoax is external to it--namely:

You can't find it at the Berkeley Public Library.

You can't find it at the Oakland Public Library.

And you can't find it at the San Francisco Public Library.

To the Boalt Hall law library's credit, however, you can find it there.

I do not know, of course, whether the public libraries' failure to carry The Diversity Hoax stems from political correctness or is an oversight. In any case, it's unfortunate, because many of the student essays are thoughtful and interesting.

The least persuasive essays are those that complain about fear of being silenced for having conservative views. If one fears speaking out at a genteel place like Boalt, it's going to be hard to do so in the hard-boiled environments many lawyers occupy. When I attended Boalt, it was quite p.c., but overall the environment was polite. Reading the essays as a whole, it doesn't sound as though much has changed--some essays suggest or observe that differently minded students are able to speak out. It helps that the faculty is fairly conservative.

The most persuasive essays are those that describe the narrow-mindedness of some liberal or leftist students and the contradictions in their own points of view. To those who have been made uncomfortable by those students' intolerance or rudeness, I can offer this consolation: you'll eventually have the satisfaction of witnessing a notable display of hypocrisy, as some of the most self-righteous bitter pills in your class meekly accept work defending toxic-waste dumpers and the like.

It's refreshing to see that most of the essay writers, though conservative, have avoided the kind of pompous writing that marks a young fogey. The essays tend to be plain-spoken and thoughtful. Here's an example: "[W]hen a majority of California voters approved the demise of racial quotas in the government and education sectors, what happened next? Liberals got mad because the entitlement program that made everything look better was suddenly extinguished. Conservatives were overjoyed because now the state didn't officially sanction injustice. But what about the fact that so many minority students are still finding it so hard or lack the desire to compete on their own?"

One other note: during one's three years in law school, it's easy to acquire an exaggerated sense of the importance of academic life. Some professors are cloistered in their own law-school-centric world, and it's natural to follow suit. (As an example of such self-absorption, retiring Boalt Hall dean Herma Hill Kay told the San Francisco Daily Journal that "[s]he expects to take a sabbatical during the 2000-01 school year to finish a book on women law professors . . . ." Perhaps Kay thinks that's an interesting topic, but personally I'd rather read about Amelia Earhart. I have to wonder who she thinks will read a book about law professors, other than other law professors.) Whatever travails the tensions at Boalt present will fade after graduation.

Wienir and Berley's "Diversity Hoax" provides a disheartening glimpse into the state of American higher education. It illustrates the hyperbole and closed mindedness that passes for free thought and reasoned discourse at Berkeley. But more importantly, "The Diversity Hoax" exposes the current gilded notion of "diversity" for what it is. Berkeley students, professors, and administration evidently celebrate diversity of skin while shunning diversity of thought. Currently a senior in high school and aspiring lawyer, I will soon face the seemingly Sisyphian task of standing up to the radical liberalism so prevalent on college campuses. I only hope that I will have the same courage as Wienir and Berley to speak my mind and fight for true diversity.

A lucid, well-written and concise exploration into the styfling intellectual environment at one of America's top law schools, UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall. These student-written essays--in which many of the authors self-identify as liberals--are replete with anecdotal and factually verifiable stories of the systematic oppression of free speech which ironically takes place at the epicenter of the free speech movement of the 1960s, UC Berkeley. These essays not only expose the slanderous tactics of the student left, but also advocate a more modern and progressive concept of "diversity," one in which ideas are adjudged based on their content regardless of the speaker's skin tone.

A must read.

I read the book straight through -- just couldn't put it down. While I agree with some of the criticism that the writing is unpolished and unprofessional, I found that overall the collection gives outsiders important insight into the state of education today-- particularly in California after Proposition 209. For the benefit of prospective readers who may be put off the book by the arrogant review by "kanandume" on April 29, 1999, I would like to offer a few remarks. This review is evidence of what so many of the essayists in "Diversity Hoax" complain about. As is so common with hyper-postmodernists, this person assumes that if somebody doesn't agree with the position of the left, then they must just be dumb; that if the essayists do not agree with affirmative action, then they are dualists, and are simply missing the truth that all enlightened beings have come to know (through their great mystic father Derrida and his crew) that "meanings and values are contextually contructed". Well, of course, not everyone believes that meanings and values are ONLY contextually contructed. I believe that any value I hold is informed by my cultural and historical position, but I also believe that there are certain values that are trans-historical and precede culture. And, in contrast to this reviewer's charge that the essayists are unable to transcend their dualisms (because they're so dumb) and hence fail to see that they can choose the best from among multiple alternatives, I believe that most of the writers in the book give evidence that they examined the alternatives and simply do not find affirmative action to be the best answer to the problem of "minority" underrepresentation at Boalt. So, in short, I applaud this book as an important wake-up call to all of us who care about the future of education, and are tired of being terrorized by radicals who cannot sit quietly long enough to listen to alternative arguments, to weigh opposing arguments carefully and thoughtfully before assigning labels. Indeed, if our ultimate goal is enlightenment and intellectual growth, we need the resistance of all well-argued viewpoints to shape our own viewpoints.

"How many Asians currently play in the NBA? Are they under-represented? If so, why is this tolerated, and what must *WE* do to remedy this grievous situation?"

These absurd questions are not so absurd, at least according to the Leftist PC-police who rule the roost at Boalt Hall (UC Berkeley's prestigious law school). A straightforward, powerful, often-disturbing collection of essays by Boalt students, "The Diversity Hoax" questions the self-serving notions of "diversity," "minority," and "racism" from the ultra-liberal perspective. Readers lucky enough to pick up this volume are left with little doubt that far too many students--and far too many educators and administrators--at Boalt view any opinion or individual outside of their narrow view of "tolerance" with extreme intolerance.

Why does Boalt's definition of "diversity" refer only to racial diversity? Why do Boalt professors and administrators turn a deaf ear and a blind eye in the face of blatant personal attacks on those who have the `audacity' to express themselves from anything but a ultra-liberal perspective? Why is the eternal message of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. ignored by those who hold his words most sacred?

The answers to these and other questions contained in this powerful little volume, though certainly debatable, make this collection a fascinating read. Compiled by David Wienir (a second-year law student at Boalt) and Marc Berley, "The Diversity Hoax" is as provocative as its title. After reading this book, I am far more aware of the close-minded intolerance practiced by those who most vocally preach "tolerance."

I heartily recommend "The Diversity Hoax" to anyone who has ever had the courage to express their "minority" views (take that either way) to a hostile crowd, to those who have been shamed and silenced by the same, and to people of all ethnic backgrounds who want a fresh perspective on the true meaning of diversity and racism. Don't pass this up; it's a keeper.

First of all, I'd like to say: 1) I have not read all the other reviews here, 2) I am not - and never will be - a law student and, 3) I do not hold a four-year college degree (yet). I am a regular person who enjoys non-fiction. I am also a "minority" who resides in California.

I highly recommend this book. It was very engaging and easy to read. I was fascinated and engrossed by these essays. I was also dismayed at the realization of the state of our institutions of higher learning. This book had a huge amount of relevance to me personally, because I have often been puzzled by the way liberal society has attempted to orchestrate diversity. Throughout history, minorities (including women) have fought bitterly to be treated "equally" and yet they've subjugated themselves to something as unbalanced and prejudicial as affirmative action. In all my life I would never dream of demeaning the blood, sweat and tears of my grandparents, who worked exhaustively as migrant farm workers in Central California, by accepting a decree that basically says I am not capable of succeeding because of my ethnicity.

I currently live in a small city with a high Hispanic populace. There is constant raging debate at the city government level about Hispanic representation. A small but vocal (much like the protesters in this book) group has instigated a lawsuit through the Justice Department, seeking to divide our puny city into voter districts in order to allow more Hispanics to be voted onto our city council. But I assure you, race is not the issue, politics is the issue. I am fully Hispanic, but theoretically, if I were to run for office and be elected, I guarantee that I would be politically dismissed by that small but vocal group! This mentality is everywhere. Unfortunately, it will continue to grow unless more books like this are written and read.

Caveat Emptor: This collection of essays is not for the weak or feint of heart! In these short, lucid (though mostly unpolished) essays, the student-contributors candidly expose the styfling intellectual environment at Boalt Hall. As a fellow student, I can attest that the student leftists employ terror tactics, so as to control and, thus, seriously limit the parameters of discourse at Boalt. There is nothing exaggerated about these contributions. Three cheers for these brave students!!!

Given that David Wienir asked for "diary-like submissions," I find it laughable that a fellow Boalt Hall student who has also reviewed the book on-line has the audacity to criticize the quality of the writing contained therein. One must query, why did this "learned reviewer" fail to contribute an essay? Why did this charged review rate a book endorsed by the likes of Ed Meese a One Star? Furthermore, one might expect a well-written review from such "a critical mind," with substantive issues raised and debunked; instead, however, its author provides the reader with a rambling, unreasoned diatribe, replete with grade school solecisms--an insight into the type of second-rate mind about which the essayists in Mr. Wiener's "Diversity Hoax" eloquently write. Unlike second-rate review suggests, outsiders should rest assured that student conservatives at Boalt do not fear or disdain diversity; rather they champion a more complete and modern notion of diversity, one in which philosophical viewpoints are adjudged irrespective of the speaker's skin tone. Also bear in mind that many of the essayists in "The Diversity Hoax" are in fact for racial preferences and self-indentify as liberals. So for the bitter multi-culturist reviewer, I say, "E Pluribus Unum!!!"

Considering the purpose the of "The Diversity Hoax," I give it FIVE STARS.

Male, Boalt Hall, 2000

David Wienir does an exemplary job courageously revealing the Emperor's New Clothes of the Diversiy Hoax, which paradoxically is the enemy of intellectual diversity in the name of political correctness. The essays are perspicacious and implicitly making a case against the new orthodoxy of much of American higher education. As a former student radical and civil rights worker, I feel the ideals of the 60s ( free speech and equal opportunity for all) have been betrayed by perpetrators of our fundamentalist secular seminaries - where uncritical orthodoxies sufficate dissent. Wienir's book is a warning that the highest values of the academy are in danger.

Is anyone out there paying attention? I was a guest at the Boalt Hall graduation last night. The class president read off her laundry list of all the great things that the students had accomplished in their law school years -- all the liberal causes they furthered. How about that students published this book?!?!?! Yes, this book is controversial. Great! All the more reason to applaud, because a controversial book might finally get the conversation rolling! I don't even care if these students published a book on the most mundane of topics, if they wrote about the various forms of grafitti and what they depict about the grafitti artist and his childhood problems......the point is that these students did something major....they published a book, for crying out loud. Yet, not a mention of it is the president's speech. Each and every speaker mentioned affirmative action and how great it is and how the entire class is saddened by its demise, but not a mention of this accompishment. Can we say one more indication of the liberal tyranny trying to wipe out or at least forget the rest of the class?

Yes, I was a guest at the ceremony. I sat on the stage in my cap and gown, and I shook the Dean's hand, but I was not a member of the class represented by the laundry list. What do you think would have happened if I got up there and spoke and failed to mention the liberal accomplishments? It would have been 100% wrong of me. This was 100% wrong of our elected leader and chosen speakers.

It is this type of experience that the book represents. The problems with the lack of open debate at Boalt go far beyond a graduation speech. They go far beyond any one student's experience. The Diversity Hoax gives the reader a view into these experiences and leaves it to them to see how the whole is built. If you are interested in the reality behind the image, even the image portrayed to the audience at graduation, pick up a copy of this book and explore it for yourself.