I think that is probably at least some of it. Other candidate explanations might include the following. (I’m going to use phrases like attitude toward racial issues in an awkward attempt to cover the continuum from overt racism against people of color to DEI superstar status; this is not meant to imply that the more DEI a viewpoint is, the better.)
From the perspective of a Forum commenter, the response to many “here is some racism” things may be more tractable / have a clearer theory of change and impact (which may involve education, norm reinforcement, placing social pressure on people, etc. depending on the poster) than many “let’s learn about DEI” type posts.
In particular, one could think that attitudes about race in the lower half of the progressiveness distribution are more important toward “scoring” the community’s overall attitude toward racial issues. For example, the percentage of people who espouse views on race that are problematic is probably an important metric for the extent to which the community is unwelcoming to people of color.
In contrast, if a person is at the 75th percentile of progressiveness on racial issues already, moving them to the 95th percentile may not accomplish nearly as much as moving the 5th percentile person to the 25th. And it’s likely that the bulk of people who are interested in engaging with “let’s learn about DEI” posts in a supportive manner are at least already above the median here.
Also, a paucity of DEI often implicates structural barriers that are significantly harder to address (especially at the individual-commenter level) than individual/organizational bad behavior.
People tend to react more strongly to losses from an established baseline (e.g., losing $100) than equal-magnitude gains from that baseline (e.g., winning $100).
One could think there are significantly diminishing returns at play. In particular, one might identify a “good enough” point beyond which additional improvements are likely to have relatively little benefit to EA. For instance, this is likely true from a PR/optics standpoint; we’re unlikely to get positive press coverage even if we reach an A+ score on DEI. So there’s not much delta between a B and an A+ through the PR/optics lens. And one might think EA is currently at the “good enough” point (to be clear, this is not my personal view).
Some people could associate the “let’s learn about DEI” type posts—rightly or wrongly—with ideas like affirmative action (positive discrimination) that they find contrary to their values. In contrast, posts focused on bad behavior may be less likely to trigger this association.
Some vocal commenters (and strong-downvoters) are so opposed to DEI-like ideas that commenters may not feel like putting on the emotional armor to engage on pro-DEI-like posts. They feel more social support to comment on the “here is some racism” posts, and they feel that overt racism is stigmatized enough to create some social pressure not to throw flaming arrows at them in response.
All of these ideas are speculative, and I’d be curious about the extent to which any of them resonate / don’t resonate with people.
I think that is probably at least some of it. Other candidate explanations might include the following. (I’m going to use phrases like attitude toward racial issues in an awkward attempt to cover the continuum from overt racism against people of color to DEI superstar status; this is not meant to imply that the more DEI a viewpoint is, the better.)
From the perspective of a Forum commenter, the response to many “here is some racism” things may be more tractable / have a clearer theory of change and impact (which may involve education, norm reinforcement, placing social pressure on people, etc. depending on the poster) than many “let’s learn about DEI” type posts.
In particular, one could think that attitudes about race in the lower half of the progressiveness distribution are more important toward “scoring” the community’s overall attitude toward racial issues. For example, the percentage of people who espouse views on race that are problematic is probably an important metric for the extent to which the community is unwelcoming to people of color.
In contrast, if a person is at the 75th percentile of progressiveness on racial issues already, moving them to the 95th percentile may not accomplish nearly as much as moving the 5th percentile person to the 25th. And it’s likely that the bulk of people who are interested in engaging with “let’s learn about DEI” posts in a supportive manner are at least already above the median here.
Also, a paucity of DEI often implicates structural barriers that are significantly harder to address (especially at the individual-commenter level) than individual/organizational bad behavior.
People tend to react more strongly to losses from an established baseline (e.g., losing $100) than equal-magnitude gains from that baseline (e.g., winning $100).
One could think there are significantly diminishing returns at play. In particular, one might identify a “good enough” point beyond which additional improvements are likely to have relatively little benefit to EA. For instance, this is likely true from a PR/optics standpoint; we’re unlikely to get positive press coverage even if we reach an A+ score on DEI. So there’s not much delta between a B and an A+ through the PR/optics lens. And one might think EA is currently at the “good enough” point (to be clear, this is not my personal view).
Some people could associate the “let’s learn about DEI” type posts—rightly or wrongly—with ideas like affirmative action (positive discrimination) that they find contrary to their values. In contrast, posts focused on bad behavior may be less likely to trigger this association.
Some vocal commenters (and strong-downvoters) are so opposed to DEI-like ideas that commenters may not feel like putting on the emotional armor to engage on pro-DEI-like posts. They feel more social support to comment on the “here is some racism” posts, and they feel that overt racism is stigmatized enough to create some social pressure not to throw flaming arrows at them in response.
All of these ideas are speculative, and I’d be curious about the extent to which any of them resonate / don’t resonate with people.
I love that you took the time to engage with this, and that you typed out these speculations!